Still don't get it
schultjr said:
Why anyone but the caps? Well, lets start with the fact that your owner is an idiot. He foolishly spends tons of money on players, then realizes what a bozo he was and basically gives them away. Also, he punched a fan. Then there's the fact that you had a team of all-stars THIS YEAR. Jagr, Lang, Bondra, Gonchar, and Kolzig are all-star material. You should not have been one of the worst teams. When your team underacheived, you gave away your players, called up multiple minor leaguers, and proceeded to lose many games. Of course, being a penguin fan, there is the whole rivalry, "i hate the caps," factor, I'll admit. Not to mention Ovechkin will be lost in Washington, who, in my opinion, has very few loyal fans, evident by the 50% penguin fans in the MCI center, even when the caps were good. Don't take this to mean that there are no loyal fans, because I know that is not true. Just a few of many reasons that I say "anyone but the Caps."
Foolishly spends $? How is that a criticism? He wanted to build a winner. He thought the one thing the Caps lacked then, and in the past, was top draw offensively minded talent. It fit in w/his marketing and w/what he felt was our one major weakness. He was wrong, it happens. Last year the team chokes in the playoffs for the eightieth time and is even worse this year w/the team not responding at all to the young coach, or to his replacement, a new CBA that could dramatically shift the pay scale in the league could be around the corner and the Caps are losing cr@ploads of money because when they aren't choking in the playoffs, they're missing the playoffs outright. Fans aren't showing up, your losing money, a lockout is around the corner, your one of the worst five teams in the league. So hell, keep all you're hugely salaried players, all deep into their thirties that can't beat Colombus, or Carolina let alone Ottawa and New Jersey. Do you realize how nuts that is? Of course they were traded, the team had missed the playoffs now in two of the past three years and was just getting OLD. The owner did the one smart thing he's done all along. Recognized that he couldn't win w/somewhat old stars and a disinterested fan base and decided to go young building on the prospects that have been accumlated over the past handful of years with more prospects.
That's not stupid, that's smart. If there's no season next year, how smart is it to have a roster chockful of hugely paid mid-thirty year old stars who couldn't get the job done in '03-'04 just gathering age while there is no season? Instead, what wasn't working was abandoned, a small core of relatively young, hard working players were kept, and an already good farm system was stocked w/even more quality youngsters, and a bevy of draft picks came in to help build around.
When you're old, and you're expensive, and you suck, it's time to go younger, cheaper, and better and that's what the team's doing, or at least trying to do.
As for the punch? It was silly, stupid, and moronic at best, but on the other hand why should I care? If an owners swings at me or you, or tries to choke us? Particularly a fat slug like Ted, why not swing back, he instigated, so drop his fat arse. All i know is that it's completely irrelevant to what's going on out on the ice so who freaking cares? Its a red herring, irrelevant, and you know that, but chose to throw it in with the litany of other complaints you have about the Caps. I could care less. I care about what the Caps are doing to get better, not about the temperment of our owner (which is a damn site more interested than absentee Pollin preceeding him). Hell, maybe we can get a nice double bill w/the battling front office boys in friday night fights, we already know that GMGM likes to throw, at Chicago anyway.
What are team "should have been," is irrelevant, what it was was what is relevant. A tiring, slow, aging squad w/some poor coaching and probably the worst ground of defensemen in the league and no money to address the need (at least according to the owner). There was unlikely to be any improvement, only regression as the team further aged. And really what are you building for? If you want to win the cup, the team as constructed and paid would never do so, and if what you were trying to build for was the playoffs, well that hadn't happened for two of the past three years so that wasn't consistently happening either. I don't see a problem w/what they did, they cut their losses and refocused on rebuilding rather than retooling a roster that wouldn't be getting us anywhere near the Stanley Cup.
As for the Penguins rivalry, it's not exactly Red Sox-Yankees, as neither team has accomplished all that much, and at least the Red Sox have made it to their share of World Series. The Caps made it only once, no doubt because Pittsburgh went down to Montreal that year. I just don't see any reason for Pitt fans to hate the Caps. How can you hate a team you get over on so much, at least historically? Doesn't make sense to me.
As for loyalty? I'm sure Pittsburgh has more, they have a less transient population, but they also generally don't generate all that much money for their franchises. I could be wrong, but I don't think of Pittsburgh the same way I do about where I live (the bay area), or even other less productive city and suburb economies. Pittsburgh will have their loyal fans, but the franchise isn't exactly financially stable. While the Caps aren't exactly generating a lot of ticket sales, they do have an owner w/huge pockets, and a city that supports winners. If the team wins, sales will increase, not as much as if say the Boulez suddenly and inexplicably started winning, but still there would be sales.
Pittsburgh didn't deserve Ovechkin, and neither did Washington or Colombus, Ovechkin was simply going to go to whomever was luckiest or NY if they had been bad enough (
). Pittsburgh wasn't lucky, Chicago wasn't lucky, Washington was. Sometimes you get the breaks, sometimes you don't and the Caps just got perhaps the biggest and one of the only breaks they've ever gotten. I wouldn't complain, you've got two Stanley Cups, and have had the priviledge of watching Lemieux, Francis, Jagr, Straka, Kovalev, and so many other studs play together for so many years, something few other fanbases have ever been lucky enough to have. I wonder if part of that loyal fan base you've got may have something to do w/the amazing players you've had and playoff successes, I think it just might. Don't you? If you'd had a relatively anonymous collection of hardworkers that annually choked away 3 and 2 game playoff leads perhaps you're fans wouldn't be quite so willing to pay, and pay in great numbers to see you're squad every year. Just a thought.
Regardless, I think the Washington fanbase might finally start growing now, hopefully anyway, and beyond that, good luck w/Malkin, and if all goes well and you're franchise survives the potentially culling, maybe we'll both have two of the best squads in the east a handful of years from now.