Ovechkin: Sticks on Fire

This week I’ve kind of wrote less about football. I had some friends and family complaining about that I focus too much on football. Sorry, but football is my expertise. So, here is another new blog on a different sport... hockey. Yes, I said hockey, the sport that is played on ice where it’s cool for people to fight. I’m not you avid hockey fan until the Stanley Cup playoffs…I’m hooked like a guy on drugs.

Well hockey’s current savior Alex Ovechkin is getting some heat from coaches and even his own coach Bruce Boudreau. After scoring his 50th goal of the season, Ovechkin celebrated with his hockey stick pretending it was on fire like Chad Johnson does with a football after a TD. Some people didn’t like the sight of it. Caps Coach Bruce Boudreau said he was caught off guard by the celebration and will talk to Ovechkin about it. Bolts Coach Rick Tocchet was not happy wither, "I grew up in the old days in the Spectrum where in the first period, after that happened, it might have been a three-hour first period. It's not something I like. It's hard for me to see that in our building." Tocchet also said, "I think he’s a terrific player. He went down a notch in my books after that”.

The NHL will take another look at the goal celebration and it will see to enforce any penalties to Ovechkin. WOW! The NHL allows fighting and celebrating goals, but not celebrating a goal in an unusual manner. Last night’s celebration was a first and unusual to many people who saw it. I’ve seen some celebration with sticks, but pretending your hockey stick was on fire…that was good and creative. I couldn’t believe no one else thought of it before. Many hockey players aren’t big watchers of the NFL. In the NFL, if there were a “Celebration for Dummies” book, the ball on fire celebration would be the first few celebrations displayed in the book and the more elaborate ones later.

Let Ovechkin do what he wants (hockey wise). That goal last night really didn’t harm anyone. Some coaches got mad over it and then it becomes blown out of proportion because people put their two cents into it (like me). Ovechkin is hockey’s last hope in a sense and if you don’t let him have fun in the NHL, and fuel that fun and enthusiasm into hockey, the sport will frizz away. I even heard of NHL banning fighting within the years to come. They can’t do that, fans love the fights. Every fan who sees a live hockey game in the NHL or AHL, wishes for a fight in the game. I know I do when I see the Wolf Pack.