Outside Hockey? Don’t Mind If I Do!

Classic Simpsons references and hockey.  Two of the great joys in life.    Toss in some Winter Classic action, as well as some Hocketyown Winter festivities, and you’ve got yourself a party…with plenty of ice!  YEEAAHHHH!!  And now that the CSI Miami horrible pun section of this post is over, let’s discuss some of the awesomeness of “today’s” announcement.

I think the entire week is going to be fantastic.  There will be two OHL games, the Great Lakes Invitational (MSU, UM, MT, and WMU), an AHL game (Grand Rapids vs Toronto), and the Alumni Game.  I do need to stress a couple of negative points before we get to the positives:

• If Nicklas Lidstrom is playing at Comerica instead of The Big House, I will already have cried myself to death.
• If NBC makes the American Idol (or whatever reality singing show they have) winner sing the National Anthem instead of Karen Newman, everything will hit the fan.
• If there is no octopus anywhere around the rink in some fashion, I’m calling BS.
• If I don’t get to meet Deb Placey and/or Kathryn Tappen, I will be sad.

And now, I’m going to briefly discuss all of the events because it’s what I do.

OHL Games

There will be two games featuring Windsor, London, Plymouth, and Saginaw.  You know what this means – we get to watch prospects play!  I love doing this, even though it won’t be the best quality ice.  As you can tell by my last post about the Griffins, watching players who could soon be in the league is awesome.  I still remember some of the things Justin Abdelkader and Drew Miller did at MSU when I was there.  These games will get me to start researching the top players on each team and seeing who has NHL potential.  This way, when I’m (hopefully) at the game and can (hopefully) see them from where I’m sitting, I can play GM: “I hope we can trade up to get him.” “I can play better than that guy.”   Yes, these things will be said, even though I’m a D-league rec player for life.

The AHL Game

I really want to be there for this game.  It probably won’t be as good of a “scouting” game, seeing how the ice for these games is typically crappy at best as previously mentioned but it will still be cool to see.  If one of my boys are there (Tomas “THE SOUSE” Tatar or Gustav Nyquist (!!!)), I would get such a rush seeing them score.  And since I read www.tsn.ca quite a bit, I’ll know plenty of players on the Marlies that could be future Leafs.  This is probably the event I’m looking forward to the most at Comerica Park.

The GLI

I don’t know why, but this event seems the least exciting to me.  I think it would be better if they had the first day at the Joe and the second day at Comerica.  It just seems like a little bit of overkill to have four games in two days with the same four teams.  I know it’ll be easier to get tickets to one of the days, but I think it’s too much.  Plus, with so many games, if the weather is the least bit not-perfect, it  could yield very poor results, especially for the championship game.  All this being said, I’m still looking forward to going down there and rocking my Green and White attire while singing the Spartan fight song whenever possible.  VICTORY FOR MSU!!!

Alumni Game

Yzerman.  Howe.  Delvecchio.  Lindsay.  Draper.  Osgood.  Maltby.  Shanahan.  Redmond.  Larionov.  Murphy.  Hull.  Robitaille.  Hasek.  McCarty (if he doesn’t have to work in the Pawn Shop that day).  Shanahan.  Fedorov.  Other Howe.

Yeah, it’s worse than the All Star Game, but dammit, I’m already getting chills thinking about the cheers when Stevie and Gordie are introduced.  Oh man.

The Winter Classic

Let’s Go Red Wings!  Go Leafs Go!  Let’s Go Red Wings!  Go Leafs Go!  LET’S GO RED WINGS!  GO LEAFS GO!

If you’ve been to any of the recent games against the Leafs at the Joe, you know awesome the atmosphere is.  Imagine that times five times as many people.  Oh yeah, and there’s an actual game to be played!  I don’t know how I’m going to get tickets to this as I’m not a season ticket holder, but I WILL BE GOING!  Here’s a conversation between one of my bosses and me this morning: ” Boss: Are you going to the game? Me: I don’t need two kidneys!”  Yes, the joke there is that I will be selling one of my kidneys if it means I can go to this game.  Or…maybe I can get a press pass now that I’m officially a blogger?  Anyone?  Hmm, oh well.  I think we all know this game is going to be amazing, and I cannot wait for it to happen!  GO WINGS!!

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