Winter of Discontent: The 2017-18 NHL Season

[FiddySicks]

Way to go Stars, you dip :censored:s. 

 

 

[crashcarson15]

I think this has been brought up on this board before, but the biggest problem with “Pittsburgh” sports fans — and it propagates best through “Penguins” fans — are the people who don’t actually live there, and in a lot of cases, have no reason to be Pittsburgh sports fans except for the fact that their football and hockey teams have been good. @McCarthy could probably give better context, but there are a lot of Pittsburgh fans in central Ohio who are just extremely, extremely obnoxious when they go to watch the Penguins in Columbus.

 

I was in Pittsburgh for Game 5 of the 2014 first round with the Jackets. It was a great experience, and we were surrounded with a lot of knowledgeable Penguins fans who were very welcoming and into having conversation. Originally being from the part of Ohio that near touches the state line, more than half my family’s Pittsburgh fans. Most of them are good people. But there are a lot of people who’ve jumped on the Penguins bandwagon specifically, and they feel the need to be the biggest idiots in the world at sporting events. It’s unfair to a lot of the people of Pittsburgh, a fantastic, beautiful city I love, but that’s the perception most of us have of Pittsburgh sports fans (and this is not a unique experience, mind you — a lot of people probably have the same feeling about Cavs “fans” in their cities, and absolutely did with “Heat fans”).

[HedleyLamarr]

15 hours ago, Crabcake47 said:

ohhhhhhh right right right that's what I meant to say. 

 

Honestly I'd take the Caps' lack of cups and constant disappointments over being a Pens fan any day of the week. You guys are the Patriots of hockey. 

Please....I'd take seeing a bunch of Stanley Cup/Super Bowl/World Series/NBA championship banners at my teams' venues.  Give me rings over whatever perception the fans have. 

 

Fan behavior/perception can change.  Those championship flags fly forever.

11 hours ago, Ice_Cap said:

They were an ok team for a while before they got really bad, and almost moved to Hamilton and then Kansas City. Then they got Crosby.

So to me the Penguins aren’t this annoying team that always wins. They’re a  bad team that got their crap together and turned it all around. Same with Chicago, really. I don’t really view them as an annoying juggernaut either.

I'm not sure it was "getting their crap together" as much as it was "the NHL Ewing'ed them a once-a-generation player in an alleged 'Everyone Has A Shot' draft lottery".  Not televising that was the worst thing the NHL did to the fans once they ended the lockout.
 

Quote

You probably shouldn’t be talking trash after starting 0-2 and finding yourselves on the wrong end of a 10-1 thrashing though.

 

Meh....counts the same as a 2-1 loss.  Commendable to at least be talking smack after a game like that.

[The_Admiral]

Maybe my favorite thing about Penguins fans is how they've taken the heat off Blackhawks fans. I forgot what it's like to be called an advocate of genocide and rape!

[IceCap]

1 hour ago, HedleyLamarr said:

I'm not sure it was "getting their crap together" as much as it was "the NHL Ewing'ed them a once-a-generation player in an alleged 'Everyone Has A Shot' draft lottery".  Not televising that was the worst thing the NHL did to the fans once they ended the lockout.

I’m always going to air on the side of “not believing in conspiracy theories.”

 

1 hour ago, HedleyLamarr said:

Meh....counts the same as a 2-1 loss.  Commendable to at least be talking smack after a game like that.

Nope. You lose 2-1 it’s a tight game. Lose 10-1 and there are probably deeper issues that need to be worked out. 

 

Maybe it is commendable to talk trash after getting beaten 10-1, but you have to expect people to be particularly vicious in dealing with your trash talking.

 

Will the Pens turn it around? Probably. Almost assuredly. 

On the chance they don’t though? Well people’s tolerance for the trash talking’s going to go down.

 

2 hours ago, crashcarson15 said:

I think this has been brought up on this board before, but the biggest problem with “Pittsburgh” sports fans — and it propagates best through “Penguins” fans — are the people who don’t actually live there, and in a lot of cases, have no reason to be Pittsburgh sports fans except for the fact that their football and hockey teams have been good. @McCarthy could probably give better context, but there are a lot of Pittsburgh fans in central Ohio who are just extremely, extremely obnoxious when they go to watch the Penguins in Columbus.

 

I was in Pittsburgh for Game 5 of the 2014 first round with the Jackets. It was a great experience, and we were surrounded with a lot of knowledgeable Penguins fans who were very welcoming and into having conversation. Originally being from the part of Ohio that near touches the state line, more than half my family’s Pittsburgh fans. Most of them are good people. But there are a lot of people who’ve jumped on the Penguins bandwagon specifically, and they feel the need to be the biggest idiots in the world at sporting events. It’s unfair to a lot of the people of Pittsburgh, a fantastic, beautiful city I love, but that’s the perception most of us have of Pittsburgh sports fans (and this is not a unique experience, mind you — a lot of people probably have the same feeling about Cavs “fans” in their cities, and absolutely did with “Heat fans”).

Reminds me how everyone in southern Ontario knew that one guy who became a lifelong Habs fan every playoffs when the Habs were making it and the Leafs weren’t. Suddenly everyone had a French Canadian third cousin who was vital to their hockey fandom

[HedleyLamarr]

2 hours ago, Ice_Cap said:

Nope. You lose 2-1 it’s a tight game. Lose 10-1 and there are probably deeper issues that need to be worked out.

Still counts as one singular loss.  A 10-1 score and a 2-1 count the same in the standings.

 

Just a game that got away from the Penguins.  Not sure how much you can really read into that scoreline.  There was a Flyers-Penguins playoff series a few years ago where one team lost something like 10-3, and the team that lost that game still won the series.

[IceCap]

5 minutes ago, HedleyLamarr said:

Still counts as one singular loss.

If that’s the hill you want to die on? Be my guest. 

You’re still a schmuck if you talk trash after a 10-1 asskicking.  

[Still MIGHTY]

Of course they count the same, but you know they aren't the same.

 

Sure you could probably just laugh off a 10-1 loss because you were never really in it, whereas a 2-1 tight loss might be more gut-wrenching. But at least you had a shot and could see a conceivable path to victory.

 

You're not a "better" fan for saying a loss is a loss and we'll move on to the next one like the players do.

[The_Admiral]

Would have been a closer game if Antti Niemi hadn't pissed all over himself like Nick Brophy. Never augurs well when the goalie falls on his face trying to get on the ice.

[wildwing64]

Since this has partly become the Why I Hate the Pens thread, I may as well chime in.

 

...Well, actually I kinda don't. They used to get on my nerves because of the NHL and all associated media being firmly wedged up Crosby's rear end. Yes, I get it, Sid the no-longer-a-Kid is a great player, generational talent, the Second Coming, this that and the other. But I don't need all the contrived narratives and his name being beaten into my head over and over again, nor did his return from an injury that one time warrant every single goddamn NHL headline being about his glorious rise from the ashes. They may as well have renamed the franchise to Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins.

 

Eventually, I learned to ignore it. And beyond that I've never felt any animosity towards the team. Their logo is awesome and the current uniforms are right up there among the NHL's very best. No comment about the fans, because every team has its fair share of sh!tty fans. We're a weird species because we hate each other because we cheer for different groups of millionaires pushing an object up and down an ice rink.

[HedleyLamarr]

18 minutes ago, Still MIGHTY said:

Of course they count the same, but you know they aren't the same.

 

Sure you could probably just laugh off a 10-1 loss because you were never really in it, whereas a 2-1 tight loss might be more gut-wrenching. But at least you had a shot and could see a conceivable path to victory.

 

You're not a "better" fan for saying a loss is a loss and we'll move on to the next one like the players do.

Who the hell said it makes one a better fan?

 

A team that's won the last two Cups loses Game 2 of an 82-game slate by 9 goals.  A team that knows how to pace themselves over the course of a 6-month season lost a game in early October by 9 goals.  It was one team's Opening Night at home, while the other team was playing on the road a night after playing a home game with all their Opening Night ceremonial happenings, and with supposedly a depleted roster at that.  While no fan wants to see their team lose by 9 goals, if there's any fan base that shouldn't overreact to one game, it's Pittsburgh.  And as a fan of a team that once lost a game 10-1 and seen many blowouts at home, those are games that are just so comically bad that you just laugh about it.  You're making jokes and laughing during the game.

 

I'm just pointing out that some put waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much stock into one championship contender's early October game that's 1.2% of their schedule. 

[Alex Houston]

2 hours ago, Ice_Cap said:

If that’s the hill you want to die on? Be my guest. 

You’re still a schmuck if you talk trash after a 10-1 asskicking.  

 

I'll add the nuance that context matters. I can't trash talk them because Pens fans have plenty of ammo back at me. Hawks fans, however, have a way better rebuttal when it comes to proving their success to Pittsburgh. It's poor form, at the very least, but not totally unreasonable. 

[The_Admiral]

I will never let the 2017 sweep stop me from trash-talking the Perds, their gomer-ass marketing stunts, and their petulant pissbaby BFIBs-on-ice fans with their stupid matching neon shirts like a giant Bible camp. Still up three to nothing where it counts.

[chcarlson23]

4 hours ago, HedleyLamarr said:

Still counts as one singular loss.  A 10-1 score and a 2-1 count the same in the standings.

 

Just a game that got away from the Penguins.  Not sure how much you can really read into that scoreline.  There was a Flyers-Penguins playoff series a few years ago where one team lost something like 10-3, and the team that lost that game still won the series.

Except that goal differential is a tiebreaker... That 10-1 loss vs. a 2-1 loss might be the reason you miss the playoffs...

[Crabcake]

Ovi just bagged another hat trick. Caps 4-0 over the Habs after one. 

[The_Admiral]

One assist on the two Tavares goals tonight. One-man team, huh.

 

Jack Johnson needs to get his sh-t wrecked tonight if the Hawks put this one out of hand.

[twi]

Watching the game on the NHL network, I'm reminded that perhaps some of the Penguins hate comes from their over the top announcers. Yeesh. 

Can see Reaves becoming one of those "I hope they don't win because I don't like..." type guys. It appears he has let being traded for a first rounder go to his head. 

[Sodboy13]

Nick Schmaltz fast-tracking the Eric Daze career path, apparently.

[CraigJPritch]

Ovi is back and I'm so excited. The Caps can keep their awful 3rd D pair if Ovi puts in 3 a game!

[habsfan1]

When it counts in a crucial playoff game, it's always a different story for some reason.