A send off for Bob.

Well I was thinking about just leaving that beautiful piece of literature I contributed this afternoon as my final thought on the Gainey resignation. But I realized I would be just like those fake fans that I despise the most if I did not leave a final tribute to one of the classiest guys this organization has ever seen. Bob Gainey was never the best guy on the ice, but he was the smartest. I think this was the case for his Managerial work as well. Even though flashy GM's like Brian Burke had more success with all out styles of negotiating and blockbuster trades, I respected Bob's tentative style. Many people hounded him for his reluctance to give up a lot for a trade, but I promise you, 95% of the deals he passed on would have hurt us in the long run. If it was up to the majority of idiot Hab-nots, we would have Vinny Lecavalier, 15 goals and all, without Andrei Markov, Tomas Plekanec, maybe even PK Subban who has become one of the premier Defenseman in the AHL in his first year. Everything he did was thought out and thorough although the players he acquired almost never performed the way he expected they would. Lost opportunities in the names "Kovalev, Lang, Tanguay, Latendresse, Samsonov, Higgins, Ryder, McDonagh, David Fischer" might soon be joined by "Pacioretty, Lapierre, D'Agostini and Price", and ultimately this could be a core reason for our failures during the Bob era. Or maybe it's the guys who we let go, year after year, only to watch them have success elsewhere. "Well maybe we can let Souray go, at least we have Streit. Oh, you say they're both All Stars now? And they both do not play for the Canadiens?" Personally, I just never had that much of a problem with it. I felt each year Bob tried to put us in a position to compete, and in the early spring of 2008, it seemed everyone had forgotten why they hated Gainey so much. No one seemed to care about the "Niinimaa for Ribeiro" deal anymore, they all pretended to love Bob, only to turn their backs on him once again, after a team he did not play for, a team whose fortunes he could not change on the ice himself, started to slide. Maybe that's pro sports for you, a thankless and cruel world where the most repeated mantra is not "Play as a team!" or "For the love of the game!". It's more like "What have you done for me lately?". Maybe that's just Montreal, where the best/worst fans in the world scrutinize every deal, every signing every fart you let out, just because they happened to be privileged enough to grow up in an age of dynasties that no longer exists and need some happiness that they obviously cannot generate for themselves.

I guess what I'm trying to get at is, as happy as you morons are who parade Montreal today, finally "ridding our glorious team of that boring and passive shlub", I warn you. I'm watching you cowards. And when things get bad in the new and improved Pierre Gauthier era, and I promise you, it will sooner than later, I dare you to go on the Team 990 where Tony and friends pleasure themselves to the doom and gloom of our 8th place team, and say out loud "Gauthier is garbage, I wish Gainey was back".

You take this team as it is, or don't take it at all.

Don't be a fucking hypocrite.

Peace True Believers,

And thanks for everything Bob, hope you find some happiness.

E

Gainey gone.

Bob Gainey will step down today as General Manager of the Canadiens. Pierre Gauthier will take over on interim duties.

To all of you who thought we were fucked with Bob.

You have no idea what's in store, you simple little people.

Pierre Gauthier, in the immortal words of Superbad's Jonah Hill "Is the anti-poon". If poon means hockey intelligence and signing savvy.

Pray for your souls.

E

Attack of the Dawgs! Plus today's game preview.

If you told me that the top line in Montreal's WIN against the defending Cup Champions would be three Hamilton Bulldogs who were only called up yesterday, I would have assumed that you were starting to party for the Super Bowl a couple days early. Yes the trio of Ryan White, Brock Trotter and David Desharnais certainly stepped it up in the absence of Andrei Kostitsyn, Mike Cammalleri and Benoit Pouliot and will have to keep the energy going if we want to top the Bruins today at 3, who will be absolutely desperate for a win. Pleks, Gio and Scotty Gomez Adams all had huge games yesterday and will need to produce points consistently until the Olympic break There will be some sort of cruel sweetness if this win against the Bruins will push Pete Chiarelli to give Claude Julien the can, even though I do not think the B's struggles are his fault. I personally hope Claude can keep his job, as he is a very good coach and a good guy. I do hope that the Canadiens keep winning this key games while teams behind us like New York, Tampa and the Bruins continue to slide. There is an article out that theorizes that the Canadiens only need to go 12-10-1 in our remaining games to clinch a playoff spot. I think thats do-able. So enjoy the game, enjoy the football and enjoy those damn funny commericals. Let's hope we see some more Danica Patrick in compromising positions.

Peace true believers,

E

A tribute to a true hero. Brendan Burke (1988-2010)

TSN has just broken a story that Brendan Burke,the youngest son of Leafs GM Brian Burke has died as a result of a car accident in Indiana. This news has hit me very hard. Brendan was only 21, and this November, he mustered up the immense courage to come out as a young gay man, saying that he quit hockey because of the difficulty of keeping his homosexuality a secret and that he had hoped to be the first openly gay NHL executive in history. I never really was fond of Brian Burke's brash style of business, even though I knew he got the job done better than almost any one else in the league. I truly believed that Brian would not speak publicly about his son's life and maybe fuel the fire that suggests his mantras of "toughness, tenacity and truculence" made him homophobic. When Brian came out and said that no matter who Brendan was, he would always love him and support him, he immediately jumped in my books from an annoying "act" of a manager to a truly genuine "class act" who tells it like it is. Brendan stood out as one of the bravest young people in this world today who through his dreams and ambitions not only changed life for the gay community in sports but possibly all minorities. I am not a hopeful Hockey player, nor am I a Homosexual and I am definitely not a Leafs fan, but I am a Jew, and there was something uplifting about a person belonging to a minority demographic standing up and saying "What I am is not important". "Who I am and what I am able to do is important". Brendan's loss is a tragic one for the Gay community, the hockey world and young people everywhere. My thoughts and prayers are with the Burke family, and let us try to open our minds for the future, so that Brendan Burke's story can live on as a testament to the human spirit and a rallying cry for us to treat ever single person on this earth equally.

Sleep well and have a safe weekend,

E

Halak saves our sorry asses. Again... Habs 3 Bruins 2

Thank you to the Texas Titan for the title of today's blog.

Watching the game down 2-0, there was not much to be positive about. The team came out flat, we were not getting shots and it looked like all the momentum we got from our hard fought 3-2 Vancouver win was gone. Then came the two quick goals. I guess the one positive thing about our bevy of goals from bizarre sources is that it is scoring by committee, something we need in light of Mike Cammalleri and Andrei Kostitsyn's prolonged injuries. The one thing that has kept me optimistic of late is that Jaroslav Halak is putting in a MVP like performance each game we go into. I have been, and always will be a Carey Price fan, I think his potential could dwarf all of the criticism he has been thrown, but until he finds his center I will support Jaro Halak and his calmness and coolness throughout. To me, Jaro Halak is what every goalie should be, someone who comes to the NHL with th sole objective to play Hockey. No distractions, only Hockey. He did his time in the AHL, had to wait behind player after player, and has been winning big games for three years. If I had told you after Jaro went 4-0 for us in 2007 during the playoff push that he would not be our starter by now, you would think two thing. 1) You are freaking crazy. 2) Cristobal Huet must've won a couple Vezinas. Well you'd be very wrong on both counts. Even though I hope that Carey Price becomes the future #1 in Montreal, I am sure that Jaorslav Halak will be one the NHL's finest tenders, if not for the Habs then definitely somewhere else.

Peace,

E

Why does this always happen? Canadiens 3 Canucks 2

Watching the game last night, I should have been elated at the Habs big win that catapulted them to 7th in the East. I should have. There was something strangely unsettling about the Canadiens, minus our two top goal scorers, beating a team that we should not have beaten through an incredible effort by Jaroslav Halak. Why, you ask? Well for a couple reasons. BIG FRIGGIN REASON #1: If we can beat the Vancouver Canucks, one of the hottest teams in the league, why can we not get points out of easy games in Florida and Tampa after beating them the week before. Why can we not keep a level of consistency against these teams. If we were able to sneak out a win tonight, when our roster was depleted, why were we man handled the first time we met, when Andrei Markov was our lone casualty? Why did we collapse against the Rangers last month, only to beat them silly 6-0 a week later? BIG FRIGGIN REASON #2: After Toronna and Calgary pulled the trigger on HUGE deals that shipped off their underachieving "Players of the future" like Dion Phaneuf and Matt Stajan, at what point does the usually gun-shy Bob Gainey decide to do the same with Carey Price? I am the first one to say that we should keep our two #1 caliber guys, but after a win like last night, the so called "Hockey Intelligentsia" of Montreal won't be seeing it the same way I do. I know that every young goalie in this league struggled in his initial years, and that if teams like Pittsburgh were as impulsive as the "experts" in the Antichambre, they would be minus Marc-Andre Fleury, and minus a Stanley Cup banner.

We should be thrilled that we got two points, but maybe we should be disappointed that we missed so many great opportunities beforehand.

Peace True Believers,

E

This might be bad. Nucks Habs preview

Let's not sugar coat it. The Canadiens aren't in the best situation right now. Mediocrity has set in, we are fighting for a playoff spot, we cannot score even strength goals, and the one guy who can is on the shelf for six to eight weeks. All you need now is a Tiger Woods like sex scandal and you've got the perfect storm. The Habs try to get some points as they take on the red hot Vancouver Canucks tonight at 7:30 at the Bell Centre, if the Canadiens want to not be sellers at the deadline in March, they will have to finish the Pre-Olympic stretch strong, starting tonight. Benoit "The Giant Chicken" Pouliot and Brian Gionta will move up to Tommy Plekanec's wing tonight and maybe this will work out in Cammy's absence. Plekanec has picked up his once torrid pace, with five points in his last four and Pouliot has been the Canadiens' most consistent scorer since his arrival. Matt D'Agostini has been called up, but he might not even play because of the flu. Jaro Spacek is also questionable because of the virus. So enjoy the game, and let's try to survive these six to eight weeks of hell.

Peace True Believers,

E