Georges Laraque recently appeared in an online commercial for an alcohol-infused energy drink, violating NHL policy. On Tuesday, he apologized for breaking the league rule. He has not stopped apologizing since. He really needs to stop.
The phoniness of our major professional sports leagues is boundless.
Laraque is one of the league's top fighters and a popular player for the storied Montreal Canadiens. The Canadiens play in a hockey palace currently called the Bell Centre, formerly known as the Molson Centre. Back then, you couldn't go anywhere in the rink without a beer logo in sight.
On Thursday, the NHL suspended Flyers forward Daniel Carcillo for his actions in the closing seconds of Pittsburgh's 4-1 win on Wednesday night. It was part of a somewhat embarrassing end to the game, as the Flyers racked up 23 penalty minutes in just 19 seconds.
Carcillo admitted that the official dropping the puck warned him not to try anything.
When NHL general managers gathered in Florida this week, one of the major items on their agenda was fighting. The GMs decided to recommend abolishing "staged" fights, as well as greater enforcement of the instigator rule.
Well, it was bound to happen at some point. Why not a few hours after we started hearing about the ideas?
NHL general managers want to take some steps to curb the allegedly hideous amount of fighting taking place in hockey. The instigator rule and "choreographed" fights are the main targets. After hearing of these ideas, Montreal Canadiens enforcer Georges Laraque had his say. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that the big man isn't pleased about much of this.
Red Wings 4, Sharks 1: In the fourth -- and final -- regular season installment of Western Conference Finals Preview '09, Detroit picked up a 4-1 win over San Jose on Wednesday night. Henrik Zetterberg scored a pair of goals in the win, including a shorthanded marker early in the second period to give the Wings a commanding 3-0 lead.
Marian Hossa and Ville Leino also scored for Detroit, while Ty Conklin turned aside 34-of-35 shots in net. The loss snaps San Jose's four game winning streak, while the two teams split the season series.
It didn't happen, but it wasn't for lack of trying. Taking advantage of having the last line change, Canadiens head coach Guy Carboneau assigned Laraque to shadow Lucic all night long. A quick look at the highlights I saw on Hockey Night in Canada made it clear that Laraque was doing his level best to goad Lucic into dropping the gloves, but the 20-year old winger wasn't biting.
They say the best lawyers are the ones who never see the inside of a courtroom. By extension, the best enforcers in the NHL are often the guys who never have to drop the gloves.
So far this season, Georges Laraque has only four fighting majors, a full five behind NHL leader Brandon Prust. But if you want to know exactly why Laraque doesn't have to drop the gloves more often, then watch this video where he took on Josh Gratton of the Philadelphia Flyers in Montreal on Saturday night.
Know this: plenty of other fighters around the league will watch this clip and the message will be received.
As far as November regular season games go in the NHL, tonight's Penguins - Red Wings tilt is a pretty big one, if for no other reason than it's the much anticipated rematch of last season's Stanley Cup Finals, which the Wings ultimately won in six games.
It was a bad omen for the Penguins when, prior to game one, goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury tripped and fell over the red carpet as he was exiting the tunnel. I was at Joe Louis Arena that night, and as soon as he went face-first into the ice it was difficult to not get that feeling of, "oh, so it's going to be that type of series." The rest of the team followed in that path for the first two games, falling all over themselves, as Detroit was clearly the superior team.
The Penguins fought back, however, pushing it to six games only to fall inches short as Marian Hossa's last ditch effort was stopped as time ran out on the season.
Welcome to the NHL FanHouse 2008-09 season preview. While other sites are previewing "30 teams in 30 days," we decided to take advantage of the extra time off before the start of the season to bring you all 30 previews over the next three weeks. We're counting down in reverse order of finish from last season in each conference every weekday from now until October 3. Look for an Eastern Conference preview every morning and a Western Conference preview every afternoon. Click here to read them all.
Who's Out:Mikhail Grabovski, F (Trade-TOR); Michael Ryder, F (FA-BOS); Mark Streit, D (FA-NYI) What's Changed: The Canadiens are hoping that a couple minor tweaks and the experience of last year's run combine to make this year's team all the more dangerous. Montreal made no changes to their defensive top six, they signed Denis only to compete for the backup job behind Carey Price, and the top forwards are all back.
Honestly, Montreal shouldn't have to change much. Price melted down in the playoff series against Philadelphia (more on that in a bit), and the defense didn't play terribly well. However, the Canadiens fielded a pretty young team, had a great season, and they return practically everyone while making a couple of potentially significant additions.
When your team musters seven shots over two periods, it's pretty obvious something isn't working. Penguins coach Michel Therrien certainly isn't one to argue with that, as he said today that in light of the Pens' game one debacle in Detroit he's going to be shuffling his lines for game two. From the AP:
Is Therrien pushing the panic button already? It's hard to say. Malkin, and by extension Sykora, have been largely invisible in the past five or so games, while I think the physical Malone may compliment Hossa and Crosby much better than Dupuis does. Staal and Kennedy have both been playing great hockey during the playoffs and joining them with Dupuis makes a solid checking line, but it's hard to say how much offense that line might produce.
In fact, that makes me think that the symbolic of Malkin to the third line is more symbolic than anything. It's likely Therrien's attempt to motivate his struggling star. Pushing the right buttons to get his players to perform better is one of Therrien's strong suits (see: Orpik, Brooks). Will it work in this case? Hard to say.
On Thursday, the NHL suspended Flyers forward 
When NHL general managers gathered in Florida this week, one of the major items on their agenda was fighting. The GMs decided to recommend abolishing "staged" fights, as well as 
Well, it was bound to happen at some point. Why not a few hours after we started hearing about the ideas?
With the news hitting the wires yesterday that Montreal Canadiens defenseman 
When your team musters seven shots over two periods, it's pretty obvious something isn't working. Penguins coach 
