Tuesday, September 08, 2009

Ten Things I Hate About ... the Pittsburgh Penguins

So you're just gonna wear that out in public?

We hate. We hate a lot. We hate our eternal rivals, thugs, Western Canadian Cup-stealers, Western Conference franchise player-stealers, and big-city blowhards with one Cup to show for seventy years of ineptitude. But most of all, we hate it when Lord Stanley's mug resides in someone else's trophy case. So until further notice, here's some reasons to hate the guys who have our birthright.

10 Things I Hate About the Pittsburgh Penguins

10. They have this. We wants it.

9. They have him and him. We wants them.

8. Pittsburgh. Penguins. Fuck alliteration. You sound like a high school team.

7. The CSKA Penguins. Does anyone remember this? The Pens went out and bought a stake in CSKA Moscow, only the most famous team in Russian hockey, and turned them into a walking joke. For any fan of the game's history, seeing the team of Kharmalov, the KLM line, Tretiak and Fetisov sporting that fucking ugly skating Penguin was a travesty.

6. Ulf Samuelson destroying Cam Neely's leg with a cheapshot ... no wait, that was FUCKING FANTASTIC. I fucking hate Cam Neely. Um ... Rick Kehoe's pornostache always freaked me out as a kid?

5. The Penguins historically comical uniform choices include this, this, this, and this. That's not even half of the changes, in just 42 years of existence. Pick. A. Fucking. Uniform. That. Doesn't. Suck.

4. Play-by-play man Mike Lange was amusing in Mario's heyday, but now he's an uncontrollable geyser of stupidity thanks to a thousand appearances on ESPN and TSN top tens. "Buy Sam a drink and get his dog one too"? Buy yourself a pistol and put us all out of our misery, for fucksakes.

3. Stole Ron Francis & Ulf Samuelsson for John Cullen and Zarley Zalapski. Fuck me.

2. Jaromir Jagr. The hair. The damn Jofa helmet with that hair. The fact that the Pens lucked into him at fifth overall and picked him with fucking awful, awful hair. The ridiculous luck of pairing Jagr with Lemieux (did I mention that fucking hair?)

1. 1975: The Pens creditors come knocking, since the team can't pay its bills. The fans aren't coming, the team is bankrupt, and just before the Pens are contracted or moved, a last-ditch effort saves them.

1983:
The fans aren't coming to see the league worst Pens, the creditors are chasing the owners, Roberto Romano is starting games in goal to tank in an effort to get Mario Lemieux. Amazingly, a last-ditch effort saves the team from moving a second time.

1998:
Despite having the talents of Lemieux, Jagr, Francis, Zubov, and others for the last decade, the Pens can't draw enough fans to the Igloo and start deferring player salaries. The team files for bankruptcy for the second time in their history, and (wait for it) only a last-ditch deal put together by Mario himself saves the team from moving for the third fucking time.

2001 and on:
Still needing to cut costs, the Pens trade off Jagr, Alexei Kovalev, Robert Lang, Martin Straka and anyone else earning a major-league salary, plummeting to the basement a la 1983-84. The Pens end up picking no lower than 2nd for four straight years and end up with Marc-Andre Fleury, Evgeni Malkin, Sidney Crosby and Jordan Staal to show for it.

So, to sum up: The Pens spend years struggling, the fans stay away, the team almost folds or contracts, the fans rally for a few years and fill the building when the high draft picks lead them to glory. Rinse. Repeat. Congratulations, you bunch of front-running fuckheads, you're the Florida Marlins of hockey!

17 comments:

Young HF29 said...

the Florida Marlins of hockey

outstanding.

You didn't even link to the really ugly powder blue unis that matched the HNIC jackets of the day

Carina said...

The Pens aren't worse than their douchebag fans. I HATE PEN FANS!!!

Like the one time when my hockey team won a playoff game against the Pens in our home rink and some stupid Pen-bitch told me to stop cheering after the game finished(because I was loud). I didn't pay effin $100 (300 level, I'm poor) to have some stupid Pen fan tell me to stop cheering in the home rink of MY team. I hope I broke her ear drums.

Or she got run over by a train.

lawyergirl77 said...

I can't stand Pens fans who go APE. SHIT. whenever you start hating on Crosby.

Dudes.

He's hella talented.
Doesn't make him any less of a whiny dink.
Yes, I would still call him a whiny dink if he was on my team.

Sigh.

Navin Vaswani (@eyebleaf) said...

Can I write a guest post about the Habs, in this same format?

GoldenGirl11 said...

Well done!

Just think how I feel with 4 boys and one is named Michael... Michael, motorcycle. That can REALLY get under your skin when said 427 times at dinner alone. Thank god for Pierre Houde.

South Shore Habs Fan said...

I hate the Penguins for being able to squeeze quality hockey out of Georges Laraque.

Boob Gainey said...

Eyebleaf - Go ahead, but it will have to be:

10 reasons I resent the Habs.

Hockey Joe said...

Congratulations, you bunch of front-running fuckheads, you're the Florida Marlins of hockey!

Holy. Shit.

Incredible.

Anonymous said...

"1975: The Pens creditors come knocking, since the team can't pay its bills... The Pens end up picking no lower than 2nd for four straight years and end up with Marc-Andre Fleury, Evgeni Malkin, Sidney Crosby and Jordan Staal to show for it."

I like to think of it as accepting nothing less than greatness from your team.

Number31 said...

Congratulations. Elvis has left the building.

South Shore Habs Fan said...

Canadiens website has a little feature on Georges Laraque... something I thought was interesting:

"After opting to avoid having surgery done on the herniated discs in his back, Laraque has been hard at work this summer in the gym, eyeing his return to the heavyweight throne."

Awesome. Herniated discs just heal themselves during intense workouts, right? ... right?

Baroque said...

Congratulations, you bunch of front-running fuckheads, you're the Florida Marlins of hockey!


LOVE this.

Anonymous said...

Wait... let me take my 2009 Stanley Cup Champions Hat off...

Now what were you saying? Your birthright? That kind of arrogant presumption is exactly why you don;t have it. You think you are owed it, like you don't have to earn it.

Mike Lange, yeah he's HOF thru and thru unlike this place. Joke of a blog.

jennyquarx said...

I think I love you. This is the greatest thing I have read all day. Possibly ever.

Anonymous said...

Next time the Habs come within reach of the stanley cup, lemme know. otherwise, you really shouldn't complain about any team but your own. if you cant agree with that as a fan of hockey in general than somethings wrong. fix your own team, no need to bash others. unless they are the flyers. fuck those dbags.

Hoiles said...

Hey "anon", until your team stops relying on players from -our- hometown to win them championships, we'll say whatever the fuck we want about your team.

Anonymous said...

I am from Pittsburgh and I will agree that we have had won the lottery with our draft picks in the past and been extremely lucky in the past. I am a Pens fan but I do see both sides of it. Yinz gotta understand that we were a very small market who have fans that only support a winning team and most have very little to no hockey knowledge, and are simply trying to jump on with the team when they are winning. Don't ever ask a Pens fan any hockey history questions that did'nt involve their 2 early 1990's cups or they will problably give you a blank stare. People were giving tickets away and their was little to no interest in the team until we lucked out getting a bunch of great talent and now tickets are so expensive, filled with snobby buisnessmen looking for the new hot ticket in town and taking the seats up because they can afford to. The are fairweather fans who only cheer for a winning team. I am grateful to see so much talent play up close. There are still fans whether we win or lose who sit thetr all day trying to get tickets, Mark Andre-Fleury gives out pizza and tickets every home gameto fans out there all day. They appreciate the fans and don't think that all us Pens fans are ignorant and take this kind of talent for granted, we appreciate seeing good hockey and helping our team stay in Pittsburgh. Plus their is a new interest in playing youth hockey here and even the Pens practices are packed. We know the history of the Habs and the original 6 and the Great teams yinz had. My relative Harry Lumley is a Hall of Fame goalie and have relatives all over Canada who think the same about the Pens. Understand most of the true fans can't afford outragious ticket prices so who you meet at the games problably just bought their Crosby jersey and aren't true fans of hockey but maybe interested. We haven't earned this type of talent but maybe one day we will get to where yinz respect The Pens and our fans the way we do about The Habs.