I finally got to see some live action, my first since game one of the conference finals, you know, where Dwayne Roloson broke my heart when he flipped that allyoop pass to Peca for a breakaway. Anyways, I went to the preseason opener against the Kings, boy did it suck. It was some bad hockey, it looked like a very unorganized team, like most of them haven’t played together before. The Kings on the other hand, they had a give and go goal from Sean Avery, looked pretty good. So now that it sucked, I will try to give a reason.

Played - Rob Niedermayer, Sean O’Donnell, Stanislov Chistov, Dustin Penner, Corey Perry, Ryan Getzlaf, Francois Beauchemin, Joe Dipenta, Travis Green and Ilya Bryzgalov.

Did Not - Scott Niedermayer, Chris Pronger, Teemu Selanne, Andy McDonald, Todd Marchant and others did not suit up.

Damnit, I went to see Chris Pronger and he didn’t play. So let me tell you, the game was so bad defensively. O’Donnell played like crap, he whiffed on passes, clearning attempts and was out of position a lot. But all is forgiven, he uppercutted Sean Avery, all is forgiven. There were 4 real fights and a couple team scuffles, it was good stuff. The only sophmores that played well were Ryan Getzlaf and Francois Beauchemin. Ryan whipped the puck in the top corner for the only goal and Beauchemin just looked confident and didn’t over do anything, maybe he still has that swagger from dropping Jerome Iginla…?

As for who underachieved, the rest. Bobby Ryan looked horrid, he was falling, not making anything happen and just looked really tense. The defesense was sloppy and the offesne had no rhythm. I think they had like 7 or 8 penalties as well, it was a very sloppy game. I am hoping that they will have a few less of the rookies by Friday, when I am probably going again.

The people know what is expected this season, the players do too, it was all around the arena. Now, like they all say, lets go make it happen. The season is just around the corner, I know everyone is really excited, I can not wait!