The Wall (As Interpreted at Game 6)

During my freshman year in college, I lived in a dormitory room next to a guy who listened to The Wall by Pink Floyd pretty much every waking second that he wasn't in class that year. To say he was obsessed with it doesn't even truly do it justice. I got to know the album very well. The lyrics, the meanings the subtexts. It's all he talked about. Thirty years later I can't remember a damn thing I learned in first year Calculus, but I'm pretty sure if I took an exam on The Wall I could pass it today and get an A.

Roger Waters, who sang and played bass for Pink Floyd and wrote The Wall for the most part, was in Columbus on Friday night to perform the epic rock opera in its entirety to a packed house at The Schottenstein Center. Meanwhile, just a few miles to the south, the Calgary Flames were in town to take on the Blue Jackets in an epic early season contest in front of a half-packed house at Nationwide. Don't let anyone ever tell you Columbus does not rock.

I passed on free tickets to see The Wall. In a private box. Instead, I took the Mrs. to see the Jackets with one of my ten pairs of tickets I bought this season. In retrospect, I might have chosen poorly.

As I watched the debacle that unfolded on the ice, and mostly to make myself feel better about my decision, I imagined that the Blue Jackets were putting on there own production of The Wall. It went something like this.

Disc One, Side One

In the Flesh  So ya, thought ya, might like to go to the show. Yeah, what the hell was I thinking? To feel that warm thrill of confusion, that space cadet glow. I felt it, but it wasn't all that thrilling really (unless you were a Flames fan). Tell me is something eluding you, sunshine? I don't think I really need to spell it out here, do I? Five minutes into this mess and and I'm feeling anything but sunny.

The Thin Ice This is what the Jackets are skating on if they keep playing like this.

Another Brick in The Wall, Part 1  You! Yes you! Stand still, laddy! And that's exactly what it looked like Mason was doing when Ian White fired one from the blue line to give the Flames a 2-0 lead with 5:10 to go in the first period.

The Happiest Days of Our Lives This team made the playoffs two years ago? You would never know it by watching them today. The way they are playing it might as well have been 1979 when they last made the playoffs, the same year this album was released.

Another Brick in The Wall, Part 2 Wrong, do it again! If you don't eat yer meat, you can't have any pudding. How can you have any pudding if you don't eat yer meat? Are you listening, Nikita?

Two short-handed goals? AHHHHHHHHH!!!

Mother   Hush now baby, baby don't you cry. 
Mama's gonna check out all your girlfriends for you.
Mama wont let anyone dirty get through. 
Mama's gonna wait up until you get in.
Mama will always find out where you've been. 
Mama's gonna keep baby healthy and clean.
Ooooh baby, oooh baby, oooh baby,
You'll always be baby to me..

Two words: mommy's boys. That's how we played in the first period. (And the second period for that matter).

Disc One, Side Two

Goodbye Blue Sky Did you see the frightened ones? Did you hear the falling bombs? The Flames are all gone, but the pain lingers on. That pretty much sums up the whole evening.

Empty Spaces There were lots of them in the parking lot. And all around the lower bowl. And the upper bowl.

Young Lust Loosely interpreted, this song is about slump-busters. Is it too early in the season to start contemplating this strategy. I vote "no".

One of My Turns Don't look so frightened. This is just a passing phase. One of my bad days. Would you like to watch TV? Really? Because this is like two bad days in less than a week. It better pass and fast. I'm already $50 into four cans of beer and a parking pass for the night. So yeah, TV sounds pretty good right now. Can you get a closed circuit feed from The Schott on that thing?

Don't Leave Me Now Ooooh babe. Don't leave me now. Don't say it's the end of the road. OK, fine. I won't say it's the end of the road. Mostly because I still have 9 sets of tickets to future games this season staring at me from my credenza. At this rate, I'll soon be traveling on this road all my myself because I won't even be able to convince my dog to go to those remaining 9 games with me.

Another Brick in the Wall, Part 3 I don't need no arms around me. What was that? Another short-handed goal for the Flames? Actually, I could use a hug right about now. And I don't need no drugs to calm me. My daughter just became a D.A.R.E. Role Model so I'm good right now. But that could change. I have seen the writing on the wall. And I'm trying to erase it from my memory. Don't think I need anything at all. OK, screw it. Give me a double scotch, on the rocks with a twist.

Goodbye Cruel World This one got the audience involved. Lots of people were singing this as they exited the building about halfway through the second period with the Jackets down 4 to 1 having registered a total of 7 shots IN THE GAME.

Disc Two, Side One


Hey You Hey you, out there in the cold. Getting lonely, getting old. Can you feel me? I'm talking to you Mr. Rick Nash. Hey you, don't help them to bury the  light. Don't give in without a fight. That's right. Where's the fight? It sure as heck isn't on the first line so far. Show some fight gosh darnit! Act like you're mad as hell and you aren't going to take it anymore. By the way, pay no mind to the remaining verses of this song because they are about sitting naked by the phone, asking somebody to touch you, the wall being too high and worms eating into your brain.

Is There Anybody Out There? Guest duet on this one by Blue Jackets President Mike Priest and GM Scott Howson during a TV timeout. Good stuff. Compelling. They should have played this one earlier when there were more people around to see it.

Nobody Home This song is about the Blue Jackets defensive effort against the Flames, especially on the powerplay.

Vera Vera! Vera! What has become of you? Does anybody else here feel the way I do? Out of the dozens of you that are still here anyway.

Bring the Boys Back Home Actually, if the boys are going to play like this maybe they should just stay on the road for awhile and try to work this out.


Comfortably Numb Hello? Is there anybody in there? Just nod if you can hear me? Is there anybody home? Scott Arniel's speech to the team at the second intermission?

Disc Two, Side Two

The Show Must Go On Could this be the CBJ's next marketing slogan?

In the Flesh  I've got some bad news for you sunshine. Pink isn't well, he stayed back at the hotel.
And they sent us along as a surrogate band. We're gonna find out where you folks really stand. I'll tell you where most folks were standing. In a line for a beer at an area bar before the game was two-thirds over. I would like to think that I was watching a bunch of surrogates. If so, these surrogates are really slow, get out-hustled and pushed off of pucks, and don't like to compete in the tough spaces.

Run Like Hell  I wanted to after the first period. But we waited until after the second to avoid the rush.


Waiting for the Worms, Stop, The Trial and Outside the Wall I didn't get to experience these. I don't usually leave games early, but the Mrs. had and I had seen enough. We left feeling pretty depressed. And our heads were sore from banging them against some mad bugger's wall.

Mason Among League Leaders in Drinks-on-Goal

I hang out with some degenerate gamblers. I don't really gamble that much. (I plead the fifth when it comes to the state of my degeneracy.) On Wednesday night I hung out at Nationwide with three of my degenerate gambler friends to watch the Blue Jackets take on the Anaheim Ducks.

To protect their identities, I will refer to my friends as Larry, Curly and Mo. Larry emailed me on Tuesday and offered to take me to the game. Larry's seats are on the glass in section 121. Sometimes degeneracy has its privileges.

Toward the end of the first period, Mo leans over to me and Larry with a proposition. "Curly and I would like to propose some friendly wagers," he whispered loud enough for everyone within two rows to hear. The word friendly is a code word that means things are about to get very unfriendly if you don't start paying attention. 

Plenty of empty seats near the glass in 102. This is not a good thing.

"These will be team wagers," Mo explained. "Me and Curly vs. you and Larry. We'll have three wagers each for the second and third periods. The first wager will be over/under on total shots of both teams for each period. The second wager will be odd/even on total goals scored in each period. The third wager will be over/under on drinks-on-goal."

"What the hell is drinks on goal?" I asked. "Don't forget, I'm driving tonight."

"Drinks on goal," Mo explained, "is the total number of times the goalie in our end goes to the water bottle that sits on top of the net." I looked over at Larry and he gave the nod. Game on. We agreed that drinks-on-goal did not include the water bottle at the bench, only the one located on top of the net. Also, and most importantly, the team making the pick (over or under) had to call attention to each instance of the goalie taking a drink as it happened for it to be counted. No replays on the big screen and no second hand accounts from the dude sitting to your right.

We agreed that Mo and Curly would set the over/under lines on total shots and drinks-on-goal for the second period, meaning Larry and I would have to make the over/under call, and vice-versa for the third period. We also agreed that each side had the option of offering the other team a bonus bet during the game.

But if it means I get to sit here every now and again, it's not completely a bad thing.

Larry and I lost total shots and the odd/even in the second period, but we nailed drinks-on-goal. Curly and Mo set the line at 4 and we took over. As it turns out, 4 is really low. The Ducks Jonas Hiller wasn't particularly thirsty, but he hit the bottle for the fifth time with well over 5 minutes to go in the period.

Prior to the third period, Larry and I huddled and came up with some very shrewd lines. We set the total shots line at 19. Curly and Mo took the over. We set the over/under line on Mason's drinks-on-goal at 7. They took the over. And they took even on total goals.

Larry and I were looking really good on total shots and drinks-on-goal for most of the period. We were helped immensely by Curly and Mo's inattentiveness. Two times Mason hit the bottle while Curly and Mo were busy staring at the Pepsi Power Patrol girls as they scraped the ice. A third time Stinger came down to the glass just a few feet to our right and started banging on his drum. Curly and Mo ate this up. At that same time, much to their obliviousness, Mason was drinking up just a few feet to their left. Larry and I were laughing so hard we were trying not to throw up.

To spice things up a bit, Larry and I threw out a bonus over/under on total attendance. We set the line at 10,000. Curly and Mo took the over. Sadly, we ended up winning that one. To counter that, Curly and Mo offered the following bonus bet: they would wager that either Nash, Vermette or Huselius would score the next CBJ goal (if any) and we would get the field. We accepted.

Hey, look over there guys! It's Stinger!

Things didn't get real interesting until the last two minutes of the game. The shots were parked at 13, total goals were odd and, thanks to Curly and Mo's short attention span, drinks-on-goal was sitting comfortably at 4 (but should have been 7 or 8). We were looking at a sweep. And then mayhem ensued.

The final minute and a half saw several stoppages. Each time Mason went to the bottle like a wino. Drinks-on-goal hit 7, which would be a push if it stopped there. Shots crept up to 17 as the Ducks pulled Hiller and brought on the sixth attacker. Then with the clock ticking down, Nash feathered a shot into an empty net, winning total goals and the bonus bet for Curly and Mo. The cannon fired. The crowd roared. And Mason went to the bottle. With 28 freaking seconds left in the game and a two goal lead. If you count the times he drank up at the bench during timeouts, he probably hit 15. The dude is a drink-a-holic. Duly noted.

Nash's shot was the 18th of the period. Thankfully, there were no more in the final half minute. So after all that, it was a draw. Curly and Mo won four wagers and Larry and I won four wagers. 

If me and my degenerate gambler friends ever see Mason out and about, I might have to buy him a drink. Or I might not.

The Blue Jackets in Sweden: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly

The Blue Jackets return to Columbus today and will have the better part of a week to readjust their body clocks and prepare for the defending Stanley Cup Champion Chicago Blackhawks on Friday. The trip to Stockholm now in the books, Coach Scott Arniel and his staff will break down the film and identify what went right and what didn't in two thrilling, and at times maddening, games against the San Jose Sharks.

THE GOOD

1. Kristian Huselius The 1st Star of the trip has to go to Huselius.  Playing in his homeland with dozens of friends and family members in the stands, Kristian Huselius could be excused for feeling as though he had to carry the Globe on his back. But he responded with two beautiful power play goals, three points and 8 shots on goal. Good to see The Juice get loose early in the campaign.

2. Steve Mason: The 2nd Star should probably go to Mason, although you wouldn't have guessed it by the way things started for him. When Torrey Mitchell put a soft wraparound in just over two minutes into the CBJ season, a look of panic crept onto the faces of even the most die-hard Jackets fans for a short while. But Mason ultimately settled in,  especially during the late stages of a 3-2 overtime win in Game Two. Is he back to rookie season form? Maybe. Let's talk in a month or so. But he sure looked closer than he did at just about any point last year.

3. The Penalty Kill:  Technically, this is a bad thing, isn't it? It's kind of like saying you are a really good driver when it comes to eluding the police. Though they now lead the league in Times Short Handed (tied with the Flyers) with 14 after the two games in Sweden, the Jackets managed to kill off 10 of those man advantages and came up large when it mattered most in the waning minutes of Game Two. But let's be honest: we don't want to be lauding the virtues of the PK in a couple of months.

4. The "Checking" Line:  Most Jackets fans expected solid, veteran play out of the Umberger - Pahlsson Moreau line, but did anyone expect it to be so emotionally draining to watch? This line brought feistiness, solid back-checking and offense too, finishing with two goals, two assists and a combined Plus/Minus of +5. They also finished with a total of 8 penalty minutes, a couple of which caused collective hair loss back in Columbus. After heading to the box twice in Game Two, Ethan Moreau, who clearly looks motivated and happy to be in Columbus, emerged as the hero with a deft, top-shelf wrister to win it in OT. His addition to the roster already looks to be a very shrewd move by GM Scott Howson. If the play of one line summarized the Jackets two games against the Sharks, it was this one. Thrilling, inspiring, maddening, gritty, clutch. This line was all over the place, literally and figuratively.

THE BAD

1. The "06-07-08" Line: This line (also known as the Milk and Cookies Line or the Pepsi Power Patrol), combined for 2 points (both assists by Filatov), a combined Plus/Minus of 0 and 0 penalty minutes. Other than the aforementioned assists from Filatov (both of which were pretty slick), the play of this line was fairly nondescript. But if the 3rd line continues to play the way it did it will provide some additional time for these young guns to gel.  The key here is Brassard, who registered only 1 shot on goal in the two games, but did manage to win 7 out of 10 faceoffs.

2. Too Many Penalties: It's early. Penalties at this point in the season are to be expected, especially when they involve misuse of the stick and especially when a young team is pressing against a team of the Sharks' caliber. This will need to be addressed forthwith and it will undoubtedly be a focal point for Arniel and his staff in the next few days as they prepare for the Blackhawks.

THE UGLY

1. Mike Commodore: After scoring a rare goal with a wicked one-timer from the slot in the Jackets final preseason tuneup against Malmo on Tuesday, the planets seemed to be lining up for Commodore to have an Extreme Makeover in Columbus. They still might be.  But things did not go so well for Commie in Sweden once the puck dropped for real. First, he looked completely over-matched when he squared off against Ryan Clowe in Game One. Credit him for wasting no time to show that he does indeed have a backbone. But any good will he earned from that fight was squandered by a lackadaisical attempt to control and clear the puck from the Blue Jackets zone that directly led to the Sharks first goal in Game Two. Commie ended up with a paltry 27 minutes of combined ice time over the two games, a Plus/Minus Rating of -1 and 9 penalty minutes. Compare those numbers to Rusty Klesla's (40 minutes; Plus/Minus Rating of +2 and 2 penalty minutes). Considering the uncertainty surrounding Klesla's health heading into this season, the fact that he logged 13 more minutes in Sweden than Commodore is, in a word, disturbing. (as it relates to Commodore anyway). A lot of Jackets fans are pulling for Commie, which is a testament to the solid guy that he is. Let's hope he just ate some bad meatballs or something.

2. The Lumps on Frazer McLaren's Melon Fighting is not common in Swedish hockey. The fans in the Globe were eager to see a good ol' fashioned North American donnybrook. They may not have gotten the matchup they truly wanted to see, that being Jared Boll vs. Douglas Murray. But they were treated to the site of Jared Boll inflicting a decisive beat-down on Frazer McLaren which, according to Swedish journalists covering the game, was the first NHL fight in Sweden.  Boll starts the season 1-0-0.

Overall, it was a more-than-decent showing by the Blue Jackets against one of the NHL's top two teams from last season. The Blue Jackets may have opted to keep last season's roster mostly intact, but they showed enough for fans to see that this is not the same team.

Coming Soon to an Arena Near You: The 2010-11 Blue Jackets

If yesterday was any indication, the screenwriting team of Scott Howson and Scott Arniel is a force to be reckoned with, if not in the NHL then most certainly on Broadway. As the sun came up on Saturday, there was much work to be done. The script for the 20010-11 season had some very unsettled plot lines to be resolved and a 6PM deadline was looming. After hunkering down in the production room for most of the day, Howson and Arniel emerged with what appears to be quite a compelling story.

First, the final roster cuts were made at mid-day. Ten players were cut.  As these things go -- which is to say sometimes saying goodbye can really suck -- it couldn't have gone much better. The only disturbance was a somewhat salty salute (Guided By Voices pun intended) from former Blue Jackets fan favorite Dan Fritsche as he was handed his pink slip. But in general, parting ways with such promising young talent as Ryan Johansen, John Moore, David Savard and Tomas Kubalik was less bitter and more sweet. Raise your hand if you are going to be looking for the Springfield Falcon's boxscore each morning.

Second, Arniel needed to tie up a loose plot string involving mercurial prospect Nikita Filatov. So right after the cuts were made he announced that Filatov would begin the season playing on one of the top two forward lines. As loose plot strings go, this was a doosie. Here was the answer to perhaps the biggest mystery in the Blue Jackets abbreviated camp, the composition of the forward lines. And yet the announcement barely registered a ripple. In a deft move to avoid giving away the ending, Arniel dropped this hint on Columbus while most of the city was collectively suffering from a fit of gastric distress, having just watched Terrelle Pryor get carted into the Ohio State locker room during the Buckeyes game against Illinois.

And so, at 6PM, with the script mostly finished and a full cast on hand, it was time for the curtain to be raised on the the Blue Jackets final home dress rehearsal of the season. Playing the part of the villain was the Chicago Black Hawks junior varsity team, otherwise known as the Atlanta Thrashers. The announced crowd of 11,969 was treated to a very entertaining production, a thrilling action-adventure saga with a surprise ending (at least for most Buckeye fans). Like any good script worth its weight in popcorn, this one kept the audience guessing right up to the final few scenes. The hero turned out be . . . . . . none other than Filatov, who scored his second goal of the game at 15:07 in the 3rd period to lift the Jackets to a 4-3 win. Broadway likes to lay it on thick sometimes, and apparently so do Howson and Arniel.

The win evened the Jackets preseason record at 4-4, but the real story was the emergence of Filatov as a viable leading man. Preseason games are generally meaningless in the grand scheme of things, but not so much in this instance. Filatov, more than anyone else on the roster, needed to make a statement in this camp. And for that matter, so did Arniel. For his part, Filatov scored 4 goals in 5 games, displayed a "twisted wrister" (with a tip of the cap to George Matthews) on a game winning goal in a shootout and conducted himself as a model citizen. Arneil responded as he should, and as everyone in Jackets Land wanted him to for the most part, by slotting Filatov in the lineup where it only makes sense that he should be.

Time will tell if this production will have a long run or whether the script will ultimately have to be reworked. But as fans exited Nationwide on Saturday night, the buzz from what they had just seen was enough to create quite a tailwind for the team charter as it lifted off for Sweden. Don't miss the 2010-11 Columbus Blue Jackets, coming to an arena near you soon.

A couple of other thoughts:

Umberger Moves to Third Line The biggest ripple to come out of the announcement that Filatov would play among the Top 6 forwards was the assignment of R.J. Umberger to the third line. Some around the league will probably call this a "demotion" for Umberger. Don't believe it. The third line is where Umberger belongs. Yes, he has skill, enough so that he can be counted on to bump up to one of the top two lines at any time and log respectable minutes. But his skill and goal-scoring ability seems like the perfect compliment to a line that also includes Sammy Pahlsson and Ethan Moreau, two players cast in the same grit and energy mold as Umby.  And let's face it, on most teams Umberger would be viewed as a protoypical third line winger. This move should be interpreted more as a sign of an increasing talent base in Columbus than anything else. One thing is for sure: this has the makings of one of the best third lines Columbus has ever had.

Puck Possession is Fun! One of the more interesting developments in camp has been the makeover given to the Blue Jackets power play by assistant coach Bob Boughner. At one point in the 1st period of the game Saturday night, The Jackets maintained possession of the puck in the Atlanta zone for a full 1:58 of a 2 minute power play. Read that again. And again. Smiling yet? The Blue Jackets have sported a number of different looks on the PP including a 1-3-1 formation with four forwards that was deployed on the above referenced man advantage. Listen up Columbus Halloween costume shops: you might want to stock up on The Boogieman outfits.