Slava Malamud rips into Ovechkin/Caps

WTFMAN99

Registered User
Jun 17, 2009
33,109
11,129
Slava Malamud is the Official Russian Sports Writer

https://twitter.com/SlavaMalamud

I wanted to post this in another thread but given the size of the rant and how it could be buried I decided it was likely better to make a new thread;

1/ #Caps problems extend beyond a bad def pair, an underperforming goalie. The failure is endemic and systematic. It’s the result of choices

2/ fanboy owner Leonsis made in 2004 when he decided his business model would be not building a winner but servicing a marketable megastar.

3/ There’s nothing wrong with building a team around a star, but it has to be the right kind of star. Ovi just isn’t the “win first” type.

4/ I’ve known Ovi since he was 17. Kid was born with a silverware set in his mouth. Always told he is the greatest, teammates must be worthy

5/ but his demands on himself stay the same. He’s not the bloodied inspirational leader. He is the tousled-hair sexy charismatic ruffian.

6/ Yes, he’s the NHL’s favorite stripper who’s been giving the hockey world a lap dance for 13 years. [mod]

7/ [mod] You need to face the truth: the Caps personality-cult culture is counterproductive to winning the cup.'

8/ Fueled by innumerable fanboy blogs and media whipped into terrified subservience by CapsPR, the culture feeds on self, kills all dissent,

9/ and spurns all criticism. You know, Caps fans, that despite all the issues Oates and Hunter had, your main problem w/ them was trying to

10/ turn Ovi into a man of the system. You hate that. You want your boy toy wild and free. Everyone wants this of Ovi, even RUS coaches.

11/ Compare this to Crosby who will take any role on CAN w/o complaint. You call 87 a whiner, but who whined the loudest during the lockout,

12/ threatening to stay in the KHL? Who whines now, threatening to leave the league to get an Olympic trinket? While Leonsis bends over

13/ backwards to satisfy all his ridiculous demands. This is a guy who looks out for himself and his public image (Wild and Sexy Rebel,

14/ Patriot of Motherland). His only interest in the Cup is how his reflection will look in it. Problem is, Leonsis has the same priorities.

15/ He has dissolved himself and the team in Ovechkin’s 13-year-long marketing campaign. It worked out great financially. The price to pay

16/ is being humiliated every year by real winners. Congrats, Caps, you've sold lots of t-shirts. Congrats, Caps fans, you've been had.

17/ Oh, and that sound you’ve just heard is your window of opportunity slamming shut. I hope this wild ride on the Charisma Train was fun.

18/ Rant out. Enjoy your Redskins mini camp.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Cuttinfrealbirt

Registered User
Apr 23, 2017
120
0
Pretty much. I think we all know the Caps' window is over, and so they won't be back for at least another five years or so, but since they're cursed, they probably won't ever win seeing as they didn't this year.

Shame, because it's a likable team and it's easy to root for them because they're fun to watch. But they're done, and I don't just mean for this season. And we all know that. This guy is just venting it seems.
 

Mickey Marner

Registered User
Jul 9, 2014
19,704
21,487
Dystopia
An appreciable amount of homo-eroticism in that collection of tweets.

Is this Malamute fellow someone of repute, or just a guy with a keyboard and an internet connection?
 

The Nemesis

Semper Tyrannus
Apr 11, 2005
88,409
31,889
Langley, BC
Careful everyone. If you stare directly into the hot take you might go blind.

I don't care who it is, hockey is not a game that is won or lost on the back of a single player. If Ovechkin plays poorly it certainly doesn't help the Caps win, but it doesn't make them lose.

This is the same ridiculous nonsense that has been hung around the neck of Joe Thornton for his entire career too. The media likes a scapegoat because bagging on a single player for not having some vague "it" makes for saltier sports journalism than accepting that sports contests and playoff series are complex affairs that are driven by a hundred different variables that can't be isolated and turned into 500-word narratives in service of getting more eyeballs.
 

WTFMAN99

Registered User
Jun 17, 2009
33,109
11,129
An appreciable amount of homo-eroticism in that collection of tweets.

Is this Malamute fellow someone of repute, or just a guy with a keyboard and an internet connection?

A lot of respected hockey community members follow him and Dreger was the one who actually pointed out the read.

Careful everyone. If you stare directly into the hot take you might go blind.

I don't care who it is, hockey is not a game that is won or lost on the back of a single player. If Ovechkin plays poorly it certainly doesn't help the Caps win, but it doesn't make them lose.

This is the same ridiculous nonsense that has been hung around the neck of Joe Thornton for his entire career too. The media likes a scapegoat because bagging on a single player for not having some vague "it" makes for saltier sports journalism than accepting that sports contests and playoff series are complex affairs that are driven by a hundred different variables that can't be isolated and turned into 500-word narratives in service of getting more eyeballs.

You make valid points but I think he had a few kernels of truth in that rant.
 

hototogisu

Poked the bear!!!!!
Jun 30, 2006
41,189
79
Montreal, QC
An appreciable amount of homo-eroticism in that collection of tweets.

Is this Malamute fellow someone of repute, or just a guy with a keyboard and an internet connection?

He's reputable in the sense that he's a freelance (I think) sportswriter who actually has interviewed Ovechkin - and many other Russian players - a bunch over his career.

He's gone in pretty hard on Ovechkin in the past - ripped him for hamming it up with Putin fairly recently IIRC.

At the end of the day it's just one guy's opinion, really.
 

tarheelhockey

Offside Review Specialist
Feb 12, 2010
85,370
139,212
Bojangles Parking Lot
An appreciable amount of homo-eroticism in that collection of tweets.

I was thinking the same thing. 6 sentences with references to Ovechkin's sex appeal or looks. That's just cringey.

Is this Malamute fellow someone of repute, or just a guy with a keyboard and an internet connection?

He's a known name in the Russian hockey press.
 

Mr Positive

Cap Crunch Incoming
Nov 20, 2013
36,307
16,802
I don't know this particular writer, but bloggers of the past have shown they are not immune to emotional venting. I can recall many for the Oilers who said all kinds of ridiculous things after the Hall trade.

I think changes are coming to Washington, but Ovechkin stays. Maybe he'll lose the captaincy like Thornton did. They could even sell it to the fans and to Ovie as them trying what the Sharks did.
 

Knave

Registered User
Mar 6, 2007
21,650
2,238
Ottawa
A few bounces and this thread is about Crosby's choking ways. Ridiculous media.

I mean... this is hardly one series. This is series after series after series and not just against the Penguins either.

People had no trouble going after the Sharks and Thornton. Ovechkin and the Capitals have easily eclipsed that.
 

AnAceOfKidneys

Registered User
May 2, 2014
1,493
1
Careful everyone. If you stare directly into the hot take you might go blind.

I don't care who it is, hockey is not a game that is won or lost on the back of a single player. If Ovechkin plays poorly it certainly doesn't help the Caps win, but it doesn't make them lose.

This is the same ridiculous nonsense that has been hung around the neck of Joe Thornton for his entire career too. The media likes a scapegoat because bagging on a single player for not having some vague "it" makes for saltier sports journalism than accepting that sports contests and playoff series are complex affairs that are driven by a hundred different variables that can't be isolated and turned into 500-word narratives in service of getting more eyeballs.

the guy makes !0 MILLION dollaridos. He needs to be held ACCOUNTABLE, huh? Tickets for the whole family are kind of expensive, ya?
 

Blitzkrug

Registered User
Sep 17, 2013
25,785
7,635
Winnipeg
I'd just like to point out the irony of a Russian trying to claim it's bad for productivity to build your whole organization around a cult of personality.

That made me chuckle
 

The Toews Era*

Registered User
Nov 29, 2014
3,605
1
I'd just like to point out the irony of a Russian trying to claim it's bad for productivity to build your whole organization around a cult of personality.

That made me chuckle

The old soviet teams played a perfect team game...

And he even criticizes russian hockey for how they handle ovechkin
 

The Nemesis

Semper Tyrannus
Apr 11, 2005
88,409
31,889
Langley, BC
the guy makes !0 MILLION dollaridos. He needs to be held ACCOUNTABLE, huh? Tickets for the whole family are kind of expensive, ya?

And he can be held accountable. But there's accountability for the things that are under his control (his own play) and there's hot-takey "Alex Ovechkin playing like crap caused the Caps to lose this series and he's proven that he's a loser who can't lead a team to a championship because he doesn't have "the will to win" or some other mealy-mouthed, fungible nonsense that media and observers love to use to prop up retroactive narratives because a well-woven story that flows sells better than accepting that Ovechkin and multiple other important players played poorly and the team lost because multiple parts of the machine broke down, not just one single individual."

This is especially shoddy because it's almost entirely reputation driven. If the Caps lose, it's all on Ovechkin being a loser. If the Sharks lose, it's because Joe Thornton is a choker. The Blackhawks got swept but nary a person proposed that there are cracks in the armor of the otherwise-bulletproof Jonathan Toews. This is then made worse because we go from a reputation being informed by results to that reputation being used to justify results. Ovechkin is a loser because the Caps lose, but then the Caps lose because Ovechkin is a loser. It's circular reasoning at its finest.

This isn't basketball. One player does not make or break a team by his play, no matter who he is, how big his contract is, or how important he is to the scheme by which the team plays.

You make valid points but I think he had a few kernels of truth in that rant.

Even the hottest of hot takes generally has some kernel of truth at its core. But a single beautiful diamond covered in 10 tons of refuse is still fundamentally indistinguishable from any other landfill.
 

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