Dearest readers, I'd like to apologize for your having to read so much Toronto news. I mean booorrrrrrriiiiingg! I thought we were all under the agreement here at HSHS to not write unless our team was doing well. The way Greener and Norte are writing you'd think the Leafs weren't losing constantly. Well they are! How do I know? Because being an Oiler fan I am more than capable of sniffing out another basement dweller. I'm an expert at it! Without watching a single Leafs game I'm still preternaturally disposed to sensing their doomed season looming off into the distance forever and ever and ever. Its just a stank that your nose gets used to sniffing when you've been smelling your own team's rank ripeness for the past two years. So apologies to the hopes and dreams of Leafs fans but I see the smoke coming round the mountain on this one.
As there's no end to the horrors of the Oilers season to write about I'm gonna take it little steps at a time starting with the number one worst thing on the team ever, and no its not injuries...
Dennis Grebeshkov. I've not seen someone play this bad with a tinted visor and gold chain since.. well ever really. He's just horrifying and Moose and I are positive that there's a conspiracy here. Alright, I know we're missing Souray, Pitkanen, Greene and Roy, but that STILL doesn't excuse the fact that he's playing top defensive pair, 1st PP unit and 1st PK unit. I had the opportunity to watch him "play" when the Oil were in town playing the Kings (when Greene and Roy were still healthy) and holy mackarel, we thought Bergeron was a hand grenade with the pin pulled out, ole Grebby hasn't made the right read yet this season! He's been the responsible player on every heart breaking goal in the last 4 games and that's only since I've been keeping track. He holds the puck too long when he has to get it out of the zone or make the pass, and he passes it only when there's a 4 on 0 going the other way that he's able to set up. His positioning is terrible, he's not strong enough in the corners or in front of the net and that's on the few occasions he actually goes to those places. Watching Smid play 21 minutes a game, carrying the puck through the neutral zone and making the smart safe decisions with the puck, how does he get sent down and Grebs stay up? HOW!? How is he still getting the minutes and failing at every opportunity? Schremp, Pouliot, you guys have one bad shift, pack your bags! Enjoy Springfield! Grebby, why don't you give up the puck at the blue line on the PP and then cover the guy without the puck on the ensuing 2-1? Great job! Here's the C.
Next point, the Power Play. I have nothing more to say on this subject. Its baffling when I watch another team on a power play. It almost seems like they have some sort of numerical man advantage against the defending team. As opposed to the Oil. You know what, they actually gained the zone and held it a lot more in this last game against the Preds. The only chances did come from broken plays in the zone though, so maybe its one of those things where they all have to stop trying and they'll accidentally score? Jesus its embarassing.
Did anyone notice that the team completely folded after Hemmer didn't score in the third on yet another fifteen bell deke-o-rama? Maybe he's more of a leader on the team than I'd been giving him credit for. I knew it was going sour as soon as Ellis got a toe on that shot and somehow the whole team did too. So the real question is which one of us started it? I'm willing to take the blame on this one. Maybe because I stopped believing then the rest of the team followed suit. I am afterall Imaginary Honorary Captain of Oiler Jinxes. Assistant Captain goes to my buddy DJ Luigi who is able to counter a counter jinx thereby treble-jinxing the team, and from two whole time zones away. So he may have stopped starting not to un-believe when Hemmer missed the chance, causing the team to collapse like two people simultaneously dropping into comas. Co-lapse. Ugh!
Finally, I scored my first goal last sunday in our sad excuse for a beer league, and am looking forward to scoring two tomorrow. Moose had two goals and the assist on mine, plus an assist on one of Greener's two goals. The reason this is relevant to anyone reading this blog is that a team of people, the majority of whom hadn't played a year ago and are over 45 (read Gre
ener and Moose) matched the entire goal output of the Oilers for this entire season in one game playing with what amounts to an indian red rubber ball that camouflages into the playing surface exactly while huffing and puffing LA's finest Malibu mansion smoke. Ugh. What's more exciting than my first goal? I delivered my first face wash (artists rendering at right) in a goalmouth imbroglio! Hooray! I'll probably write an entire article on that in the weeks to come. I've never been more proud. Of myself...
Ugh!
Wash.
