Offensive frustration is building in multiple places around town. Thank you for your continued patronage.
Author: McClure
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The Long Kiss Goodnight Is A Christmas Movie – Hawks vs Rangers, Habs, Leafs Preview
So after a weekend where the Hawks did a little better than expected with a surprise win against the Caps in Washington for the first time in the smartphone era, they’ll return home tonight for a quick stop off before heading back east again into Canada for the Habs and Leafs over the weekend. And all the problems that the Hawks have had still remain, such as not being able to score like AT ALL, and as a result they can’t win in regulation, but at this point they’ll take the victories any way they can get them. Five of the Hawks 9 total wins have come in OT or the shootout, but after the way things started, going to extra time against eastern conference opponents on the road isn’t the worst thing by a LONG shot.
What’s been the story and has been emphasized on this road trip is the Hawks newfound commitment to shot suppression under Derek King, or more than likely, Marc Crawford’s shadow regime. In the month since they have taken over, the Hawks are allowing the third fewest high danger chances in the league, and are solidly in the middle of the pack with regard to overall chances and shots allowed per 60 minutes of 5v5 hockey. Combining that with Fleury’s .956 at evens during that time, and they’re at least giving themselves a chance. In the first month of the season, Fleury allowed 13 high danger goals, since he’s allowed 3. All of these numbers paint a picture of a team that is playing with a lot more structure in its own end. It truly is the goddamnedest thing isn’t it?
Of course, they still can’t score a damn goal to save their lives, and if DeBrincat or Garbage Dick don’t do it, no one else is going to. Toews and Dach are complete non entities on the score sheet at the moment, which was never part of any plan either regime may have had. It’s hard to know what’s real and what’s statistical anomaly, whether it’s Toews still fighting through rust or Dach fundamentally being a different player than he was drafted do be and/or boned by inept coaching, but they can’t be counted on for anything until they show differently, so it’s likely these close, counterattacking games are here to stay. What purpose that serves with regard to the long-term trajectory of the team still remains to be seen
12/7 vs Rangers
Game Time – 7:30PM CST
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago, Various SportsNets, WGN-AM 720
Yauch Forever – Blueshirt BanterWell, the Hawks get a look at the Blueshirts for the second time in less than a week, this time on home ice where hopefully they can keep track of the guy wearing 10 in white a little better. He should look pretty familiar, he’s kind of good. With Shesterkin having some form of crotch detatchment the night before they played the Hawks last time, Gerard Gallant now turns his jowly gaze to Alexandar Georgiev and his .856 save percentage in the meantime. The Rangers haven’t played since the two teams’ date at MSG on Saturday so they’re still riding a six game winning streak, and have won 10 of their last 11, their only loss coming to the equally hot Maple Leafs, whom the Hawks face on Saturday. Shesterkin isn’t slated to be out long term, so they should be able to keep solid footing in the turbo competitive Metro division.
12/9 at Montreal
Game Time – 6:00PM CST
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago, WGN-AM 720
Mont Tremblant Seems Lovely – Eyes On The PrizeFinally, a matchup of the two biggest fuckup franchises so far this season. The problems locally are pretty well covered and lead in grotesqueness by a wide margin, but a quick rundown of the Habs’ misery – After a fluke run to the Cup Final in a made up playoff format in an abbreviated season, they promptly took any good will they had and flushed it down the toilet by drafting a known sex criminal in the first round, and then shat all over themselves justifying it. Then, franchise goalie Carey Price checked himself into a substance abuse clinic on the eve of the season starting where he can hopefully get the help he’s seeking, but leaving the team dangling with Jay Gallon now in a #1 role he’s already shown he’s never been cut out for. Add a predictably shitty start where no one is scoring because they never really had any top end finish to begin with, and that FINALLY cost Marc Bergevin his job. His replacement is the recently discussed former GM of the Rangers Jeff Gorton, who isn’t a Francophone, so at least they might be done with that stupid rule. Anyway, the Habs have played 2 more games than the Hawks and are 6 points behind them, just to give an indication of how things are going there.
12/11 at Tronna
Game Time – 6:30PM CST
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago, CBC, NHL Network, SportsNet, WGN-AM 720
Arrest Drake. Arrest Rivers Dubas. – Pension PlanIt’s that time of year again where the hockey cognoscenti declare the Leafs an unstoppable juggernaut with about a third of the season played. And the thing is, they’re not wrong inasmuch as the Leafs are a very good team loaded with offensive firepower and are playing very well at the moment. It’s just a race to trip over their own dicks to coronate a team with nearly the longest cup drought in the history of the sport, and they haven’t learned to hedge their bets even a little bit yet. And it’s not fair to pin it on one guy just because their sex-crime-apologist/victim-blaming GM has in the person of Jack Campbell in net, but that’s eventually what it’s going to come down to, whether or not he can stand up to anything in the playoffs. And given the way the aforementioned Metro looks, as well as with Tampa still lurking in Toronto’s on FlorTheast having not lost a playoff series in a very long time, it’s probably a little early to start with this shit, if only because it just adds to the amount of time the general public has to listen to Leafs fans, and hear about what it’s like to be a Leafs fan. Anyway, Jason Spezza is probably getting an unpaid vacation for a while after the to-do with Neil Pionk, and Mitch Marner is ouchy, and they’ll probably still boat race the Hawks on home ice. And that’s fine.
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Pay For The Piano – Hawks at Capitals, Rangers, Islanders Preview
To a certain extent it’s a mild relief that now the Hawks are losing games where they’re simply outgunned as opposed to looking like they’re playing a completely different sport than the opposition, or at best there like was a gas leak in their locker room (which would have explained Coach Jeremy Trestman hiding in the stalls). But regardless of who is coaching it, and that’s still currently up for debate seeing how much more of a role Marc Crawford has taken recently who is now playing the part of Dick Cheney in the Derek King administration, this team still really can only get goals from like 3 players even when things look how they’re supposed to. Basically if Alex DeBrincat and Garbage Dick don’t score, they’re not really going to, especially since the power play has completely dried up. Dylan Strome gets back into the lineup and back onto the first unit this evening after being healthy scratched for a while, and he STILL has their last power play goal that happened over two weeks ago. But with what Toews can contribute still a mystery, Dominik Kubalik still trying to gain his footing after having his ice time messed with by Kelvin Gemstone, really past the top 2 wingers there’s a big yawning void only occasionally filled by Brandon Hagel. Kirby Dach hasn’t scored in over a month, much of that spent between two guys with 40 goal potential, and that’s simply unacceptable for the third overall pick and who the Organ-I-Zation says the future is entrusted to. If that doesn’t turn around in a big way and in a hurry, there are going to be some extremely bleak and uncomfortable situations concerning the post-Toews era.
12/2 at Washington
Game Time – 6:00PM CST
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago, SportsNet, WGN-AM 720
Bulldog Front – Russian Machine Never BreaksLook, the Hawks are going to lose this game. They literally have not won in DC since 1998, and the Caps are just better even without plenty of key pieces (Backstrom, Oshie) in their lineup, even though it does appear that Justin Schultz is supposed to return. When watching this game, just seriously take time to appreciate what Alex Ovechkin is doing right now. Yes he’s creeping up on the all time goal list having passed Brett Hull this season (Hull himself was gracious, his Garbage Son was not) in a race against time to possibly catch Gretzky. All things considered factoring in eras and equipment and style of play, Ovie already is the greatest goal scorer in the history of the league, but having that number to prove it would be something to behold, especially after it was once thought that literally no one could every ascend to Gretzky’s totals. But the fact that he is second in the league in goals and third in the league in points (19 and 37 respectively) through 23 games in his age 36 season is truly incredible. He’s on pace right now for 68 goals, which would put him just two shy of Gordie by year’s end. And even if that pace flattens out a bit, he still might be the oldest player to score 50 goals ever, passing Johnny Bucyk 50 years ago. And Ovechkin isn’t just camping out at his spot on the power play. Twenty four of his 37 points have come 5v5, 27 at all even strengths. The Hawks have 26 goals AS A TEAM at five on five.
12/4 at MSG
Game Time – 7:00PM CST
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago+, WGN-AM 720
NUMBA ONE BAYBEE – Blueshirt BanterAfter completely overhauling their front office and coaching staff where they decided they needed to get more rock-headed in launching Jeff Gorton and David Quinn for first timer Chris Drury as GM and red ass Gerard Gallant behind the bench, the team promptly announced that as a roster they intended to be stupider by trading for Ryan Reaves. Of course, this roster was already promising enough with a surprise Norris from Adam Fox last year, as well as Mika Zibanejad flourishing alongside Artemi Panarin, but it appears that they’re poised to make a return to the post season with 31 points in the airtight Metropolitan division. Chris Kreirder has cannonballed his way into 16 goals already, on pace to obliterate his career high of 28 – though shooting 26.2% against a career average of 14% probably helps with that quite a bit. There’s no one thing that this team does exceptionally well, they’re in the middle of the road statistically in pretty much everything, but Gallant teams always play fast and hard, and Igor Shesterkin’s .936 5v5 and .935 overall are certainly good to make it all stand up. Given the expectations set by the start and the new management, don’t be surprised if they try to make a big splash at the deadline.
12/5 at Belmont
Game Time – 6:30PM CST
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago, WGN-AM 720
A Headache With Pictures – Lighthouse HockeyApparently the limits of Barry Trotz’s occult coaching wizardry are finally breached by a 13 game road trip to start the season, injuries, and a COVID outbreak that forced the Islanders to postpone three games last week. Perhaps playing in the the charmingly revolting toilet that was Nassau Coliseum is where those dark forces that allowed the Isles to reach two straight final fours/semifinals/whatever in modified playoff years, because their brand new UBS Arena at Belmont Racetrack has not been so kind to them to this point, as they’ve lost all four games they’ve had there in regulation. They’re currently in the midst of an 8 game losing streak, and will face the somewhat surprising Sharks tonight at home before they see the Hawks again, so that may very well reach nine. They’ll at least have the benefit of getting the Hawks on the second half of a back to back, but given the offensive struggles of both of these squads, it’s not likely to be a Sunday evening track meet.
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Live From The Five Hole – Post-Bordeom
Well, The Beloved embarassed themselves yet again for seemingly the millionth time in our collective lifetime today, and to what end no one is clear on. Also, wither Kirby Dach?
Happy Thanksgiving.
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Better Than The Alternative – Hawks Win Versus Penguins, Coyotes
Apologies for waiting two days to get a wrap up here, but all things considered, this was a relatively uneventful week with only two games, and only minimal off-ice unpleasantness. Even on top of that, the Hawks actually won both of those games, and even one in regulation- it truly us a wonderous new frontier around here.
11/9 – Hawks 2, Penguins 2 (Hawks Win “Best Hog” At The Hog Shit Snarfing Contest)Last Tuesday Marc-Andre Fleury was given another chance to face his former mates, after a disastrous turn of affairs a couple weeks ago in Pittsburgh wherein he was yanked in the first period and melted down in the tunnel. Even if Sid and Geno still weren’t playing the Penguins threw everything they had at the Hawks in the third period after falling behind 2-0 in the second on the first goals with the team from both Jhujar Khaira on a vintage Toews power move around the net, and Amy’s oldest son Seth nicely picking a corner through traffic at the top of the right circle. Derek King tried to get this group to collapse and sit on a lead in the third, and he was probably quickly shown that this team is not constructed to do that from a personnel standpoint at forward, even if the likes of Jones, Jake McCabe, and Calvin deHaan have been asked to trap at previous stops in their career. All it led to was the Penguins out-attempting the Hawks THIRTY THREE TO SIX in the final period before escaping with a point and getting things to the skills competition. If nothing else though, this looks like it would be a fun rollercoaster:
11/12 – Hawks 2, Coyotes 1
Look, the less said about this one, the better off the hockey world at large is going to be. This game was banished to an online-only audience, and it lived up to every bit of that billing between a team that is still playing like it’s half-concussed and its foot fell asleep from sitting on the toilet too long and another that is basically the restaurant that Ray Liotta convinces Paulie to buy and then hollow out and burn down in the beginning of Goodfellas. And the actual in game production was right in line with the quality of play. It’s clear ESPN doesn’t give a fuck about hockey (and why would they), because they’re just transposing all of their usual production methods and it’s not working. First off, the mix of the sound is unbearable. It’s been like this for Sunday night baseball for a while too, which is why the Ohtani bomb in April against the Sox on SNB sounded like a firecracker – things are way too tinny and hollow sounding, nothing sounds like it has any weight to it as far as ambient hockey sounds are concerned. Secondly, the brightness and contrast on their cameras is cranked way the fuck up, presumably because they’re used to filming things on primarily green and brown surfaces. But on a solid white backdrop, all it does is blind people and completely wash out many of the lines on the rink, especially the tops of the circles. They were also employing a camera “method” where when they went to a secondary camera behind the end boards for something like a defenseman wheeling around to make a breakout pass, when they went BACK to the main sideline camera, it was seemingly back in time a half-second to where the viewer saw the pass occur again from the side view. It’s a very tweak-inducing feeling, particularly when you’re watching these two bags of wet dirt collide into one another (and knock Kirby Dach’s teeth out) for an hour. Given that it’s ESPN and they don’t have to change anything to keep cashing checks, don’t expect any of these things to change any time soon. But at least Dylan Strome scored.
Up next is Pacific Northwest swing on this year’s version of the Circus Trip even though there’s no circus anymore. The Hawks will have winnable games in Seattle and Vancouver sandwiched around an inevitable torching by McJesus and Leon in Edmonton in the Duncan Keith Revenge Game (or something). Enjoy staying up late.
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Live From The Five Hole – The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald
With a load of iron ore and twenty six thousand tons more.
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Walking Is Still Honest – Penguins & Coyotes Preview
At last the long national nightmare is over. Coach Kelvin Gemstone/Vinny Del Colliton/Jeremy Bevington/Jeremy Trestman/Alpo Colliton/Jeremy Prinze, Jr./Cool Youth Pastor and his throbbing brain filled with defensive schemes so elaborate he forgets to even bother thinking about in game deployment are gone. It was about 18 months overdue, but the important thing is that it’s over, and with all of the other shit that happened two weeks ago in a cleansing fire, there’s actually finally a new prism to view this team through rather than utter nihilism. Interim GM Kyle Davidson was as forthcoming as anyone with an interim label could possibly be in his remarks after Colliton’s dismissal, saying that the message simply wasn’t getting through and correctable things weren’t being corrected, both of which are tremendous understatements but accurate nonetheless. Basically it only took him a week and a half of watching this disorganized and disinterested horse shit to see enough to get Stan’s golden child the hell up out of here and bring in Pigs bench boss Derek King.
King’s coaching resume is limited but had a pretty lengthy NHL career in the mid 80s and 90s (plenty will remember him being not a bum on Sega), but he at least had enough common damn sense to understand to tell these guys to just go out and play and not worry about adhering to some galaxy brained man-on-man high pressure SYSTEM. It’s well worn territory here, but the dirty secret in hockey is that it’s not exactly like they need to run elaborate blitz packages and disguise coverages on defenses in hockey. Puck side defenseman pursues and goes into the corner, weak side stays in front of the net, wingers on points, help if it comes up the wall, and ass on the boards at the hash for a breakout pass. This is what everyone who’s played hockey for any length of time just instinctively knows in their bone marrow and is what is just a default even when at an 11:45 on a Tuesday night rat hockey. Which is why having the D chase and stay with their checks everywhere in the zone was so counter-intuitive and the results clearly bore that out. Furthermore, in his post game comments, King remarked that he wanted to prioritize matching up Carpenter against Sissons on Sunday, and also had Erik Gustafsson barely play at all. So while he might end up ultimately proving himself A Moron, he’s at least got a baseline of common hockey sense that seemed to so elude his handsome predecessor, and all of the sudden the Hawks find themselves with actual winnable games on the docket.
11/9 vs Pittsburgh
Game Time – 7:30PM CST
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago, TVA-S, WGN-AM 720
Ben Roethlisberger Retire Bitch – PensburghSo after missing the first 7 games of the season with a wrist injury, Sidney Crosby came back for one game against the POWERHOUSE New Jersey Devils, was a -3 with no points, and promptly returned to Sick Bay with a mildly symptomatic case of Covid. With him being out and Evgeni Malkin out for a few more months still, things have gone about as well as could be expected with this last-gasp Penguins group, which is to say it’s barely .500-ish with a 4-3-3 record in 10 games, which is good for 11 points and the ass-end of the Metro division. When Danton Heinen is leading the team in goals and points at any juncture of a season, it’s probably safe to say that things aren’t particularly optimal. Most recently the Pens to the first place Wild (huh?) to a shootout on the road and ultimately ended up losing the Hog Shit Snarfing Contest, but Mike Sullivan still has the team playing relatively hard even if they’re pretty outgunned most nights without their franchise pillars. Tristan Jarry has at least been pulling his weight in a starter’s workload even after every Yinzer wanted to toss him into a variety of rivers last spring, with a .945 save percentage 5v5 and .925 overall. This is a team that has to play with structure and discipline because it can’t get away with skill right now, and one game with Derek King isn’t magically going to have the Hawks be able to counter that, even if on paper the Hawks’ current lineup does have more spice than the Penguins right now.
11/12 vs Arizona
Game Time – 7:30PM CST
TV/Radio – ESPN+, Hulu, WGN-AM 720
Kyrsten Sinema Is A Goblin: Five For HowlingThe Coyotes are the only team in the league worse than the Hawks right now, and really it could be argued that they shouldn’t even count because not only are they willfully trying to be bad on the ice, but the entire franchise is basically a money laundering front/shell corporation for the league right now, and they’re going to get evicted out of their building at the end of the season anyway. It’s tough to say whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing that this game is an online exclusive- on one hand if this was a game ESPN/Hulu earmarked as being a selling point for the platform and ad dollars, they were catastrophically mistaken. On the other hand, it’s almost a public service that no one can accidentally find their way to this imminent disaster, one would have to be a true sicko to go out of their way to find and watch this game. But it will at least be the first time it’s been Hawks red vs white Kachina in like 15 years.
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Live From The Five Hole – Indictment
We’re still dealing with it, but at least we cover some actual gameplay this time around. Thank you again.
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We’ll All Be Dead Come November – Senators, Canes, Jets, Predators Preview
There is literally nowhere for this team to go but up after the worst week in this franchise’s long history of bad weeks, both on and off the ice. The Hawks extended their own streak in futility to start the season, came away with one point out of a possible six, and looked like disinterested shit while doing so. It all pales in comparison to the shockwaves still echoing across the league today for their arguable criminal negligence 11 years ago, but either way the games on the schedule still have to be played. Not that this standard is going to be adhered to, at this time in 2018 when the now disgraced Joel Quenneville was launched and the team was supposed to be competitive (as this one was to be), he was fired after 15 points in 15 games. With two points in 9 games so far, it is now not possible for Jeremy Trestman to even meet that meager threshold, but given the circumstances around the team, it remains unlikely he’ll be fired any time soon. Even at that point, the next choice on the bench to step in is Marc Crawford, who was the first head coach Quenneville served under, and was suspended himself for physical abuse of players. Around every every corner there seems to be a new and fresh pile of shit to step in, but perhaps most impressive is that in just a month, the Hawks have seemingly managed to absolutely crush the spirit of one of the league’s smiling faces for a generation in Marc-Andre Fleury, while basically playing themselves into a wasted season in the blink of an eye. If the Hawks new GM Kyle something or other has any humanity, he’ll get Flower the fuck out of here at the earliest possible convenience.
11/1 – vs Ottawa
Game Time – 7:00PM CDT
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago, SportsNet1, WGN-720
Lance And Blake (One Son) – Silver Seven SensPerhaps the Hawks’ best chance to grab a victory comes tonight against the visiting Senators, though that’s not to say that it’s going to be in any way easy, as absolutely nothing about this team can be taken as a given at this point. The Sens are coming off a victory in Dallas, having last played on Friday, so they got to spend their Halloween here in the city. That marked the Senators first road win and second against the Stars so far this season, and to this point they’ve been fairly competitive. They’re obviously an incredibly young team that’s still figuring things out with all of the hallmarks – good power play, bad on the road, and needing excellent goaltending to prop it all up, which they’ve gotten from Matt Murray and Filip Gustavsson, but former Hawk legend Anton Forsberg has been another story. So far the younger of the Garbage Tkachuk Sons has yet to hit his stride after missing camp and the first three games of the year with his contract dispute, but he’ll likely round into form soon. Likewise Tim Stutzle has been slow out of the gates after showing plenty of flash in last year’s abbreviated campaign. The Senators have gotten contrtibutions elsewhere up front for the time being in Drake Batherson and Josh Norris, but they’ll need their marquee guys to step it up, along with getting the play driven from the back end by Thomas Chabot in order to hang around for longer than just a month before their inevitable descent into the oblivion that is Kanata.
11/3 – vs Carolina
Game Time – 7:30PM CDT
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago+, TVA-S, WGN-AM 720
Larry Johnson’s Grandmama – Canes CountryThe Hurricanes are now 8-0-0, with all eight wins coming in regulation. They will also have had two full days off coming into Wednesday night’s game, having played most recently on Sunday afternoon. This probably goes just about as well at Club 1901 as it did in Raleigh.
11/5 – at Winnipeg
Game Time – 7:00PM CDT
TV/Radio – NBC Sports Chicago, WGN-AM 720
Leave Them At “The Airport” – Arctic Ice Hockey, Jets NationSo Kevin Chevyldayoff gets to keep his job despite the fact he was in the meeting where all of Hawks upper management effectively conspired to keep Kyle Beach’s claims swept under the rug because he was the only person who placed himself there, but still didn’t manage to do anything about it? This is why hockey culture is perversely fucked and needs to be burnt to the ground for any real improvements to be made. Anyway, on the ice, the Jets are the same mess they’ve been for what feels like 12 years now. The forward group is extremely solid top to bottom even if Blake Wheeler is somehow like 58 years old now, the blue line is a complete gas can in its own end, and Connor Hellebuyck needs to be in top form for them to have a chance. To this point he hasn’t been, with an .899 overall, but that’s been absolutely obliterated by the Jets’ horse shit PK, which is only operating at 63% right now, good for 31st in the league. Of the 24 goals Hellebuyck has allowed, a staggering ELEVEN have come on the power play, and his even strength save percentage is a fully respectable and sustainable (for him) .935. Good thing for them that Paul Maurice teams are known for staying out of the box.
11/7 – vs Nashville
Game Time – 6:00PM CST
TV/Radio –NBC Sports Chicago, SportsNet1, WGN-AM 720
It’s Just Fucking Everywhere Isn’t It? – On The ForecheckEvery year it seems like it might finally be the one where Nashville finally has the bottom fall out of it, and every year they seem to still make the playoffs by the hair on their ass. Of course, they won’t get to play a full 12% of their games against this stupid ass Hawks team like they did last year and took 15 of 16 possible points. Nearly 25% of their points came from games against the Hawks last year, and it’s not exactly like John Hynes has a throbbing brain in that big bald head of his. It literally just takes a single counter-measure to make Vinny Del Colliton look like a completely clueless asshole. Roman Josi is once again leading this team in scoring with 9 points in 8 games from the back end because that’s how this whole thing has to work with Filip Forsberg the only real threat offensively because Ryan Johansen is too busy chugging root beers. Juuse Saros has been solid at evens with a .931, but only has a .917 overall thanks to early season PK issues in Nashville as well, though clearly not to the extent of the Jets. He’ll have to be excellent for them to even stay on the fringes of the wild card situation even with as shitty as the Pacific is, if only because there’s simply almost no firepower up front.
