No Merry Christmas for NY Rangers fans and I am sorry
With the possible exception of being hit in the groin by a Aroldis Chapman fastball, the worst feeling in sports is when your favorite hockey team gets eliminated from the playoffs. The hockey regular season is a grueling seven month ordeal for hockey fans. The highs and lows felt during the regular season are unlike those felt by the fans of any other sport. These wide mood swings cause hockey fans to become extremely emotionally invested in their teams by the end of the season. And if your team makes the play-offs, the vision of drinking from Lord Stanley's Cup becomes indelibly etched in a fan's mind. It seems so real you can actually taste it ... The taste is a little funky from all the silver polish residue on the cup, but what a gloriously funky residue taste it is.
The play-offs continue this roller coaster ride but with vastly higher peaks and much lower troughs. Rick Nash nets a game winner against Montreal and you become instant lifelong BFFs with the stranger you've been high-fiving all game in the row in front of you. Hank Lundqvist lets up a goal in double overtime against Ottawa and you walk the streets aimlessly looking for a dog or two to kick. When the end comes, and it eventually will come to fifteen of the teams that make the play-offs, its like a not-so-little piece of you dies the moment the final horn sounds. Colors in the city seem a little faded, children don't laugh as much anymore and the manicotti at the local pizzeria just doesn't taste right. Fortunately, things get back to normal by the time the next hockey season starts, but its a long four months.
When such a traumatic event happens, people naturally start to dole out the blame. The sudden and abrupt end to what was a most promising playoff run by the Rangers is no different. The blame game will be fierce. No one will be free from criticism. The coach was clueless, the defense couldn't clear the crease, the power play was too passive, why didn't the offense "SHOOT THE PUCK", the goalie let up too many rebounds, the refs hate the Rangers and the league wants a Canadian team to win the Cup. Those are just a small fractions of the reasons people will come up with on why the Rangers failed to bring this great city a Stanley Cup ... and all those reason will be wrong. You see, I was the reason the Rangers lost.
A successful playoff run is highly dependent on how the fans are dressed. I maintain that despite having the most talented team year after year, the Washington Capitals have never won a Stanley Cup because 99% of their fans wear Ovechkin jerseys to the games. C'mon, the Caps have been in existence for over 40 years, they've had other good players besides Ovechkin. Until the fans wise up and start to add variety to their jersey rotation, they are doomed. Anyways, I just never got into a groove on my play-off game jersey selection. I wore Messier when I should have worn my Lundqvist jersey, my Zibanejad sweater when I should have pulled out my trusty Martin St. Louis jersey, and I never even wore my Chris Keider's third jersey! What was I thinking?!! I know my bone headed wardrobe malfunctions cost my beloved Rangers at least a couple of games during the play-offs.
My culpability didn't end there. One of the oldest traditions in hockey is for fans and players alike to grow a beard during the playoffs. The rules are simple; No shaving at all once a playoff series starts and you can trim the beard only between rounds. Like any normal Ranger fan, I decided to 'grow one for the team' and was all in until I had an UVA Alumni function in the city. The dean of the business school was going to be in attendance and I wanted to look good. My beard was beginning to look a lot like Grizzly Adams's since I had failed to trim it after the end of the first playoff series. I decided I needed to clean up my mutton chops a little before the date of the event ... I didn't worry ... how much trouble could a mere trim cause the Rangers? Plenty! The UVA soiree just happened to be in the middle of the second round series with the Ottawa Losers. I think my little grooming session cost us a game and thus the series. I should have sucked it up for the team and walked around looking like a mountain man for a few more days.
Why did Goliath lose to David? How did the Jets upset the Colts in Super Bowl III? What was it that that allowed the 1-2-3 Kid to pin Razor Ramon? Why is Donald Trump President today instead of Hillary? One word: Overconfidence! Overconfidence doesn't just impact normal, hum-drum, who cares everyday events like Presidential elections; it impacts hockey games too! I was so confident that the Rangers would win game six of the Ottawa series, I booked a flight to Ottawa for game seven, even before game six had been played. Yes, I was measuring the proverbial curtains for the oval office before the people had voted. My over-confidence clearly rubbed off on the Ranger players because they played like they were going through their pre-game skate around when the game started.
When things look bleak, that's when hockey fans pull out all the stops. They negotiate with God for a comeback win. When things began to look bleak for the Rangers ... down 3-2 with 2:00 left and Henrik Lundqvist was heading off the ice, normal fans would offer the big guy upstairs $5,000, their stereo, TV, car, house, motorcycle, their first born kid, ... anything (hey, it worked for the Red Sox in 2004 ... look up the SNL Master card commercial). What did I offer up? The first thing that came to my mind was that I was going to give up potato chips if the Rangers scored a goal ... potato chips? I don't even eat plato chips! That brain fart cost us the game tying goal in game six. With that momentum, the Rangers would have scored in OT and easily have been on their way to a deciding game seven victory. But it was not to be ... if only I could have offered up a couple of my kids.
"If and buts were candy and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas". They'll be no Merry Christmas this year and it's all my fault. I let the team and all my fellow blueshirt faithful in Rangerstown down. Next year, I am going to be at the top of my game, no more screw-ups. Next year, we will have to get hit in groin by a Aroldis Chapman fastball to fell the agony of defeat.
The play-offs continue this roller coaster ride but with vastly higher peaks and much lower troughs. Rick Nash nets a game winner against Montreal and you become instant lifelong BFFs with the stranger you've been high-fiving all game in the row in front of you. Hank Lundqvist lets up a goal in double overtime against Ottawa and you walk the streets aimlessly looking for a dog or two to kick. When the end comes, and it eventually will come to fifteen of the teams that make the play-offs, its like a not-so-little piece of you dies the moment the final horn sounds. Colors in the city seem a little faded, children don't laugh as much anymore and the manicotti at the local pizzeria just doesn't taste right. Fortunately, things get back to normal by the time the next hockey season starts, but its a long four months.
When such a traumatic event happens, people naturally start to dole out the blame. The sudden and abrupt end to what was a most promising playoff run by the Rangers is no different. The blame game will be fierce. No one will be free from criticism. The coach was clueless, the defense couldn't clear the crease, the power play was too passive, why didn't the offense "SHOOT THE PUCK", the goalie let up too many rebounds, the refs hate the Rangers and the league wants a Canadian team to win the Cup. Those are just a small fractions of the reasons people will come up with on why the Rangers failed to bring this great city a Stanley Cup ... and all those reason will be wrong. You see, I was the reason the Rangers lost.
A successful playoff run is highly dependent on how the fans are dressed. I maintain that despite having the most talented team year after year, the Washington Capitals have never won a Stanley Cup because 99% of their fans wear Ovechkin jerseys to the games. C'mon, the Caps have been in existence for over 40 years, they've had other good players besides Ovechkin. Until the fans wise up and start to add variety to their jersey rotation, they are doomed. Anyways, I just never got into a groove on my play-off game jersey selection. I wore Messier when I should have worn my Lundqvist jersey, my Zibanejad sweater when I should have pulled out my trusty Martin St. Louis jersey, and I never even wore my Chris Keider's third jersey! What was I thinking?!! I know my bone headed wardrobe malfunctions cost my beloved Rangers at least a couple of games during the play-offs.
My culpability didn't end there. One of the oldest traditions in hockey is for fans and players alike to grow a beard during the playoffs. The rules are simple; No shaving at all once a playoff series starts and you can trim the beard only between rounds. Like any normal Ranger fan, I decided to 'grow one for the team' and was all in until I had an UVA Alumni function in the city. The dean of the business school was going to be in attendance and I wanted to look good. My beard was beginning to look a lot like Grizzly Adams's since I had failed to trim it after the end of the first playoff series. I decided I needed to clean up my mutton chops a little before the date of the event ... I didn't worry ... how much trouble could a mere trim cause the Rangers? Plenty! The UVA soiree just happened to be in the middle of the second round series with the Ottawa Losers. I think my little grooming session cost us a game and thus the series. I should have sucked it up for the team and walked around looking like a mountain man for a few more days.
Why did Goliath lose to David? How did the Jets upset the Colts in Super Bowl III? What was it that that allowed the 1-2-3 Kid to pin Razor Ramon? Why is Donald Trump President today instead of Hillary? One word: Overconfidence! Overconfidence doesn't just impact normal, hum-drum, who cares everyday events like Presidential elections; it impacts hockey games too! I was so confident that the Rangers would win game six of the Ottawa series, I booked a flight to Ottawa for game seven, even before game six had been played. Yes, I was measuring the proverbial curtains for the oval office before the people had voted. My over-confidence clearly rubbed off on the Ranger players because they played like they were going through their pre-game skate around when the game started.
When things look bleak, that's when hockey fans pull out all the stops. They negotiate with God for a comeback win. When things began to look bleak for the Rangers ... down 3-2 with 2:00 left and Henrik Lundqvist was heading off the ice, normal fans would offer the big guy upstairs $5,000, their stereo, TV, car, house, motorcycle, their first born kid, ... anything (hey, it worked for the Red Sox in 2004 ... look up the SNL Master card commercial). What did I offer up? The first thing that came to my mind was that I was going to give up potato chips if the Rangers scored a goal ... potato chips? I don't even eat plato chips! That brain fart cost us the game tying goal in game six. With that momentum, the Rangers would have scored in OT and easily have been on their way to a deciding game seven victory. But it was not to be ... if only I could have offered up a couple of my kids.
"If and buts were candy and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas". They'll be no Merry Christmas this year and it's all my fault. I let the team and all my fellow blueshirt faithful in Rangerstown down. Next year, I am going to be at the top of my game, no more screw-ups. Next year, we will have to get hit in groin by a Aroldis Chapman fastball to fell the agony of defeat.
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