On Stage for your Viewing Pleasure: The Saviour (TM)

Let the record show that on Wednesday, October 10, 2007 Carey Price made his first NHL start, his first win, and his first 1st Star selection, in a Habs uniform. He made his first save, and a tremendous one, at 0:53 of the first period, robbing Mark Recchi in close. Does this mean he is The Saviour, the Future Face of the Franchise, the Man-child who will lead the Habs back to their Glory days and bring the first Stanley Cup to Le Centre Bell? Yeah, we don’t know. But lets take a closer look at The Saviour’s (TM) first game.

Price is the prototypical goalie for the New NHL. He’s not a true butterfly goalie in the mould of Patrick Roy; he’s a “hybrid”, which basically means he’ll do whatever it takes to stop the puck. People who know way more about goaltenders than FHF talk about a goalie’s “tool box”, or the set of different save skills they use to keep the puck out of their net. Just like a great NHL goalie, a great Strip club needs a variety of young ladies who bring their own particular talents to the stage for your viewing pleasure. And of course, as with everything else, the best way for FHF to explain Price’s attributes is to use some kind of stripperiffic-like rating system, so here goes.

The first thing The Saviour has going for him is size. At 6’3” 212 he covers a lot of net right off the bat, something the Habs have not had in between the pipes for a while. A perfect example occurred in the second when a Penguins player took a shot from the high slot and Price went down in the butterfly and it just deflected off his shoulder and into the corner. If that was 5’11” (in Paris’ heels) Theo, he’s fishing that puck out of his net.

Stripper equivalent: obviously, breast size. Price would be the blond with the DD’s, and not the kind you have roll up when you’re done with them. No, these are sitting right her the chin (see the pic for the Pens preview).

Then there’s Price’s athleticism; while he made lots of technically sound saves, he also had to scramble for a few. All night long you could see how quickly he recovered when he went down.

Stripper equivalent: Working the pole. Oh yeah, don’t pretend you don’t know what we’re talking about. FHF has seen you working you way up to the stage when that petite raven-haired goddess comes on stage, the one who can do the upside down splits at the top of the pole. As Timmyyyy put it, yowza.

Then there are his reflexes. In the third, Christensen got off a shot through traffic that Price couldn’t have seen before it was two feet from him, and he threw up his blocker, knocked it out of the air and smother the rebound.

Stripper equivalent: The brunette who always looks half drunk, the one who does all her lap dances with a Vodka-Red Bull in one hand. Never spills a drop - not that we noticed, anyway.

Young and nubile (just ask LG77), Carey’s got the flexibility thing going. Again in the second there was a mix up behind the Habs net and Crosby almost managed to stuff it in. Give credit to Komisarek for helping his ‘keeper out, but The Saviour appeared to make his spine disappear as he twisted around to keep the puck from crossing the goal line.

Stripper equivalent: Remember that cute redhead with the B cup who put her ankles behind here ears? She says she’s 23 but she looks 18 (and that’s just because, well, even we have limits). Yeah, we remember her too…

Probably the most important skill for a goaltender in the New NHL is lateral movement, getting from, post-to-post as quickly as he can. Without this, NHL goalies don’t last long (ask Bill Ranford). The Saviour made about 5 saves over the course of the night coming across, one of the best off Old Man Roberts half way though the first.

Stripper equivalent: The 6’1” chick with the black hair who goes from the stage to the back, stage to the back. Just a blur in between and always a guy waiting when she gets off stage. She’s not only putting herself through college, but the club owner’s 17 kids with 8 different wives, too. When she leaves you move on to the next peelers arena that opened up down the street.

The flashiest move in goaltending is the glove save, and The Saviour pulled out a few (although admittedly Fleury had the glove save of the night). A couple of times, though, you could see Price just pick the puck out of the air like he used the Jedi Mind Trick to slow it down first.

Stripper equivalent: The hottest girl in the place, the one with perfect tits and the defined abs and legs who you (or anyone else) can't take their eyes off while she's gyrating on stage. The reason you keep going back ever night for more, you degenerate.

One of the perks of being a goalie is you get to have more individuality than your teammates, mostly reflected in your mask. Carey's new one (seen above) is the best Habs mask since Roy left, IMHO. If replicas go on sale, Panger will be the first in line for one.

Stripper equivalent: The tall lean one with the long blond hair who wears the great outfits - the ultra short jeans with pink fishnets peeking out, to go with the thigh high fuck-me boots. Just try to look away. Or not.

Another key element in today’s game is rebound control. In the third, with Malkin lurking on the doorstep, Whitney stepped into one from the point, and Carey when down butterfly style and squeezed that bullet for a face-off. Otherwise, 2-2 and it’s a different game.

Stripper equivalent: The smoking hot black girl who is constantly trolling around the room, looking for her next victim. No guy can say no to her, and none of her targets manage to get away before dropping next month’s car payment.

One thing that seemed to need work was communication. Although Bouillon said on RDS during the 1st intermission that this was fine, the mix up behind the net when Price left the puck behind the net and Koivu skated past it. Thankfully it didn’t result in a goal.

Stripper equivalent: The French girl who doesn’t speak English, dancing for the guys from Texas who don’t speak French. Somehow everyone seems to figure out what they should be doing, though, and everyone leaves happy.

Puck handling skills have been sorely lacking in Montreal since the halcyon days of Jeff Hackett. Theo was a disaster and Huet is not much better, although at least he seems to realize his limitations. Price, on the other hand, is fantastic. While a couple of his shots off the boards landed on opponents’ sticks, you could see the velocity on them. And at one point he has the puck behind the net with a Pen closing in, between him and a Habs defender (can’t recall who). Anyway, Price calmly flipped the puck over the Pens stick right on to the tape of his teammate. He’ll set up his share of goals with long bombs, and probably will score a goal to finish it off.

Stripper equivalent: We’ll leave this last one to your imagination. Let’s just say it doesn’t take place out in front of the club, and you usually have to pay extra. And it definitely has a happy ending.