Leaf fan again, cheering for the Bolts for many reasons.
I have admired the Bolts ever since my favorite NHL player of all time, Phil Esposito brought them into the NHL.
When my third favorite NHLer of all time Steve Yzerman became GM, it was a shoe in, as to who my second favorite NHL team was going to be, for all time.
My cheering for the Leafs is a dna thing, I have tried on a few occasions to exorcise the chords that bind me, and it was successful in terms of the intensity of my emotions that ran for them, but to date, I have not been able to cut full ties.
What I like about the Leafs is that they are in a way, similar to what the Bolts were just before their Championship years Zesty, spicy, really fast and entertaining. Super charged to watch.
But as the Bolts finally found out, goaltending and being downright stingy on D, is what brings Cups.
I miss the Bolts of old sometimes, just going 15% faster than any other NHL team. It was crazy to watch, but now I see that whenever I want, when the Leafs play most of their games.
If I want to watch a team that has figured out the magic formula of how to win. In the time of year, most like actual war and battle I I watch now, the Tampa Bay Lightning. in the playoffs.
If and when Tampa snuffs out the hopes and dreams of a team that has a fair amount of future in front of it, the Rangers, a heckuva confrontation awaits the NHL.. And NHL historians.
In a wildly equalized parity environment, an NHL team might win three Stanley Cups in a row.
Which, is insane, in this crazy cap humbling NHL world.
Its really exciting for me, I cannot think of what it must be like for a Tampa first and foremost fan.
And there is a heckuva team waiting to prevent that from happening.
As a fan of hockey, of the NHL, I eagerly await, a potentially historic/epic/epoch making final.
Very similar to a New York Islander/Edmonton Oilers of the eighties like confrontation.
This is a potential series, particularly if its really close, to make the grand time history books of the NHL.
One that will far outlive the lives of current fans and players.
So, lets get past New York today, injury free, and wade into history, big time history.
Tampa has the best player in the NHL imo, and its always best to have that guy, Vasi....
I am rubbing my hands in anticipation.