Who Saw This Coming?

Is This The Year: Revisited

2011-10-25T16:12:00.000-06:00

Is This The Year?

Since I visit/post/read/laugh at this little corner of the Internet I created about once every 22 years or so, I thought it'd be fun to take the last post made on this site - which was a bunch of predictions for last season - and see how I made out in my prognostications.

I bet I got them ALL right! ....

Is this the year!?!? ...that Ales Hemsky plays almost an entire season and reaches that coveted "point per game" mark? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that Dustin Penner further expands on his role a top line 30+ goal scorer? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that JF Jacques plays more than five whole games in a row before going on the IR list? (Nope...he's already on the IR) NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that the entire team doesn't succumb to Swine Flu/Mono/Broken Limbs/Erectile dysfunction? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that Shawn Horcoff battles back into the good graces of Oiler fans with savvy veteran leadership and a solid 2-way game? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Sam Gagner starts to pile up the points like he did in Junior? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that Theo Peckham sends someone from the Flame's organization to the infirmary thanks to a bone crushing hit? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!?  ...that we don't have to listen to Mark Lee do the games on CBC? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that Gilbert Brule scores 30? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Andrew Cogliano goes over 50% at the faceoff dot? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that Tom Gilbert finally finds the perfect shoe to go with that European Carryall bag? YEP!!!

Is this the year!?!? ...that one of the Edmonton rookies of MPS, Eberle or Hall lead in rookie scoring? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that Tyler Seguin crashes and burns and makes the Hall pick look soooo good? COULD YOU PLEASE REPHRASE THE QUESTION?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Khabibulin plays more than 20 games on his way to Team MVP? LOL, MVP!!

Is this the year!?!?  ...that the Oilers play exciting hockey, but finish with a top 3 pick in next year's draft? SORTA...YEP!

Is this the year!?!? ...that the Oilers surprise everyone and make the playoffs? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Sheldon Souray plays the entire season with the AHL's Hershey Bears? I THINK SO! WHEN HE WASN'T INJURED.

Is this the year!?!? ...that Stortini says "uhmm", "andhuh" and "youknow" 3,239 times in interviews over the course of the year? YEP!

Is this the year!?!? ...that MacIntyre actually does his job as a Nuclear Deterrent and provides the younglings and little guys with the confidence to play without the fear of getting destroyed...while also scoring 5 goals? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...that Steve Smith scores one in his own net...from behind the bench? YEP! IT HAPPENED IN PRACTICE!! WE TALKIN' BOUT PRACTICE.

Is this the year!?!? ...Curtis Foster makes everyone forget about that Souray fellow? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...Jim Vandermeer reaches 15,000 followers on Twitter? DUNNO, TOO LAZY TO LOOK.

Is this the year!?!? ...the beer in Rexall goes DOWN a dollar in price? NOPE!

Is this the year!?!? ...the Oilers decide on whether it's JDD or Dubnyk? SORTA, THIS PAST SUMMER THEY DID.

Is this the year!?!? ...Ryan Jones proves why he was a better choice than Reddox? YEP!!!

Is this the year!?!? ...Ryan Whitney provides stability on the back-end? YEP!! UNTIL HE BROKE HIS ANKLE.

Is this the year!?!? ...I finally put a name and number on the back of my two blank Oiler jerseys? FAIL.

Is this the year!?!? ...Bell TV gets Sportsnet One? YEP!

Is this the year!?!? ...Tom Renney somehow earns coach of the year honours? NOPE!

Is This The Year?

2010-10-07T10:37:00.001-06:00

With the NHL Regular season getting under way today (SQUEEEEE!!!!1!!), I thought it would be fun to sort of lay out my hopes and dreams for the upcoming season as far as my beloved Oilers are concerned.

I'm going to go with that "Is this the year?" thing the NHL had going on a while back in their marketings.

Let's get down and dirty, shall we?*

Is this the year!?!? ...that Ales Hemsky plays almost an entire season and reaches that coveted "point per game" mark?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Dustin Penner further expands on his role a top line 30+ goal scorer?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that JF Jacques plays more than five whole games in a row before going on the IR list? (Nope...he's already on the IR)

Is this the year!?!? ...that the entire team doesn't succumb to Swine Flu/Mono/Broken Limbs/Erectile dysfunction?

Is this the year!?!? ...that Shawn Horcoff battles back into the good graces of Oiler fans with savvy veteran leadership and a solid 2-way game?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Sam Gagner starts to pile up the points like he did in Junior?

Is this the year!?!? ...that Theo Peckham sends someone from the Flame's organization to the infirmary thanks to a bone crushing hit?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that we don't have to listen to Mark Lee do the games on CBC?

Is this the year!?!? ...that Gilbert Brule scores 30?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Andrew Cogliano goes over 50% at the faceoff dot?

Is this the year!?!? ...that Tom Gilbert finally finds the perfect shoe to go with that European Carryall bag?

Is this the year!?!? ...that one of the Edmonton rookies of MPS, Eberle or Hall lead in rookie scoring?

Is this the year!?!? ...that Tyler Seguin crashes and burns and makes the Hall pick look soooo good?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Khabibulin plays more than 20 games on his way to Team MVP?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that the Oilers play exciting hockey, but finish with a top 3 pick in next year's draft?

Is this the year!?!? ...that the Oilers surprise everyone and make the playoffs?

Is this the year!?!?  ...that Sheldon Souray plays the entire season with the AHL's Hershey Bears?

Is this the year!?!? ...that Stortini says "uhmm", "andhuh" and "youknow" 3,239 times in interviews over the course of the year?

Is this the year!?!? ...that MacIntyre actually does his job as a Nuclear Deterrent and provides the younglings and little guys with the confidence to play without the fear of getting destroyed...while also scoring 5 goals?

Is this the year!?!? ...that Steve Smith scores one in his own net...from behind the bench?

Is this the year!?!? ...Curtis Foster makes everyone forget about that Souray fellow?

Is this the year!?!? ...Jim Vandermeer reaches 15,000 followers on Twitter?

Is this the year!?!? ...the beer in Rexall goes DOWN a dollar in price?

Is this the year!?!? ...the Oilers decide on whether it's JDD or Dubnyk?

Is this the year!?!? ...Ryan Jones proves why he was a better choice than Reddox?

Is this the year!?!? ...Ryan Whitney provides stability on the back-end?

Is this the year!?!? ...I finally put a name and number on the back of my two blank Oiler jerseys?

Is this the year!?!? ...Bell TV gets Sportsnet One?

Is this the year!?!? ...Tom Renney somehow earns coach of the year honours?

Is this the year!?!?

LET'S DOOOOOOooooo THIS!!!!1!**

-TB

*that's what she said!
**that is also something she said.

Speaking of Wookiees

2010-09-08T12:48:00.000-06:00

The new batch of kids were handed their numbered jerseys today. MPS will wear 91, Eberle will wear 14 and Hall was ceremoniously awarded Kevin Lowe's old number 4.

Not real earth-shatteringly shocking news. But interesting none the less as I suppose this means they will all have a spot waiting for them on the roster - It's theirs to lose.

I can't wait for this season to start already. It's going to be a lottery year again I think, but a least we might have some fun watching these guys play.

-TB

Photoshop Tuesday!

2010-09-07T15:00:00.000-06:00

Nothing to do with hockey? CHECK.

Nothing to do with Oilers? CHECK.

Chewbacca content? CHECK.

Three outta three aint bad!

You're welcome.

-TB

Bored On A Saturday Night

2010-09-04T22:13:00.000-06:00

Fuck am I bored.

Long weekend, supposed to be off camping in one last hurrah of the the season. Instead I'm in my basement clacking on my computer. Had to cancel the trip due to a sick little one. Boooo.

I decided, in my boredom, to make a desktop pic for my computer. What better topic than the Oilers, right?

Yeah... so here it is:

GOILERS!!!1!

-TB

Getting Excited - UPDATED

2010-09-02T21:18:00.016-06:00

I don't know about you, but I'm pretty excited about the upcoming season. So excited that I figured I needed to write about it. Ok, I am excited but I'm really only writing this right now to prove to Oilersnation stalwart commenter "Buck75" that my blog is indeed still active. I was planning on writing something about the upcoming season in the next week or so, but he just kicked my butt into doing it. No problem. I blog in my sleep.

So lets get started, shall we?

The topic of discussion I want to talk about is how Tambo's summer went from my point of view.

Short Answer: Great.

He started off by firing/reassigning the training staff. Awesome. I didn't like the way that one guy tossed Hemsky towels during a game last season. I'm no physiologicalist, but I think that towel toss may be the reason Hemsky bowed out of the season early with a shoulder injury.

He reassigned the great Pat Quinn higher up the ladder and stripped him of his coach-ship. Really, it's just a fancy way of firing without all the optics of a "firing". Renney has the reigns now. That's cool. I think Pat is a good hockey mind, but it was quite evident last season that he had no real pulse of his lineup - not that it was much of a lineup. Really nobody, except Penner, excelled during his reign. That should say something. Renney brings a more scientific approach to coaching, as well he seems to be more dialed in with his players. That being said, Renney doesn't scare the fuck out of me like Quinn does. Maybe that was part of Quinn's problem...who knows. Only time will tell I guess.

Tambo also unleashed his wrath on the roster. Nilsson, O'Sullivan and Moreau all were placed on waivers. Good riddance. I don't necessarily champion the idea of waiving your Captain...but, in my opinion, Moreau shouldn't have been named Captain to begin with. So...yah, that's a whole other blog. Moreau was picked up by Columbus off waivers, O'Sullivan was traded to Phoenix for Vandermeer (and then released by Phoenix - OUCH!). Nilsson signed in the KHL. Good stuff.

Tambellini also added a few peeps to the roster by acquiring some players via trades, free agent signings and re-upping some existing Oilers:

SAM GAGNER	C	21	SIGNED 2-YEAR CONTRACT AUGUST 29
LIAM REDDOX	LW	24	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT AUGUST 9
MARTIN GERBER	G	35	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT AUGUST 6
JEFF DESLAURIERS	G	26	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 31
GILBERT BRULE	C	23	SIGNED 2-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 27
RYAN O'MARRA	C	23	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 16
GREGORY STEWART	LW	24	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 16
THEO PECKHAM	D	22	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 15
J-F JACQUES	LW	25	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 14
DEVAN DUBNYK	G	24	SIGNED 2-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 13
SHAWN BELLE	D	25	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 13
BEN ONDRUS	RW	28	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 9
BRAD MORAN	C	31	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT JULY 7
TAYLOR HALL	LW	18	SIGNED 3-YEAR ENTRY LEVEL CONTRACT JULY 5
ALEXANDRE GIROUX	LW	29	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT AS A UFA JULY 3
STEVE MACINTYRE	LW	29	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT AS A UFA JULY 2
JASON STRUDWICK	D	34	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT AS A UFA JULY 2
RICHARD PETIOT	D	27	SIGNED 1-YEAR CONTRACT AS A UFA JULY 2
KURTIS FOSTER	D	28	SIGNED 2-YEAR CONTRACT AS A UFA JULY 1
JIM VANDERMEER	D	30	ACQUIRED FROM PHOENIX FOR PATRICK O'SULLIVAN JUNE 30
COLIN FRASER	C	25	ACQUIRED FROM CHICAGO FOR 6TH ROUND CHOICE (151ST OVERALL) IN 2010 DRAFT JUNE 24 & SIGNED TWO-YEAR CONTRACT WITH OILERS JULY 1
MAGNUS PAAJARVI-SVENSSON	LW	19	SIGNED 3-YEAR CONTRACT JUNE 2
LINUS OMARK	RW	23	SIGNED 2-YEAR CONTRACT APR. 6
CHRIS VANDE VELDE	RW	23	SIGNED 2-YEAR CONTRACT APR. 6

As you can see, plenty of depth/role players, some key re-signings and of course: Taylor Hall. There's also a plethora of, presumably, AHL players that were picked up over the summer. Good stuff. Setting up shop in Oklahoma over the summer was a catalyst to build a team that can at least compete. The shitshow in Springfield last year was atrocious. Come to think of it - the NHL team wasn't much better. It did get us Hall though. YEAH!

The only RFA waiting to be re-signed is Cogliano. From what I've read there is a deal on the table and it's pretty much in Cogliano's hands at this point. Obviously there's a bit of a gap between the two sides. I'm sure it will be agreed upon in the near future.

What else did Tambo do? Oh yeah...He let Pisani go out to pasture (signed with Chicago) and he also will apparently let the newlywed Comrie have an extended honeymoon by not re-signing him. It's probably for the best. Sad to see both of them go, but there's a lot of young talent bubbling under the surface here that the team needs to have a good look at.

Tambo also had plenty of drama to deal with this summer. There's the Souray thing and of course this whole Khabibulin thing. Tambo has been trying to deal Souray since the end of last season. As you can imagine, there's not much of a market for an oft-injured, old, high salaried player that doesn't have that "team player" aura. Tambellini waived Souray...nobody wanted him...even at half price. That's a kick to the junk from Souray's point of view. Well, I suppose it's a kick to the junk to the Oilers too. :(

Khabibulin just got his sentence the other day for his DUI trial in Phoenix. His lawyers appealed the sentence, further delaying any real resolution. This seemed to catch Tambellini a bit off guard. The plus to all this is that by appealing the sentence it makes Khabibulin available for training camp and the beginning of the season. From what I've read the appeal process can drag on forever - perhaps even to next summer.

That's pretty much it for the major news hits from the Oilers over the summer. It's hard to believe summer is almost over. Rookie camp kicks off in a couple weeks and main camp is shortly after that. Unreal.

So, back to the beginning of all this rambling. Why am I excited?

Mostly because of these beauties: (nohomo)

Who saw this coming?!? Not Buck75...that's who didn't see this coming.

-TB

UPDATE:

P.S. Don't click here.

Happy Canada/Free Agency Day

2010-07-01T08:45:00.005-06:00

Happy Canada Day!! Or as us Canadians like to say: NHL FREE AGENCY DAY!!!

No, in all seriousness...this is one of my favorite holidays not just because of Free Agency; I'm proud to live in a country like Canada because it is easily one of the top places in the world to call home. Anyone who complains about living in this country should spend some time in a third world country or a country run by a maniacal dictator....or the U.S. - ZING!!! People that complain about this country have no idea how good they have it.

Anyways, enough of this patriotic-quasi political soapbox stuff....let's get down to business: NHL Free Agency Day.

This is traditionally the time of year when the Edmonton Oilers run around like the outcast kid in high school that tries too hard to get the eye of the popular girl. Running around behind her, holding her books and offering to do her homework. All the while the popular girl is laughing at this kid while she's got her eye on the captain of the football team. Classic.

The past few years of free agency have been mostly failure on the part of the Oilers. We've seen our team chase after big name free agents only to have them sign with the teams they truly wanted to sign with. Read: Stanley Cup Contenders. We've seen the Oilers try to "make a splash" by "signing that big name" on free agency day; usually for too much money and for a once good player that spends more time in the IR than on the ice.

But what can you do at this point if you're the Edmonton Oilers? You haven't committed to an actual rebuild. You've been thinking your team is just 2 or 3 good players away from being something. Well, that pipe dream burst last season. The injuries exposed this team for what it was: A team with a couple decent players that lacked depth / role players. Injuries to the best players left this team with a squadron of shit and a 30th place finish was the result.

So far this summer we've been witness to the fallout from the realization that the Edmonton Oilers were maybe not as good as they thought they were. Tambo has blown up this team from the management all the way down to the training staff. People are being fired and let go like they have some sort of disease or something. I guess they do, it's called LOSERITIS!! These firings have marked an important point in the timeline of this team. It has set in motion an actual honest to god rebuild. Something that probably should have happened two or three years ago.

This brings us back to Free Agency day. Now that the team has accepted the fact that they need to rebuild they can stop chasing the popular girl and concentrate on the glaring holes in the roster instead. There's a plethora of young, talented forwards that will be vying for a spot in the top 6 at training camp this fall. So I think we'll be alright up there. But here's some things I hope to see today (or over the summer) that should round out the team to, at the very least, be competitive:

1. 3rd/4th liner that can win faceoffs and work the PK. (Remember Kyle Brodziak?)

2. Depth stay-at-home defenceman to round out the 4/6 range.

3. A top 4-ish d-man in return for Souray. (I just don't see how he can come back to the team.)

4. Trade one of the young goalies maybe for a veteran FWD or some AHL depth? If they're hanging on to them because they fear Khabi won't be available they shouldn't...cuz there's always a goalie looking for work somewhere.

4.5 Speaking of AHL depth...perhaps some signings to build up the depth in Oklahoma wouldn't be such a bad idea either. New team, new identity, new fans...you probably don't want to shit the bed down there.

5. A gritty, mucker that will drop the gloves to protect our babies coming into the lineup. Someone that will punch the first guy that takes a run at Hall. Preferably a player that can actually use his hockey stick to play a little bit of hockey now and then too.

That's pretty much it for my wish list. I say the Oilers roll the dice with the kids coming in and shore up the glaring holes and see what happens. They can't get any worse!!

-TB

The Fall For Hall Has Finally Fell

2010-06-26T00:44:00.005-06:00

Well well well.

The Edmonton Oilers have done it. They went with Hall. I gotta say I was leaning towards the Seguin camp coming into this draft; but let's be honest, either kid is a great pick. I don't think the Oilers could have gone wrong either way.

I look forward to this kid leading my favorite hockey squadron to victorious victory!

P.S. Tambo couldn't get anything else done in the first round? Bummer.

Taylor Vs. Tyler

2010-06-24T15:16:00.004-06:00

OHhhhhhhh MAN!!! Only one more sleep!!!

-TB

UPDATE:

No more sleeps. SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

The Day Of Reckoning Is Near

2010-06-21T23:15:00.006-06:00

Have you looked at a calendar recently? Do you realize what this Friday is? That's right lady and gentlemen, it's NHL Draft Day!

A little team I like to call "The Edmonton Oilers Of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, North America, Earth" or "Oilers", for short, will be smoothing things over with their fan base by selecting first overall in the Entry Draft on Friday. It's a small token of appreciation shown to us fans by the team after last season's something something that I don't want to talk about. *COUGH* LAST *COUGH* PLACE *COUGH* SHITTIEST TEAM EVER *COUGH* FML *COUGH*

Basically, unless you live under a rock and haven't heard, there's two kids hoping to be selected 1st overall: Taylor Hall and Tyler Seguin.

"Who do you think the Oilers will pick?" you ask.

Well, since you brought it up, I believe the Oilers will select Taylor Hall. Here's a list of reasons why I think this way:

1. Bob McKenzie from TSN said he thinks Hall is the best pick for 1st overall.

2. ....that's all I've got.

Basically I don't have a clue which kid the Oilers should take. I've seen Hall play a couple times on TV and I have never seen Seguin play. I can't base my judgement of which kid is better based on my drunken hockey watching so I have to rely on people that have seen the kids play multiple times, with their own eyes. Bob McKenzie doesn't just spout off his opinion based on which kid he "thinks" will be better - he actually uses linear regression analysis and statistic baselines to formulate an accurate projection of who the best pick will be. ...ok, that's total bullshit....but what Bob does is interview scouts from all over the damn place and get their opinions of who the best pick is. So, by doing this he gets a broad spectrum of opinions and I think a more accurate "projection" of who should go first and why.

Honestly, I don't care which kid the Oilers take. Either one of them will be a nice cornerstone piece to initiate an honest to god rebuild of this team. No more chasing old balls free agents that want to sign in some city with palm trees. No more trading away youth for "experience" which we've all learned is just a euphemism for "10 to 13 games before a season ending shoulder injury occurs." No, it's all about the draft and developing the youthful core nucleus of a team that will grow and learn together from here on out.

One more thing - did you guys know that TSN is showing a behind the scenes documentary about the Oiler Brass and their trials and tribulations as they prepare for the upcoming draft? It's called "Oil Change". It will have footage of the Oiler big wigs interviewing the top prospects Tyler and Taylor as well as behind closed door meeting footage of the GM arguing with his scouts about who's the better pick. It will also supposedly show footage following Tyler and Taylor around from their visits to Edmonton over the past couple of weeks. Rumor has it we'll also see the inside of the Wayne Manor (Daryl Katz's house). I can't wait to see it. It's going to air Thursday night (June 24th) at 7PM MST on TSN.

-TB

Eberle Mancrush Starts in 5, 4, 3, 2...

2010-05-14T10:38:00.010-06:00

Photo above: Canadian Players huddle around Jordan Eberle for warmth.

Most likely because he was on fire in the 12-1 romp over Norway

at the WHC in the southern German city of Mannheim on May 14, 2010.

1G, 4A, +3

Team Canada Player of the Game

I love this kid. I know...I know...It's only Norway. I will hold off on the statue and parade for now.

Still, I think the future looks bright in Edmonton with MPS, Eberle and Hall/Seguin knocking on the door.

-TB

ZOMG ZOMG ZOMG ZOMG

2010-05-13T23:58:00.003-06:00

*swoon*

Eberle gets his big shot this morning. I honestly don't expect anything crazy. I'm just happy to get to see him play with some real NHLers. I'm curious how he'll look.

Giddy up!

-TB

Is This Thing On?

2010-05-11T13:46:00.006-06:00

Hello there.

Where do I begin?

Well first off, how about a little story as to where in the hell this lovely corner of the Internet went over the past few months...

Our story begins around month two of the 2009/2010 Regular Season of my beloved Edmonton Oilers. Up to that point, there was still the annual hope in the air that the Oilers could somehow churn out another mediocre-barely-make-the-playoffs-in-fact-not-even-make-the-playoffs-but-give-a-good-showing-over-the-final-twenty-games effort. Turns out that was nothing but a pipe dream, as the Season From Hell™ was gathering steam...and lots of it.

Injuries, the flu, mono, concussions, surgeries, DUI's, general malaise, constipation, urinal tract infections...you name it, it happened. Not to mention what the Edmonton Oilers went through! Ok...kidding...that was all them. The team could not buy a break, even with the billions of dollars in Katz's piggy bank. They sucked. I grew weary.

As the losses mounted and the roster took on an ECHL flavor this feeling of "I don't give a shit" began to take a hold of me. It was rough. As a die hard Oiler fan for many many moons I can tell you this feeling of not caring about my team was quite foreign to me. As a result of the Oilers' Shitshow™, the "Who Saw This Coming!?!" you all know and love took a direct blow to the post count. My posts came further and further apart, eventually with me not even caring enough to post something like "at least we have the 1st overall pick!1!!" But no. A picture I found of Jordan Eberle was my last post...World Juniors? Seriously? WOW.

It's sad, because I'm the guy that buys all the PPV games no matter what...even after the Smyth Trade™. Not this year. I'm the guy that plans his social calendar around off-nights of the Edmonton Oilers. Not this year. I'm the guy that plans his social calendar around on-nights of the Edmonton Oilers. "Let's meet for drinks at (insert name of place with TV's that show Oiler games)" I would say. Not this year. I'm the guy that goes to as many games as I can possibly afford. "I don't need to eat this month." I would say. Not this year. I went to two games ...and they were free.

Now that the Season From Hell™ is long over and I have had some time to heal. I feel my love for my team creeping back in. There's a lot to look forward to for next season. I mean...they can't get any worse, really. There's a pretty good draft pick coming in. Some young prospects will be knocking at the door. Tambo is supposedly done assessing and plans on cleaning some house this summer. It can't possibly turn out any worse. Can it? I don't think so. I don't expect them to be a playoff team next season, but I do expect them to not be DEAD FUCKING LAST again.

So, with that all in mind, this place is NOT dead. It is still here. I will still toss up my beautiful photoshop creations. I will still spew what ever is in my head out into this blogging machine and I will do it a little more regularly. I am, afterall, The Towel Boy. I have fans. (Thanks Mom!)

Speaking of The Pint - NationDraft Playoff Editions.... Have you seen where I currently sit?

That's right. 7th. Who saw this coming!?!

But I'm gonna admit. I am royally fucked after this round of the playoffs is over. Look at my team:

Yeesh.

Well, it was good while it lasted.

-TB

A Real Canadian Hero

2010-01-08T19:40:00.004-07:00

I stumbled upon this gem on the old internets today. Classic.

Two Words: 1. AWE. 2. SOME.

There's been a lot of talk in the Oilogosphere since the end of the World Junior Championship about Jordan Eberle. Some fans think he is the savior that this team needs. Some have a more measured outlook that we should wait and see how he looks playing in the NHL before we plan the ticker tape parade. Then there are other absolute buzzkilling trolls that call him a bumb and a loser. We ignore those guys. Well, I do at least.

I'm in the "let's wait and see how he does against NHL players" group. I'm not stupid and I realize that good Jr. numbers don't always translate into elite level NHL numbers. For that reason alone I haven't ordered my Oiler jersey with "EBERLE 14" on the back. That being said...I wouldn't hesitate to get a Team Canada jersey with "EBERLE 14" on the back.

Nobody can question the ability of this kid to score clutch goals in very tense situations on the world stage in the name of Canada. He's a gamer. I just hope he can translate some of the magic he's performed on the Jr. stage in the NHL. Time will tell.

GOILERS! (DFF)

-TB

THIS! IS! KHABIBULIN!!!!

2009-10-07T08:55:00.007-06:00

In honour of Nikolai Khabibulin reaching the 300 win mark last night with his shootout victory over the Dallas Stars...I present to you this wonderful masterpiece. I spent a good 3 minutes on this one, so enjoy it. I have no story or written words to go with it...so I'll leave you with a big, happy "GOILERS!!1!!!"

-TB

Da Stars

2009-10-06T13:04:00.003-06:00

Pictured Above: A Star.

I'll make this quick. The Stars fly into RX1 tonight. The Oilers are looking to shake off the feelings of despair that they most undoubtedly felt after watching Khabibulin pull a Horcoff (read: Whiffing on a puck.) to end their season opener on a bit of a downer.

The Powerful and Mighty Oilers will be looking to absolutely hand it to the Marc Crawfordly looking Dallas Stars this evening. This game also marks the return of Charile Huddy to RX1, as he is now an assistant coach with the enemy after being let go by Tambo this summer.

The offensive aspect of the Oilers' home opener wasn't too much to complain about. They showed that they can play physical. They got their noses dirty and generated chances by charging hard to the net and being tenacious on the puck. But I do expect a little bit cleaner play from our squadron this evening on the defensive side of things. Quinn mentioned in the post game comments from Saturday's game that he wasn't terribly thrilled on how his team looked on any of the four goals against. I would have to agree with him. Mostly because he's Pat Fucking Quinn, and also because all four goals against were pretty weak. Except that last one...there was nothing Khabibulin could do on that one. (read: Sarcasm)

Sounds like Nilsson draws into the lineup to replace Moreau who sits tonight with some sort of infection in his foot or something. I dunno. But nothing seems to surprise me anymore when it comes to our Captain and injuries.

The game is being broadcast on PPV tonight. There's an OilersNation.com PPV party with Wanye Gretz and Jason Gregor being held at a swanky new pub "The Pint" at 10125 - 109 Street in E-town. I've been told it's the old Fox and Hounds or something? If I lived within cab ride distance of that place I would be there. But I don't. So I'm just going to continue to pout about it.

Speaking of PPV games... What the fuck is with having the second Oilers game being broadcast as a PPV game? I realize the network/regional tv draw of the Oilers has probably dwindled somewhat since the '06 cup run. But dammit. I don't want to pay for a PPV game so early in the year. I need to see this team in action a few times before I'll commit to dumping 15 bucks on a PPV game. I suppose it's cheaper than "going" to a game...and who am I kidding...I paid for PPV games at the end of the 06-07 season when the team went 2-18 in the final 20 games. One more thing, have you seen the PPV schedule for November? Good lord. There's like 5 of them! I'm going to need to find some friends house(s), bars and/or internet feeds to watch some of those ones. The last thing I need is an extra 75 bucks on my Satellite bill.

Ok then, my guess is Oilers 5, Stars 1. Gagner with the hat trick tonight. Yep...you heard it here first.

-TB

Stay Hydrated

2009-10-03T16:14:00.004-06:00

Well well well. What the hell do we have here? Am I mistaken?... or is tonight the season opener for the Edmonton Oilers? You're god damn right it is! I sure hope Khabibulin is drinking lots of water. We don't need our new/old goalie getting dehydrated and having to leave the game between the second and third periods. Do we?

This has been the longest day ever. I woke up this morning around 7 am...as I am normally prone to do. Reason: My kid tends to wake up between 6:30 and 7:00 am every day, which is awesome. I get to live every day to the fullest extent possible, regardless of the state of my hangover. Ahh, the joys of parenthood. You see...some of you may not know...but I am the proud father of a 2 year old girl. (Yeah...I know hey? I barely have the mental maturity of a 12 year old...let alone an adult that could parent offspring ...and have it survice to the age of Two.)

She's a cutie though....so it makes waking up so bloody early at least worth it.

What a darling eh? How do you suppose she knows to what team to cheer for? I swear I've never told her ANYTHING about the Oilers. Ever. She doesn't even know what hockey is.

"But...umm...TB...I hear you in that video telling her what to say."

Well....then....I suggest you get your hearing checked...because I've reviewed this video multiple times and I can't hear anything but a cute kid cheering for her favorite hockey team. My guess is that through some miracle of genetics, she knows that the Oilers are awesome and she must cheer for them to ensure the survival of her species. That's just my guess.

Moving on...

Game Day Bitches!!! The Oilers are playing host to those farm animal lovin' cowpokes from down south this evening. It should be a spirited affair, as always. I'm anxious to see how the Oilers play tonight because the Flames have already played a regular season game. For that reason, I hope the Oilers don't come out flat and I hope they bring it from the second the puck is dropped.

The Flames looked pretty good against the Canucks the other night. They stormed out of the gates and had the Canucks on their heels for 2/3 of the game. The third period was all Vancouver...but the shock and awe technique employed by the Flames in the first two periods was enough to build a lead and weather the storm for the third.

The Oilers need to play a full 60 mintues tonight. They were guilty of playing partial games last season. I don't recall very many games last season where the Oilers stormed out of the gates and kept rolling through to the final buzzer. I sure hope that is one aspect the Oilers work on this season.

I expect the 4th line tonight to be the money maker. I think the combo of Moreau, Gagner and Stortini is a good mix of grit, hard work and skill. It should fare well against the Flames.

That brings me to a final thought: I like these line combos that Quinn and his 332 coaches have thought up. I like the idea of a balanced attack. I mean, sure you could have ONE really potent line...but then you sacrifice the other lines to be chock full of muckers and ham n' eggers. I like the idea of mixing a bit of skill with a bit of hard work....it's a departure from the Mactavish days where we had lines of skill, lines of defensive forwards, lines of muckers and lines of grinders. You knew when the bottom two lines were out on the ice that the chance of scoring a goal was pretty much nil. This way any line has a good chance of potting some G's at any point.

...sounds good in theory...doesn't it?

...what the hell do I know. I just hope it works.

Game time is 8:00pm MST. CBC.

LET'S DOOOOO THIS !!! !!11!

Towel Boy

Wait...what? There's Hockey Already?

2009-09-17T09:12:00.007-06:00

Picture Above: Me, looking at the calendar the other day and discovering there is hockey being played already.

What the hell!?! There's friggin hockey being played already! It's the middle of September! Who saw this coming!?!

Yeah, so basically in my excitement of becoming a new owner of a sweet top hat (pictured above), I forgot that the preaseason season was happening. I didn't forget in the sense that the Oilers have played two preseason games already and I didn't know. I "forgot" in the sense that some people actually read this site and expect well written, informative and often mind blowing essays on all things Oil. What better time to fire up the old blogging machine than the first preseason game for the Oilers. Problem is, I was lazy...didn't do it and the first preseason game was two days ago.

Sooooo, I'm hoping all my faithful readers will forgive my laziness and absense over the past couple months and start reading my crap again. I have quite a few unique visitors to this site. If you'll bare with me, I'd like to give a shout out to some of my regular returning visitors:

1. Google cache. You, my friend, have been coming back to this site since it started. You stop by every few days to see if there's any new content and I applaud you for that. I'll remember you, always.

2. Google image search = Child_crying.jpg

I don't know what it is about this picture...but it gets more visitors to my site than any other image I have. People must google image search "Child crying" lots...cuz I bet I get 3 or 5 unique visitors per month looking for this image. Is there that many depressed individuals in the world that they actually look for pictures like this? Does it make them feel better? I know it makes me feel better and I'm glad I google image searched it 10 months ago. I look at it from time to time when I'm feeling sad and I realize that the kid in that picture has it much worse than I do. "Haha...loser" I say to the kid in that picture when I'm feeling sad, and then after I say that I feel awesome again. True story.

3. us.military.gov - I'm not sure what you guys are looking for, but I'm not involved in any terrorist plots to overthrow the government and I think Obama is a pretty cool dude.

4. Mom - Thanks mom.

5. Person that connects to the internets via the University of Alberta running MacOSx - You read this site. Lots. If I could identify you I would by you a sandwich or something. Keep coming!

6. Myself - You, good sir, have more visits to this site than anyone I know. You are amazing, great looking and you have a great smile. I thank you for your tireless efforts in reading this site and I hope you'll continue doing so as the season wears on. Thank you. Sincerely.

Ok, now that we've got that out of the way...How about those OILERS!!! Yeah baby! 2 and 0 to start the preseason. I love it. I am locking down playoff tickets as we speak. I would like to share with you a few observations from the training camp and the two games so far:

- Everyone looks real damn rusty. Like seriously...how many missed nets, posts and whiffs happened in the first two games? I don't keep stats for that stuff, but I wager if it was a number...it'd be high.

- Ethan Moreau's eye still creeps me out.

- Pat Quinn looks godly behind the bench and I swear to god he will cause the splitting of an atom at some point this season from chewing the hell out of that piece of Extra Sugar Free gum.

- We have like 35 goalies at training camp this year. WTF?

- Schremp sure looked good in the first preseason tilt in Calgary. He really controlled the play on the PP and he didn't look too terribly out of position. The Islanders are sure going to have a sweet waiver wire pickup when the Oilers have to place him on waivers because they have 102 forwards to fill 14 or so spots in the lineup.

- Hemsky looks like a giant when he plays with Gagner and Nilsson. Like he absolutely looks HUGE.

- Eberle is a beaut! Man, this kid is gonna be some kind of awesome if/when he makes the team. It's crazy to think he'll go back to JUNIOR if/when the Oilers boot him out of taining camp. Pretty solid offensively. Quick shot and he's sneaky.

That's about it for now. The Oilers' next preseason game is tomorrow night against the Panthers. Somehow the TSN preseason power rankings have put the Panthers one spot ahead of the Oilers, so I figure the Panthers should walk right thru Rexall on friday and score 12 goals and not even break a sweat. We'll see, TSN preseason power rankings....we'll see.

-TB

Fotochop Friday

2009-09-04T15:07:00.002-06:00

Jeanshorts posted an interesting video link the other day of our old pal Zack Stortini hanging out with some game nerd playing the upcoming NHL10 while discussing the finer points of hockey: fighting and being a pest in the NHL.

I am so bloody pumped about the upcoming latest release of arguably one of the best sports games ever created. So pumped that I whipped out my photochop machine, input a few 1's and 0's and had the machine put Zack Attack on the cover. Why? Cuz Zack Attack is quickly entrenching himself in Oiler fan psyche as a player that bleeds copper and blue. He's like a regular Joe that doesn't possess any amazing talents and has to work extra hard for every minute ice time. He's not a whiny superstar jerk (Read: Dany Heatley) and I think that's why he's so easy to root for.

I don't know if you watch as much Oiler website video as I do, but I can tell you that this summer has been the Zack Stortini show. Between boatloads of public appearances, charity work, fishing, picking garbage and helping old ladies cross the street, Zack has been the Oilers' PR go to guy. I'm 100% positive he does it because he wants to, not because he has to. But that's the type of stuff that wins over fans. He's chosen to stay in Edmonton for the off season and make the city his home. You gotta respect that.

I like Zack Attack. He just seems like such a down to earth guy. He's seems thoughtful and respectful off the ice. On the ice I'm sure he's a bit of a mouthpiece. But that's his game, and say what you will about his fighting style, he backs it up. He's been amping up his off season training regiment and training with one of the best NHL fighters in George Laraque. I think Zack is going to have a wonderful season in both fisticuffs and points and settle into a nice actual full time gig in the nightly Oiler lineup.

The season is just around the corner! I can't wait.

P.S. If there is any takers in the world of PS3 that want to have their asses handed to them in NHL'10 when it comes out...friend me... Cooked_Electron is the name. You've been warned.

Let's DOOOOOOOOoooo THIS!!1!!!!

2009-08-20T11:38:00.005-06:00

Ok...so I know I've been a little slack around here lately. It's summer. What do you want from me? This is primarily an Oiler related blog and there hasn't been much exciting Oiler related news for me to force on to you my opinions of said news.

Aside from this whole "douche bag" thing (read: Dany Heatley) this summer, there hasn't been much excitement from 'ol Tambo and his crew.

It looks, by all accounts, that the Oil will be going into training camp with virtually the same roster as last season. Of course a new/old goalie is in net and we no longer have the services of Kyle Brodziak. But aside from that, we can expect the same group of guys to lace'em up for the Mighty Oil. There is still time for Tambo to make a trade or two. We'll see. But chances are good that the roster will remain unchanged.

I think this year is going to be different with this group though. Last summer heading into training camp we (the fans, the media, the coach) had high expectations of this team. We all know how that turned out. But if there's one thing the Oilers know how to do - it's how to not live up to expectations. Whether that means sucking when expectations are high or playing lights out when expectations are low is anyone's guess. This team has shown tenancies to do both.

This year is different for me because I almost don't care about the tiny details. I don't care if Hemsky gets 90 pts. I don't care if Sam Gagner plays the first half of the season like he typically plays the second half. I don't care if Souray's shoulder explodes. I don't care if Lubo's shoulder is healed. I don't care if Horcoff buries feeds from Hemsky or whiffs on them. I don't care if the Oilers get blown out 10-2. All I care about, from the bottom of my heart, is that the Oilers somehow, some way MAKE THE FUCKING PLAYOFFS. I don't care about the details of how they do it...I just want it done. I'm so tired of not caring much about hockey after the regular season is over.

It's been three summers of playoff hockey with zero Oiler content. I can't take another. I need a reason to damage my liver...other than "hey, it's Monday night!"

Oh, and if you dig the picture up there...why not show your appreciation for it by buying the T-Shirt from Jeanshorts & Baggedmilk You can buy it here.

Alright...now...expect to see more shit as we draw closer to training camp. You've been warned.

My Take On The Heatley Thing

2009-07-02T15:23:00.001-06:00

Ok. We all need to fuck'n relax and take a step back.

Yes. Dany Heatley vetoed the deal to come to Edmonton...twice.

No. It's not because the City of Edmonton is a shit hole or he flat out hates the Oilers.

...and Yes. Baggedmilk is a god among mere mortals for his tales of debauchery form around the globe. But back to hockey talk...

The point about Heatley that I want to get out there is that We don't know the whole story. No matter what the media people say or feel..they don't know the whole story either. The only people that know are the Sens, the Oilers and Dany Heatley and his agent. So why would I judge Heatley on 3rd hand knowledge of the entire situation? The only thing I can judge him on is is ability to score fucking goals from every angle on the ice...and that's enough for me to remain in his corner...for now. Unless some hard core straight up "FUCK YOU EDMONTON" comes directly out of his mouth...at that point he'll be dead to me.

My take on the whole thing...

The List:

Heatley asked for a trade and gave a list of teams that he would accept a trade to. Fine. It's his choice - he earned it and negotiated it into his contract. Stories that came out in the beginning had Edmonton as being a place on his list...then days later stories came out saying that Edmonton was NOT on his list. Reading stuff from today, it's a fair assumption that Edmonton was not, in fact, on his list at all. Given that assumption, if it was me and I had a list of places I would accept a transfer to and left my boss in charge to get the best offer for my services from one of those places... only to find that the best offer he got was from a place that wasn't on my list - I WOULD TOTALLY WANT TO THINK ABOUT IT. I wouldn't be all "Oh, ok boss...where do I sign?" I'd be more like "Edmonton? What the fuck is this shit? They weren't on my fucking list. I never even considered them as a viable option. Where is this Edmonton? Do they have women there? I need to drink on this."

Why would I want to drink on it? Well, for fuckin' 1. It wasn't on my list. 2. I would want to see if the other places on my list come up with something. Because, honestly I would go to Edmonton, but I'd rather go to any of the higher ranked cities on my list because...well, those cities were on my fucking list. It's why I had a list to begin with. It's the very nature of a LIST.

The NMC:

Just because he has a NMC and can "say" he doesn't want to play here means nothing to me in terms of "would I even want him on the Oilers after he said No?" Cuz honestly...players without NMC's have been traded to Edmonton and you can bet that at first they weren't exactly happy with the situation...Visnovsky comes to mind. He was hours away from having a NMC kicking into his contract when he got the trade call. I seem to recall his first interview as more of a "What the fuck L.A.? why?" than it was "I'm happy to be an Oiler today." Obviously he wasn't keen on the switch...and if he had the NMC active I bet 7 dollars he would have vetoed the trade as well. So to me the vetoing of the trade by Dany was more waiting to see what the other teams ON HIS LIST had to say, rather than it was about hating on the Oilers.

The Rumours of Duchebaggery and Dickheadishness:

Look. I don't give a fuck if Heatley is a complete asshole. Lots of hockey players are assholes. They get paid to play a sport, they're not always good people. In my books, they don't have to be all nicey nice when they bring something to the table like Heatley does. Duchebag or not...he scores goals and makes his linemates better. Cocksucker or not...he's a multiple time allstar and has rep'd Canada on the world stage many times. I don't care what kind of a person he is. I'm not even worried that "he'd be a cancer to the room"...cuz honestly...there might be some cancers in that room all ready. They're fuckin' hockey players, not babies. They don't need to be protected from the big, bad, mean superstar. Gimme a break. Teammates don't even have to be best friends off the ice. In fact, I would argue that some times it's best when they're not buddies off the ice...that means there's less of a chance for Baggedmilk type adventures (Read: hookers and blow).

In Summary:

I don't villify him for what's happened...I believe it all started from the Oilers not being on his list...then all of a sudden he/agent hear the Oilers have a good package...they give the go ahead to Murray to start negotiations with the Oil...thinking all the while it'll drive up interest from the team he really wants to go to (Rangers?) But all that ended up happening is that the Oilers had the most unbeatable offer and the Rangers, sensing defeat/dirty poker/them being played....said "fuck ur hat." Now we're here.

I don't pretend to think Heatley is a saint or even a good guy that I would have a beer with. But his record on the ice is proven and that is enough for me to feel that the Oilers should continue to court this guy...and for that I'm not boarding the "Hate Dany Heatley Bandwagon" just quite yet. The summer is young though...he may say something bad about Rusty or JSBM and then I'll have to throw down. Until then, I'm all for whatever it takes.

- Towel R. Boy III

Congratulations Oilersnation.com

2009-06-25T07:50:00.004-06:00

I would like to give a big huge internet high five to the fine folks over at Oilersnation.com for pimpin big.

In case you missed it, bingofuel and Gregor are movie stars now:

Not only did this small website have cool enough readership to send Gregor to Montreal to cover the draft, but they also raised a boatload of cash to go to the Stollery Children's Hospital. Way to go readers and Oilersnation peeps. Way. To. Go.

- TB

Dream With Me For A Second

2009-06-09T13:35:00.006-06:00

The photo above was taken from the future. It is a distant future. There's laser guns, flying cars, holograms on every corner and Dany Heatley is an Oiler. In what could be described as "the worst photoshop The Towel Boy has ever done" (above) you will see an accurate* artistic representation of this world and how it would look as Dany Heatley does his post goal flyby.

Flashback to the present:

Word came down today from the hockey megaverse central hive (tsn.ca) that Dany Heatley wants out of Ottawa. I don't blame him. That is one shitty team over the past couple of seasons. They went from balls out awesome to flat out titty-fucking awful over one offseason. Some of it was coaching, some of it was goaltending. I don't pretend to know why the Sens turned up the suck...maybe it was Jason Smith. But they did...and that's what lead up to the events of today.

Would Heatley want to be traded to the Oilers? I don't know...I don't even know if he has a say really. I don't think he has a no trade clause, so it would seem it's up the Brian Murray. It's not like the Oilers have been lights out the past couple of seasons either, when compared to the Sens, but here's why I think Dany Heatley would love to play for the Oilers:

1. I said so.

So there you have it. A solid argument as to why the Oilers should do everything in their power to package up a nice assortment of up-and-comers plus Rob Schremp to land Dany Heatley. Besides, it doesn't look much like Hossa is coming here this summer.

Now, back into my time machine! I was in the middle of watching the series finale of Big Brother coming up this summer when I decided to come back and post this.

*KERZZZZOOORK* poof.

Signed,

Past Towel Boy writing as Present Towel Boy with information from the Future Towel Boy

*not at all accurate, pretty shitty actually

The Two Headed Coaching Monster

2009-05-28T07:56:00.005-06:00

So, it's been a while since I've been in touch with the internet. I've been away from my desk working on a project most of this week. Now, imagine my surprise the other day when I get an email on my Blackberry from the Edmonton Oilers Pipeline informing me that there would be a press conference around lunch time. Imagine more of my surpise when I don't get that email until after I happened to be at home for lunch and TSN was reporting that the mighty Pat Quinn and Tom Renney would be appointed as the Edmonton Oilers' new Coach(es). Imagine even more of my surpise when I get an email from a buddy simply titled "DOOOOOOODE!" with the new coaching information nicely packaged within. Now imagine even more surprises when I get a text message from yet another buddy saying "What? No Towel Boy around today? Who saw this coming!?!" Now imagine you're in a large open field, with the wind gently blowing the tall grass causing it to sway slowly back and forth....woops...shit, sorry...we're done imagining now.

THIS SHIT IS REAL!!!

Yeah...so double you tee eff! "Two coaches!?" "Who the fuck saw this coming!?!" I scream to myself.

All of us interneteers that deal with the Oilers had our suspicions that Pat Quinn could possibly be named as Head Coach. We also had our suspicions that Tom Renney could possibly be named as Head Coach. But never and a brazillion years could any of us imagined that BOTH men would be named as coaches of our beloved hockey squadron.

The Mighty Pat Quinn will be the head honcho and Renney was named his "associate". Pretty sweet since I would have been happy with either man being named as any kind of coach for the team.

I really like this tandem of coaching awesomeness. Both men have excellent coaching records. Both men have shown abilities to lead teams to winning records. Both men are committed to icing a competitive product next season. With two coaches they can even pull the "good cop, bad cop" routine when needed. I'm so fuckin' PUMPED!

Now Tambo has the delightful duty of meeting with his new coaches and doing some roster tweaking over the summer. It'll be curious to see how the roster shakes out going into training camp this fall. Could this summer be any longer!?!? (what?...it's only May? ...fuck.)

Signed Impatiently Yours,

The Towel Boy

Ghost Town...

2009-05-25T09:46:00.001-06:00

Hastily Made Cleveland Tourism Video

2009-05-13T09:53:00.004-06:00

Huge Free Agency Signing

2009-05-12T15:30:00.010-06:00

My new home?

Soooo...word came down from my agent today that I signed a multi-year, multi-million dollar deal with Jeanshorts and Baggedmilk. I also hear that Admiral Rusty Shackleford has signed with the team as well.

This is good stuff. Those two fuckers over there at the JSBM Research Center and Child Day Care Home come up with some pretty crazy shit. They scour the internet and find the stupidest/lamest/weirdest/funniest/hotest/randomest shit the internet has to offer, add a Megan Fox picture or video and then open up discussions about it. Think of it as an internet town hall for filth and trash. Not only do they offer up the underbelly of the internet, they also are diehard Oiler fans and are hosts to the Oiler game night internet gathering of the Bonsignore Citizens Brigade...which is a good way to bitch about the game as it goes on with fellow fans who like to swear and talk about boobs. The best of all worlds really.

So...heads up internet citizens...this should be interesting.

Hahahahahahahahhaahhahahahahahahahahahahaha

2009-05-12T11:01:00.004-06:00

Soooo...the Canucks are done. Too bad. Where was your ALLSTAR goaltender last night Canucks fans!?? HUH!??

Luongo lets in 7 goals. In ONE game. Who saw this coming!?!

P.S. Vancouver fans: If you want to run your goalie out of town by all means direct him towards Edmonton. Kthanxbye.

2006 Cup Finals Rexall Place Scoreboard Intro Vid

2009-05-07T11:14:00.002-06:00

*wells up with tears of pride/joy/sadness*

My New Fave Beer Commercial

2009-05-06T21:25:00.005-06:00

Not sure why...but I find this ad for Lakeport beer absolutely fucking halarious. Good job advertising brainiacs. Good job.

The Blackberry Dude Is At It Again

2009-05-06T11:03:00.006-06:00

Seriously...who would stand in the way
of giving this guy a franchise?

I'll tell you who: Gary Bettman and the NHL Owners Club™. That's who.

For some reason Jim Balsillie doesn't like to play by the rules. Most billionaires don't. I can't say I blame him. If I could buy islands and small countries with the change in the ashtray of my Ferrari I'd probably have little regard for "the rules of society" as well.

But, the society of the NHL Owners Club™ is a tricky one to slither into. From all accounts it's a bit of an Old Boys Club...and in order to get in, you HAVE to play by their rules. They don't seem to enjoy flashy billionaires trying to circumvent the bureaucratic process, and Jim has tried to do just that on two previous occaisions.

So, we'll see how Canada's favorite billionaire makes out this time around. It sounds like courts would be involved and then there's the matter of whether or not a bankruptcy court has the authority to tell the NHL how to conduct its business. This could get ugly.

In related news...

Baggedmilk says the team will be called the Hamilton Storm...get it? Balsillie?...Research In Motion?...Blackberry?....STORM?....I must say, that is quite clever. I'm in.

Signed lovingly as always,

TowelBoy

Jaw-O-Mer Jaw-Ger

2009-05-01T13:09:00.004-06:00

Jagr's head on Gagner's body? Who saw this coming!?!

So, news is fluttering around the internet series of tubes and chutes the past couple of days about how much Jaromir Jagr would LOVE to play for the Edmonton Oilers. If, of course, he wasn't already under contract in the KHL... and they made him a good offer... and he didn't have to play a starring role....and if there was less contact in the NHL. All those minor tidbits aside, apparently he's just smitten with how much love the Oilers showed him a few months back in trying to woo him from his KHL team where he makes eleventy billion dollars a season, tax free.

I'm not sure where I stand on this whole deal. I know that Jagr was one of my favorite players when I was 13. I even have his rookie card in O-Pee-Chee Premier 90-91, in mint condition locked away in an acrylic card protector inside a climate controlled safe. Ok, that last bit about a climate controlled safe is a total lie, but the rest is true. That card was my pride and joy when I was 15 and it still is to this day. I take it out every now and then to remind myself of how awesomely rare it is. "Not everyone has a Jaromir Jagr rookie card in O-Pee-Chee Premier 90-91, in mint condition locked away in an acrylic card protector inside a climate controlled safe." I tell myselft when I look at it.

Gushing about sweet rookie cards aside, I think I'd be in with Jagr as an Oiler, providing they a) don't overpay his old ass. b) don't sign him to more than a year.

I suspect those two points will be the exact opposite of what he'll be looking for along with his ticket to E-Town...but hey....you never know. I sure could get used to seeing Jagr and Hemsky connecting like they have been at the IIHF Worlds this past week. If you missed it....Jagr has setup both of Hemsky's goals. I even watched the last game on a Czech feed and all I could make out was "czech czech czech Jagr czech czech czech Hemsky czech CCCCZZZZEEECCCHHHHH!!!" It was totally sweet.

Your friend,

The Towel Boy

Web Comic Interlude...

2009-04-29T09:05:00.002-06:00

Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

Thumbs Up

2009-04-28T07:35:00.002-06:00

President's Trophy winning Sharks...Done!

Flamers...DONE!

Best fucking day ever.

R.I.P. MacT

2009-04-15T14:01:00.003-06:00

Time To Stop Being Such A Grumpy Dumb Dumb

2009-04-13T22:10:00.008-06:00

Well. I see I haven't been exactly lighting up the internet airwaves of late. After the loss to the Kings I pretty much saw my will to care about hockey dwindle away from a raging inferno to a tiny spark. I guess having your team shit the bed and miss a post season appearance for the 3rd straight year will also do that to you. Just the idea of the final two Battles of Alberta meaning absolutely jack squat sucked the life straight out of me.

But, I'm still here and the Oilers are still a team in the NHL. As long as that criteria is met, I'll be writing something.

With that in mind, I thought it'd be a great idea to give incredibly short commentary on the final media availability comments for each of the players. Let's do that, shall we?

MacT - Looked/sounded/acted like he got kicked in the junk.
Hemsky - Confused.
Horcoff - Diplomatic - as always.
Moreau - Huge Pupil.
Staios - Worried.
Grebeshkov - Disappointed.
Gilbert - New Shoes.
O'Sullivan - "It was difficult."
Roloson - Positive...and old.
Reddox - 12 years old.
Macintyre - Happy just to be there.
Nilsson - I don't think he gets it.
Gagner - Sophmore slump OVER. No, for real - he gets it now.
Visnovsky - Healing. Loves his team.
Jacques - Wait...why did they interview him? Didn't he play like 7 games?
Strudwick - Happy just to be there.

Noteable Absenses - Souray, Stortini, Cogliano, Penner and Brodziak. Smid too!

I was pretty surprised to not hear anything from Souray...or his great hair.

Ok, that's all for now.

Towel Boy, out.

I'll Let Roy Tell You How I Feel

2009-04-07T23:41:00.005-06:00

A Snowball's Chance In Hell

2009-04-06T13:34:00.004-06:00

Things that have better chances of happening than the Oilers making the playoffs:

Me getting mauled in my own back yard by a Howler monkey.

The NHL decides to move the Phoenix Coyotes back to Winnipeg, writes a formal letter of appology to the fans and refunds 13 years of season ticket dollars to the Phoenix patrons who actually thought Hockey was "neat."

Sex Panther™ fragrance for men. 60% of the time, it works every the time.

Jeanshorts hooks up with Evanka Osmak.

Dwayne Roloson hat trick.

Tom Gilbert goes on a shopping trip and buys shoes that don't match his top.

Tavares decides hockey isn't for him and takes up professional lawn bowling.

Wanye Gretz switches from Bud Light to Big Bear.

I wake up one morning to discover my pillow is actually edible....so I skip breakfast.

MacT resigns or is "restructured" out of a job.

What I'm saying is, people...the Oilers are basically fucked. The sheer minute probability that 2 of the 4 teams in front of them in the playoff race blow it and the Oilers finish off the season with three wins is so miniscule I can't even describe it. But you didn't need me to tell you that. I just need to put something up on my blog to keep my editor happy.

Thanks for reading,

The Towel Boy

Stauffer Gets His PeePee Slapped

2009-04-03T08:09:00.007-06:00

So, I'm sitting at my buddie's place last night mostly losing at poker. I'm in an entire room full of Flames fans too, I might add. The TV showing the Oiler game is on in the background but there's no audio. No audio cuz they don't care about the Oilers like I do. They just want something manly on in the background while poker is being played.

So anyways, imagine my surprise when the game is over and I look up and see President of Whatever Operations, Kevin Lowe, speaking to the media in the place where MacT normally holds his post game presser.

With no audio I was left to my wild imagination to decipher what K Lowe could have possible been talking about. Many things flew through my brain. Did they fire MacT? Ok...that was the only thing I could come up with at the time.

So I covertly hopped on my blackberry and checked out Twitter...only to discover a tweet from Dan Tancer saying something about Bob Stauffer getting a text message from Bruce Wayne himself saying something to the effect of "MacTavish is going nowhere."

Ohhhhhhhhhh.....this was getting juicy, I said to myself...and then went ALL IN. It paid off big...I got the flush card on the river! The whole time I was raking in my freshly won pot, and chuckling at the demise of two of my opponents, I could only think of how pissed off DK must have been to take the time to slap Stuaffer's weiner.

I can sort of see Daryl Katz's anger. Imagine yourself as Daryl Katz. You're in your beautiful car, driving with your beautiful wife to the hallowed grounds that are Rexall Place; a place of worship which shares the namesake of your vast pharmacutical empire. Life is good. You turn on the Mark Levinson sound system in your whip and tune in to the radio station that covers your beloved hockey team. You want to hear pregame stuff that will give you insight as to how the forthcoming game is going to shake out.... stuff like which direction the zambonis went around the rink, who is in the lineup and who's out, comments from players and coaches on what will be needed to eek out a win....stuff like that . Fluffy things that make you feel excited to get to the rink get to watchin'. Only thing is...you don't hear that. You hear the guy you basically pay to cover your team raggin' on the coach and reporting his inevitable demise. You say to yourself..."Sweet merciful crap!" and you hop on your phone and fire off a short, but effective, text message to the guy talking trash about your coach. You can do that cuz you're Daryl fucking Katz.

Now, I'm sure Bob Stuaffer doesn't normally give a shit what anyone thinks of him or what he says....but I suspect there's one dude that can make Bob pucker, and that is The Man himself. And when The Man personally sends you a curt text message dispelling everything you just spent the last 10 minutes talking about. You go "oh....shit...boss is mad."

Now, I gotta say...I may not exactly think MacT is the coach of the Oilers' future. But I also have to say, I don't think we can do much better. I believe most of the issues this team has are with the on ice personnel. If I was to go along with firing MacT it would be because sometimes change is good, but I don't think Craig is a bad coach. This year didn't shake out as planned, but sometimes that happens. Jason Gregor over at Oilersnation.com has stated that he believes if MacT leaves, it will be because he resigns and not because he gets fired. I have to agree, especially now that I know where Katz stands.

Either way, it should make for an interesting summer. Either because of trades that will inevitably happen, or because MacT throws in the towel.

I have to say also, the season's not over yet...they're not mathematically out. I'm still hopin' and prayin. ...but I will admit...it doesn't look good. They did show good fire last night though. Good fire against the best team in the league and they almost got it. I'm sure Kotalik would like 3 or 4 of his scoring chances/posts back. Oh well. On to the next game.

Over and out,

Towel Boy

That Didn't Go As Planned

2009-04-01T10:33:00.006-06:00

Sooo...yaaa....right. ...I've got nothing much to say, except that they're not mathematically eliminated yet. But honestly...even a run of the table in the final games doesn't guarantee squat. So, while I don't like their odds...they're not completely done yet.

I will say this; I thought MacT looked like a hero for putting Zach Stortini out as the extra attacker when he pulled Rollie. That gamble paid off big time as Zach Attack made a sweet deflection to get the Oilers within one. Of all the players he could have chosen...he picked old Zack Attack. Speaks volumes for Stortini's play of late...and not so much for some other so called "talented" players.

...and then the stick measurement call happened...

While the timing for a bad outcome on that call wasn't the best, I believe MacT was 100% sure it was going to go their way, otherwise he wouldn't have made the call. He acted on what he thought was accurate information and it didn't work out. Shit happens. Neidermeyer even admitted after the game that Selanne's stick probably wasn't legal prior to the game and that he was "glad he took care of it before the game." It still doesn't take the sting away though.

Now it's on to the Sharks. That should be a guaranteed win. Right? I mean the Oilers are behind the 8 ball now. The collective hockey world has written them off. That's how they like it. This "come from behind when you're down and out" scenario is getting pretty old here in Oil Country. But whatever, I'm still in it for the long haul...I have to believe they can do it....what else can I do? I'm too much of a fan and will be until the bitter end.

Now, anyone have some glue? I've got some broken stuff I need to put back together.

Truly yours,

The Towel Boy

The Willingness To Get Your Hands Dirty

2009-03-31T10:15:00.003-06:00

Net Front Presents?

The image above is from the game the other night. Look at those netfront presents! It was one of the few times I recall during the game where the Oiler players actually drove to the net looking for garbage. Great work down low by Hemmer to shovel it out front, Horcoff got a rebound and tried to hammer it home. Players were shoved all over the place, people were flying into the crease and out of the crease...even Backstrom was shoved into his net from the sheer netfront presence in front of him. In short...the Oilers mucked it up in front of the net and almost got a puck in the net for it. It appears to be something that lacks on a consistent basis this year with my beloved squadron.

Penner seems to bee one of the few guys that actually stands in front of the net...mostly on the powerplay, mind you, and mostly because he is told to, but he's there! I was watching specifically the other night for the Oilers to employ something different in their offensive zone tactics. Most of the season they seem to think that carrying the puck in the zone and firing the puck around or thru the defender from the half boards, hoping for a rebound, is going to generate a lot of chances. Well, it mostly hasn't. Either the half board "skilled player"loses the puck and turns it over or the shot is never taken and the play ends up going the other way with nothing to show for it. The few times a shot does get thru, nobody is driving to the net to mop up...there's not traffic in front. It's very frustrating.

Another thing....there's very little retained puck possession in the offensive zone for what ever reason. Lack of willingness to compete along the boards? Players that think they can stick handle their way out of anything? A few cases of Individualitis which leads to lack of team play?A lack of desire to get their hands dirty? I don't know what it is but the majority of Oiler shots seem to come from the perimeter.

So, that being said? What do I want to see from the Oilers this evening vs. the Ducks? Well...throw some fucking hits for one. I wanna see more of JF Jaques hits that lead to Brodziak shots from high slot with Stortini's ugly mug right on top of the crease. That's the kind of shit I wanna see tonight. Play physical! I don't wanna see (insert skilled forward name here) skate thru the neutral zone, fake slap shot, button hook outside, attempt cross ice pass just inside zone and have the pass intercepted and give up an odd man rush the other way. I don't wanna see the shit. I see enough of it watching the Oilers lately.

I also wanna see more images like the picture up there. Bodies flying towards/in/out/on the net. I wanna see some gritty playoff hockey where one of our players would put a puck in with his teeth if it meant the Win. I wanna see the players look and play like they give a shit. I want them to give me a reason to cheer.

That brings me to my other rant...Yesterday Dan Tencer's blog had an audio clip mixing audio memories of the '06 cup run with interjected pleas of mercy from Gilbert, Grebs, Gags, Struds and Horc. They all wanted the fans to know that they need our support during the homestand. They want us to cheer loudly and not boo them. They want us to know that we give them motivation to play. Well for fuck sakes. I don't know why, but that rubbed me the wrong way. Especially when Horcoff said "fans don't realize...".... What the fuck do you mean Horcoff? We realize you're not exactly mopping the floor with your oposition lately. We realize you, Mr. Horcoff, are practically invisible during the game lately. We realize you wiff on shots and passes. We realize you are about to be the highest paid mook on the team next year. We realize lots. You need to realize that YOU need to play like you want it and the fans will get behind you. Until then, expect us to be skeptical of your abilities and desire to win games with whatever it takes. Give us a fucking reason to get behind you. God dammit.

Ok... Now, I'm willing to put this rant behind me tonight and ravage a case of Bud Light while watching the game. I'll cheer loudly and yell at my TV. I'll even support Horcoff and his bid to get motivated. I am a fan...always will be...always have been. I just don't like you questioning my ability to support the team, Mr. Horcoff. Now...go out there tonight and please play like you give a fuck. Give me a reason to be happy again.

Sincerely,

The Towel Boy

They Killed The Baby Ewoks

2009-03-27T07:31:00.002-06:00

Welp. Looks like the baby Ewoks died for nothing.

...They play the Ducks tonight....I've got nothing to say right now.

TB, out.

Oilers at Endor vs. The Evil Galactic Empire

2009-03-25T16:02:00.002-06:00

Allow me to nerd out for a moment...

If the Oiler season could be a story arc of sorts, and one could compare that story arc to one of the greatest double trilogies of all time - "Star Wars"....this would be the point of the story in "Return of the Jedi" where we await to see if Han Solo can successfully disable the shield generator on Endor...with the help of the Ewoks, of course.

It's the moment where you think all hope is lost. The empire has seemingly won. The Ewoks are dying. The sad music is playing. Luke is about to get his ass tazed by the Emperor. It's basically as shitty as you can think it can get. Much like where some think the Oilers are right now in their season.

But you know what? You know who had hope? You know who Mr. Positive was? It was Han's old buddy Lando. Lando Calrissian. Lando believed in his heart that Han would get that shield generator down. But there was another believer. That believer was a five year old me. I believed Lando was indeed correct and Han would get that generator down. Why? Cuz even though I was five...I knew the story would suck if Han didn't do his job. The baby Ewoks would have died for nothing. Even a five year old knows baby Ewoks dying for nothing doesn't make good cinema.

I look at this next game coming up in Phoenix tommorrow night as the battle on Endor for control of the shield generator. The shield generator is, of course, a playoff spot and the Oilers are Han Solo. The happy ending all hinges on whether or not they do their job. If they wanna blow up the Death Star (win the Cup)...they need to win this pivotal battle to get there. Han didn't let the baby Ewoks die for nothing and I hope the Oilers have the same morals. Come on Oilers, do it for the baby Ewoks. With their cute little black beady eyes and fluffy fur. Do it for them! Let's get that generator down so we can blow up that Death Star!

/end nerdness.

What does all this Star Wars talk at all have to do with the Dessert Dog up there? Absolutely nothing...but thanks for reading.

Your Pal,

The Towel Boy

Jedi Master

Oiler Cats vs. Red Wings...mrraawwr!

2009-03-24T06:34:00.001-06:00

How totally awesome is that picture? What would the world be like without google image search? Crazy to think there was a time where google image searching didn't exist.

Allow myself to start with an old joke...stop me if you've heard this...oh wait, you can't...read it, bitch! (That was a bit harsh...wasn't it?-ed.)

The Detroit Red Wings foreign scout flies to Baghdad to watch a young Iraqi play hockey in the new American sponsored league, and is suitably impressed and arranges for him to come over to the US .

Ken Holland signs him to a one year contract and the kid joins the team for the preseason.

Two weeks later the Wings are down 4-0 to the Blackhawks with only 10
minutes left. Mike Babcock gives the young Iraqi the nod and he goes in. The kid is a sensation - scores 5 goals in 10 minutes and wins the game for the Wings! The fans are delighted, the players and coaches are delighted, and the media love the new star.

When the player comes off the ice he phones his mom to tell her about his first day of NHL hockey. "Hello mom, guess what?" he says in an Iraqi accent.
"I played for 10 minutes today, we were 4-0 down, but I scored 5 goals and we won. Everybody loves me, the fans, the media, they all love me."

"Wonderful," says his mom, "Let me tell you about my day. Your father got shot in the street and robbed, your sister and I were ambushed, raped and beaten, and your brother has joined a gang of looters, and all while you were having such great time."

The young Iraqi is very upset. "What can I say mom, but I'm so sorry."

"Sorry? You're Sorry? !!" says his mom, "It's your fault we moved to Detroit in the first place!"

Now Click Here

There...now that we got that groaner out of the way....on to the more important things...liiiiike:

How the hell did we thrash the Avs and come out on top of the Hawks on our roadtrip, but couldn't score a damn goal in Minnie on Sunday? Man. I was hoping to go 2 for 3 on the trip, and I pegged the Hawks game for a loss and hoped for a win against the Wild. It's still the same amount of points earned in the standings...but at least my way the Oil would have stuck it to the Wild-who are chasing us in the standings, far too uncomfortably close I might add. Oh well. I guess it was still a pretty good road trip, all things considered. The Oilers are still in a death grip* of 7th place in the West.

The Redwings come into RX1 tonight. Not sure how I feel about that exactly. I do know the Oilers haven't faired well against the RougeWings this season. Let's see....4-0, 4-3, and 8-3....all losses for the mighty Oil. From a statistical standpoint it's fair to say, judging from the historical final score data noted prior, that the RedWings will likely score a number of goals evenly divisible by 2...and the Oilers will lose. That's what a statististishun would say**...but being that I have no knowledge of statistics and can only rely on my blind optimism as a hard core Oilers nut...I say the Oilers win this game tonight and stick it to the RedWings a la Cup Run 2006. The Oilers are in "Take no prisoners" mode and proved that prior games in the season series mean jack squat by beating the Blackhawks on Friday night...a team that, previous to the last game, had their way with the Oil.

I predict 4-2 Oilers.

GOILERS!

Towel Boy, out.

*perilously teetering on the brink of disaster

**no, probably not...you tool.

GOALA-GOALA-GOALA-GOALA-GOOOAAALLLL!!!!

2009-03-19T22:03:00.007-06:00

Sam Gagner:

3 Goals. 1 Assist. First career hatty. 8 points in the last 5 games.

Jesus H. Christ, that was AWESOME! What a great time to bust that sophmore slump.

I still don't really know what just happened...but I love it. Who saw this coming!?!

On to Chicago boys!!

Towel Boy

LET'S DOOOOOOOOO THIS!!!

2009-03-18T22:36:00.006-06:00

Hokay. The Oilers finally got that monkey off their backs and won a game in OT against the Blues. It was a badly needed win and so too was the extra point in the standings. I would have rather seen the Blues not get ANY points...but...whatever. I'll take it.

Great news! The Oilers head off on a gut check type of road trip with three games in four nights against the Avs, Hawks and Wild. There's even an awesome back to backer in there for good measure. Oh, and an afternoon game in Minnesota to sweeten the pot. Wait...how in the hell is this at all good news for the Oilers?

...yeah...I've got nothing either.

I just don't know how it's all gonna turn out...but I think the one game we SHOULD win for sure would be against the Avs. The Oil should be well rested and they actually won the last time they played in Colorado...oh, and the Avs suck. After that, it's a crap shoot. Chicago has had our number all season and, I'm too lazy to look it up, I can't remember the last time we won in Minnie...in an afternoon game none the less....so ..."yay" on that front.

Well...I've got no choice but to go into this with a "They can do it!" attitude and cheer them on in full force...with full beers. I'll do my part. Oilers, you better do yours!

GOILERS!

With love,

yoB lewoT

Patty O'sullivan and The Little People

2009-03-17T09:40:00.002-06:00

HAPPY ST. PATRICK O'SULLIVAN'S DAY!

GOILERS!

WINNERS FIND WAYS TO GET THE LOSER POINT

2009-03-16T09:02:00.010-06:00

K, so I'm sitting here trying to think of something positive to pry out of this sich-yay-shun the Oilers find themselves in of late. Let's take a look...

The Negatives:
The PP sucks. The PK sucks. Three straight OT losses. Hemsky isn't scoring. Teams that are far below us in the standings seem to find ways to beat us. It's friggin' cold and snowy in March. Life seems to suck right now in Oil Country.

The Positives:

OMG!!!1!! moment: I was staring at the standings waiting for something to jump out at me...and I quickly noticed the Oilers' startling inability to win in regulation has lead to the startling inability to win in OT as well. Eureeka! That's it! This is the positive I've been looking for! The wonderful LOSER POINT! Five points in our last 10 from just gettin' er to OT. Sweet baby jesus, whoda thought losing could somehow be a positive? The Oilers are still in a play off spot cuz of it. Another positve? The Wild, Ducks and Stars, whom the Oilers are in a dog fight with for a ticket to the dance, all have less points in their last 10 games. The other teams in the mix being, Nashville, Columbus and St. Louis have gathered more points in the last 10...but they're not running away with it either:

TEAM PTS PTS in L10

Vancouver 81 15

Columbus 78 12

Dallas 74 9

Edmonton 73 11

Nashville 73 15

St. Louis 72 14

Minnesota 72 7

Anaheim 70 9

Yes, due to pitty points, the Oilers have eeked out 11 points in their last 10 games. It's enough to stay in the mix, for now. Who saw this coming!?! By most standards this sort of record isn't great...mediocrity often isn't great by its very definition, but it could be much worse. We could be Minnesota. We could be Anaheim. We could even be Dallas. It would suck to be Dallas, but they have those sweet "Ice Girls". Only in Texas could they somehow find a way to make cheerleaders part of hockey. I love it. Moving on...

Anyways, yes the team has issues, no question. Maybe they'll make it, maybe they won't...but HOPEFULLY they can get their shit together real fast and hand it to St. Louis tomorrow night down at the Pharmacy. Enough of this mediocrity...get to the winnin' already...and DON'T GO TO OT!

I still think this smells like '06. Just sayin...

Love,

Towel Boy

Seriously...

2009-03-13T07:50:00.004-06:00

Marty Fucking Reasoner?

*places head in palm of hands...weeps uncontrollably*

Ilya Kovalchuk To Edmonton (E5)

2009-03-11T14:56:00.007-06:00

No lie. Ilya is coming to Edmonton tomorrow night. He's coming with his Atlanta Thrashers in tow to play a hockey match against the Mighty Oilers. I should mention here that he's coming in with his team on a 3 game winning streak and he's also coming in with 12 points in his last 5 games. Great. Just great.

Imagine the scene above, played out 45 to 50 plus times next season: The post goal bench flyby. Imagine your jubilation. Imagine your pride. Imagine Ilya Kovalchuk as an Edmonton Oiler.

*sigh...stares longinly into image dreaming of what could be*

Yes. I want to see Ilya Kovalchuk in Oiler silks next season. It's possible. He is a UFA next summer. If things go south, the Oilers will probably be looking to restructure their salary commitments somewhat and would likely love to find room for a Kovalchukian type of guy. I'm sure the Thrashers would love to resign him too and will probably do everything in their power to do so. Let's just hope Katz does a good sell job on him this summer and seals the deal with rides in his private jet, Rexall One.

I would like to think that if the Oilers strike out with Hossa this summer, they'll likely be looking to add a top gun of some sort to please fans like me who like flashy goal scorers. Ilya is exactly that: flashy, shiny, Russiany and goal scorey...ohh...to dream of what could be.

Oh that's fucking lame!

2009-03-10T20:09:00.002-06:00

What the fucking hell just happened?!?

I honestly thought the Oilers were gonna blow thru this game.

After two periods they Oil were massively out hustling, out shooting, out chancing, and generally out awesoming the Habs.

Then the 3rd period happened.

Then OT.

Then a penalty by the new kid.

Then...FUCK!

OILERS VS. HABS - ROUND 2

2009-03-10T08:23:00.009-06:00

The Oilers can't let this business about Bob Gainey stepping behind the bench get into their heads when they visit the Bell Centre tonight. MacT should pay no attention either...no for real...he's safe. Right?

For the second time in three seasons, Bob's back. He decided that the shit show Carbo has been running isn't good enough to guarantee a playoff birth this spring. I guess he thinks he can do better. I guess the pressure is on to make the dance in the 100th season of the Habs.

I don't know, maybe he can make it happen. Maybe Guy just quit. Maybe the players quit on Guy. All I know is that coach firings are anyone's guess as to how the team will respond. My guess is they'll come out swinging. But like I said...the Oilers can't let this business of Gainey taking over interfere with THEIR compete level. They need to bring it.

This is the same team that the Oilers mopped the floor with about a month ago putting up a nice healthy 7-2 win. The Oilers need to channel those memories into this evening's affair and continue the moppage of the Habs in the season series. The Oilers need wins badly if they want to make the post season. Both teams have something to prove in that regard, so it should be a feisty affair.

Sounds like B.D.P. (Big Dustin Penner) sits tonight and Row-bert Neelson will draw back into the lineup after sitting and watching from the rafters for four games. MacT says he can't wait anymore for BDP to get his shit together and, with Bobby heading back in the lineup, there's no room with the newly added depth for everyone. So BDP sits.

There's a good back and fourth started by Jonathan Willis over at Oilersnation.com about the surprising merits of BDP on the top line. It's a good read. It pretty much boils down to "yeah, BDP isn't the fastest moving guy, he's not the skinniest, and he's not the biggest producer...but he's probably the best option on the top line given what else we've got." Who saw that coming!?!

Current odds out there on the internets have the Oilers at a 55.2% chance of making the playoffs. It could go up as high as 70% after tonight if the following longshot happens:

The Oilers win.
The Caps beat the Preds.
The B's beat the BJ's.
The Sharks beat the Wild.
The Blues beat the Stars.

So yeah...if those five events take place tonight. Big gains in the Odds tonight. Yeah, I know...good luck right? Yah. Nothing better than relying on other teams to improve your playoff hopes.

On a side note: I wouldn't be too disappointed if somebody decided to cream Plekanic tonight...if you recall it was he who decided to be a dirty shithead and sloughfoot Grebs into the end boards in their meeting at RX1 last month.

Eneh-wayse...

GOILERS!

Sincerely,

Robert R. TowelBoy

HNIC Prime Time vs. The Leaf Blowers

2009-03-07T13:49:00.003-07:00

Hockey Night In Canada. The first game of the Saturday night double header is versus the Leafs with a tight playoff race on the line.

It doesn't get any bigger than this. ...Until next game. But for now, this is huge.

The Oilers showed up in the "Nation's Capital" on Thursday and proceeded to bring the suck. The new parts acquired at the deadline looked tired and the team didn't seem to have any umph. Gagner played a pretty good game all by himself. Everyone else took the night off.

Moving forward to this evening, I expect an up tempo, physical game from the Oilers. I expect the Leafs to suck. I expect Hemsky, Horcoff and Souray to find the score sheet finally after quite a number of games of being fairly invisible. I expect hits, forechecks, backchecks, passes and goals. I expect good hockey. I expect explosions, lasers, fog, holograms and face melting guitar solos too.

Ok Oilers and Leafs...Entertain me.

Lovingly yours,

The Towel Boy

Well for fuck sakes

2009-03-06T08:53:00.004-07:00

Twelve seconds into the game last night I knew I was about to witness a piece of shit hockey game.

I don't know what it is with the Oilers these days, but these so called "must win" games down the stretch here don't look like much of a big deal to most of the team.

Lazy plays, lazy players, indifferent looking superstars and all around general bone headed plays are killing this team lately. A complete lack of effort on the part of some players.

I wanna see some god damned PLAYOFF INTENSITY FROM HERE ON OUT! DAMMIT!

The kind of intensity that people lose 5 teeth from an errant clearing attempt and come back after getting a few stitches to set up the game winner. The kind of intensity that causes your Captain to play with dislocated shoulders. The kind of intensity that causes pucks to enter the opposition's net by sheer fear. The kind of intensity that takes you deep into the playoffs.

Leave it all out on the ice type of shit.

Rollie seems to be the only player that is consistently playing at this level lately. The rest of the team seems to be invisible one game and there the next. Except for Sam Gagner over the past few games. Quite solid.

Gagner played his wee little heart out again last night. He was all over the ice. Banging, crashing, scoring, passing, preparing donairs for Penner and generally being the little buzz saw we hoped he'd be out of the gates this season.

MacT didn't sound terribly impressed with most of his defensive core in the post game comments last night. In fact, it was probably one of the few times this season where he didn't try and spin the game to sound like it was better than it was. There was no "Well, I thought we played good, we got a lot of good looks at the net." There was no "The score wasn't indicative of how well we played." No...just MacT calling out his defense and looking generally pissed off at most of his team.

GOOD! Now maybe something will happen to kickstart this team into playoff mode.

One can only hope.

Towel Boy, out.

Trade Deadline Day Hangover

2009-03-05T08:21:00.014-07:00

oooohhhhh...my head hurts.

Ok. So the trade deadline came and went. It looked like it was shaping up to be a deadline where the Oiler brass would sit on their hands and not get anything done. I had my fire and venom blog almost completely written when about 20 minutes after the deadline passed, word came down that the Oilers had possibly made a trade.

I says "Pardon?"

*deletes venomous blog*

With my ears glued to the Tradecenter broadcast from TSN I impatiently waited, for what seemed like an eternity, to find out what the hell the Oilers had actually done. News slowly started to trickle in...and It was confusing.

"The Oilers have completed a trade with Carolina" was the first word we received.

...oookkk.... Robin Brownlee over at Oilersnation.com had mentioned a couple weeks ago that if the Oilers traded Erik Cole, Carolina would probably be their dance partner.

"The Oilers have traded with Carolina, for Patrick O'sullivan" was the second words we received.

.....oookkk.... But O'sullivan doesn't play for them. What the fuck TSN? Gord Miller, are you on the sauce again?

"Ok, the Kings have made a deal with Carolina for Justin Williams for Patrick O'sullivan."

...oooKKK!....It became clear, at that point, that the Oilers, Kings and Hurricanes got down and dirty with some raunchy 3 way action!

Sweet!

But wait...what'd we give up? Not Erik Cole...Not Erik Cole...NOT ERICK COLE........fuck...it was Erik Cole.

I liked Cole. I thought he was just starting to hit his stride with the team. He was looking good over the past few weeks and had a helluva game in Nashville the other night. But in this crazy,

salary capped NHL, it all comes down to asset management and with Cole being a UFA this summer, Tambo couldn't risk the chance that Cole would walk and the Oilers would be left with nothing but a nice parting handshake. So, I GUESS...from that standpoint, the deal is alright. We also got a 2nd round pick in the deal. Not bad. Not bad at all.

But wait...what was this? ANOTHER deal had happened with the Mighty Oil? Jesus guys, it's like 30 minutes past the deadline? I waited impatiently once again to find out what the hell happened.

Turns out Tambo struck a deal with the Sabres to bring Ales Kotalik over for a 2nd round pick. Ohhhhhhhhh....but wait........I thought the Sabres brass absolutely hated everything about the Oilers and would do anything in their powers to fuck us over cuz of the whole "Vanek Offer" sheet debacle in the summer of '07. I guess they burried the hatchet, or simply wanted to do the deal cuz they needed to shed salary from roster to give some breathing room after the Tim Conolly extension they inked earlier in the day - plus they wouldn't have to deal with Kevin Lowe. Either that, or Tambo is a smooth operator and had Darcy Regier eating out of the palm of his hands. I like to think the the latter. Honestly - WHO SAW THIS COMING!?!

Wow, guys, sexy pictures. I hope you play hockey like you look in pictures.

So far, this season is like shades of ‘06. The team is kinda floundering, hovering around the last playoff spot. People are calling for MacT’s head on a plate. The team is maybe somewhat lost in the weeds, some players aren’t playing up to their contracts… and then the trade deadline comes along. We pick up some somewhat fringe players that are kinda noteworthy, but not superstars, basically throw some duct tape on the roster and head on down the stretch. All of a sudden the playoffs arrive and our team is playing the best hockey we’ve seen them play in years and voila…SCF.

Let's hope history has a way of repeating itself.

Towel Boy signing off from the TBHQ Tradecenter HQ Headquarters Center and Conference Center, Toronto

Ohhhhh MAN!

2009-03-04T07:41:00.004-07:00

Trade deadline day! W00t w00T!

I just don't know what the Oilers are gonna do today. I'd like to think Bobby Nilsson is gonna have a new address after today...but I just don't know what Tamb-lowe-lini are gonna do today.

*crosses fingers for something good*

TB, out.

I should just shut my cake hole...

2009-03-03T21:03:00.008-07:00

Ok, so my powers of prognostication need a little work. I did NOT see this coming!

I thought I had this one pegged and in the bag. Seriously. I was so sure that the vision I saw while taking my morning shit was the front page of the Edmonton Journal for tomorrow and I could have sworn the headline read "Hemsky, Hero in Nashville!"

I guess it was "zero"...not "hero".

Honestly...where was the kid tonight? Wow. Everytime he touched the puck it was a turnover or a botched stick handling move. Not cool.

Now the Preds are tied with us in the standings. FUCK!

Poo, Sam and Cole played a stellar game though. Gotta love that.

But man, was I wrong. Wrong wrong wrong.

At least we got a point...right?

...whatever...and to think that I spent 3 days making that cool AVP photoshop thingy too....gah.

Love,

The Towel Boy (aka Sylvia Browne...send me money and I'll let you talk to your dead aunt)

AVP - Ales Vs. Predators

2009-03-03T11:08:00.004-07:00

Big game tonight.

Huge.

Collossal interstellar battle. Good vs. Evil. Ales vs. Predators.

The preds currently sit one big comfy point behind us in the log jammed Western Conference standings. This is yet another one of those proverbial "4 point" games.

The Oilers appear to be floundering somewhat of late. They haven't put forth a solid full 60 minute effort in...well...I'm too lazy to remember. What I can remember off the top of my head is that they got lucky against Minnie last Saturday and had Rollie steal the show, they laid up a stinker against the BJ's and almost had Rollie steal the show, they got lucky against the Bolts and got an empty netter to make the score look much better than it actually was and of course they blew a 3rd period lead with just over a minute to go against the Flames - only to blow the shootout with ZERO shots on net. ZERO. The SHOOTOUT. Skater + Goalie + Puck. ZZZZzzero shots.

Anyways, I think the Oilers are gonna win tonight. 4-2. Hemmer with the strong game. We need a big game out of Hemmer. I think he's gonna bring it. He seems to like the road games.

Towel Boy

R-O-L-A-I-D-S spells "OILERS WIN"

2009-03-01T22:13:00.013-07:00

With my pilgrimage complete I arrived home somewhat road weary, but relieved. Afterall, I had just travelled thousands of kilometers over land and sea to catch the Mighty Oil win a game in person.

After unloading the dog sled, the kid, the wife, the luggage and the 543 flat pack boxes from IKEA, I settled back into my Oilers themed PJ's and Housecoat and went down to the 5th subterranian layer of TBHQ and sat down to watch the game that I had just attended only 24 hours earlier.

Why? Cuz I wanted to see if I could find myself on TV mostly. I could see the back of my head on TV...AND I made it on the Jumbotron during the game too...thanks, mostly, to my fake boobs.

I also wanted to PVR the game cuz when you view a game in person you miss all those little nuances that make a TV broadcast from CBC such a delight. Nuances like Scott Oake fumbling with preamble for 139 seconds to ask a one liner question and the likes of Mark n' Marc fumbling with player's names and also their illfated attempts to call the play. "Dwayne Rolofson" anyone? Straight up quality broadcasting is what I'm all about.

What a game I was at!!! Well, alright, the win was a nice touch but there were some issues and/or points of concern:

Sam Gagner can't buy a goal and is in real danger of losing the scoring race with Zack Stortini. I believe Zack has cut Sam's lead in half now. 6 for Sam. 5 for Zack. *shakes head* Sam had some nice looks at the net though and almost sneaked in a nice backhand off the rush.
Three shots on goal in the third had me looking for a beer vendor that would sell me a Nyquil chaser for my beer to help calm me down.
Dustin Penner looked like he was wearing a parachute out there. I guess MacT saw it too, cuz it didn't take him long to slap The Red Ox on the top line
Can Rollie honestly play every game from here to the end? He did look pretty good out there though.
17 minutes during intermission isn't enough time to get out of your seat, line up to get out of the seating area, find a bathroom, relieve yourself, wash your hands, go to a food vendor, stand in line, wait, keep standing in line, wait some more, order your food and beer, wait some more, show your ID to the 19 year old kid working the counter, get your food, slap some condiments on it and run back to your seat. I missed Zack's sweet snipe cuz of that. I had to watch it from the stairwell. :(
I hope Moreau's eye isn't permanently damaged. It didn't look good. A guy like Moreau would play with missing limbs and when you see him squirming on the ice in pain...you know it's bad.
Sitting in front of two doctors and having to listen to them debate the pros and cons about buying either a Lotus, a Maseratti or an Aston Martin all while the play is going on can be somewhat trying. They also had a nice convo about the winter cars they've had and which ones were better: the Hummer, the Range Rover or the Porche Cayenne. *rolls eyes*

In all, I think the Oilers played a good physical, hard nosed game for about half of the game. The other half they were on their heels and let the Wild take the play to them. They owe this win to Rollie though...the old man's a gamer. I liked a bit of what I saw in terms of effort but a complete 60 minutes is going to be required from here on out...from every player. Nobody can be allowed to take even one shift off. Not even the nice usher lady in section 120...yeah...you remember now lady? Remember letting me down into the club section without checking my ticket? Yah...that kinda stuff won't fly coming down the stretch. Shape up or ship out.

TB, out

The Pilgrimage

2009-02-27T21:10:00.003-07:00

The Towel Boy is set to embark on a long journey of self discovery and enlightenment...a pilgrimage of sorts.

To borrow from Wikipedia:

In religion and spirituality, a pilgrimage is a long journey or search of great
moral significance. Sometimes, it is a journey to a sacred place or shrine of
importance to a person's beliefs and faith. Members of many major religions
participate in pilgrimages. A person who makes such a journey is called a
pilgrim.

Pilgrims? HA! How bout "suckers"! At least that's how I feel driving a couple of hours to plop my ass down in a solid gold encrusted seat in the lower bowl of RX1 tomorrow night.

Truth be told, I got free tix and dinner off a salesperson I do business with and if it wasn't for that...there's no WAY I'd make the journey to Edmonton. There's no way in hell i'd be crossing the frozen tundra of Alberta to see this shitanus™ team limp into their own building and pretend to play hockey.

I'm mad as hell and I'm gonna be sitting in section 121 to let the people around me know it.

The Oilers better fucking show up...cuz I am.

Angrily yours,

Towel Boy ver. 2.105

BJ's 1 - Oilers 0

2009-02-27T08:34:00.007-07:00

What was that shitshow the Oilers laid out at RX1 last night?

Seriously. That was the worst game I've watched in a long time.

Pretty awful showing for such an important "playoff atmosphere" type of game with everything on the line.

It was a nasty mixed up assignment on the Torres goal. Gagner was covering high for Gilbert and then on the way back up ice they both decided to take the left wing and forgot about the right side all together....leaving Torres, of all people, wide open. *sighs heavily*

I think it's time to do some housecleaning.

FMNF!

The Towel Boy

I'm coming for you...

2009-02-25T23:03:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago a certain founding member of Oilersnation.com that goes by the name "Wanye Gretz" decided he'd like to start a little friendly fantasy salary cap pool at thesportingnews.com.

I enjoy a good friendly contest of intellect and jump at any opportunity to show off my cerebral bulk...but this was all that he could come up with, so I joined. I created my team over the course of many days using complex mathematical formulae and in depth statistical analysis to come up with the ultimate in fantasy draft teamery.

Turns out I forgot to carry a one and got off to a rocky start. BUT! I've made certain corrections and have slowly been creeping my way up the standings with one goal in mind:

And that is to take down Wanye Gretz's - Lord Sexington's Steeds.

Oh yes, the good "lord" is gonna get some...and soon. As you can see in the picture below, I currently sit one spot below Mr. Gretz.

Well Mr. Gretz. I'm here today to tell you that you better keep your head on a swivel buddy...cuz the PAIN TRAIN is coming. What's that? You only got 14 points last night?...to my 181!?! Yeah...that's what I thought.

Volley to you, dear Sir.

Signed,

Gen. Winston J. Towelboy, Supreme Allied Commander - European Campaign

They did it!!!

2009-02-25T08:12:00.005-07:00

The Oilers beat the Lightning. A team well below them in the standings. They did it in their own barn to boot.

Wow. Just wow.

Who saw this coming!?!

The Oilers looked much better last night except for the lousy power play. What the hell was with that PP last night? Brutal. There was one PP where they almost looked good and snapped it around and made three cross seam passes in about a four second span, that was pretty exciting. They controlled the play for the pretty much the full two minutes...but couldn't pot the goal.

And what the hell is up with Cory Murphy scoring two goals on us? The guy comes in with like 2 or 3 all season...and gets TWO!...whatever.

Oh well. A win is a win and good lord did the Oilers need one.

Now it's on to the BJ's!

...that'd be the Blue Jackets.

TB

A storm's a brewin'...Lightning strikes RX1

2009-02-23T20:29:00.003-07:00

For the second straight year the Tampa Bay Lightning are hovering around the bottom of the standings, as noted in fig. 1-a titled "The Bottom Feeders" below.

They aren't bringing the suck like the Islanders are...but the Lightning are not bolting up the standings either (get it? BOLTing!...OMG!...so brilliant).

The Bolts got off to a rocky start: They fired their coach after 10 games, they have the 1st overall draft pick in Stamkos and he isn't going all "Crosby or Ovechkin" on the stats sheet in his first year, they've had goaltending issues, player issues, Lecavalier to Montreal trade rumour issues and their owner is the co-creator of the "Saw" series of movies. Let's face it, the first Saw was cool cuz it was different...but what are we at...Saw V now? Come on. Enough already. I swear to christ - Saw VI will go straight to DVD - book it. Enough with the same re-hashed story of clever ways to die and enough with the god damned roman numerals. ......now where was I?...oh right...Les Boltes. What's with this team? Why were they so dominant for a few years and then all of a sudden: crap city. I don't know. Why would I? I'm just a stupid Oilers fan....blind to all other teams and the Copper and Blue can do no wrong. Long live MacT! The conspiracy theorist in me would speculate that the Lightning tanked last season to get Stamkos to generate some much needed buzz for the new owner. But that same inner conspiracy nut would also say my Digital TV converter box has a camera and micorophone built in to watch my every move so I wouldn't necessarily buy what I'm selling.

Eneh-wayse, this brings me to the point of all this preamble:

THE OILERS ARE FUCKED.

"Why?" you ask. Allow myself to elaborate.

Normally the prospect of a team that currently sits 11 points back of your team in the overall standings would be just cause for early celebrations and jubilation that would allow one to look past this game and, instead, worry about the prospect of eeking out a win against the Blue Jackets on Thursday. Unfortunately, as a fan of the Edmonton Oilers, the easy win is not always so easy and thus is cause for great concern.

So far this season the Oilers have blown "easy" wins against sickly teams with winning issues like the Leafs and the Sens. Teams that, you may note, are included in fig. 1-a titled "The Bottom Feeders" above. For some reason teams limping in to RX1 have a history of walking out feeling pretty damn good about themselves. Happy that they've "turned the corner" thanks to the Mighty Oil. If a player hasn't scored in 10, or has zero points in the last 15, or a team has won 2 of their last 12 you can bet the Oil will be there for them to help bust that slump. This is not to say that the Lightning are currently slumping...but they certainly have more losses than they do wins....which, in my estimation, doesn't bode well for the home team.

For some reason the Oilers haven't stacked up well against the Lightning over the past few seasons either. Here's the breakdown:

Jan 22, 2008 @ Tampa Bay: 3-4 L
Mar 7, 2007 @ Edmonton: 3-1 L
Jan 22, 2004 @ Edmonton: 3-2 L

[sarcasm]Yayyyyyy. Three straight losses. Alright! Yah! ...s'awsome![/sarcasm]

The '04 loss can be excused, cuz if memory serves me correct, the '04 Lightning were a pretty kickass/president trophy winning team that took it to those cowpokes down south and walked away with Lord Stanley's Mug. The Oilers of that same year took the usual route of a mediocre season with a strong finish only to end up barely missing the playoffs by 2 points. Such is life in Oil Country.

It looks like the Oilers are heading for that same path we've all grown to love every year: Outside, looking in with a little over 20 games to go, with 3 other teams around the same number of points vying for the last two spots. I know what you're thinking...who saw this coming!?! right? Who could have seen that the Oilers would be desperately looking for W's against so called "lesser teams" in late February. Who coulda seen it?!? Let's just hope they Oilers pull a fast one on me and blow the Bolts out of the water. The Oil need a win badly. Four game losing streaks suck hard. Real hard.

Depressingly and grumpily yours,

Towel Boy

Hockey Day In Canada - Sheep lovers invade RX1.

2009-02-21T11:25:00.006-07:00

Those sheep lovin' cowboys from down south are invading the Holy Ground at RX1 tonight.

The Oilers better get their poop in a group this evening and put up a big W, cuz they need it. A three game losing streak wouldn't be a good way to stay in the playoff hunt.

GOILERS!

Rick Rolled

2009-02-19T21:25:00.003-07:00

Dallas 4....Oilers 2.

Who saw this .... ahhhhh fuckit.

I'll blog later when my rage level has decreased.

Rocket Stortini

2009-02-18T10:14:00.001-07:00

Zachery Stortini appears to be on a mission of late:

A mission to score more goals than Sam Gagner.

Check these stats...

Sam Gagner #89

Season	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PP	SH	GW	S	S%
2008-2009	51	6

Average TOI: 16:56

Zack Stortini #46

Season	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PP	SH	GW	S	S%
2008-2009	37	4

Average TOI: 6:56

What in Sweet Zeus's Underpants!?!...Zack has 4 goals to Gagner's 6, while playing 14 fewer games and averaging 10 minutes less TOI per game. Am I reading this correct? Doth mine eyes deceivith me...eth?

Ummm....who saw this coming?!?

I understand that Gagner has put up more points than Zack...a lot more points....but goals is what this narrow minded and one sided article has focused on.

Sam is a play maker, so it stands to reason he's going to score less goals than your average sniper. I get that. But to have only 2 more than your team's limited minute huggy bear? That's the worst thing imaginable. Especially for someone of Gagner's draft position and hockey pedigree.

Perhaps this is the push that Sammy needs to start finishing some of his chances down the stretch. It already appears lately that Sam has taken a page from the gameplay manual of one Zachery Johnson Howard Stortini:

1. Crash net with wreckless abandon. Check!
2. Fight. Check!
3. Dig puck out of corners and cycle deep...maintain solid forecheck. Check!
4. Grow 5 o'clock shadow at 9:30 AM. Ok, gotta work on that.
5. Use "well umm" and "uhhh" and "errr" multiple times in TV interviews. Not Required.

Now, there's nothing wrong with a little healthy competition amongst teammates...So it should translate well down the stretch for both players to keep this little goal scoring race going. I just deep down inside hope Zack doesn't surpass Gagner in goals...cuz Sam's Sophmore Jinxed psyche doesn't need that kick to the ball sack.

The Towel Boy...CBC News.......Edmonton.

Swedish Meatballs

2009-02-15T12:50:00.011-07:00

A couple months back, Jonathan Willis over at Oilersnation.com posted a little blurb about a Swedish Edmonton Oilers prospect by the name of Linus Omark (I'm sure there's Swedish accent thingies in his name somewhere - like they have on Ikea furniture names...but I can't find them on my keyboard). In this little article by Willis he outlined a few points about this relatively unknown player trying to make his way in the Swedish Elite League. The article is interesting and words are good...but what I zeroed in on was the youtube video Willis embedded in his article:

Pretty slick there Cowboy.

You: B.F.D. Towel Boy...why is this news? Willis showed me this 2 months ago.

Me: Hey look, a bird!!

Moving on...
I was looking at the pictures in the Edmonton Journal today and I couldn't help but read the title of a particular article entitled "Prospect Dazzles". After failing to see more pictures that would reveal to me the point of this article...I had someone read it to me and discovered the article in question was about Linus Omark. Apparently in a recent hockey match in the Swedish Elite League, Mr. Omark dazzled again...scoring a goal with the old cut-across-net-put-puck-between-legs-move-and-roof-puck-over-goalie-just-under-crossbar move. See moving picture box below:

Unnamed Swedish Goalie, you siv. You shoulda saw that coming.

Now, this move isn't anything super special. Many players have done it in all sorts of skill competitions all over the world. Hell, even the Towel Boy himself can do it...as long as there is no goalie, no defenders nearby, not during an actual competitive game and hitting the net is optional. What makes this little move so sweet is that it happened in an actual game. On an actual goalie. In an actual net. Against actual players. As far as I know, the SEL is no slouch in terms of competition either, which only adds to the growing youtube legend that is Linus Omark. Did I mention he leads the SEL in points? Good work kid.

I just hope his youtube legend doesn't over hype the hell out of him like another Oiler prospect. A certain player who's name rhymes with ROB SCHREMP.

*crosses fingers*

Signed,

Handduk Pojke

Sam "Raging Bull" Gagner

2009-02-14T18:50:00.007-07:00

Wow.

Ok, so this afternoon the Oilers and the Kings met in L.A. to fight and call each other names, and a game of hockey broke out.

In a game filled with 3 fighting majors, a nice array of minor penalties and some awesome hits from both sides it was clear that Sam Gagner would have to step in and chuck some knuckles to settle this thing down. Who saw this coming?!?

That's right...Sam Friggin' Gagner dropped his tiny gloves with Jack Johnson this afternoon and stood up for himself after a net crashin' post whistle scrum.

Both players landed some decent shots and tagged each other in the final blows. After it was all over Gags had a bloody nose and my respect to show for his efforts (which is huge...cuz I'm kind of a big deal). It doesn't matter who won or lost, what matters is that Sam Friggin' Gagner dropped the gloves. My wee Little Sammy.

*tear of pride rolls down cheek*

Math Time:
Interesting statistic (Jonathan Willis, take note) - this was Sam Gagner's 2nd career NHL fight.

The following graph will analyze Gagner's number of fights and the distribution of the months in which they occured:

That's right! Both of Sam Gagner's NHL fights have occured in month of February. Who saw that coming?!? February 16th, 2008 and Today to be exact.

Maybe Sam's got lady troubles and the general region of Valentine's Day (tm) sends him into a week long, angry, alcohol fueled fit of rage where he would fight his own mother if she was within swinging distance.

Either way...I've got my calendar marked for mid February, 2010 for Sam's next tilt. Can't wait!

Yours truly,

Winston J. Towel Boy IV - esq.

WSTC: 1 - Welcome To Awesometown!

2009-02-09T19:28:00.006-07:00

Montreal at Edmonton:

So...the Bleu, Blanc et Rouge decided to come out west for once and visit us gun waving rednecks. Really, you should have seen this coming...cuz it was on the schedule since September...but what you didn't see coming was the complete spanking the Oilers laid down on the Habs. 7 - 2. Sweet sassy goodness that was awesome.

This home win makes up for 1 of the 3 blowouts the Oilers have been on the receiving end of so far this season. Hopefully this win was the result of good play by the Oilers and not simply that the Habs are in the worst losing skid in franchise history (possible exaggeration...really I'm too lazy to look it up), coupled with players that seemingly aren't motivated, coupled with "superstars" that are invisible, coupled with a goalie that couldn't stop a tree from moving. Hopefully this win was actually good, hard nosed play by the Mighty Oil and that was simply why they looked to be the better team. When we lay the smack down to a NW team ahead of us in the standings...I'll be a true re-believer.

Sean Avery:

It looks like our favorite mouthpiece has gotten himself a ticket to the minors. Who saw this coming?!? The Dallas Stars pretty much said "fuck no" to any future involvement with him and so did the 29 other teams in the NHL...I guess they weren't into sloppy seconds. So it's off to the minors for Avery.

I really do hope he gets his game straight and makes it back in the NHL...cuz he is a decent player and is very good at his job: and that is being a fucktard. It sounds like he will make it back into the big show sooner than later with the Rangers being his new stage from which to profess his douchery, as the Stars approached the Rangers to see if their AHL affiliate, Hartford Wolfpack, would be interested in housing him for the time being. It's believed the Rangers would then pick him up on re-entry waivers for half of the bone headed salary Avery is making.

Until then, gone are Avery's days of taking down celeberty babes and ex supermodels...the tail in the minors isn't as refined. Here's an example of the puck bunnies that frequent the post game hot spots in Hartford:

Yeah...that's hot.

Your pal,

Every start has its beginning.

2009-02-07T23:07:00.001-07:00

Now that I've blown your mind with that clever title...read on.

I'm an Edmonton Oilers fan and here's my plan:

As a regular contributor of inane babble and seemingly incoherrent ramblings in the comment sections of the most excellent Oilersnation.com, I've become extremely jealous of the contributors to that site and other excellent Oilers related blogs in the blogosphere of the Mighty Oil. I see them strutting around the internets with their diamond earrings, fur coats, ferraris and, of course, the multitude of willing and able ladies. This has made me draw the conclusion that blogging = fame and fortune and I must act quickly and decisively if I want my cut.

So, that being said...

Each week* or so I plan on discussing** certain aspects of my beloved ice hockey syndicate: The Edmonton Oilers. The plan is to highlight stuff you didn't see coming...and laugh at you for not seeing it coming. I appologize in advance, but really...it's not my fault you don't regularly read Oilersnation and thus did not see it coming. I also want to include happenings and surprise oddities of the NHL in general as well***.

So, that being said...

Who saw that coming?!?

TB, out.

*could possibly be monthly, quarterly or whenever the fuck I get around to it.
**rambling without structure, general prose or good grammar.
***or not, who knows.