Canucks & Beyond
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“Dirty” isn’t a Dirty Word
by Alanah McGinley on 04/16/09 at 11:45 AM ET
Comments (10)
“Any team with human excrement like Burrows deserves a beating of the greatest magnitude. Go St. Louis!! I may not be a fan but any team is better than the Vancouver No Cups and their trashy lineup of scabs, overpaid Europeans, and greasy haired oft injured goalies.”
Source: Emotionally distressed commenter at HockeyFights.com
How can anyone not love the internet hockey world? Where else can you find such unbridled hatred and borderline psychosis on display? Quite entertaining. And while the remarks are largely nonsensical ("scabs"??), it’s easy to see what motivated the rant.
While watching the Canucks—Blues game last night, one of the least-charitable exclamations that I shared with the room in the third period was: “Wow. This is amazing. It’s the playoffs and we’re the ones with the dirty team!”
And that wasn’t a criticism; it was sort of a compliment.
It wasn’t that the Canucks were relentlessly dirty or anything (i.e. Chris Pronger’s play alone, in any one period of the Van/St.L series of 2003, was dirtier than all of Vancouver’s performance in this entire game) but they’ve definitely learned their lessons about playoff hockey from past experience: Take no prisoners. Every opportunity you can take to be a dick, take it.
Alas, I’m probably going to hell, but that’s the truth, no?
Everyone with an ounce of sense—including the Blues—should’ve reasonably expected that Vancouver would have more physical play. It was something they’ve been improving for months, and if anything, they were less physical than we might have expected in the first period. But as the game progressed, they certainly took liberties.
Back to the comment at the top… I’m not sure why the writer was so obsessed with Alex Burrows’ performance, but I can respect the frustration. Burrows is golden on this team, and so by default probably a freakin’ nightmare for everyone else. So I’ll take that “human excrement” line as a compliment. But there are other players that I think are going to become even bigger lightning rods in future—like Kevin Bieksa, for one (the guy is popping off all over the place; there’s probably going to be entire message boards dedicated to Bieksa Hate by the time this series is over) and Ryan Kesler for another.
And geez, even the Sedins weren’t shy about the chippy stuff. (Seriously, St. Louis: if you’re letting yourself get handled by a twin and letting them skate unmolested into the slot, this series is not going to go well for you.)
Still, the Blues played well and will probably be more physical in the future as well. Hopefully Vancouver’s response will be more self-discipline.
The game wasn’t an exhibition of hockey grace, by anyone’s standards. But as Brad Zeimer at the Vancouver Sun notes, “Style points don’t matter in the playoffs. Wins do.” And thank the lord for that, ‘cause the style wasn’t pretty.
I like the St. Louis Blues, incidentally. Their talent and determination were laid bare to witness in that game, and their own style points come out far ahead of Vancouver’s. But the final score of the game tells all you need to know about the importance of style.
I’ll take the chippy, mucking, “dirty” team with the “human excrement” on display, any day of the week. 
Other Reading:
- St. Louis Game Time has a great read on game #1, and points out that the Blues can certainly make adjustments that could take this series.
- Nucks Misconduct sums up the situation from the Canucks side.
- Puck Daddy points to a Blues fan that may get himself in a pack of trouble for his love of Oshie.
- St. Louis Post-Dispatch looks at the Blues/Canucks history.
- Buzz Bishop reminds us why Canucks’ fans have such an affection for Mark Donnelly.
- Victoria Times Colonist notes the economic stimulus effect of the Canucks playoff run. (Though I often wonder at if there’s not also some silent economic train-wreck occuring when 20,000 people a night are dropping an average of about $200+ each of their disposable income on playoff tickets...)
Filed in: playoff hockey, vancouver canucks | Canucks and Beyond | Permalink
Tags: alex+burrows, kevin+bieksa, playoffs, ryan+kesler, st+louis+blues, vancouver+canucks,
Comments
Ah Alanah, I wish I had your job. It would be glorious to surf the web and dig up all that pain and anguish that the STL fans must be feeling this morning!
I’ll choose to call last nights play “intense” rather than dirty. Hell, even Lou was checking! It’s good to see the team is alive and willing to go the distance. Can’t wait for Friday.
Posted by TriniD from VanC on 04/16/09 at 01:02 PM ET
Earl Sleek -- Gee, thanks for the memories. (You’re banned!) 
TriniD—Preying on the pain of others isn’t nice… but alas, it is a wee bit fun.
And you’re right, “dirty” probably isn’t really the right word. I suppose it was more that they seemed ready to play “meaner” than the Blues. Bieksa really stood out to me for that. And I bet Mitchell will, too—I remember thinking he was almost pure evil when he was on the dark side in that Canucks series against Minnesota some years back.
Posted by Alanah McGinley from British Columbia on 04/16/09 at 01:20 PM ET
The Blues and the Canucks were two of the most heavily penalized teams during the reg. season for a reason ya know, and it wasn’t for piling up fighting majors either if that’s what you’re thinking.
Posted by Bill on 04/16/09 at 03:12 PM ET
Did anyone else watch the CBC feed and there was moment (i think at the end of the first period) where you could here the players trashtalking each other. Burrows laid this gem (and I quote from memory), “You’re balls are f~@king tight, you f~@king pussy!”
I really wish they would have a pay-per-view channel with all the mics on all players and coaches and crowd and just here them banter over the course of the entire game.
Posted by grey wall on 04/16/09 at 07:30 PM ET
instead of color commentators.
man, my grammer is the suck.
Posted by grey wall on 04/16/09 at 07:31 PM ET
Burrows and Kesler trash talking at the end of the clip (click my name), or trying to, I can’t really take them seriously
Posted by Sarah from England on 04/17/09 at 05:21 PM ET
Burrows and Kesler trash talking at the end of the clip (click my name), or trying to, I can’t really take them seriously
Posted by Sarah from England on 04/17/09 at 05:21 PM ET
LMAO!!! Sarah ain’t kidding. Click on her name in the original post and just watch the clip till the end. Friggin’ hilarious…
Posted by SYF from Las Vegas, NV on 04/17/09 at 05:30 PM ET
this in the Sun today:
TRASH TALKING: Alex Burrows was a little surprised to hear Friday morning that he’d made YouTube.
“It is?” Burrows said when told a clip of he and Ryan Kesler trash-talking Blues’ forward David Backes at the end of the first period of Wednesday night’s game was available on-line. “Oh, that’s not good.”
Burrows and Kesler were heard baiting Backes about his wife. “Tell Kelly I said hi,” Kesler said. “Hey, Kelly’s a great gal,” Burrows added.
Backes insisted he wasn’t bothered by the remarks, although he did deliver a nasty elbow to Burrows’ face after he scored Vancouver’s second goal Friday.
“It’s part of the game, get under the other guy’s skin and get them off their game,” Backes said.
Backes said his wife won’t be bothered by the remarks, either.
“She’s stronger than I am and she can take it if they want to give her any grief,” he said. “If they want to keep giving it to me, she’s pretty attractive and I’m pretty proud of what I landed. I’m over-achieving and I’m not going to deny that.”
Posted by Sarah from England on 04/18/09 at 04:44 PM ET
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About Canucks & Beyond
Alanah McGinley has been blogging hockey since 2003, sharing opinions, rants and not-so-deep thoughts with anyone who will listen. In addition to writing Canucks & Beyond and helping manage Kukla’s Korner, Alanah is one of the founders and co-hosts of The Crazy Canucks Podcast, as featured at Canucks.com.
She has contributed pieces to FoxSports.com and the New York Times Slapshot blog, as well as other stray destinations in cyberspace.
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Other Canucks Blogs
Well, I think I’m obligated to point out:
Last night went a lot better for Roberto Luongo than the last time he faced Andy McDonald in G1 of a best-of-seven.
Posted by Earl Sleek from Anaheim, CA on 04/16/09 at 12:30 PM ET