The Trap Thrives in 2006 Olympic Games

[Ironchef Chris Wok*]

i was angry when Rick beat my high score at DDR

 

[Garbs]

the forwards of team russia are not using their skills? you just have to accept that team canada lacks skill and speed.

Compared to who exactly?

 

[Raimo Sillanpää]

As for resident of other countries saying that the NHL playoffs are less important than the Olympics because "hockey players play all their lives for the Olympics" must be living in a dream World. First the NHL is the Elite league of everything that is related to hockey. To win the prize is war, a grueling 82 Games season. The Olympics heck it has not even been ten years since the best players went there, most of the time it has been an amalgam of patching of guys brought left and right. But most of all EVEN THE EUROPEAN PLAYERS AND GUYS FROM AROUND THE WORLD DON`T CARE. Sure it`s nice to win for your country. But ask anybody in 2006 and it sure means more to them to go all the way for the Stanley Cup. You think Jagr has trained all his life just because of the Olympics. Sorry their day-to-day lives means more, having a career in the NHL means a lot more. The goal of guys in Russian, Sweden and so forth in this day and age is now to make it into the NHL.

As for poster GiganticSnake you represent the worst sort-of poster I thought this Forum did not welcome. From pure blind fanboyism chauvenistic zealotry. And the other posters that applauded this type of behavior are as worst if not more. Because I deplored the trap and i`m Canadian suddenly all Canadian are simple-mind and trying to find loopholes because our teams are losing?

Great Hockey.

That`s all it should matter.

Bull.

Players:
Both Kurri and Tikkanen said at the end of their careers that they'd swop their Stanley Cup rings for an Olympic gold.

Fans:
Whoop-de-doo if Tampa/Toronto/Shanghai wins the Stanley Cup. I can't go around Helsinki giving high fives to anybody and celebrating it. Nobody cares, they'll enjoy it and discuss it, especially if at least one Finnish player was on that cup winning team. We were happy for Kurri, Tikkanen, Lehtinen, Nieminen when theyn got their rings. But that's it.
We won world championships gold in '95. The streets overflowed with people celebrating. Picture scenes of the Red Sox winning, insert that into Helsinki. There you go.
Slovakia won the world championships in 2001, exact same scenes. Czechs won the Olympics in 98, world championships in 99, insert the same scenes.

If Finland wins gold, its a national holiday. You forget about your own problems and celebrate. Max out your Visa to get completely and utterly sloshed. Sing songs, burn Swedish flags (ok not really but.. make jokes about Swedes). If we beat Sweden in the final (all the better), go to Swedish websites, chatrooms and flame away/make fun (this is you're a 15 year old nerd).

Montreal wins the Stanley Cup - Congrats Saku.. that's about it.
Same for Sweden. They win the Olympics? Stockholm will run out of beer before midnight. The stockmarket will go up 10 points for no other reason. Aftonbladet will have a 55 page special detailing each and every single second of the game and the lives of the players. Stamps will be printed celebrating the medal.
Forsberg/Lidström/Näslund wins the cup.. congrats.. but hey, soccer season just started! Go AIK go go go! Walk around town in your AIK shirt, scarf and socks. Insult opposing teams fans..

Wait, there was a Stanley Cup final? Oh, good for Foppa that he got another ring.. so about this seasons football..


It's the same for Swedish players. Why did Forsberg go over to Turin despite not being 100% ? Because he's willing to die for that Olympic gold.
If he get's the Cup and a Olympics silver, he'll consider his career a disappointment as he coudn't help Sweden win best vs best during his era. If he get's an Olympic gold and Philly chrash out of round 1. He'll retire a happy man and a national hero.

There is no parade by x NHL team in downtown Europe (inc Russia) when they win the Cup. There's a million man march through town and the bars if your national team wins Olympic gold though.

Giantsnake made an excellent post. But some of you still don't get it. It makes no difference to us who wins. I consider myself a Flyers fan, and I'm excited when they win, very happy if they get the cup. But I can't celebrate it. It's something intangible to me. So I can't ever reach that same emotional like with the club that I can make with my national team or my local club team.

If you can't understand that. Then just stop where you are, ignore the discussions and think to yourself - I can't comment on this because I don't get it.
Would you comment on a nuclear physics forum about x phenomenon if you didn't understand it? No? There you go.

 

[Pica]

100% true, well said Raimo.


Jadeddog:
Everyone knew rules before tournament started. No best of 7, best of 5 - just one game and we have found better team (yes, to me better team can be found looking at scoreboard). No need to post again and again how much more youd like to see best of 3,5,7 series.

 

[Joretus]

Just wanted your opinion here, do tons of europeans play in the NHL strictly because of monetary reasons? Or do they want to play for a chance to win the Stanley Cup? Do all of the NHL players on european and north american teams train for 4 years to go to the olympics, or to make the NHL?

And im not basing the olympics in any way, I love watching them and have no complaints, theyve been great. Just to re-iterate from my other post, I just tend to believe the Stanley Cup is the hardest thing to win in all of sports, tournaments included.

I honestly dont see why they cant be equally as important, you think the players on the ice slack off because its the olympics? Or they slack off because its the Stanley Cup? No, the desire to win is there.

Firstly I think every player want olympic gold. Actually any1 who is doing sports have their dreams about olympics. Then of course they have their sports biggest champions. Ie. World Championships or in Ice Hockey Stanley Cup, etc. So I bet there would be players who want stanley cup more and some who are dreaming more of olympic gold. But ie. if they have win other I bet they are desire more of that another. And Stanley Cup is more of personal winning and Olympic Gold team/National feeling&winning. So it's about personality in that too.

Then saying it's hardest of all sports to win Stanley Cup is just pure ****. There isn't and won't be more harder thing to win than football(for N-Americans it's soccer for you) World Championships. They have it just every 4 year and football is most played sports in the world.

Oh and btw. about topic. We have seen a lot of good hockey. If Canada would be winning canadians wouldn't whine for sure. Did they whine 2002? No and 2002 we still had 5 times more hooking&interference.

edit:Raimo already did made good post about first point. Sorry not to read it first.

 

[AndersEriksson*]

Kimota

I shouldn't be welcome on this forum cause I don't agree with you when you are dead wrong?? Well excuse me for not agreeing with you then. Would you have complained about boring hockey if Canada had blown out the Swiss 8-0?? Fanboyism chauvenistic zealotry to you to.

If you think it means less for a hockeyplayer to represent their country than it does for other athletes because hockey has a league.. well

You as a fan may care more about your team than your national team but there isn't one euro NHLer that share that notion. This I guarantee.

And personally I quite enjoyed all the praise my first post got

 

[MrRuin]

The thing some seem to miss is the factor of your local town winning the stanley cup is just as great a feeling like your country winning olympic gold.

You guys need to realize that if I lived in Montreal and the habs won the cup there are the same celebrations in the streets with people going crazy. Of course that doesn't matter as much to a european because basically we like the players from our country, no matter what team they play on, not necessarily the team itself. Most have no connection to a city except their favorite hockey player playing there.

Don't you celebrate if your team wins the local league? Now think about it: Your team is playing in the biggest and best league and wins, wouldn't you count that as high as olympic gold for your country? Look at the rangers: One Cup in what...54 years? Thats special in my opinion. That matters for fans (and that's what we are), especially if you follow your team for years and years, seen hundreds of games and went through every high and low to the ultimate pinnacle. International games are often too much about national pride.

Olympic gold is great and it matters, as is the Stanley Cup. The difference is the scale on which it matters.

 

[artilector]

Now think about it: Your team is playing in the biggest and best league and wins, wouldn't you count that as high as olympic gold for your country?

No way, not even close. If you can compare the two, we're on different planets. One city celebrating vs. a thousand cities. Recognition from the rest of the country vs. recognition from the rest of the world. Its order(s) of magnitude apart. A huge majority of people not raised in North America think like that, and that means most of European players in the NHL, as well. Those who become estranged from the countries of origin are exceptions, not the rule.

To win the Stanley Cup is physically harder than to win the Olympic tournament. But in the same way, it may be physically harder to scale some devious local cliff than it is to climb Everest - but guess what, nobody outside of your locality gives a damn. Imagine if there was only a once-in-four years window to climb Everest. This is what the Olympics is about: can you wait four years to bring it in the single moment when it counts, with the eyes of an entire nation on you? Nothing comes close to matching that...

 

[MrRuin]

thats exactly the point I tried to make. For me personally it may be bigger even though a lot of other people dont give a damn.

Scale is the difference.

 

[psycho_dad*]

I dont know if anyone has said this so far, but...

All the NA teams need to do is adjust and fans should stop whining. There wasnt much of an uproar when Finland and others had to travel to North america, fight the jetlag and play in an NHL sized rink. Finland went into the finals and lost there...on small ice.

So are you guys just trying to tell us that Canada and USA are only good on small ice, and that europeans should always give you guys that advantage, because you are the underdogs and it would only be the fair thing to do?

I thought Canada ruled the hockey universe. Shouldn't they then rule the big ice as well? Too much has been said about this topic anyways...the ice surface is same for everyone...if your team cannot cope, they are simply not good enough. Same with the european teams.

 

[jaydub*]

I really don't understand this anti-NHL stuff. I don't see any anti-swedish elite league or anti-russian superleague stuff from people from north america...

 

[PeterSidorkiewicz]

The thing some seem to miss is the factor of your local town winning the stanley cup is just as great a feeling like your country winning olympic gold.

You guys need to realize that if I lived in Montreal and the habs won the cup there are the same celebrations in the streets with people going crazy. Of course that doesn't matter as much to a european because basically we like the players from our country, no matter what team they play on, not necessarily the team itself. Most have no connection to a city except their favorite hockey player playing there.

Don't you celebrate if your team wins the local league? Now think about it: Your team is playing in the biggest and best league and wins, wouldn't you count that as high as olympic gold for your country? Look at the rangers: One Cup in what...54 years? Thats special in my opinion. That matters for fans (and that's what we are), especially if you follow your team for years and years, seen hundreds of games and went through every high and low to the ultimate pinnacle. International games are often too much about national pride.

Olympic gold is great and it matters, as is the Stanley Cup. The difference is the scale on which it matters.

THANK YOU, Ive posted this twice already but no one seems to notice, its just a big pissing war. If youre from Finland the chances of you being a huge NHL fan are minimal, im sure theres some though. Obviously if Montreal won a Stanley Cup it would be fricken crazy as hell. I dont get why you guys dont understand this? There is NO NHL in europe, so why would european fans care as much?

How many north american fans care if Jokerit or something won the finnish league?

My other point, Saku Koivu wins the gold, that would be awesome for him and im sure he plays his heart out to win it. If he won the stanley cup that would be awesome and he plays JUST as hard to do that. Thats why hes a professional athlete, because he has the drive to win.

 

[Joretus]

I really don't understand this anti-NHL stuff. I don't see any anti-swedish elite league or anti-russian superleague stuff from people from north america...

Maybe because swedish ppl or russian ppl aren't claiming that Olympic gold is nothing to hockey players, but winning russian league/swedish would mean everything?

 

[Force]

A DEL championship for Ingolstadt (100.000 citizens, 10.000 remotely interested in ice hockey) is way more important than Olympic gold for germany. (80.000.000 citizens, 8.000.000 remotely interested in hockey).

Anything clicking?