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Boston Update 5/28

Posted 2009/05/28 By Benti

Nothing interesting going on besides NBA playoffs and NHL playoffs. Yep, nothing interesting about that, which means it’s time for a Boston update!

Patriots: Fun stuff this past week for the Patriots. First, if you haven’t heard the news, Tom Brady’s back, practicing and everything. Great news. In the video, he looks pretty good as well. I don’t see any noticeable limp and the ball looks like it’s coming out just as good as it was before. The key will be in August when pre-season starts. He will HAVE to play a pre-season game because he hasn’t played since last September and if he gets hit, New England will hold it’s collective breath and then pray to the sports gods that he gets up.

Confidence also seems to be a hip thing in the New England locker room recentaly (or cockiness depending on who you root for). Brady said in an interview with Peter King in SI that he’s “as confident as anyone could be that I’ll be ready to play, back to playing normally, when the seasons starts. I’ve done everything I could to push myself, sometimes too hard. Right now, I’m doing everything. Literally everything. There’s nothing I can’t do.” A little more fire from Mr. Tom Brady this year? I like it.

Then there’s Randy Moss, a little perturbed about some list ranking greatest receivers of all time. I guess Mark Murphy, former Packers safety and now roaming coach, said who he saw as the greatest receivers that he has ever seen including Lebron James (yes that Lebron James) on the list. Randy’s not angry that Lebron was on the list (Randy even said he thought Lebron would be better then Antonio Gates) he’s just angry he wasn’t on the list. “I’m the best wide receiver of all-time, hands down,” Moss said in an interview for ESPN.com’s package that examined how James would fare in the NFL. “I could really give a damn what [Murphy] says.

Brady AND Moss fired up to prove people wrong this year? Holy crap I’m excited.

Red Sox: I don’t understand this team right now. They are VERY streaky. One week, they look unbeatable and they next week they’re dropping games to the Mets and Twins. I don’t get it. I don’t know what to say about them. I guess Bay is delivering a monster season and it will be interesting to see how far Jacoby can take his current hitting streak (22 games) but really, they’re a likable, but un-exciting team right now.

Bruins: Kessel and Krejci went under the knife for surgery, Kessel for shoulder and Krejci for hip. This led me to post on my twitter page while stroking my chin “HMMMMM”. Two of the Bruins top scorers are up for free agency, and now have surgery and might miss the beginning of next season? Could this lead to reduced contracts to return with the Bruins because few teams will want to jump on a “damaged goods”? More to come on this story.

Celtics: I didn’t really find the need to make a whole post about the end of the season like I did for the Bruins for two reasons.

1. We won last year.
2. I didn’t expect to win the title this year.

But Benti, shouldn’t you expect to win the title every year? Isn’t that the goal of playing the season?

Yeah it is, but here’s the thing. Celtics fan’s wanted them to defend the title which doesn’t necessarily mean win the title. This Celtics team came in night in and night out and played with heart and determination. This was especially apparent when KG went down in February.

One of my favorite games of the regular season was the double OT game against the Bobcats. The Bobcats had a pretty good lead and the Celtics could have easily rolled over and said “You know what? We don’t have it tonight. We’re going to be the two seed anyway.”

Not this, Celtics team though. They staged a comeback barely missing to win in regulation when Rondo missed a layup. Then, in the first OT, the Bobcats had the lead until the Ray Allen came through with the tying jumper. Then this team got a defensive stop to force second OT. Finally Jesus Shuttlesworth came through again with another three at the end of the second OT to win it after just missing another shot. The game was exciting fun and best of all, showed a team with heart a determination to defend a title know matter what.

Until Next Time
~Benti

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Hope Lost

Posted 2009/05/15 By Benti

“And then it comes to be that the soothing light at the end of your tunnel, is just a freight train coming your way.” ~No Leaf Clover- Metallica

It is hard to explain the shock of the Carolina Hurricanes upset of the one seeded Boston Bruins at the TD Banknorth Garden in Game 7.

I was confident going into Thursday night’s Game 7 against Carolina that I did something out of the ordinary for me and had friends come over to watch the game. I don’t normally do this. Most of my sports watching is spent in the “Dungeon” (my mom’s word for it because I never come out) watching the games and twittering about them. This was different. This was supposed to be a celebration. The Bruins already got a break by Pittsburgh beating Washington, the only team that routinely beat the Bruins this year and the Bruins had all the momentum at home. There really was nothing to worry about.

Bitz scored, we went up 1-0. Then Carolina got their momentum. Brind’Amour scored making it 1-1 and then one of the few players that I was legitimately scared of on Carolina, Sergei Samsonov, scored in the second making it 2-1. The air left the dungeon. Nobody could believe what was happening. Then I had a sense of déjà vu. I’VE SEEN THIS MOMENT BEFORE!

Can’t lie about this, I had this dream 2 weeks ago when Boston was still playing Montreal. In the dream, the Bruins were down 2-1 at home, against Carolina, in Game 7, going into the third, going left-right across your television. I believe in this shit and I was scared because in my dream the Bruins lost. It was a freight train coming right for me.

Then, hope, my boy Milan scored the tying goal, roofing it past Ward. The Bruins were back in the game and had the momentum. They played a great end of the third and came THIS CLOSE to winning in regulation. We were going into overtime. The physical dream was over, but the cup dream was still alive.

(By the way, did any one player play their heart out more than Milan Lucic in this series? He was laying people out, dangling past defenders, fore-checking, making tape to tape passes, and scoring goals. I was proud of my boy during this series)

The overtime began and immediately the Bruins got some more chances and again just missed. Then the Hurricanes took control. We got worried, my friend, Tommy, said “It would suck if Scott Walker scored the winning goal”. Two minutes later, Scott fucking Walker scores. Silence.

(One thing humorous from the overtime, my friend Brad says when the overtime started “Couldn’t you just see Carolina scoring and Jack Edwards just screaming “FUCK!” and Andy Brickley’s mic turning off and you hear him chugging some liquid from Jack Edwards mic?” Yes, definitely imagining that)

Everyone left, I cleaned up, I updated my twitter saying “I don’t want to go to school tmrw” and went to bed. It’s taken me the day to think about WHY this one hurts so much more. The Bruins have been eliminated before. We lost to the Canadians after fighting back last year, why was this year so different?

It seems that every few years, you have that team that you get so emotionally attached that you know it’s probably unhealthy, but you don’t care. You love it. You love feeling like you’re a part of the team, that you being fan affects the team on a day in day out basis. I’ve had four such seasons that I can think off the top of my head.

1. Red Sox: 2004 (The re-deem from 2003 ALCS team, they NEEDED to win this year and they did)

2. Patriots :2007 (The eff-you team. This one did not end as well with me cursing the Manning names and shedding a few tears)

3. Celtics: 2007 (Well you gave up the future, you better win)

4. Bruins: 2008

Why was this season different? Because of last year. Game 6 gave us hope. We were right on the cusp of greatness, our young talent was finally ready, and most of all, we proved we could beat the Canadians. If we could do that we could win it.

Such high hopes going into this season. The sign was the third game of the season in Montreal. It looked like another Canadians killing of the Bruins. They went up 3-0 in the first and every Bruins fan (including myself) was thinking “Here we go again”. But something was different. The B’s kept playing. It was 3-1 and then all of a sudden, it was 3-2 and the Bruins had a chance. Then the Bruins ran the ballsiest play I may have ever seen in hockey. They intentionally bombed the puck against the boards, it took a funny bounce right in front of Carey Price, and Marc Savard picked it up and hammered it home. They didn’t win the game (they lost in a shootout) but this was the sign. This season would be different. Then they beat (and beat up) the Stars at home and the Bruins hit their stride.

This was supposed to be THE season. The light at the end of the tunnel. The wait on the development of the prospects finally over, the veteran trade to bring in an established the winner (Recchi), the chemistry and toughness of the team, the wait for the Cup (1972!) over.

But all that light was an aberration. Just a freight train coming to de-rail us fromthe ultimate goal.

Wait Till Next Year

~Benti

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Staying Alive

Posted 2009/05/11 By Benti

Words cannot begin to describe how nervous I was entering Sunday night’s game. I had already deemed it the biggest Boston sports night (so far) of 2009 on my Twitter page. The Bruins had to win to keep their season alive or else they would be golfing for the rest of the summer instead of having a sweet tour with Lord Stanley’s Cup. The Celtics needed a win to even the series and not put them selves into a situation that they probably would not win. It was an interesting night to say the least.

I started with the Bruins and the one thing I kept repeating all day Sunday was that if “We could get to game 7 then we would have a chance in the series”. While it sounds like it comes from the Joe Morgan school of sports obviousness, if you think about it it makes perfect sense. I was pretty confident that the Bruins would win game 5 at home and indeed they did. Phil Kessel finally got going in this series with two big goals and if Phil Kessel can continue this then I give the Bruins a good shot.

But game 6 scares the crap out of me. Carolina just doesn’t lose at home. I have never seen a hockey crowd that tailgates before a hockey game. That’s badass. Say what you want about non-”hockey towns” but Raliegh has good hockey fans. I like to contibute this to “We have nothing else so what the hell” factor. Think about it. Carolina has two major sports teams (Panthers, Hurricanes) and a D-league basketball team (Bobcats) that is on the cusp of being a pro level team if Micheal Jordan just steps down. When football season ends, it’s Hurricane season which allows the Carolina fan to concentrate on one pro sport at once. So it’s easy to build a fan base when you’re the only pro sport in town at a given time. Just look at Utah with the Jazz. It’s similar to that.

I would love for the Bruins to make it to Thursday, but it will be tough. But if they do get to Thursday, all bets are off. This seriees will either be Canes in 6 or Bruins in 7. Carolina won’t win in Boston but I give them a 80% chance at winnning at home.

My favorite moment of the night had to be the Celtics finish. I don’t think I have ever been happier with the result of a team blowing a 4th quarter lead. There is no way to describe the utmost fear of Glen Davis getting the ball TWICE in the final minute with the game on the line then the pure disbelief when he comes through TWICE. Even the annoucers didn’t understand what they were seeing (“Pierce passes to, Davis?”). I didn’t believe what I was seeing, I didn’t even celebrate. I just sat there, hit myself, and then said “wow, that just happened”.

The NBA, where amazing happens.

Until Next Time
~Benti

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