You’re reading Snipe City, 36 Crazyfists frontman and Alaska native Brock Lindow’s weekly take on hockey. 36 Crazyfists’ new album, Time & Trauma, will be released on February 17th on Spinefarm Records. You can read about that here.
Welcome to the second episode of Snipe City.
Thanks to everyone for the cool comments last week, let’s drop the puck on this mutha… Starting with promising back-to-back wins last week the Flyers, in dire need of a serious run if they want to make the playoffs, lost to Boston on Saturday. To add insult to injury, starting goaltender Steve Mason left the game in the first ten minutes with a lower body injury and will be sidelined for two weeks.
Re-enter Rob Zepp, the Lehigh Valley Phantoms netminder that made his NHL debut a few weeks back at the tender age of 33. Zepp got his first win to become the oldest rookie to get a “W” since Hugh Lehman did it in 1926 with the Chicago Blackhawks. Listen boys, we are damn near at the halfway point of the season as the All-Star break is two weeks away. Step it the fuck up, pretty please!!!!!
I will say this. The one constant that the Flyers have given me over all these years is the fact that this team drives me to drink. Pour me a double… on the double!
Moving along and into friendlier territory, the legend Teemu Selanne, the Finnish Sensation, was honored as the first Anaheim Duck to have his jersey sent high into the rafters Sunday night. Teemu set the NHL record for goals scored by a rookie with 76 in the 1992-1993 season and continued to prove he belonged among hockey’s elite, from his sixth Olympic tournaments through his final NHL season in 2014. The ceremony lasted a mere 93 minutes before the Ducks/Jets game and it delayed the game by 48 minutes, but no one seemed to care, as the player who epitomized class throughout his career was feted with a celebration that lived up to his classy standards. For those about to rock, Teemu, we salute you!!
Now onto the “Fight of the Week,” a segment I meant to put in last week, but pre-game jitters
had me absent-minded, so here we go. I, for one, am a happy man to see that fighting in the game has been ramped up this season, compared to the last few, as the chatter of experts — I mean idiots— call out to remove it from the game. Nonsense! Fighting plays a major role in the game; enforcers don’t just drop the mitts to get a rise out of the fans. It’s a momentum changer, to make sure liberties are not taken on franchise players and it’s a respected code between these animals and I, for one, appreciate the “grinders” role. The dust up I loved the most last week was when the Arizona Coyotes faced off with the Columbus Blue Jackets. It was Joe Vitale and Jack Skille, respectively. This was a pure hammer fest and it was good to see Vitale coming back off an injury to jump right in the mix after a marginal cheap hit on Oliver Ekman-Larsson. He let Skille know that he’s there for his boys. Respect to Joe for sending the message. I can’t talk about fights without including my boy Justin Johnson of the Alaska Aces. Do yourselves a favor and look him up — just a beast and one of the most lethal southpaws in the game.
Well it’s almost noon and the pond is callin’ for a lil’ shinny. The 8-year-olds were pretty nasty last week, so I’m gonna see if there’s any old timer pick-up games this week and see if I can muck it up in the corners with some of them…
…’Til then my friends.
Keep your head up,
Brock
