Created: November 22nd
Except for the fact that there are corporate (mostly American) ads everywhere, with an audience of 60 000 who paid about $2000 a piece! Almost everyone there was there because their corporate job entailed getting free tickets to sports events. It was obvious because whenever the camera switched to the crowd, you could tell they weren't interested in the outcome of the game. I guess I can't blame them. Each team in the NHL plays like 80 games, what are the chances that this one game is going to affect whether they get into the playoffs or not?
This game is nothing but a regular game of NHL hockey with the roof removed, and yet the announcers contantly remind everyone how this is supposed to be some amazing proof that the NHL hasn't... lost it's roots or something. Oh trust me, dear announcers, this game has just about nothing to do with hockey's roots.
The "Heritage Classic" (which is apparantly different from the other 2 billon NHL games in the regular season) started off pretty bad. We've all seen those opening faceoffs where some popular guy drops the puck and the two centres are supposed to try to win the face off but they don't because the "opening faceoff" isn't actually part of the game. In the "Heritage Classic", two famous retired players dropped the puck for this special heritage faceoff.
Read that last sentence again.
Two people dropped two pucks at two players. Who the hell sets up this bullshit? Oh, yeah, and I'm real sure they had this special guest faceoff BS 50 years ago, about as sure that this page isn't dripping with annoying sarcasm.
The game was low scoring as far as I saw it, but I didn't stick around. It wasn't exciting in the least. It was like every other hockey game without the roof or dignity. It was an attempt to raise ratings and was saturated with all the BS of today's hockey.
The only part about it I liked was the ice. Despite the cold weather, ice doesn't hold up as well outdoors. It was pretty cool watching the players try to keep their balance on real ice when they're used to their pussy stadium ice. By the end of the period, players would make lots of snow fly into the air as they turned and stopped, more than usual anyway. So that was cool.
But overall, it was an over-hyped game that was exactly like every other hockey game. I'm getting sick of it. You can only watch so many games of hockey before you get tired of the repitition and realize that it doesn't matter who wins.
What if the Maple Leafs win the Stanley Cup? What will that do? Will Ontario get a tax break, or experience anything at all that will eventually lead to me getting something? No. Will I get the satisfaction of knowing I won something? Probably not, considering I'm not on the team. The only reason to watch these things is so you can enjoy the strategy involved. And my limited love for that is wearing thin.
