Another long hockey diatribe

I've got a hockey package on my TV right now.  Basically, I get access to every televised hockey channel, and it's absolutely free.

I have a sneaking suspicion this is a limited-time thing, and they'll pull the plug on me mid-season, and I'll be writhing in the agonies of cold-turkey hockey withdrawal, pondering blowing the totally-unreasonable sum they demand so I can watch each and every sharks game.

I really enjoy watching the Sharks play, watching the game on a California-based sports network.  It's hockey, done through an american lens.

I'm not here to slam americans.  Hockey is not their game to the same degree that it's a Canadian game - I think everyone will agree on that.  But it still cracks me up, as I'm used to watching the very professionally-done CBC broadcasts.  And you can tell that American televised hockey is not up to the same standards. 

For example, on the season opener, the announcers were explaining the nature of the penalties called against the players - why a "high-sticking" was called, and what was meant by "holding".  In a Canadian-announced game, of course, that very rarely happens - commentators assume you know what those calls mean.  And if you don't, odds are 50/50 you're in a pub, and you'll just ask the person sitting next to you.  (I did this the other night... I called up my dad and asked him why a double minor had been called... he simply said "because the other guy bled and cried."  I said "Oh", and hung up.  True story) 

Also, the commentators naturally point out the "hometown heroes".  What's funny is that, in a game dominated by Canadians and Europeans, how they describe players, and imply foreign players are "local heroes" because of where they played college hockey.  Dany Heatley, for example.  The commentators announce that he played in the university of Wisconsin - that he was an "U of W boy".  The reality is, Dany Heatley has Canadian and German citizenship.  My guess is, they didn't even realize they were doing this - they just had the info on their fact sheets on where a player played, but had no idea of nationality.  Not that I blame them - if you were trying to sell a game to an American audience, would you do it by telling them that most of the good players are foreign... that the only local players are mostly pretty crappy?   

My favourite moment in the opening game, however, had to be after Patrick Marleau's second goal.  The announcers begin with "Patrick Marleau's parents are watching the game in Newfoundland right now, where it's 12:30 a.m.  Marleau told us he grew up in Newfoundland, and his parents would drive him a one hour drive, in the freezing newfoundland winters, every day to hockey practice.  And it obviously worked out for them..."

Which is a nice story.

...Except Patrick Marleau is from Saskatchewan.

Ryane Clowe is the Sharks' newfie.  But it was nice of Patty Marleau to fly his folks all the way across the country to watch the game with Clowe's folks.