2009-2010 Player Profiles: Brett Lebda...

OK, it’s that time of year. Hockey’s so close that you can almost taste it. By my count, there are 11 days remaining before the Wings kick off their season in Sweden (which is still entirely too many, but at least we can see the light at the end of the tunnel). In order to pass the time, I’ll be posting a player profile every day until then (in alphabetical order, because I’m one of those people). I want to make it very clear that these are not predictions, because I do not, under any circumstance, make predictions. They’re simply my thoughts on each player’s performances last season, and my hopes and expectations for them this time around. Today’s subject:

Brett Lebda


2008-2009 Regular Season: 65 GP, 6-10-16, +/- 9, 48 PIM
2009 Playoffs: 23 GP, 0-6-6, +/- 8, 22 PIM

Season Highlight: His Winter Classic goal.
Season Lowlight: Being utterly forgettable the rest of the time.

Lebda’s run last season was much like the rest of his seasons in the NHL. It was nothing special, but neither was it truly terrible. He was just kind of there. He’s an interesting player because I like to pick on him, but I’m not entirely sure he deserves most of the yelling that I do. Granted, he’ll never be an all star, but after several minutes of deep thought, I’ve come to the conclusion that he’s not really bad, he just happens to stand out as being less talented than his fellow Wings defensemen. And that’s entirely understandable considering that he suits up with the likes of Lidstrom, Rafalski, and Kronwall.

Lebda’s season is going to depend a lot on what happens with Lilja and his concussion. As of now, Lebda’s slated to be paired up with Jonathan Ericsson this season, but if Lilja gets healthy, then Lebda’s liable to find himself in the press box or as trade bait. Assuming he’s a regular in the lineup, he should put up about the same numbers as he did last year. He and Ericsson will still make a pretty good third pairing, and the Wings defense corps is still one of (if not the) deepest in the league. And I’ll continue to sweat it out while he’s on the ice, and then promptly forget about him as soon as he goes off on a line change.

What he needs to do to make me happy: Just keep playing his reasonably solid defensive game. Nothing flashy.

The NHL Schedule and Video Madness...

So the NHL released next season’s schedule yesterday. This is always an exciting day for me because now I can plan my life for the next 10 months or so. My friends and family now know the 82 times between October and April during which they should not attempt to contact me. This is very important for them because over the years, they’ve learned to check the score of the Wings game before asking me for something. If things are going well, then they’ll hop on the phone asking for favors galore. If things aren’t looking so hot, they know to put off their requests until such time as I’m likely to be cheerful.

I’m really looking forward to the games in Sweden. If I had money instead of school, I’d totally be there. Unfortunately, that’s not how my life has worked out to this point. So instead, I’ll be chilling on the couch, celebrating the fact that the football game is away that weekend, and diving right back into my obsessive fandom.

I’m not going to go over the schedule. Enough people have done that already, and I don’t have much to add. Someone commented on Snapshots that the March schedule is brutal. I’d have to agree with that. I don’t think it’s going to be any different for any other teams though. The NHL schedulers have been lauded for not increasing the number of back-to-back games this year to account for the Olympic break. Instead there are just more one-day breaks between games. This is good for me as a fan, maybe not so good for the players. Remember last year when there was that five or six day-long gap in the Wings’ schedule for no apparent reason? That was miserable. None of that this year.

Other things of note: the Wings play Pittsbugh twice. I half expected the NHL to schedule them to play against the Pens in their home opener just so Gary Bettman could get the satisfaction of forcing them to watch the banner raise. Thankfully, the Hockey Gods aren’t quite cruel enough to allow that. They also play Alex Ovechkin and the Caps twice, which is nice since he’s only played at the Joe once before (Thanks for that, NHL and your misguided attempt to force teams into rivalries.). Other than that, it’s nice to see the New Year’s Eve game return. Not that the Winter Classic wasn’t worth it last year, but it was a little bit sad to miss that tradition last year.

Now that the schedule’s out, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Summer’s never been my favorite season. Some kids reveled in their summers, thrilled to be off of school and enjoying the weather. I spent my summers dreaming of ice and free agents and October. I realize that this isn’t entirely normal, but it is what it is. I can totally sympathize with this article, written by Paul Kukla of Kukla’s Korner fame for NHL.com. It’s pretty much the story of my life.

Snapshots pointed me to this video of Darren McCarty at the hockey camp at the Joe. Because, clearly, as a Wings fan, you needed another reason to love the guy.

I also stumbled across this on YouTube. It’s not necessarily Red Wings-related, but it made my friend and I laugh hysterically. There’s apparently a whole series of them on YouTube using the same clip. The Michael Jackson one’s pretty good too. In other amazing hockey-related video news, head over to Japers' Rink and check out these two videos. It’ll be worth your while. I promise.

I’m not even going to touch the Jiri Hudler saga. That one’s just going to have to play itself out. I can’t shake the feeling that the Wings are getting completely hosed with the whole deal, but I’m not one of those people who thinks that it’s intentional on the NHL’s part. I think they’ve been looking for a chance to make this an issue for a while, and the Wings were just lucky enough to be the ones to get caught in the cross-fire. I really don’t see Hudler suiting up for the Wings next season. I just think it would be nice to be able to get something back for developing him as an asset. You’re not supposed to lose valuable RFAs for nothing. Unless you fail to mail their qualifying offers in time. Oh no, what kind of postal nightmare have I brought upon myself for daring to mock them again? I’m going to leave you with that while I go cower in a corner and await the terrible consequences of that last comment.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, Part Three...

The ugly:

The final installment of my season recap features the worst of the worst. It's the stuff that was too bad to make the cut for the bad post. Not all of it's nice, but (most of) it's all in good fun.

--The NHL has a long and storied history of featuring guys like Scott Hartnell. And I say, "keep it coming." There's nothing more beautiful in this world than seeing a guy like Hartnell step out on the ice in full hockey regalia. He wouldn't even need to play a shift. Simply sitting on the bench with that face would be enough.
--The Handshake Incident. I have nothing to add to this. I don't even care that Crosby didn't shake everyone's hands. I'm mostly irritated with the way the media handled it all. They somehow, I'm assuming through a great deal of effort, managed to be less professional than Sid the Kid. They should be ashamed of themselves.
--At one point during the regular season, I watched a game against Dallas on Versus with my brother. By the end of the first period, we weren't sure that the announcers were aware that they were calling a hockey game. We lost count of the outside sports metaphors that were used to describe plays being made on the ice. I don't remember all of them, but they included the announcement that someone had just tried to "alley-oop" the puck into the net, that the score was currently 1-Love, and several others that went beyond the standard "quarterbacking the powerplay" that's commonly used. Even better, later on, they described this save by Chris Osgood as "mastodonic." We still haven't figured out what that means. I'm assuming it was a compliment, but honestly, there's no way to tell. If you happen to know exactly what he was trying to say, by all means, enlighten me in the comments section. The highlight of the game, however, was when one of the Versus guys said that Pavel Datsyuk played with, "such fabulosity," thus introducing me to my new favorite word. There was a month there where my brother and I couldn't have a conversation without dropping "fabulosity" at least a dozen times. This is perhaps the only thing for which I've ever been grateful to Versus. Oh to have had my DVR back then...

--This picture will probably haunt me forever. Not to mention the fact that I can't even bring myself to post one of Crosby hoisting the Cup.
--The Goal that Wasn't. Things worked alright in the Anaheim series, so this goal won't cause Wings fans to convulse the way Buffalo fans do when shown this goal, but still... The worst part was the way the NHL closed ranks to defend Brad Watson and his patently obvious error. A few days later, an NBA referee blew a call that changed the outcome of a close game, and the league acknowledged it publicly. While it didn't change the fact that the mistake had happened, at least it gave the NBA the appearance of being a professional organization with standards and accountability, something the NHL is sorely lacking.
--Then there was the matter of the lowlife who stole Henrik Zetterberg's game-used stick from a kid after the Winter Classic. Seriously. Stories like that make me wonder what the world has come to. The whole incident had a happy ending, as the guy who bought the stick from the thief sent it back to the kid, and both ended up with something. Conclusions like that at least partially restore my faith in humanity. Props to the guy for returning the stick to the kid after he read about the incident. There need to be more people like that in the world.
--The saga of the Phoenix Coyotes and Jim Balsillie was timed perfectly so as to serve as a distraction from the league's showcase event: the playoffs. While I never bothered to delve into the financial/legal aspects of the mess, I have to admit that a little part of me wanted Jimmy Balls to come out on top, just so Gary Bettman would lose. I don't know, maybe that makes me a bad person or even worse, a bad hockey fan, but I'm not sure I care all that much. I couldn't shake the feeling that a Bettman loss would be the beginning of the end for the commish, and that's enough to get me to support just about any bandwagon.
--"The Beard is Back." It's entirely possible that this is the worst playoff slogan ever invented. When you combine it with the signs saying, "You're entering a no-shave zone," it's a complete and utter disaster. I love a good playoff beard as much as the next fan, but there's a difference between having something as a quirky hockey tradition and using it as a major marketing campaign. Mike Ilitch needs to fire his marketing team. I'm assuming that they're the same people behind those atrocious Little Caesar's ads. Find a new line of work, people. Please. You wouldn't think it would have been that hard to find a way to market the defending Stanley Cup champions. My kid sister could've come up with a better slogan. Ugh. And was it really necessary to adorn the Al outside the entrance to the Joe with a big fake beard? I tried one of those on, and I'm pretty sure I have black lung disease now from inhaling the pieces it shed. Al deserves better than that.
--Donald Brashear's hit on Blair Betts during the first round of the playoffs was another truly ugly moment from the 08-09 season. If watching this video doesn't make you shudder, you're probably a sociopath and should leave this blog immediately.


--Valtteri Filppula's hair continues to get worse and worse with each passing season. You'd think that with all of the money this guy makes, he'd be able to find a better stylist. Until this season, I was unaware that he had a little cult-like following of girls who find him sexy. I can only assume that these are the Michigan-born cousins of the Sidney Crosby fangirls that plague the Pittsburgh area.
--This video of a distraught Sharks fan after his team's elimination is pathetic in every way possible. (Make sure you stay with it until the parents show up. That's when it really gets good.) It's like a trainwreck that you just can't stop watching. And yet, strangely, watching it makes me feel a little bit better about myself. Not even in my lowest moment have I ever approached the level of...I don't think there's even a word for it...that he displays in this video. I sincerely hope that his parents got him some psychiatric help.
--Last but not least, the NHL's disciplinary process managed to devolve into even more of a complete and utter joke. I'd link videos, but honestly, there are too many to choose from. Coming up with a comprehensive and consistent policy needs to be the NHL's top priority before somebody ends up with a life-threatening injury from one of these nasty hits that are tolerated so long as the victim is able to skate away with his head intact.

On a personal note:
-I managed to sprain my toe whilst flailing around on the floor in front of my TV during the final minutes of Game 7. Clearly, this was not a high point in my life.

Part One: The Good
Part Two: The Bad

Season Review: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, Part One...

In order to avoid making this post epically long, I decided to break it up into three separate entries. Like the Unofficial Awards, this is a long-standing tradition in my life, with the title most likely inspired my my father's love of watching reruns of westerns with me as a child.

The good:

Despite the number of hours I spent screaming at my TV and mentally strangling the NHL (yes, it’s possible to strangle an organization) over the course of the last year, the 2008-2009 season turned out to be a pretty good one. It fell one game short of being great, but it’s not like I didn’t enjoy the ride. Here we have the best of the best, or at any rate, the best that I could remember off the top of my head. Please feel free to remind me of any highlights that I might have missed.

--The Winter Classic. Despite Pavel Datsyuk’s wind-aided goal, the Classic was an amazing experience and, quite frankly, one of the few things the NHL got right this year. It was so much fun that part of me felt bad for the fans of other teams who had no rooting interest in the game. You pretty much knew it was going to be epic when Mike Babcock and staff came out wearing fedoras. I think that was the moment when I realized that he was probably the only coach who could replace Scotty Bowman in my heart. The other highlight of the game: Henrik Zetterberg + eye black. I’m just saying… (Why are there not any better pictures of this? Seriously.)
--Possibly my favorite part of the playoffs was Ozzie semi-silencing his critics. He was supposed to be the Wings’ weak link, and he came this close to walking away with a well-deserved Conn Smythe trophy. Honestly, of all the Wings, he’s the one I felt worst for at the end of Game 7. It seemed like no matter how well he played, analysts kept saying he was going to implode and the next game would surely showcase the “real” Chris Osgood. But game in and game out, the man was an absolute wall. I’m of the opinion that the way a player performs when he’s under maximum pressure shows his true character, and this year, Ozzie did nothing but reaffirm my faith in him. Despite losing, the man has nothing to be ashamed of.
--I was also a huge fan of CBC’s Coldplay intro to the Finals. If ever there was a song that you wouldn’t associate with hockey, it’s “The Scientist.” Those Canadians made it work in a spectacular fashion, though. In moments like those, I almost wish that I was Canadian. Last year, when I didn’t have cable, my playoff mantra was TGFC—thank god for Canada!—and CBC was literally the only thing that kept me sane. Despite the fact that they lost their Song, aka the unofficial Canadian anthem, this year, those guys never let me down.
--In other random media notes, I was thrilled to see the reemergence of the Cup lift commercial. This is quite possibly the greatest advertisement ever made. It’s hard to believe that the NHL was responsible for it. That strange and pathetic sound you hear every time it’s played is thousands of grown men simultaneously bursting into tears. At any rate, it’s absolutely mesmerizing. I can’t tear my eyes away from it when it’s on, nor would I want to. When I missed games this year, I would stop fast forwarding through the commercials on my DVR just so I could watch this one. And there’s no greater complement that I can give to a marketing instrument.
--Speaking of mesmerizing, one of the Wings’ season highlights was Datsyuk’s epic shootout goal against Minnesota. Much like the Cup commercial, I don’t think I will ever tire of watching this replayed on youtube. It’s pretty safe to assume that at least 75% of the views for that video were from me. It was a Dangle Dangle Special of the highest order.
--Also on the subject of Datsyuk, few interviews could top his chat with Mickey Redmond while serving his quasi-suspension after the All-Star Game. It should be mandatory that he give interviews like that 365 days a year.
--Another of Mick’s finest moments was the interview he and Ken Daniels did with Gary Bettman in which Mickey “debated” (which is a kind way of saying that he delivered an intellectual ass-kicking) many of the issues nearest and dearest to Wings fans’ hearts with the commish. Because, clearly, I needed another reason to love Mickey Redmond. Not many people involved in the game have had the audacity to publicly stand up to Bettman and *gasp* question his actions, and you have to imagine that it took the commish a week curled up under his security blanket made from Sidney Crosby’s game-worn jerseys to get over the affront. I’m not sure whether I liked the look on Bettman’s face as he squirmed while Mr. Bingo Bango dared challenge him or the awkward look on Ken Daniel’s face as he desperately tried to find a way to rein Mickey in. I still haven’t found a youtube video of this “debate,” and that makes me sad on many levels.
--The fake Henrik Zetterberg ads. These things make my life. As far as I'm concerned, they're sheer brilliance on the part of the guys who created them. Also, this video. It should send chills down your spine if you're a true hockey fan.
--One of the best regular season things the organization did was begin the $15 student tickets around Christmas time. I realize that this was only in response to the lousy economy, and thus it’s a little hard to take joy in it, but it allowed me to attend more games that I had ever been able to before. I hope they continue this next season, because, let’s face it, Wings games are like my version of crack. The more I watch, the more I need to fulfill my craving.

And a few more on a personal level:
--I had the opportunity to meet Ted Lindsay at the Joe this year. I got his autograph, but more importantly, I was able to shake his hand. This was perhaps one of the finest moments in my career as a hockey fan (yeah, I said “career”).
--During another visit to the Joe, my friend and I were running late and arrived after the game had started. The concourse was pretty much deserted as we were running to our seats. As we passed by one of the pillars, I spotted something out of the corner of my eye. Sitting right there, 5 feet away at a book-signing table, was none other than Mr. Hockey. I stopped dead in my tracks and blurted out, “Holy shit, that’s Gordie Howe.” He then proceeded to look up at me and laugh. That’s right. Gordie freakin’ Howe looked me in the eye and chuckled at me. I stood there for a moment with what can be best described as a look of bewilderment on my face. Then I did a little half-wave, and ran away to find my seat. You had better believe that I’ll be telling that story to my grandkids some day.
--Going to my first playoff game was another personal highlight. I'll never forget rising to my feet in unison with the entire crowd as the Wings broke in on a 3-on-1 in overtime. While there is literally nothing that can ever be done to make me enjoy playoff OT, this was by far the greatest play I've ever witnessed in person at the Joe.
--Starting this blog has quite possibly saved my life. It’s hard to believe, considering the enormous amount of time that I waste on the internet every day, but for some reason, I was completely unaware that there was a vast hockey blogging community until halfway through this season. Once I saw the brilliance that was out there, it was only a matter of time until I felt compelled to join in and have my say. Putting my thoughts out here has been a wonderfully cathartic alternative to ranting and raving at (yes, “at,” not “to”) my friends and family who care about the Wings significantly less than I do. Mostly it's just good to know that there are other crazies like myself out there. Suffering alone is no fun at all.

Part Two: The Bad
Part Three: The Ugly

Like a Bad Blind Date...

I've never in my life watched the NHL Award show. People who know me find this strange because I spend almost every waking moment pouring over any NHL-related news that I can get my hands on. So you would think that I would love to see the players in a different setting and completely out of their element. Mostly though, it just comes across as awkward. Kind of like when Luc Robitaille had a cameo on Bones this year. I couldn't bring myself to look away and all I could do was sit there with a horrified grimace on my face.

So I prefer to stick with my annual Unofficial Awards, which this year managed to land me on both A2Y and Puck Daddy. I'm not ashamed to admit that this was the highlight of my day yesterday. Mostly I'm just amazed that anyone is reading my ranting and raving. So thanks, I guess.

As everyone not living under a rock knows by now, Dangle Dangle took home the Lady Byng and the Selke. I only watched the video of his awards and Vladdie's entrance, so I can't say for sure that his acceptance speeches were the best ones of the night, but I'm willing to bet they were. Why? Just because.

There weren't any real shockers on the night. The awards fell pretty much as I thought they would. I was disappointed that Lidstrom didn't win the Norris, but I wasn't remotely surprised. I had figured that one would be a toss up between Chara and Green, and I'm kind of glad that it fell to Chara. At least he appears to be a defenseman. Maybe next year Green will challenge Datsyuk for the Selke. I'm pretty sure Dangle Dangle would still win, though.

The highlight of the night was Vladdie's appearance. That and the Winter Classic are possibly the only two things the NHL did right this year. I still remember sitting in front of the TV watching the coverage of the limo accident with tears in my eyes. He's one of those guys who everybody except apparently Penguins fans can rally around. It makes me proud to say that he was/is a Red Wing.