NHL Around the NHL XII - Golden Knights Fire Gallant

[The National]

I admit I sort of enjoy the ASG skills competition, the game itself I could do without.

 

[Aussie Bruin]

Guys must love interviewing him . He can’t help but put a smile on your face .

Pastrnak being front and center at the all-star weekend is one of times you get to see the disconnect between the team the Bruins have become and the picture that most fans and even media elsewhere in hockey-land have of them. Boston has built a team almost entirely of nice, decent human beings. They're competitive, they play hard but rarely rough and almost never dirty. Obviously whether they've gone too far in that direction is an ongoing debate here, but it's clear as day for us what the nature and culture of the team currently is.

Not so in the rest of the States and Canada. The image of the Big Bad Bruins who are nasty, physical bullies that will do whatever it takes to gain an advantage has lingered long after it ceased to be a reality. A lot of people continue to see Boston as a nasty team. I've noted before that the Blues took advantage of this last year because almost no-one would or wanted to believe that they could be the aggressors against Boston. When pressed as to who these supposedly nasty Bs' players are people normally just point to Marchand, which is not entirely unreasonable but does not account for how he's changed his attitude in the last 18 months, or sometimes to Chara, which is just ignorance based on his size and the fact that he can look scary. So Brad is almost single-handedly allowing people to retain their preferred image of the Bruins as a bunch of thugs, demonstrating how easy it is to see what you want to see and ignore all evidence to the contrary.

Thus when Pasta comes along and receives some genuine national media attention outside of the Boston bubble, it confuses a lot of people. How can this guy, who presents as one of the most genuine, giving players you could ever hope to meet, be a Bruin? Bergeron's been written off for years as an anomaly, but now here's yet another good fellow. In the long run it won't change the perspectives of the vast majority of fans, but it's curious and kind of amusing to see how things like this can challenge mindsets and even just briefly upset or re-calibrate existing beliefs.

 

[Elmer]

I still remember him tuning up Evander Kane , like it was yesterday.

Horton always stood up for his teammates. He was a beast. Here, he destroys Theo Peckam who cheap shotted Krejci with an elbow. Best part of the fight, Horton throwing haymakers as Peckam goes to the ice. "No mercy". Sadly, this kind of response is sorely lacking with the current team.

 

[TCB]

Horton always stood up for his teammates. He was a beast. Here, he destroys Theo Peckam who cheap shotted Krejci with an elbow. Best part of the fight, Horton throwing haymakers as Peckam goes to the ice. "No mercy". Sadly, this kind of response is sorely lacking with the current team.

Maybe Sweeney should bring in PC as an adviser, on acquiring guys with skill, toughness, and who have one anothers back.

 

[Fenway]

NHL - Around the NHL XIII - All Star Weekend