Quick hits: More Bourne; Shoot, you freaking pansy!; Suck it, figure skaters; new PHN article

Yeah, two Justin Bourne posts in a row, but seriously, what an entertaining writer. (I'm not just sucking up because he linked to my blog. Really.) And his next article on THN is out today. It's terrific, natch.

Go check it out.

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Also, in Justin's blog post today, he says, "Today’s coaches preach shoot-shoot-shoot, and the players usually want them to shut-up-shut-up-shut-up."

And I thought, "AH HA! So you guys don't like to shoot!"

I have to ask why this is. Someone please enlighten me.

Of course, it's not the first time I've asked. Every time Butchy crosses the blue line, spins around, slams on the breaks, and gets the puck taken away, I die a little more inside. And I'm a pretty patient fan. I'm not a "SHOOOOOT!" person at all, unless I see a lane and they don't take it.

I recall watching my pal Schultzie's Tri-City Americans (WHL) play a televised game earlier in the season and it was clear that sometime between juniors and the NHL, the fellas decide a) they don't have to go to the net anymore and b) they don't wanna shoot.

Here's the list of things that can happen when you shoot:

1. Goal
2. Rebound
   
3. Freeze
4. High
5. Wide
6. Fall down (maybe get laughed at)
7. Broken stick
8. Bounce off defender resulting in a breakaway
   

Which of these is worse than your coach moaning to the local paper that you won't effin' shoot the puck and it's driving his ass crazy? Maybe #8. That's it. Those are good odds. Play the odds. Shoot the f**king puck.

Unless you're shooting on Ms.Conduct. Then feel free to whiff and fall down. (Oh, I left whiff off.)

9. Whiff (maybe get laughed at... definitely by the goalie)

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Went to Memorial City like I always do mid-week to work on my footwork today. Of course, I forgot it was spring break, so there were lots of kids, but it wasn't so crowded I couldn't do my thing (which, incidentally, gets LOTS of stares at that figure skating-oriented rink).

But dammit if those friggin' figure skaters hadn't put a million holes in the ice with their toe picks. Someone dug the goddamn Grand Canyon in front of one of the creases. Chunks of ice everywhere. Really annoying. Wish it was like golf where you have to fill your divots. Hope those triple lutzes were pretty, bitches.

(Mostly kidding, though the Grand Canyon was totally true. It's actually pretty fun to watch the better skaters there, though their movements around the ice are terribly unpredictable. I spend a lot of time dodging them and vice versa.)

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Forgot to mention, my next PHN article is out today as well. Nothing special particularly. I feel kinda like I'm holding my breath through the rest of the regular season. The photos are pretty good though. Nice tight shots of Beautiful Benny and Krazy Krys.

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Updated: More Quick Hits: PHN article; awesome article on Cal

Well, it appears my PHN article got published to the site just before Lammers put the game winner in the net, so thanks to Lou at ProHockeyNews.com for banging it out just in time and making sure the fates weren't affected by my dateline.

Anyway, here's the latest.

More on the game tomorrow. I'm tired tonight.

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Great article on Cal from a Calgary writer. One of the best I've seen. Really well written and gets into Cal's thought processes around his agitation.

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UPDATE:
Less awesome article on Cal but a quote from Boogie, which makes it worthwhile. And how did I find out about this article? Because Wysh is the best damn hockey blogger ever and put this in his headlines this morning:

• Minnesota Wild Calder Candidate Cal Clutterbuck laughs at your feeble attempts to ridicule him: "They make fun of my last name, which is totally unoriginal. Don Cherry beat them to the punch." [Sun Media]

BOOYAH!

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PHN: Aeros Mid-Season Report

You can read my Aeros mid-season report here.

I struggled with this one, for a number of reasons. Mostly because I feel like the team hasn't changed a whole hell of a lot since the beginning of the season. What could I say that I haven't said already?

I guess I found some stuff though. And there are some pretty pictures, if you not the readin' type.

Of course, the day after I submitted it, the team sent Pouliot down. I suppose it's hard to guess how much effect that's going to have, so I wouldn't have said much about it even if I could have, but there it is anyway.

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PHN: Third period a dent in Aeros' flight plan; more from Constantine

Ha. I like the title this time. Pretty good.

Anyway, here's my latest ProHockeyNews.com piece.

I had some good photos lined up but due to the density of the Aeros schedule, we just had to get it published before the stats got outdated. I'll save them for next time, I guess.

Lots of great stuff from Constantine in this one. I could listen to him talk about hockey all day. After one game, when I asked him how a team achieves consistency (more on that below), he apologized for being "long winded" as he answered my question. Are you kidding me? I'm always a little sad when our interview time is over.

That said, I have several pages of quotes from him that didn't get into the piece, so I figured I'd share a few that stood out to me here:

On the bottom line:

All you want from your athletes from a coaching standpoint is that we keep acknowledging the issues and keep moving forward and keep working on what we need to work on and just concentrate on our next day and improving in the next day. Honestly, I'm not looking too far in the future at anything other than just keep addressing the issues.

On comparing seasons:

I think we're way further along than we were at this point last year. It took us at least 20 games before we were remotely close. I think we understand more now than we did a year ago. It's hard to judge. You're always trying to compare sometimes but your only reference point is where you've been, and we don't always want to look back at where we were last year. We have to find an identity that works for the team and they have to get together as a team and decide as a team what they want to be, so those are all works in process for any team.

On what kind of road team the Aeros are:

I don't even know how to judge our road trips yet, because of, you know, two in Manitoba and then travel to Toronto on game day in a different time zone. Then the last time on the road, we played 4 in 5 nights and one at 3 on a Sunday afternoon and then another game at noon on a Tuesday.

I don't really pass judgment yet on such a small window, especially when our road trips have been so challenging from a fatigue standpoint. I think if we spread some of those games out, I think I'd understand our team more, but I know so far we're not a very consistent team from period to period, from game to game, and even on an individual basis we don't get a ton of consistency yet, and that's something we have to continue to strive for is just a little more consistency.

On how to get consistency out of a team:

I think consistency comes from the effort you put into preparing. Your preparation the 48 hours before a game, into the game, and even your ability to handle the ups and downs of a game, because a game might have fatigue factor, might have a criticism factor, might have a "you've made a mistake" factor, it might have a physical intimidation factor, it might have "we're up by a couple" like tonight.

The only way to beat all of those adversities to consistency is to have a pre-game plan and a during game plan that puts you back on track as quick as possible, and that's part of becoming a good professional, is to develop those plans. So we have to help the players work on that.

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PHN: Aeros search for identity

My latest for ProHockeyNews.com.

I'm so in love with that picture of Schaef and Kass after the San Antonio win. It's better a bit larger because you can see the big grin on Nolan's face.

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PHN: Aeros Adapt and Improvise

My latest article for ProHockeyNews.com is out today. Check it out.

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PHN: Aeros Offseason and 08-09 Outlook

In addition to my silly blog nonsense where nobody edits out my f-bombs but me, I'm now doing a bit of real writing for ProHockeyNews.com covering the Aeros.

Mom and Dad should be very happy that the BJ degree (that's Bachelor of Journalism, but really, it doesn't seem like they thought that through very well, huh?) hanging on the wall is finally being used as it was originally intended. Well, not for sports writing... in fact, that's the LAST thing I would have thought I'd end up writing about.

Anyway, it should be pretty fun and fabulously talented photographer, Fred Trask, who takes amazing photos of the Aeros at each and every game, is coming along for the ride, so if you don't like my writing, you can look at his fantastic pictures and bask in the delight of the upcoming season.

The first article went up today, thanks to the kind and patient hand-holding of my friend Buddha who writes about the Wild for PHN and the editors there at PHN, so pop over and have a gander. I'm pretty pleased.

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