Side Blawg

Someone on reddit asked about it. And it turns out there’s a logical-ish reason:

all of the other players pair off with their man to prevent anyone else entering into the fight … so it’s a form of self policing. 

[…] The players basically want to prevent 2 on 1, etc. fights and by finding a “hugging” partner so there’s no ganging up on one guy, even on accident. They do it because it’s fair. And it’s kind of cute sometimes.

omfg i’m so pissed i legitimately answered this whole message then looked away to my cat and looked back and it wasn’t even opened? like i had the whole answer typed out and then i looked away and looked back and it was all gone like i had just imagined the whole thing i am lowkey upset about this. 

ANYWAY my answer basically boiled down to, if you try too hard you’ll burn out and hate the sport. the main advantage mens sports have over womens sports is how easy it is to be a fan. So think of the ways you passively enjoy mens sports and start doing that with womens hockey too. turn twitter notifications on, follow social media accounts for teams and players, follow tumblr blogs that are primarily woho (i’ll be making a post with these blogs soon), etc. Basically the issue here is if you make watching woho about being progressive and about wanting to support women instead of about it being you wanting to watch a sport you raise the stakes which can make watching hockey feel overwhelming and may lead to burnout. If you approach it as entertainment it’ll be a lot more fun. LIke sometimes it can really suck if you have all this stuff going on but you’re like “Ugh i have to watch the bruins tonight” like no you don’t. because turning sports into a chore makes them not fun anymore

Another thign I would suggest, is pick a team to stan. for instance the NWHL only has one year contracts so the whole team can change from year to year. If you pick one team, being a fan becomes a lot easier instead of following one player from team to team. just ride or die a logo basically. And also, i’d suggest picking one player who isn’t a star player to follow closely. One of the best ways to get a true understanding of a sport and a league is by learning of it through players that may not be on national teams and may not have huge sponsorships etc. Like think about some of the mens players tumblr loves like yeah most of the stars get a lot of love on here but what about guys like Michael Latta who isn’t even in the NHL anymore or Matt Martin who’s barely a fourth line winger? Those guys get a lot of love too. So saying Oh i’m gonna follow Rachel Llanes or Blake Bolden or Zoe Hickel will help you get an intimate view of WoHo. And again picking one player and one team lowers the work load so it hopefully doesn’t feel like a chore or responsibility, it just feels fun. 

Dad Captains

Alex Ovechkin

Zdeno Chara

Nick Foligno

Mikko Koivu

Derek MacKenzie

Henrik Sedin

Blake Wheeler

Henrik Zetterberg

Best Friend Captains

Claude Giroux

Max Pacioretty

Joe Pavelski

Steven Stamkos

Jordan Staal & Justin Faulk

“Give Me the D(efensemen)” Captains

Mark Giordano

Andy Greene

Erik Karlsson

Ryan McDonagh

Alex Pietrangelo

Plain white boy Captains, some ugly and pasty, some okay (figure that out for yourself)

Jamie Benn

Sidney Crosby

Ryan Getzlaf

Connor McDavid

John Tavares

Jonathan Toews

Beautiful Captains

Roman Josi

Gabriel Landeskog

“Dear God Give Him a Nap” Captain

Sneak Peek: On the ice they were rivals, but off the ice, Julie Chu and Caroline Ouellete make the perfect hockey couple.

As the players were rushing out on to the ice, the goalie had a little trouble finding his footing.

Thankfully, there was a photographer skating behind everyone, who was able to lend a helping hand.

But as soon as he let go, the poor kid fell down again.

Realizing the goalie gear was too much for the little guy, the referee skated over, picked the kid up and carried him over to the goal so he could fulfill his role as protector of the net.

It was a pretty adorable moment.

This is in fact true. 

There are two bones in your lower leg. One’s big and buff and one’s pretty wimpy. When you walk, that big tibia takes ~80% of your weight of impact, and the fibula only has to take the remaining 20%. 

But skaters place their weight differently over their feet. In principle a hockey player has 100% of their weight shifted forward onto their tibia. 

You can actually see the implications of this in practice. If you break your fibula, 20% of the weight-bearing is gone, and you won’t really be able to walk. But a hockey player who cracks their fibula can and will keep skating almost without noticing something’s wrong. This happens pretty damn often when they block shots. You’ll see them skate easily over to get checked out, step up onto the hallway floor, and then suddenly slump over, with medical staff helping them limp off down the hallway.

 I hear people saying, “oh, guess he’s fine!” when hockey players get up and appear to be skating okay: nah. And when a player wants to return to the ice: they may genuinely feel better skating but be too injured to walk. 

https://www.bonfire.com/team-rigsby-33/

There is the link to where you can buy her stuff! 

Also if you simply want to support women’s hockey, in general, the NWHL sells merchandise for all four teams! Hilary Knight typically plays for the Boston Pride and Erika Lawler (she did some intermission talks for the women's hockey games) plays for the Metropolitan Riveters! 

http://www.nwhl.zone/shop There is the link to all of those shops as well! 

I made my original post because I want USA hockey to do their fucking job.

I want them to live up to the promises they made the uswnt to end their boycott. And that means I don’t want the national team members having to pedal their own shirts and fundraisers so they can pay rent.

and I need y’all to get mad at USA hockey too because them not promoting the historic gold medal win except for one ugly shirt? is unacceptable.