Well, ladies and gentlemen, it’s game day at last, with the New York Rangers and New Jersey Devils slated for a big Game Six matchup in just under ten hours. This series has been very exciting, regardless of who you root for, but a lot has also been happening off the ice as well; some crazy, some stupid, some funny. (Okay, it’s the NHL so of course it’s mostly stupid.) It’s time we take a look at that, and go Around the NHL…
- When NHL games were being played on Versus, and before that, the ridiculous Outdoor Life Network, there was never a limit to the amount of what we hockey pundits could make fun of, because those networks were just…well…stupid. Remember when hockey games were being sandwiched between deer hunting, bass fishing, and extreme cage fighting? Remember when the network changed, and they launched a campaign for fans to show them your “V” (which stood for Versus…I hope; whatever that meant). Bottom line is, the networks were so bad that no one ever really made fun of the actual broadcast, because it looked like Emmy-worthy material when combined with everything else. Now that the NHL is on the highly esteemed NBC Sports Network (if I rolled my eyes any harder at that, they would get stuck facing the inside of my head), broadcasts are losing some of their luster. Aside from Mike Emrick, whose announcing has been flawless, does anyone see a point to having Pierre McGuire and Eddie Olcyk even being a part of the team? They add absolutely nothing; no enlightening comments, no inside knowledge, no nothing. All Pierre does is loft obvious questions with obvious answers toward Eddie, who, nine times out of ten, completely ignores it before saying something else. “I’d say that was a good save, wouldn’t you, Eddie?” No, you idiot, it was horrible. Tie game in the third period, why would that be a good save?
