FanHouse New York

The New York Times has mixed up a Molotov cocktail of a hockey story this morning: Chronicling the complaints of gay fans about a "a toxic atmosphere during Rangers games" that features unregulated homophobic slurs; and attacking some of the well-worn, vulgar traditions of hockey fans in the cheap seats. From "When Tradition and Taunts Collide":

Kevin Jennings, a Rangers fan who is gay, said he stopped attending home games for about a month this season because he felt so uncomfortable with the homophobic epithets that are shouted to the players. Ray Stankes, 50, of Bayside, Queens, said he canceled season tickets he had had for 25 years in part because of the antigay environment. "This is a place where I grew up, and I never really felt uncomfortable at the Garden," Stankes said. "I didn't wear it on my sleeve that I'm gay. If I take a friend who is also gay who, for lack of a better term, is not as masculine, I'm always sitting there a little tense. Like, is somebody going to say something to us? And it's made it not quite as fun as it used to be."

A Rangers spokesperson in the article said the offensive parties are (ironically) a minority, and some have been ejected from the arena for anti-gay remarks. Jennings, who is the executive director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network, offered to create PSAs to be shown in the arena "urging fans to be more respectful." The Rangers smartly declined, understanding that the same fans that booed when the New York City Gay Hockey Association's name was flashed on the scoreboard will do the same, and worse, for a video like that. Heck, they'll jeer a guy who gets the in-game trivia question wrong.

This is a problem no PSA or arena policy can solve. I grew up in the cheap seats in New York and Jersey, and I've been hearing about teams and players sucking or swallowing for as far back as I can recall. Sure, some media attention and pressure from advocacy groups could end chants of "Homo Larry" during dance routines at the Garden. But it'll take generations before using sexual orientation for public degradation is considered a cultural taboo at a hockey game.

It's Official! Kris Benson signs with the Phillies! Good for him. Have you seen the Orioles motto for this season? "THIS IS BIRDLAND." That's a great way to get fans into the park. "We traded away our stars. COME SEE THE BIRD, THE ACTUAL ANIMAL THE BIRD"

With the migration of Anna Benson comes the next chapter in a Dugout story that began in the long long ago before the darkness came about how Anna would sleep with everyone on the team including the mascot if she ever caught her husband cheating. The only way this could get better for us is if she got traded to the Red Sox and got to deflower Wally the Green Monster. She would have to go into the police force and get choked by Dmitri Young to be more Dugout ready.

Anna Benson wears a jersey around her cleavage like we'd never expect and Kris Benson gets into a plane crash and misses the '08 season with a dilated brain in today's Dugout, after the jump.

Michael Farber of Sports Illustrated has a rather lengthy and inquisitive feature story about New York Islanders winger Chris Simon which asks the same question I'm sure most of us ask whenever we hear coaches and teammates defend a player after a malicious stick foul:

So who is he, really: the tough guy given to swinging his stick or the guy Nolan says will do charity events at 6 a.m.? The guy who earned the NHL's longest suspension or a committed teammate who merely had what Hamrlik calls a "cuckoo moment?"

For too long in the NHL, players that exhibit a complete disregard for the safety of their peers on the ice are lauded for being solid citizens or "nice guys" away from the rink. It happened with Simon, and it happened more recently with Flyers goon Jesse Boulerice. It reminds me of the old, pre-divorce Howard Stern defense: It's OK if he spanks a woman's bare derriere with a dead fish on his radio show as long as he's a good husband back home. The "entertainer" is separate from the "real" individual away from the show.

But beyond what is an interesting character study about "a man who has been suspended more often than disbelief," I think some real and rather embarrassing news about the Islanders comes out in the piece:

After his disciplinary hearing with NHL director of hockey operations Colin Campbell, Simon issued a nine-paragraph apology. In it, he let it drop that when he swung his stick he was still dazed from being checked into the boards from behind by [Ryan] Hollweg. (According to a source with knowledge of the drafting of the apology, Islanders owner Charles Wang wanted to mention Simon's possible concussion as a way of "getting out in front" of the story.) Simon said he had stayed in bed for about a week with headaches. He also said his eyes were overly sensitive to light, a symptom consistent with a Grade 2 concussion, according to American Academy of Neurology guidelines. But Simon's apparent haze sounded like a hockey variation of the Twinkie Defense; instead of sugar, a concussion had made him behave aberrantly. Judging by his record, however, the concussion just made him more like himself.

So at a time when concussions in the NHL are a very serious issue -- and, as FanHouse's Eric McErlain noted, are seriously under-reported by teams and players -- an NHL owner encouraged Simon to use a possible head injury as an excuse for the stick work on Hollweg? Despicable, if true ... I wonder how a guy like Keith Primeau feels about that "Twinkie Defense?"