The All Star Game

Are you freakin kidding me?! So I broke down and actually watched the first 2 periods of probably the most boring hockey I have ever seen…and trust me I have seen some pretty boring hockey. Well let’s start with Briere…he had 4 assists and one goal…pretty good for the little guy. Then there is Rick Nash…a personal favourite. With 2 goals…and 2 assists…proving to everyone that…yes there is hope for the Blue Jackets. The West Wins with a final score 12-9!!! Yeah that’s right the Western Conference whipped up on the seemingly offensive minded Eastern Conference. Thank God.

Luckily well for me at least Sidney Crosby did not get a point…not one point!! Thus proving…he sucks…and I hate him. Well he proved he sucks…I mean honestly there were 21 points scored…9 on his team…and he didn’t even have a piece of one. YAY!! I am one happy girl.

And one thing that shocked me the most was that my beloved Alexander Ovechkin only got one point. Thus proving that he is better than Crosby…as if I didn’t already know that. One thing I do want to say is that for the most part OV was on a line with Crosby. In an interview that Ovechkin did after the game he said that he had chances to score but wanted to make it fun for the fans so he would feed Crosby the puck…and well Crosby just couldn’t capitalize. I would have it enjoyed it more if Alex would have scored more. Oh well.

Another thing that shocked me was the play of Martin Brodeur…I went into the All Star thinking that he was the God of all goalies….yes even better than Roy(I don’t like him because he played for the Avs and gave Osgood a beating.) Brodeur had one amazing save…that was just beautiful but other than that I wasn’t too impressed…I was so excited to watch him in the All Star Game because aside from highlight videos I have never seen him in the net. I still am excited to see him on Friday in Tampa Bay. Hopefully, he will be in net and will dominate the Lightning.

Oh I am so excited to say that they had the goalie’s mic’d up and when they would whistle play down they would talk to them…they mic’d up Brodeur whose mic eventually was knocked off on a shot from….somebody…I don’t know who I’ll have to look. Then they mic’d up Turco which was great he seemed like a pretty fun guy. But I only got to see like 2 of the interviews they did with him…I did see one where he was still talking to them and the Eastern Conference players were heading up the ice right at him. I think they should do that every game it was quite fun.

What else is there to say? Mark Messier annoys me. I swear every time he got on the camera he had a negative comment. Saying that the players should just take the shots they can instead of passing. Well in case he forgot it’s a team sport. You can’t win games by one guy taking all the shots….at least our All Stars are selfless. I am aware that Mark Messier was a great player and really good for the game but seriously…can’t we get someone better to commentate on the game. Maybe…Gordie Howe…or WWE wrestler Edge (they interviewed him at the game…I’m sure I would have enjoyed that better than what he said. Oh and another Messier note…Crosby won the Messier Leadership award or whatever the hell it’s called. Good job Crosby…you got a bullshit award. What a joke. So far the winners are for October, Brendan Shanahan of the New York Rangers, Scott Niedermayer from the Anaheim Ducks, and now Crosby from the Penguins.

I’m not really sure what else I have to say in regards to the All Star Game itself. I haven’t really looked into the Young Stars game or the Skills competition but when I do I will write something about it…probably not much considering I didn’t watch it and will have only read articles about it.

Teams I give a crap about…

Columbus Blue Jackets

After an impressive victory over the Red Wings I have a feeling that the Blue Jackets are going to come out strong for the last half of the season…after the loss in Nashville it seems that Hitchcock is getting the guys to get their act together and start doing something with their talent…because as we all know they are full of talent. Unfortunately most of that talent has been on the IR during the first half of the season but luckily they’re coming back soon!!!
Things I do want to see more of for the Blue Jackets is Brule being able to play on the top line. The poor kid is on the 4th line and well basically there’s not a whole lot of talent on that one. I think he deserves a chance to show what he can do…and I think he deserves some time to get his confidence back. He busted his ass out there when Nash and Fedorov were out. I also want to see Rick Nash stepping it up…he proved in the All Star game he is such a talented player when he wants to be.

Vancouver Canucks

Yup I voted for Rory. I love the Canucks! I love Luongo. He is a freaking machine. He got hit in the neck with a puck. Spent the night in the hospital and played the next night. Then in the all star game his helmet got knocked off. And he got right back up and continued playing. I just couldn’t believe it. I’m so proud. I want them to go far in the playoffs. I don’t really have a lot for this team. I think that Chouinard needs to start doing better and scoring more. Naslund looks like this next half he is going to go back to the old Naslund that we all know and love.

Detroit Red Wings

Hasek is amazing. That guy is old and as of right now I believe is the best goalie in the league with a great goals against average. Chelios is still playing very well and you gotta respect that…the man is 44. I can’t say enough about these guys. They are a wonderfully defensively minded team.

Nashville Predators

No I don’t really care about this team at all really but I have been to 3 of their games and watch their games on tv quite a bit. And, well they’re my cousins’ favorite team so I mean I should talk about them. They currently are leading the Western Conference…which they are making a big deal about it saying that oh they caught up to Anaheim…well yeah they caught up with the Ducks. The Ducks are missing their #1 goalie, Jean-Sebastian Giguere, the #1 defensemen in the league right now, Chris Pronger, and on top of that they are missing Francious Bouchemin. They lost most of their defense…So that’s my opinion of it. All will be right in the world once again ond Anaheim will be sitting at the top of the Western Conference shortly.

Anaheim Ducks

Yea they are in a slump…yes they are not playing the way they should. But like I said before look at who they are missing. I pretty much said everything I wanted to say in my little rant about The Preds. But one thing I would like to see from this team is moving Penner onto a line with Getzlaf. It’s a line that would work and start putting up the points…and allow Penner (who is currently second of all rookies for goals scored) to make a decent hunt for the Calder trophy…even though everyone has pretty much given it to Malkin.

Ok I have a lot to say...

So here we go...I just wanted to have the complete "all star" roster on here....cuz I said I would and I would talk about it.

Eastern Conference:

Goal:
Martin Brodeur New Jersey
Cristobal Huet Montreal

Defense:
Jay Bouwmeester Florida
Zdeno Chara Boston
Tomas Kaberle Toronto
Brian Rafalski New Jersey

Forward:
Jason Blake New York Islanders
Simon Gagne Philadelphia
Dany Heatley Ottawa
Marian Hossa Atlanta
Vincent Lecavalier Tampa Bay
Martin St. Louis Tampa Bay
Brendan Shanahan New York Rangers
Eric Staal Carolina
Justin Williams Carolina

I feel alright about the Eastern Conference fillers....I love Brodeur like I said yesterday...and Huet is decent. On Defense it looks good to me. I love the fact that Jason Blake and Sidney Crosby will be on the same team....hahaha...I hate Crosby so much. Now notice I didn't say I didn't think that Sidney Crosby was a bad player but I think that the NHL has promoted him to the point that he is just annoying now. I absolutely LOVE Alexander Ovechkin...and am so happy that he now has his own commercial so I can stop looking at Crosby.

Now for the Western Conference fillers:

Goal:
Miikka Kiprusoff Calgary
Marty Turco Dallas

Defense:
Philippe Boucher Dallas
Dion Phaneuf Calgary
Kimmo Timonen Nashville
Lubomir Visnovsky Los Angeles

Forward:
Bill Guerin St. Louis
Martin Havlat Chicago
Patrick Marleau San Jose
RICK NASH Columbus
Yanic Perreault Phoenix
Brian Rolston Minnesota
Teemu Selanne Anaheim
Ryan Smyth Edmonton
Henrik Zetterberg Detroit

Now...I absolutely love this Western Conference line up...I guess I'm a little bias. I love Dion Phaneuf....and I am so excited that Rick Nash is going to be in the game. He deserves it. He is doing so much better now that Hitch has taken over and has become a more complete player...in fact there was an article about it...let me find it...Check it out! I thought it was amazing. Anyway I'm glad that Teemu Selanne is in there and agree with everyone else that it's stupid that Cheech is in over him. Anyway the "All Star" is next week. I don't plan on watching...not too interested.

Here's a little rant about my Blue Jackets...the boys are starting to come back...last night in our win over Chicago we had Foote back and Fedorov and I believe Svitov was back as well. Mr. Nash is expected to return on Thursday for our game against Nashville. And then on Friday we are taking on the Red Wings at home...I cant bring myself to watch these games...I don't know who to cheer for...makes me sad.

Also, I do want to give a bit of a shout out to some of my favorite podcasts...one is The Habs Cast...who have a link on my side...and the other one is The Crazy Canucks...these two podcasts are in my opinion the best one's out there. I love listening to them I don't get bored...and I love hearing them talk about their teams. You can subscribe to them on iTunes.

Ok...now for my little section about the Ducks...anyone who knows me...knows I love the Ducks...it's just one of those things...however...for some reason when they are at home...and playing some of the worst teams in the NHL...they tend to lose...and not just lose...but lose is some crazy unheard of way....earlier this season...on November 15...they lost to the Flyers 7-4....that is the worst team in the NHL. Then on January 4th...they lost to my beloved Blue Jackets...4-3....this may not seem like a big difference but all of the Jackets goals were in the last 10 minutes of the 3rd period...then last night...they lost 6-2....to the St. Louis Blues...totally killing me. I don't know what's going on with the Ducks...you'd think they would have enough depth on their team to still be winning without Pronger...but apparently not...but they need to seriously step it up.

Anyway, I suppose that is enough for the night...let me know what you think Crosby or Ovechkin??

Peter Budaj

Wow, I had never seen this kid play before...but on Monday I watched the San Jose Sharks take on the Colorado Avs....and I have to say that I was so impressed with this kid. I tend to watch goalies more than any other players simply because in my opinion they are the most important guys on the ice. Anyway out of 42 shots on goal he only let in 3...and against the Sharks I'd have to say that's pretty impressive. Anyway so he is my player of the week...haha. If anyone doesn't know the Avs lost this game 3-1. But, they did name Budaj 2nd star of the night which I thought was great...because he made some amazing saves.

Oh, and I just want to talk about the NHL "All Star" game. They have announced the complete rosters.
Eastern Conference the starters are:

Goal: Ryan Miller Buffalo
Defense: Brian Campbell Buffalo
Defense: Sheldon Souray Montreal
Forward: Alexander Ovechkin Washington
Forward: Daniel Briere Buffalo
Forward: Sidney Crosby Pittsburgh

The only thing I have to say about the Eastern Conference is why in the world is Ryan Miller the goalie?! He has had ONE shut out this season ONE!! His save percentage is a .916...and his goals against average is a 2.61. Martin Brodeur should have been chosen as the goalie. No question in my mind.

Western Conference:

Goal: Roberto Luongo Vancouver
Defense: Scott Niedermayer Anaheim
Defense: Nicklas Lidstrom Detroit
Forward: Joe Thornton San Jose
Forward: Joe Sakic Colorado
Forward: Jonathan Cheechoo San Jose

Now the Western Conference I don't have such a big problem with...even though I voted for Rory and thought it would be wonderful if he got in...just to prove to everyone what a big joke the "All Star" game is. I will say this though...Cheechoo is not putting the numbers up like he did last year...so why is he going to be in this game? I don't know....oh well. I still enjoy watching him play. I would go into details about the complete roster...but I will save that for tommorow. I am awfully tired and feel like I have just typed a lot of stuff. So, goodnight everybody and I will blog more tommorow!!