Today I had the privilege of skating with a good friend of mine that some of you may know, Martin Wilde. I played with Marty at UVM for 3 years and in Hershey when we won the championship in '06. I also had the displeasure of having to play against him for several years when he was with Providence. For the people that haven't had a chance to meet Marty he is truly a great guy. After the Championship year in Hershey he went overseas to play in Cortina, Italy. His team won the championship that year as well and Martin decided to retire and pursue a career in business.
He also has started his own company called V:King. V:King is a Swedish lawn game that Wilde has played his whole life and it is really popular in Sweden. I have played the game several times and it is a blast! His company is manufacturing and distributing the game over here in the States. You can check it out at playVking.com.
After a year off he was coaxed out of retirement by Cortina and he will be playing there this season with another friend of mine and former bear Mike Souza. Marty also told me today that Cortina signed Louis Robitaille for the year. I haven't spoke to Louis but I want to wish him, Mike and Marty the best of luck for the upcoming season.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Saturday, August 16, 2008
USA! USA! USA!
Nothing gets me feeling more patriotic than watching the Olympics every couple of years. This years games have been pretty exciting if you are an American. The emergence of China as an athletic and world power has given the USA an adversary that has been largely missing since the fall of Communism in Russia. Every day I find myself checking the Medal Counts and hoping we can hold them off.
Being an athlete myself I get pretty fired up watching these athletes compete. They dedicate their entire lives for a few moments of competition that will decide who is the best in the world. Only one can be the champion and all but three will leave empty handed. You can't help but be inspired by the hard work and dedication. I never thought I would jump out of my seat for a swimming event but that is what happened when Lezak had the swim of his life to beat out the trash talking Frenchies in the 4x100 relay. It's stories like these that make the games so entertaining. Watching Phelps dominate his events and chase history has been very entertaining as well. He is a freak of nature and an elite competitor. I am looking forward to the track and field events and seeing the USA Men's Basketball team reclaim the USA's spot as the best in the world. GO USA!
Being an athlete myself I get pretty fired up watching these athletes compete. They dedicate their entire lives for a few moments of competition that will decide who is the best in the world. Only one can be the champion and all but three will leave empty handed. You can't help but be inspired by the hard work and dedication. I never thought I would jump out of my seat for a swimming event but that is what happened when Lezak had the swim of his life to beat out the trash talking Frenchies in the 4x100 relay. It's stories like these that make the games so entertaining. Watching Phelps dominate his events and chase history has been very entertaining as well. He is a freak of nature and an elite competitor. I am looking forward to the track and field events and seeing the USA Men's Basketball team reclaim the USA's spot as the best in the world. GO USA!
Thursday, August 7, 2008
AHL Schedule Released
Today the American Hockey League released the schedule for the upcoming 08/09 season. This is pretty much the last major news of the summer. It always takes forever for the AHL to release its schedule due to the fact that they have to wait for the NBA to finalize theirs first. Having played for 7 years in the AHL I must say that this years schedule for the Bears is the best I have ever seen.
The first thing that I look for when I look at a schedule are extended road trips and large groups of games away. The longest that the Bears go on the road this year is 5 games in a row. I can remember at least one road trip for every season that I have played that is at least 7 or 8 games. The largest concentration of road games happens to be in the first 16 games of the season, where the Bears play 11 on the road. Considering this happens in the first 16 games of the year the team will be fresh and have plenty of energy to battle early on. Nothing is harder than going on an extended road trip in February or March where every point becomes so important. That being said it is going to be important to be focused early so that too deep a hole isn’t dug.
The second thing that I look at are the number of 3 in 3's and 4 in 5's. (For those that don't know this means 3 games in 3 nights and 4 games in 5 nights.) Due to the smaller markets of the AHL in order for teams to maximize profits they must load up games on the weekends. What the players end up experiencing is sometimes the equivalent of a hockey marathon. I have heard from players in the NHL that their schedule can be pretty grueling as well, playing every couple of days you never get a whole week to recover. It definitely would be different, hopefully this year I will be able to experience it first hand! But from the hockey that I have played 4 in 5's can destroy a teams energy levels especially if there are multiple sets of them. Last year in Worcester we had back to back to back 4 in 5's in March and it pretty much buried us for the season. The amount of emotional and physical energy they require is hard to describe. You just give everything you have for every shift and worry about tomorrow's game when you get there. Most of the time when teams have a rough road schedule or lots of games at once it catches up to them a week or so down the line. Hershey this year has seven 3 in 3's and six 4 in 5's. I haven't checked but I am willing to bet this is in the bottom 20% of the league.
Looking a little deeper into the schedule reveals a couple interesting spots. I noticed that Philly is on the schedule 6 times in the month of November, 6 times! If I were trying to decide which games to buy tickets for early on in the season I would definitely get ones for games 4, 5 and 6 in November. When teams play each other that many times in a short period blood starts to boil and it becomes more like the best kind of hockey, playoff hockey. November 14th, 15th and 21st look like they could get pretty intense and, er, um physical, for those of you that are into that sort of hockey. The road trip to Texas is always fun, especially when there are not a ton of games jammed around them. The New Year's swing through New England is a good time to have it as well.
From top to bottom the Bear's schedule is very well balanced. The halfway point from a number of days perspective is January 8th, and the Bears play their 40th game on the 10th. The 1/4 pole is November 23rd with the 20th game played the 22nd. Likewise the 3/4 pole is February 25th and the 60th game is on the 27th. 12 of the first 20 games are on the road. 9 0f the next 20, 9 of the 20 after that, and finally 10 of the final 20 games. This is very well balanced.
In the grand scheme of things the way the schedule is laid out makes very little difference. I have never heard of a team winning a championship and someone saying, “Oh, it’s because they had an easy schedule.” It matters more how your team gels, how they handle adversity, and how lucky they get. Once the puck drops on the season it is one play, one shift, one period, one game at a time. Every point counts and no one will know whose season was the best until it is too late. The champion will be crowned and with the benefit of hindsight people can analyze and over analyze their teams respective seasons. No professional hockey schedule is "easy", including the Bear's for 08/09. There will be ups and downs and times where it feels like there are not enough games and times that it will feel like too many. There are 29 teams that each play 80 games over the course of 187 days. All to just earn the right to be at zero wins and zero losses on April 13th and have a chance to have a season they will never forget. But hey, it is August and we all need something to feed our hockey hungry minds!!!
The first thing that I look for when I look at a schedule are extended road trips and large groups of games away. The longest that the Bears go on the road this year is 5 games in a row. I can remember at least one road trip for every season that I have played that is at least 7 or 8 games. The largest concentration of road games happens to be in the first 16 games of the season, where the Bears play 11 on the road. Considering this happens in the first 16 games of the year the team will be fresh and have plenty of energy to battle early on. Nothing is harder than going on an extended road trip in February or March where every point becomes so important. That being said it is going to be important to be focused early so that too deep a hole isn’t dug.
The second thing that I look at are the number of 3 in 3's and 4 in 5's. (For those that don't know this means 3 games in 3 nights and 4 games in 5 nights.) Due to the smaller markets of the AHL in order for teams to maximize profits they must load up games on the weekends. What the players end up experiencing is sometimes the equivalent of a hockey marathon. I have heard from players in the NHL that their schedule can be pretty grueling as well, playing every couple of days you never get a whole week to recover. It definitely would be different, hopefully this year I will be able to experience it first hand! But from the hockey that I have played 4 in 5's can destroy a teams energy levels especially if there are multiple sets of them. Last year in Worcester we had back to back to back 4 in 5's in March and it pretty much buried us for the season. The amount of emotional and physical energy they require is hard to describe. You just give everything you have for every shift and worry about tomorrow's game when you get there. Most of the time when teams have a rough road schedule or lots of games at once it catches up to them a week or so down the line. Hershey this year has seven 3 in 3's and six 4 in 5's. I haven't checked but I am willing to bet this is in the bottom 20% of the league.
Looking a little deeper into the schedule reveals a couple interesting spots. I noticed that Philly is on the schedule 6 times in the month of November, 6 times! If I were trying to decide which games to buy tickets for early on in the season I would definitely get ones for games 4, 5 and 6 in November. When teams play each other that many times in a short period blood starts to boil and it becomes more like the best kind of hockey, playoff hockey. November 14th, 15th and 21st look like they could get pretty intense and, er, um physical, for those of you that are into that sort of hockey. The road trip to Texas is always fun, especially when there are not a ton of games jammed around them. The New Year's swing through New England is a good time to have it as well.
From top to bottom the Bear's schedule is very well balanced. The halfway point from a number of days perspective is January 8th, and the Bears play their 40th game on the 10th. The 1/4 pole is November 23rd with the 20th game played the 22nd. Likewise the 3/4 pole is February 25th and the 60th game is on the 27th. 12 of the first 20 games are on the road. 9 0f the next 20, 9 of the 20 after that, and finally 10 of the final 20 games. This is very well balanced.
In the grand scheme of things the way the schedule is laid out makes very little difference. I have never heard of a team winning a championship and someone saying, “Oh, it’s because they had an easy schedule.” It matters more how your team gels, how they handle adversity, and how lucky they get. Once the puck drops on the season it is one play, one shift, one period, one game at a time. Every point counts and no one will know whose season was the best until it is too late. The champion will be crowned and with the benefit of hindsight people can analyze and over analyze their teams respective seasons. No professional hockey schedule is "easy", including the Bear's for 08/09. There will be ups and downs and times where it feels like there are not enough games and times that it will feel like too many. There are 29 teams that each play 80 games over the course of 187 days. All to just earn the right to be at zero wins and zero losses on April 13th and have a chance to have a season they will never forget. But hey, it is August and we all need something to feed our hockey hungry minds!!!
Saturday, August 2, 2008
August Already!?!?!
Hello again everyone! It has been a while since my last post due to the fact that my computer is still messed up. I won't get into it but it should be fixed by next weekend. I decided to hop onto my friends computer and check my email. I was surprised to find so many emails and comments from everyone on/about my blog. Once again I want to thank everyone for visiting my site and your kind words/comments. I have a lot of emails so it will take me a while to get through all of them. I will try to address as many questions as I can. Once my computer is up and running again I will be more active. My goal is to have at least two posts per week, maybe more.
In many ways I cannot wait for the summer to be over and the season to start. This year is going to be a great one and I get goosebumps anticipating what is in store. In other ways I love the summer and wish it would last a lot longer. I feel like we just got back to Vermont and got settled and now we will be getting ready to leave in 6 weeks! When people ask me what the worst part about being a pro hockey player is I always tell them that there are two things that really stink. Number one being the injuries and number two being the constant moving.
Injuries are by far the hardest part of the game that I have had to deal with. I can't speak for all players but if you ask them they will probably tell you the same. The pain from the injury is not the worst part. The worst part is the rehab process and watching and waiting to get back in the lineup. When you are hurt you feel worthless and weak. I get very antsy and impatient when I am injured. You have to be careful though because coming back too soon can set you back even further. Well, that's enough about injuries, hopefully I won't have to address them ever again. I have already knocked on wood 4 times while writing this!
While it may seem fun and adventurous constantly moving around is a real pain. Imagine if you had to pack up everything you owned, load up a truck, drive to a new place, find a house/apartment, unload a truck, then unpack everything you own, TWICE A YEAR! I don't know how the guys that I play with that have kids do it. Well actually I do know how, they have wonderful, caring, and supportive wives. Behind every great professional athlete with a family, there is an even greater wife that makes a lot of sacrifices for her husband to be able to do what he does. Uprooting yourself and your family before and after every season is no easy task. When you just start to get into a routine and get comfortable it's time to move.
Hey, don't get me wrong, I am not complaining about being paid to play a sport that I love. I would do this for the rest of my life if I could. People have just asked me what the hard parts of the job are so I am telling you. By no means am I looking for any sympathy. I hope that this gives you a little more insight into what we do and how things look from my point of view. For now make sure you get out and enjoy the rest of the summer, it is AUGUST ALREADY!!!
In many ways I cannot wait for the summer to be over and the season to start. This year is going to be a great one and I get goosebumps anticipating what is in store. In other ways I love the summer and wish it would last a lot longer. I feel like we just got back to Vermont and got settled and now we will be getting ready to leave in 6 weeks! When people ask me what the worst part about being a pro hockey player is I always tell them that there are two things that really stink. Number one being the injuries and number two being the constant moving.
Injuries are by far the hardest part of the game that I have had to deal with. I can't speak for all players but if you ask them they will probably tell you the same. The pain from the injury is not the worst part. The worst part is the rehab process and watching and waiting to get back in the lineup. When you are hurt you feel worthless and weak. I get very antsy and impatient when I am injured. You have to be careful though because coming back too soon can set you back even further. Well, that's enough about injuries, hopefully I won't have to address them ever again. I have already knocked on wood 4 times while writing this!
While it may seem fun and adventurous constantly moving around is a real pain. Imagine if you had to pack up everything you owned, load up a truck, drive to a new place, find a house/apartment, unload a truck, then unpack everything you own, TWICE A YEAR! I don't know how the guys that I play with that have kids do it. Well actually I do know how, they have wonderful, caring, and supportive wives. Behind every great professional athlete with a family, there is an even greater wife that makes a lot of sacrifices for her husband to be able to do what he does. Uprooting yourself and your family before and after every season is no easy task. When you just start to get into a routine and get comfortable it's time to move.
Hey, don't get me wrong, I am not complaining about being paid to play a sport that I love. I would do this for the rest of my life if I could. People have just asked me what the hard parts of the job are so I am telling you. By no means am I looking for any sympathy. I hope that this gives you a little more insight into what we do and how things look from my point of view. For now make sure you get out and enjoy the rest of the summer, it is AUGUST ALREADY!!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
