VERSUS’ Twitter Running Out of Good Historical Hockey Moments

 

From VERSUS’ NHL Twitter Page:

                                                    

VersusNHL  Versus NHL

This Day in Hockey! 1979: St. Louis Blues traded Curt Bennett to the Atlanta Flames, in exchange for Bobby Simpson.                                                                       about 1 hour ago from web

Thoughts From Game 4 of the Eastern Finals

• Did anyone else find Doc Emrick’s moratorium on the Blackhawks for the season a little early?  I mean, there’s 10 minutes left in a 6-1 Game 4 with the Wings headed home up 3-1 in the series.  But still, saying that this is in all likelihood the last home game for the Hawks at the United Center seems a little much at this juncture.  With two days in between games, who’s to say the Hawks can’t recover.
• That said, Joel Quenneville should be fined for the effort and the actions of his team on national television.  The way the Hawks played on Sunday should rightly shame its’ newfound fanbase and anyone who’s ever tried to convert someone to a hockey fanatic.  With no NBA, and NASCAR not going on until 5:00 PM and the only competition Indy and Golf, the NHL flatlined on a huge power play.
• Also, as far as Doc Emrick goes, we still love him and wish NBC would get rid of Eddie O. and/or Pierre.  The three-man booth simply doesn’t work.  Emrick would go two-to-three minutes at times without speaking so McGuire or Olczyk could get in some inane blabber about whatever.  What’s going to keep you watching a game: Emrick talking about the game or the players or just flat-out telling one of the 40 million awesome stories that Doc Emrick knows, or Eddie Olczyk saying nothing for three minutes.
• Speaking of Pierre and the horse he rode in on (or Mike Milbury), how pointless and unnecessary have those intermission segments become?  What once was fun live theatre that featured ample debate between the two former NHL coaches has now become more of the same blather we hear during the game telecasts.  Were we all waiting for Pierre to make some sort of fancy announcement about getting passed over for the Wild GM job?  Is the “Analysts take the role of the coaches” segment ever more meaningless (and trust us, it can get pretty meaningless in a good game) than during a 5-1 Red Wing lead after 40?  Something needs to be done about the network’s putrid, worthless studio show.  It’s clear that Milbury’s the star, so get him a better foil (a Ray Ferraro type) and get a real host (Bob Neumeier, come back with your hobo suits!) to set them up.  
• This is NBC’s last hockey telecast before June 9th.  Thank you, Hockey Gods.  We’ll have what will likely be an ugly ratings picture at around Noontime.  

Report: If Conf. Finals End Wednesday, NHL Could Finagle Stanley Cup Start to Saturday

The NHL appears to have been tinged by the long-standing report that the Finals would have an ungodly long, nine day wait for the Finals to start if the Wings close things out on Wednesday.  E.J. Hradek of ESPN has the story:

According to multiple sources, if the Pittsburgh Penguins and Detroit Red Wings can wrap up their respective Conference final series by Wednesday night, the Stanley Cup finals likely would start on Saturday, May 30 in Detroit. In this scenario, Game 2 would be played on Sunday, May 31.

For the past several days, the league has been working behind the scenes with NBC, which has limited prime time real estate to devote to the Cup finals due to important “sweeps” week programming and the Tonight Show re-launch with new host Conan O’Brien.

The possible change would spare the league an embarrassing, television-created, eight-day hiatus and the competitive nature of the playoffs wouldn’t be compromised by an unusually long layoff for both clubs.

Thank God.  The two days in a row to start the series will still tick off quite a few people, but at least they avoid this craziness we’ve been talking about for awhile.

The series will likely look like this:

1. Saturday, May 30th
2. Sunday, May 31st
3. Tuesday, June 2nd (VERSUS)
4. Thursday, June 4th (VERSUS) 
5. Saturday, June 6th 
6. Monday/Tuesday, June 8th/9th

Adventures in programming.

Since the playoffs are taking place (ON VERSUS!!!!1) the ads and promotions for both The Hangover and Fanarchy. First, The Hangover looks amazing and Zach Galafinakis is all sorts of awesome, please believe. But it’s the Fanarchy is worrisome. The idea is a bunch of people arguing over webcams about sports. Which probably would have worked in like 2002 when TRL was still existent and relevant.

The previews look like the show will be framed on stereotypes of certain sports fans. At least the promos have Massholes. You know I have never been to Boston, so my knowledge of the people there is based mostly on Jimmy Fallon’s tenure on SNL. DUDE! It was like the late 90s and he was a hottie then, ok? So back off. But yeah he would wear a Red Sox jersey and yell NOMARRRRRR! and tack on “wicked pissah” to sentences. Now, call me crazy, but don’t people generally get mad about stereotype and assumptions? I get irked when people assume that my Pacific Northwest status means I wear flannel and listen to Nirvana. Negative, ghostrider.

Who am I kidding. It’s only a matter of time until I am whoring myself out to Versus and Fanarchy for page views.