Boosh's Secret Diary

(Editor's Note: Under the direction of PhillyGirl the DGS-SuperSpies managed to grab a hold of Brian Boucher's diary during the recent road trip...airport security just ain't that good)

January 3, 2011

Dear Diary –

Happy New Year! Yesterday was my birthday. I turned 34 years old – can you believe it? Seems like just yesterday I was carrying the Flyers in the 2000 playoffs and stabbing Bill Barber in the back after we had an epic collapse.

Lavvy gave me the start for my birthday against Detroit. Last time we won in Detroit, I was 14 years old. Amazing. So did we break that streak yesterday? You bet we did. Detroit was all over us in the first, but I held my ground and the team actually felt like scoring me some goals. I’ve got to find a way to keep this hot streak going because I think I nabbed the starting role from the Russian kid, finally. Do you know how much of a pain in the ass it is to be “mentor” to this kid? He doesn’t understand a word I say. He just says “Bob.”

Steals my dance moves too!

Speaking of nabbing the role – this whole three goalies thing was not working out. There’s not enough room at practice – the media is freaking out over Bob and his lost confidence and Leights is crying in the corner at practice because he can’t have a net. How am I supposed to concentrate? The good news is I think my chances of staying the number one are pretty good since Bob can’t stop a beach ball lately and Homer just gave Leights a one-way ticket to Adirondack (don't cry Leights, I hear the weather there is beautiful this time of year). Plus, I made it in and out of Vancouver without Ryan Parent coming anywhere near me.

Next up: back-to-back games with the Devils. I own them. Life is good.

Until next time.

XOXO,

Boosh

Drink Up! The Official Flyers 2010-2011 Drinking Game

In keeping up with my friends at Hoosier Hockey who wrote a post on an NHL drinking game, we here at Down Goes Spezza have come up with our own, Philadelphia Flyers drinking game.

(Warning: We don't drink at DGS, feel free to poke fun at what we come up with because of that.)

So here we go.

What you need:

Jack Daniels Whiskey
your favourite Vodka (Jason: my resident alcohol expert big stick tap for his help with the recipes, recomments Ultimat, I have also heard good things about Stoly and Absolut)
Cranberry Juice, Sprite and Coke and Orange Juice
Captain Morgan
heavy cream
Bottle Kahlua
Enough bottles of Sam Adams Boston Lager so that everyone playing has 1.
Champagne

How to "win": Last person standing wins.


When the game starts:

If Boucher is in net: pass out the bottles of Sam Adams in honor of the New Englander, Boucher. Make toast and take a sip.
If Bobrovsky is in net: Make a White Russian for everyone in the room, take a sip.
If Leighton is in net: Mix the sprite and cranberry juice and chug it. We start drinking alcohol "Leight"er.

If it's a Flyers home game: continue sipping your Sam Adams with every "BOOSH!" chant in the Wells Fargo Center.

With the other goalies:

Drink your White Russian every time Bobs gives up a deflection goal
Make a sea breeze and drink that everytime Leighton forgets to close his 5-hole. (Note: First person to yell "close your legs Leighton!" does not need to drink)

(Amy's Note: If Matt keeps the bad puns up, I will revoke his posting privilege.)

Now:

Every time Daniel Carcillo takes a stupid penalty: Pass shots of Jack around.

If Jeff Carter scores: Pop the champagne and toast to Carter scoring on something other than Lisa Hartnell

When Jeff Carter misses wide: Use vodka and orange juice to make one screw driver. First person to make the comment of "But Carter scores on Mrs. Hartnell" chooses who has to chug said screw driver.

When Jody Shelley fights someone: Make a round of mimosas for the whole crew. Everyone has to drink it because NONE of you are as tough as Jody Shelley.

When Chris Pronger elbows someone:
If he's called for it, shots of vodka for everyone in honor of what the victim of said elbow will be doing to forget the pain.
If he's uncalled for it: Attempt to steal your neighbors starting goaltender drink without being caught, if you pull this off, your neighbor has to finish said drink after you inform of it. If you fail, you must finish all of your drinks for it.


If Nik Zherdev takes a shift where he gives crap: Have your favorite non-alcoholic drink of choice
When Nik Zherdev stops giving a shit: Pick up random alcoholic drink: have some to forget about why Zherdev sucks.

When Andrej Meszaros makes a bad pass, or is caught out of position, or turns the puck over: Face palm, grab 2 shots of vodka, drink up. Hope that when you wake up forget how terrible he is. (Note: If someone jokes that Ryan Parent is better, the first person to make said joke does not need to drink. Also, if someone wishes for Ryan Parent back, they are officially cut off from drinking and should be taken to the nearest hospital.)


Last person standing wins.


(EDITORS NOTE: WARNING! PARTAKE IN THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK! IF YOU ARE UNDER THE AGE OF 21 IT IS ILLEGAL IN THE UNITED STATES TO PLAY THIS GAME. ALSO, DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE. FINALLY, DGS IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANYTHING YOU DO WITH REGARDS TO PLAYING THIS GAME.)

NHL 2010-2011 Season Preview: Atlantic Division

I saved the best for last, the Atlantic Division. How are things gonna shape up here, DGS has the answers.

Pittsburgh Penguins

The Good: Max Talbot will be able to pick out every douche in the NHL and deliver a list of them to us.

The Bad: After Crosby and Malkin, the Penguins severely lack forward talent capable of scoring 120 points a season.

Secret Strategy for the New Season: Will be coddled by Gary Bettman's permanent man crush on Cindy Crosby

New York Islanders

The Good: Will have a guaranteed top 5 pick in the NHL draft due to playing 24 games against the Flyers, Penguins, Rangers and Devils all of which the Islanders will lose.

The Bad: Will run out of get well cards for Rick DiPietro by November.

Secret Strategy for the New Season: Hope the Democrats are able to push universal health care in the United States through in order to save on medical bills for DiPietro

New York Rangers

The Good: Will in fact win all 6 games against the Islanders due to the fact that they have Martin Biron.

The Bad: Will at some point sign Kyle Wellwood to a Redden-like contract.

Secret Strategy for the New Season: Hope to every divine being known the man that Gaborik can avoid Dan Carcillo.

New Jersey Devils

The Good:

Signed shot blocking specialist Anton Volchenkov to throw his body in the way of any jars of jelly that Lou decides to throw.

The Bad: Have fallen victim to the fact that apparently the CBA matters.

Secret Strategy for the New Season:

Will fatten Brodeur up to the point where he covers the entire net even if pad free.

Philadelphia Flyers

The Good: Filled the "Craptastic Defensemen" void left by the departure of Ryan Parent with Andrej "Big Mesz" Meszaros.

The Bad: Now have to face the defending Stanley Cup champions in 4 rematches as the Hawks now play in the Eastern Conference

Secret Strategy for the New Season: Have infinite hope in the idea that opposing shooters will never hit the net as they die laughing from realizing what the Flyers goaltending quality is.

NHL 2010-2011 Season Preview: Central Division

Today we pick up with part 5 of our series on NHL Training Camp previews. It's the Central Division, meaning that the Atlantic will be last. So here we go.

Detroit Red Wings

The Good: Will save money on team travel by being able to cash in AARP rewards on flights, hotels and team meals.
The Bad: Will at some point begin to act their age.
Secret Strategy for the New Season: Have decided that trading European MVPs to the Flyers for part time enforcing defensemen is a bad idea.

St. Louis Blues

The Good: Acquired playoff hero Jaroslav Halak from the Montreal Canadiens for next to nothing.
The Bad: Were not told that Jaroslav Halak is Slovak for Choke's in Second to Last Round.
Secret Strategy for the New Season: Will undoubtedly be the best team in the NHL named after a genre of music.

Nashville Predators

The Good: Acquired familiar face Ryan Parent from the Flyers.
The Bad: Didn't realize that since Ryan Parent was traded to the Flyers from Nashville, he kinda started to suck.
Secret Strategy for the New Season: Will hope opponents die laughing when Ryan Parent is forced to log 25 minutes a game as Shea Weber's defense partner.

Chicago Blackhawks

The Good: Are apparently the defending Stanley Cup Champions, which means that the team should be loaded with a roster of scoring forwards, competent defensemen and solid goaltending
The Bad: Apparently, Blackhawks management seemed to have forgotten about small things like the NHL salary cap.
Secret Strategy for the New Season: Will sell Atlanta Thrashers jerseys and such at home games inspiring the city of Chicago to support the Blackhawks playoff heroes.

Columbus Blue Jackets

The Good: Should the team make the playoffs, RJ Umberger will light up Jaroslav Halak per the clause in his contract that states he owns anything that ever played for the Habs in the postseason.
The Bad: Seems that Steve Mason is a clone of Steve Penney.

Secret Strategy for the New Season: Have acquired former Oilers Captain Ethan Moreau, who will play far above any level played before out of sheer relief that he longer plays in Edmonton.

What type of player are you? Part 2

A few days ago, Kevin Burgundy from Stay Classy wrote a post about what kind of hockey player are you. I noticed that his list was incomplete. Needless to say, emails were exchanged and with his consent I decided to do part 2 of the list.

Last time I did this, it turned into a fairly moderate success, I partnered up with Don't Trade Vinny on that one when we did our misused hockey terms. This is what DTV had, and the official DGS reply.

So with the consent of the writer, here I go.

I'll start with what I wrote in the comments section of the original post.

The Jeff Carter: When not scoring on the ice, I score with my winger’s wife off it.

The Ian Laperriere: Block shots to the point where I have no face left.

The Chris Pronger: Use my elbows to leave opposing players looking up at me

The Stay-In The Kitchen Defensemen: A stay home defensemen with agoraphobia.
NHL Comparables: Wade Redden, Andrej Meszaros, every current blueliner on the Dallas Stars

The DJ-Goaltender: A goalie who loves strobe lights and goal horns followed by music.
NHL Comparables: Vesa ToskaLOL, Andrew Raycroft, CristoLOL Huet (Kevin added Pascal LOL-claire)

The True Stay At Home D-man: A defensemen who really stays at home, even when under pressure.NHL Comparables: Sami Salo, Mike Van Ryn, Paul Ranger

Moving on.


The Patient Forward: This guy is known for always being patient. As in a patient at the local hospital waiting for MRIs because he's always hurt.
NHL Examples: Marian Gaborik, Simon Gagne, Doug Weight, Paul Kariya

The Harry Potter: This guy is known for being totally invisible, like Harry Potter when under the Invisibility Cloak. You just never see him do anything even when he's on the ice.
NHL Examples: Lee Stempniak, Joe Thornton and Alex Semin during the post-season,

The Grinder (or hoagie, sub, sandwich): This guy loves his food. Enough said.
NHL Examples: Martin Brodeur, Tim Thomas, Kyle Wellwood

The Rioter: This guy is really talented, but he's somewhat reckless and therefore violence always seem to follow him, especially when he's playing well.
NHL Examples: Steve Downie, Dan Carcillo, every Montreal Canadiens player who caused a riot during the 2010 playoff run.

The Houdini Defensemen: This guy always seems to pull a disappearing act, especially when in the Defensive Zone.
NHL Examples: Mike Green, Tomas Kaberle, Lukas Krajicek, The Boston Bruins after the 1st period of Game 7 against the Flyers

The We Have A Legend Only Not: This guy shares a nickname with an NHL legend, too bad he doesn't play like one.
NHL Examples: Robert Esche, Ryan Parent, The 4th NHL Staal brother: Jarrett Stoll

The Smart Guy: This guy always seems to use his head or the heads of others to help his team out.
NHL Examples: Ian Laperriere, Roman Cechmanek, Goalies playing behind Keith Ballard

The Psycho-analyst: This guy likes to get into the heads of opponents in order to make sure that his team always the psychological advantage. He usually does simple things to amuse the simple minds of his opponents.
NHL Examples: Chris Pronger, Steve Yzerman when proposing trades to Paul Holmgren



There you go, now you know

 

Welcoming the Flyers new AHL team: Tampa Bay Lightning

No seriously, look at the Bolts these days, all their Flyers related history. It's almost odd how the Flyers turned the Bolts into an extra AHL team, and how the Bolts kinda play like an AHL team these days too. I mean look at the Lawton/Tocchet era. Even the coaching staff currently has come Flyers connections. The head coach is some guy named Boucher, and as a long time Flyers fan, the name Boucher means a lot to me, mainly because he didn't totally suck this year when we needed him most, games 1 and 5 of the Finals not withstanding (don't worry Brian, I'll judge you based on the result of this series). Boucher's assistant, Dan Lacroix from the 1997 Dan Line of Dan Lacroix, Scott Daniels, and Dan Kordic.

The current Bolts line up features two Flyers rejects.

Let's see, when looking at future talent, the Bolts top agitator is Steve Downie, a guy who's so undisciplined and off the wall that even the Flyers wouldn't even keep him.

The blue line has former Flyer Randy Jones anchoring it's third pair, a guy so bad he lost his job to Ryan Parent/Oskars Bartulis.

Then I realized something, this Bolts/Flyers connection has gone back to the mid 90s.

The historical examples

• When the Legion of Doom failed, Mikael Renberg was sent down to the Bolts in favor of Chris Gratton
• When Gratton didn't help, he was sent down to give Renberg a 2nd chance
• Sean Burke made his way to the Flyers a couple times in his career, he too spent time with the Bolts when he lost his A-game
• Vinny Prospal got shipped between the Flyers/Bolts quite a few times.
• After Antero Niitymaki sucked for the Flyers, he was sent down to the Bolts.
• When Steve Eminger couldn't hack it in Philly, he was traded with Downie for Matt Carle
• Simon Gagne and Randy Jones now join those ranks.

As for the future, I've obtained some exclusive pictures of the future of these franchises.

Being sent down to the Bolts:









Being Called up to the Orange and Black







Ok, I shall wake up now and stop dreaming. (DTV, you can stop crying now this was work of fiction, please don't sue me)

Seeing the Brightside, A DGS look at the Gagne trade

I've waited to post this, mainly because I wanted to avoid an unoriginal and pathetic rant about how much I miss Simon. Quite honestly, for that, my Twitter feed to the right should have supplied plenty of that. (Ain't I right DTV?)

With that, I recently posted an analysis on Blades of Funny of some of Holmgren's trades, here's what I came up...reposted here for my loyal DGS-ers



Let’s take a quick look on some of Paul Holmgren’s odd moves

Case 1: Trading Alex Zhitnik to ATL for Braydon Coburn

Well, this was basically a steal for the Flyers

Case 2: Trading Peter Forsberg to Nashville for Upshall, Parent and 2 draft picks
Then trading the picks back to NSH for Scott Hartnell and Kimmo Timonen

ok, so Parent’s back in NSH, Upshall got kicked to Phoenix for Carcillo, Kimmo and Harts are gonna end up killing our cap barring some more moves, but these guys did produce in Philly (except Parent in the Finals)

Case 3: Upshall to PHX for Dan Carcillo

I dislike Carcillo, no denials, but the fact is, Upshall wasn’t gonna see top line time as an RW with Joffrey Lupul and Mike Knuble ahead of him. Well, what if he stayed for 09-10 you say, and I say fine, where would Briere, Carter, Giroux, Lappy be moved to in order to find a slot for Upshall. I love Upshall, yes, but he wasn’t gonna fit in and so getting something for him was a good deal.




Case 4: Parent to NSH for a 7th rounder and Rights to Dam Hamhuis,
NSH 7th Rounder to SJS for Rights to Nabby
Rights to Dan Hamhuis to Pittsburgh for a 3rd Rounder

Wait, Ryan Parent, Ryan F-ing Parent for a third rounder from the Penguins, uhh, steal…duh

Case 5: Ole Tollefsen and 2nd rounder for Ville Leino

Tollefsen’s in the SEL, and Leino lit up everyone he saw in the playoffs, epic win enough said.





So, Holmgren has a knack for getting stuff done…trading Gagne and 2nd round pick for a 4th, Meszaros and Walker might just work out…if not, then my final example…

Case 6: Steve Eminger and Steve Downie to Tampa for Matt Carle…yes Homer has a way of moving Bad D-men out for good ones…



my pick for the 2010 edition

Andrej Meszaros and Dan Carcillo somewhere for a D-man who doesn't suck...guess that excludes Wade Redden, Tomas Kaberle, and Mike Green*

*-(Editor's Note: Why Mike Green made a list of DEFENSEMEN is beyond me)




I wish Gagne the best of luck but if he comes up gimpy in a game with the groin, or takes a Matt Cooke elbow…I won’t be surprised

Things Ryan Parent Could Have Been Traded For

Ok DGS back today, with a post from the Real DGS, rather than Amy, who was filling in for me while I was under the weather.

It seems that the Nashville Predators overpaid a bit for Ryan Parent. I mean, talent-wise Dan Hamhuis is far and away above what Parent is, Hamhuis could be a future top d-man on a team, Parent, if he stays healthy and plays to the top of his potential, could be a #3/#4 D-man who sees PK duty.

Parent's kinda useless, sure he's an decent PK guy, but his even strength numbers are kinda scary bad. Also, he handles the puck with the same skill, poise and dexterity as Sean Avery handles words and maturity.

Parent also is shaping up to rival Rick DiPietro for the most injury plagued career. For any NY Yankees fans out there, think about the $39,950,000 mistake called Carl Pavano.

But enough with that, should the Predators attempt to move Ryan Parent, I have a list of things that would be fair compensation.

• A bag of pucks
• Any NJ Devils backup goaltender (only thing in hockey that sees less ice time than Parent)
  
• Vesa Toskala
• Anyone half as good as Alex Daigle
• A spare water bottle
• Anyone JFJ thinks is good
• Joe Thornton Playoff Edition
• Michael Leighton, Road Stanley Cup Finals Edition
• Lee Stempniak: Maple Leafs Edition
• Andrew Raycroft
  

Analyzing the Hamhuis for Parent trade

So Parent is gone and Dan Hamhuis is in...another Dan to worry about...but a good deal for the Flyers. Parent was expendable and his back problems are now Nashville's problems. Hammer if he signs, will be a good addition to an already strong blueline, and if not, well a 7th round draft pick for Parent is still overpaying for him. If the Flyers keep Coburn, then i would say that the Flyers have the best defense in the NHL next year. Pronger, Kimmo, Coburn, Hamhuis, Bartulis and whoever gets that 6th spot, candidates include Danny Syvret, Joonas Lehtuvuori, and any number of possible draft/free agent/trade pickups.

All in all, DGS likes. So do many Flyers fans all over the world.


-Amy