Cold as Ice

Shaughnessy on hockey is like nails on a chalkboard, except nails do have their place in a classroom while The CHB has no business anywhere near anything with ice, except maybe a scotch glass.

All it took was one loss for Shank to roll out those tired tropes about bad bounces from-- get this -- 1990. Let's just forget that those Bruins were facing modern hockey's equivalent of the
'27 Yankees, while this year's edition won the Stanley Cup just two seasons ago.

And thank god the B's won in 2011, lest we be treated to a new CHB money grab: The Curse of the Zamboni.

The One Where Dan Goes to the Stanley Cup and Reports on a Baseball Game

It was a game about nothing.

That's the takeaway from The CHB's recap of Game 1 of the Stanley Cup. Comparisons abound to the Red Sox in 2004 and 2007, the Patriots-Bears Super Bowl in 1986 (when Mike Ditka was a coach!) and the 1918 World Series.

Oh yeah, and a Larry Bird mention. What more could we ask for in a column about hockey?

His Cup Runneth Over

The CHB thinks a Stanley Cup would be the ultimate response to the Boston Marathon bombings. This smacks of a future book.

Callous and calculating as ever, be His Shankness.

Shaughnessy on Drugs?

Shank gets treated to a taste of his own medicine.

The Midnight Hour

Shank stayed up late last night to give us a pretty good column on the Bruins' double overtime win over the Pittsburgh Penguins:

This was a Wilson Pickett Special. Wait Till The Midnight Hour. That’s when your love comes tumblin’ down.

The Bruins took a commanding 3-0 lead in the Eastern Conference finals at 12:13 a.m. Thursday when Patrice Bergeron slipped the puck past Penguins goalie Tomas Vokoun in the 16th minute of the second overtime to give Boston a 2-1 victory.

“We found a way,” said Bergeron. “It wasn’t necessarily our best effort in the first 60, but we regrouped in overtime. We are pretty tired, but it’s rewarding when you get results.”

Some of Boston’s most memorable sports moments have transpired in the midnight hour. Carlton Fisk’s moonshot off the foul pole in 1975 was struck at 12:34 a.m. David Ortiz’s Game 4 ALCS walkoff against the Yankees was hit even later. Adam Vinatieri’s overtime kick against the Raiders in the final game at snowy old Foxboro Stadium was a midnight-hour special. The Bruins and Edmonton Oilers went three overtimes in the Stanley Cup Final here in 1990.

Surprisingly, Shank does not mention a previous Bruins' 3 - 0 series lead that evaporated. Instead:

It’s the midnight hour for the Pittsburgh Penguins. The Bruins are going to the Final and the once-dominant Penguins are just trying to avoid the indignity of being swept.

Of course, Shank's trademark optimism is subject to change...

Flopping Column

You know you're expecting a terrible Shank column about Game 3 of the Bruins / Penguins series when it starts out like this:

“We were not just beating this team. We were destroying it. As much as I wanted to win that championship, I remember being disappointed that the Lakers were not playing better.’’

— Bill Russell, recalling a 1965 title-clinching game in which the Celtics scored 20 consecutive points, running to a 36-point lead over Los Angeles.

Welcome to Boston, you Pittsburgh Penguins.

This is just another irritating example of Shaughnessy having to interject some other sport into a given column; in this instance, it may well have to do about his, um, lack of expertise in the area.

Because we read him so you don't have to, he redeems himself later in the column, since he has a chance to take a dump on someone:

All eyes will certainly be on Sidney Crosby. Now that LeBron James has rescued the Heat in a Game 7, Crosby is the sports star with the most to prove in the spring of 2013. His reputation has taken a massive hit in the first two games of this series and he risks morphing into a Wilt Chamberlain/A-Rod pinata if he continues to pout and put up zeroes.

The sub-headline in Sports Illustrated’s May 13 cover story on Crosby reads, “You can’t keep Sidney Crosby down. You can only marvel at how hockey’s best player keeps coming back even better than when he left.’’

Well, the Bruins certainly have kept him down for two games. And the only thing to “marvel” about is the new notion that Crosby is a baby and a no-show on the big stage. He’s supposed to be the face of the NHL and the successor to Gordie Howe, Bobby Orr, Wayne Gretzky, and Mario Lemieux, but thus far in this series, he’s not nearly as good as Torey Krug. And let’s not embarrass him with the numbers about his faceoff failures against Patrice Bergeron.

And the coup de grace:

When an infant was heard crying on a JetBlue flight out of Pittsburgh Tuesday, the pilot asked whether it was Crosby crying in the back of the plane. This is not the image you want to take into Game 3 when your highly favored team was just outscored, 9-1, in the first two games of the conference finals.

A mixed bag, indeed.

Master Of The Obvious

Nothing gets past Shank:

NEW YORK — Clay Buchholz at this hour is the best pitcher in baseball.

Care to argue? Go ahead. Whom do you like better? Justin Verlander? Clayton Kershaw? Felix Hernandez? Stephen Strasburg? Matt Moore? Patrick Corbin?

Buchholz has outpitched all of them this year. He shut out the Yankees for five innings in Sunday night’s rain-shortened 3-0 victory, lowering his ERA to a major league-best 1.62. The Red Sox led in the sixth when the hard rains fell and the game was eventually called after a pair of delays. Buchholz improved his record to 8-0.

He hasn’t had a bad game. Not one. He pitched at least six innings in his first 10 starts and went only five Sunday night because the rains came while the Sox were hitting in the top of the sixth. There was no way manager John Farrell was sending Buchholz back to the mound after a 37-minute rain delay, especially given the fact that Buchholz missed his last start with stiffness in his throwing shoulder.

That's why Shank gets the big bucks - to tell you what you already know...

Rip Job?

Shank can't seem to write a story about positive things, like the Bruins' 3 - 0 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins last night, so instead he returns to beating the crap out of Jacoby Ellsbury. The reader is tipped off almost immediately:

This is not a rip job on Ellsbury. There’s no calling into question Ellsbury’s toughness or willingness to play hurt.

Then Shank proceeds to rip Ellsbury:

No need for MLB.com columnist Tom Werner to run to the keyboard and defend his player. Ellsbury missed the first two games of the Yankee showdown this weekend, but he’s played in 54 of 57 games in 2013. He’s practically been Cal Ripken Jr. Let’s call him Iron Man Ellsbury. Everyday Ells.

Nope, no rip job here!

The Boo Birds

Dan Shaughnessy, a man not exactly known for his civility, would like to inform you on manners at the ballpark:

NEW YORK — Boo.

This is not about Boo Radley, Boo Weekley, Honey Boo Boo, Boo Williams, Boo Ellis, Halloween, or Yogi Bear’s partner in picnic basket thievery.

This is about the noise fans make when they are displeased. This is about the nightly referendum at professional sports contests.

Whom do you cheer? Whom do you boo? And why?

This week, Jonathan Papelbon became the latest former Boston sports star to feel the wrath of fans who once worshipped at his size-13 feet. Pap returned to Fenway with the Philadelphia Phillies and was roughed up by Hub fans when he came out of the bullpen to face the Red Sox in the ninth.

Emotionally, this makes sense. I guess.

Being a fan is an emotional experience. It does not require reason or common sense. Cheering and jeering is all about laundry, right? Booing is on the fans’ Bill of Rights.

Still, booing Papelbon seems too dumb for words. It’s sort of like booing Johnny Damon when he came to town with the Yankees or booing Adam Vinatieri when he lines up for a field goal while wearing a Colts uniform.

It's unintentionally funny for him to acknowledge booing as not rational, then have him lecture us on who should be booed and who should not. You'd also think that a Boston Globe columnist who's infamous for writing the occasional nasty column about local athletes ought to have a level of awareness when he writes an ironic column such as this one.

Colorful History

Shank gives us an offbeat drive down memory lane before the Bruins and Pittsburgh Penguins start the Eastern Conference finals on Saturday night:

The Bruins play their next game sometime before the World Series (Saturday in Pittsburgh, to be precise), and in our effort to deliver all things Bruins-Penguins, we ask you to hop into the Jerry Trupiano Wayback Machine for some history of this rivalry and these old-timey sports cities.

■ The Penguins wore dark blue, light blue, and white as their colors when they first came into the league in 1967. They changed to black and gold in 1980, claiming it was an homage to the neighborhood champion Steelers and Pirates. Bruins boss Harry Sinden protested the change, claiming the Penguins were stealing Bruins colors.

Enough All Right, Shank

Dan Shaughnessy believes his Boston Globe readers are stupid, gullible and have short / nonexistent memories. This might be the explanation for him to write the following faux fanboy bandwagon column, presumably without the slightest hint of irony or self-awareness:

Never a doubt the Bruins were better team

Enough.

Enough of John Tortorella and his annoying press conferences. Enough of the goal-challenged Rangers pretending they had a chance against the Bruins. Enough of the antics of Derek Dorsett. Enough silly talk about the Bruins blowing another 3-0 series lead.

The B’s Saturday night put the Rangers and their fans out of their misery with a 3-1 Game 5, series-clinching victory over the New Yorkers. The Bruins advance to play the Penguins in the conference finals, starting next week at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh. It’ll be Black & Gold vs. Black & Gold. Sidney Crosby is the only thing standing between the Bruins and another trip to the Stanley Cup Final.

It’s nice to have the Rangers in the rearview mirror. New York was merely an annoyance in Round 2. There was never a moment when the Rangers looked like the better team. They deserved to be swept, and were spared that indignity only because Tuukka Rask slipped on the ice at Madison Square Garden in Game 4. This led to a lot of hysteria about 2010 and the B’s collapse against the Flyers with Rask in net.

The word 'never' would apply to the columnist himself, wouldn't it? Once again, note the passive tone of 'Enough silly talk about the Bruins blowing another 3-0 series lead' and 'lot of hysteria about 2010 and the B’s collapse against the Flyers with Rask in net, as though he didn't have a damn thing to do with any of it:

But they will be reminded that three years ago — with Tuukka between the pipes — they blew a 3-0 series lead against the Flyers.

They will be reminded that they seem to have a big problem closing out playoff series.

They will be reminded that they gave away Game 4 in Madison Square Garden. Big time.
...
Or they’ll have to come back to New York and there will be thousand more reminders that Rask was between the pipes in 2010 when the Bruins blew a 3-0 lead against the Flyers.

Do these sentences sound like someone who supposedly never had a doubt about the Bruins winning this series? To me, it sounds like a columnist who at best takes his readers for fools and knaves, at worst openly lies to them.

Didn't See This One Coming

The Bruins lost to the New York Rangers last night, 4-3, on a series of mistakes; Tuukka Rask falling down, Zdeno Chara coughing up the puck near his own goal, and a penalty for too many men on the ice leading to three of the Rangers' goals.

Of course, Shank reminds us once again of a certain playoff series loss from three years ago:

But they will be reminded that three years ago — with Tuukka between the pipes — they blew a 3-0 series lead against the Flyers. They will be reminded that they seem to have a big problem closing out playoff series. They will be reminded that they gave away Game 4 in Madison Square Garden. Big time.

Note the use of the passive voice - 'they will be reminded'. Of course they'll be reminded - time and again, with Dan Shaughnessy leading the charge.

Just in case anyone missed the point:

They’d better win Saturday. Or they’ll have to come back to New York and there will be thousand more reminders that Rask was between the pipes in 2010 when the Bruins blew a 3-0 lead against the Flyers.

There will be reminders, all right - half of them will bear Shank's byline.

Whaddya Mean, It's Not Hockeytown?

Shank's been in New York City for the past few days, following the Bruins - Rangers series as we await Game 4 any minute now. He delivers a pretty good column as he takes the pulse of the city and finds little life interest in the hometown hockey team.

NEW YORK — Hockeytown, this is not.

The New York state of mind is not focused on the neutral zone trap. It’s hard to be a Rangers fan in the city. Spike Lee and Whoopi Goldberg don’t splice Rangers footage into their films.

Sure, the Rangers have fans and sellouts and Original Six tradition, and they even won a Stanley Cup back in 1994. But I have been here since Monday and I am here to tell you that there is no buzz in this town for the New York Rangers. (closing some bars - now that's a different story! - ed.) The House of Blueshirts is the hockey house of blues.

It’s not just because the 2012-13 Rangers can’t score goals, have no power play (2 for 38 in playoffs), and are teetering on the brink of elimination. No. It was like this in the days leading up to Tuesday night’s de facto clincher by the Bruins.

Hockey Hyperbole

A week removed from Shank jumping back on the Bruins bandwagon, we have seen the Bruins win three straight games over the New York Rangers, with the latest win being last night's 2-1 road win at Madison Square Garden. Naturally, Shank overreacts to this win streak:

NEW YORK — They may never lose another game.

Maybe this is the year. Again. Maybe Dave Goucher’s Game 7 Toronto call of “Bergeron! Bergeron!’’ is destined to go into the Boston sports audio Hall of Fame, alongside Johnny Most’s “Havlicek stole the ball!’’ and Joe Castiglione’s “Can you believe it?”

On the strength of Daniel Paille’s goal with 3:31 remaining, the Bruins beat the Rangers, 2-1, Tuesday night and now hold a 3-0 series lead in their best-of-seven conference semifinal. They have been a rocket sled on Bauer blades since they stared into the face of elimination in Game 7 against the Maple Leafs.

Then throw in a mistake that hockey novices make:

Tyler Seguin got away with a stick to the face of Chris Kreider...

Tyler Seguin was shooting the puck when that happened, and the follow-through on that shot is what caused his stick to hit Kreider in the face. Might want to consult the rule book on that one, Mr. Associate Editor at the Boston Globe...

Picked Up Pablum

Shank could have used some positive, hometown themes with his most recent column; he had the opportunity to write about the Red Sox and their recent five game winning streak, or he could have chosen to get near his quota of yearly Bruins games by writing about yesterday's 5-2 thumping of the New York Rangers.

Instead, he used the guise of yet another underwhelming picked up pieces column in an attempt to justify his May 11th column all but accusing David Ortiz of using performance enhancing drugs:

Facts, not opinions: According to Major League Baseball, there have been 636 professional players suspended for violating MLB’s drug policies since 2005. Two hundred and thirty-four of those 636 are from the Dominican Republic. That’s 37 percent. Players from the Dominican Republic made up 10.4 percent (89 of 856) of Opening Day rosters in 2013. Of 38 positive tests involving major league players, 13 players (34 percent) hailed from the DR. This doesn’t mean all Dominican players use steroids. It means the steroid issue is significant in the DR. Some of you old-timers might remember a time when East German swimmers were more likely to test positive for banned substances than other swimmers. An exhaustive ESPN.com report from 2009 (headlined “Steroid problem reaches critical mass in the DR”) stated, “According to numbers provided by MLB, in 2004, the inaugural year of drug testing in the Dominican Summer League, 11 percent of teenage prospects signed by major league clubs tested positive.’’

I'm pretty sure the only relevant fact here is this - did David Ortiz use PED's this year? Big Papi himself reported a random drug test conducted on the same day (May 11th) of the original column. Unless Shank has some undisclosed inside information, I don't see the logic of this portion of the column, which is nothing more than a defense of the May 11th column. Since Ortiz has every motivation to shut Shank up, we'll have to wait until Big Papi's test results come out.

Back On The Bruins Bandwagon

There are sure signs of spring in Boston - the sun is out, birds are chirping, flowers are blooming, and Dan Shaughnessy climbs back on the Bruins Bandwagon after a first round playoff series win.

Thank you, Bruins, we needed that win

We?

The Day After was almost as much fun as the Night Before.

"I mean, I had a column half written when I was going to compare Claude Julien to Grady Little and everything! That was fun too!"

You could not tend to daily business without talking or hearing about the Bruins’ Game 7 miracle comeback Monday night at the Garden.

Where were you when they fell behind the Maple Leafs, 4-1, in the third? Did you (gulp) leave the game? Did you turn off the TV and go to bed? Did you sit up with new hope when Nathan Horton scored to cut it to 4-2 with 11:22 left? Did you wake your kids when the Bruins tied it with two goals in 31 seconds in the final 1:22? Did you have trouble getting to sleep after the epic comeback? Did you get calls, texts, and e-mails from friends and relatives around the country?

Everyone, it seemed, had a story. Everyone had an opinion. Everyone had hope. Everyone was buoyed by the Bruins.

The words 'we' and 'us' are used conspicuously throughout the article, which is your surest sign that Shank's back on board, at least until next week. Other than Shank's shameless bandwagon hijacking, it's a decent column. Better get those leaf springs checked out!

Hacktastic!

There is no doubt whatsoever that Mike's excerpt below is precisely what Shank wanted to write after Game 7 of the Leafs - Bruins series. Actual events have a nasty habit of upsetting the apple cart:

It was only a first-round series, against a team that hasn’t won a playoff series in nine years.

It was not Bobby Orr scoring to win a Stanley Cup championship. Or Adam Vinatieri splitting the uprights at the Superdome. Or coming back from a 3-0 deficit against the Yankees.

But it was one of the great moments in Boston sports history. In a pulsating Game 7 against the Toronto Maple Leafs Monday night, the Bruins trailed, 4-1, with 11 minutes left, but rallied to tie the game (two goals in the final 1:22 of regulation), then beat the Maple Leafs, 5-4, in overtime on a goal by Patrice Bergeron. Bergeron’s follow-up shot in the sixth minute of OT pushed the Black and Gold to a second-round series against the New York Rangers.

And what's a column about the Bruins without yet another comparison to the Red Sox?

The Bruins were done. They were Toronto toast. They were going down hard. They were going to be scorned. Julien was going to be Grady Little (there's still time for that one, Shank! - ed) and the Bruins were going to be the Manila Folders of ice. They were going to exit from the playoffs in a seventh game for the fifth time in six seasons. They were going to blow a 3-1 series lead. We were going to have the sounds of silence at TD Garden.

That's Our Man Shank - rooting for the loss!

Iced

Dan Shaughnessy, typing away with 2:30 left in the Bruins game last night:

"Here in the Stub of Hockey, they are Wrong Ways on Causeway, the Not so Fleet on Center Ice. Claude (as in "Clod") Julien may never have to buy a drink in this town again, but that's a good thing since he will be looking for a new job come Wednesday. Can we say another 40 years between Cups?"

Dan Shaughnessy, at 6:05 of overtime in the Bruins game last night:

"Oh crap."

Anything But Quiet

Confirming Shank's presence at Fenway yesterday, we are treated to a column that was predictably written as the Red Sox have lost seven of their previous ten games.

In case there's any doubt that he's pissed off his last ally in the Red Sox organization, here's Shank on Tom Werner, who once got Shank's daughter an internship in Werner's TV production company, a favor long forgotten:

Red Sox “Chairman” Tom Werner (third-most-famous Chairman, trailing only Mao and Frank Sinatra) was not provoked to write another missive summoning the spirit of Jackie Robinson and complaining that the Globe and other media outlets are being unfair to Sox players.

It's a compliment to be compared to a communist dictator responsible for millions of deaths, isn't it?

Shank also quotes the former Baltimore manager Earl Weaver, who for whatever reason Shank did not write anything about when Weaver passed on earlier this year:

What we are seeing is market correction from the 20-8 start. It was Earl Weaver who said “you are never as good as you look when you win or as bad as you look when you lose’’ and the 2013 Red Sox are a good example of this. They have come back to the pack but let’s not get greedy. There is every indication that they are in this race to stay and that is a good thing after what the Nation endured in 2012.

Seven weeks ago, Shank had the Red Sox battling for last place in the AL East race:

The question now is, “Who are you going to pick to finish in last place — the Red Sox or the Yankees?’’

Shank then uses the remaining part of his column to write about himself and the Ortiz kerfuffle of his own making. Way to make some headlines, Shank!

Making Friends

Check out Shank's latest trip to the Red Sox clubhouse:

As David Ortiz prepared to leave the Red Sox clubhouse after the team’s 3-2 loss to the Blue Jays, he did a double-take. The sight of Dan Shaughnessy, the Boston Globe columnist who confronted the slugger directly with suspicions about the possibility of his use of steroids, standing with a group of reporters, caught Ortiz’s attention.

“Look who it is,” Ortiz said.

He paused for a moment, then noted — loudly enough that all in the clubhouse were party to his address — that on the very day on which Shaughnessy interviewed him, he took a test for PEDs. Ortiz said he would be sure to pass along results of that test to the columnist. Ortiz became slightly more animated as he noted that he’d taken 40 tests administered by Major League Baseball.

“I’ve never tested positive,” Ortiz told the columnist, who had referenced the fact that the New York Times discovered in 2009 that the slugger had tested positive for a performance-enhancer in 2003 (at a time when a) there were no penalties for positive tests and b) test results were supposed to be anonymous).

When the report surfaced four years ago, Ortiz disputed that he had ever knowingly used PEDs, something that he mentioned anew to Shaughnessy as he walked towards the clubhouse door.

“By the way,” Ortiz said, “let me know what I tested positive for in 2003.”

As he spoke, while Ortiz was clearly upset, his tone remained relatively measured. He did not seek a response from Shaughnessy, nor did the columnist say anything while Ortiz spoke, though he did position himself to speak to Ortiz if the slugger wanted to do so.

Awkward!