“Yeah, go ahead.”
And with those words from Kalamazoo Gazette sports editor Howard Thomas, I’m covering the first National Hockey League game of my 11-year journalism career next Monday night.
Chicago.
Kings vs. Blackhawks.
Press box. Post game. The works.
I think I just peed a little.
P.S. – I’m doing this because Kalamazoo’s Scott Parse still holds down a regular shift with LA two weeks after getting a call of his own. I’d buy him a beer after the game if it weren’t taboo.
Location: Lansing, MI. Level of stupidity: Ironic
Sigh.
(Hat tip: Norene Lind.)
I’m off to Chicago for a couple days to do some networking, so I thought it appropriate to highlight a Q&A session between John Buccigross and Bob MacKenzie.
Buccigross anchors SportsCenter on ESPN and is the network’s resident puckhead. MacKenzie is one of a few hockey insiders in the Canadian media biz. Both are excellent journalists and broadcasters and both have a burning passion for the sport that shines through in their work and lives. I’m linking to this article because:
Money line by Buccigross (regarding his son): ”I primarily demanded he kept playing for the exercise and the human contact one gets at the rink. It is a very human place in a world getting less human.”
I play hockey two nights a week. In each case, it’s the only time in my life that I spend two hours not thinking about anything outside of the centering pass that’s about to snap onto my stick or the phlegm I’m coughing up on the bench while I recover from my shift.
I’ve also worked in and around the sport for the better part of the last decade. However, I’ve made very little money doing it. Maybe landing a gig like Bucci’s or Mac’s will never happen for me. Maybe I’ll have to sell my soul in order to write about hockey in my spare time.
Maybe not.
When it comes to my on-the-record opinions about Western Michigan University’s hockey program, I’ve committed enough major penalties — high stick to the head coach, checking the recruiting efforts from behind, slew footing the athletic director – to warrant a suspension and a hearing with the league commissioner.
That is, of course, if truth-telling were a punishable offense.
But it isn’t.
Which is why I’m going to do it again.
*
The sign pictured above was plastered on the doors at Lawson Arena Saturday night. And who can blame the University for being cautious?
After all, it is Bronco hockey season. And the usual symptoms returned against Michigan State:
Spartans 5, Broncos 3.
WMU hockey: Do You Feel Sick?
Along the lines of this post I wrote a while back …
*
I stop into the local D&W earlier today to buy a little Halloween treat for my friends’ seven-month-old son. Not really knowing what would be appropriate for a little bald man who drools and can’t walk yet, I wander the aisles for about 10 minutes.
Hmmm… Tootsie Rolls?
(Choking hazard.)
Peeps - Pumpkin edition?
(Lame. Even a kid who can’t talk knows this.)
Aha! The bakery!
I settled on the cupcake above. $1.99. Figured we’d set it in front of him in the high chair and let him go to town.
I pointed it out to the baker and he retreated to his wealth of packaging material — cardboard and plastic containers of various styles and sizes, stacked high and wide. I figured he’d reappear with a nifty little plastic container, the kind you might get with your croissant to go.
No.
Instead, he rips the top off a plastic four-pack cupcake holder. After gently setting the lone cupcake into the upper right slot, he grabs a cardboard cake box — oh, I dunno, twelve inches by twelve inches — and unfolds it, sets the plastic cupcake four-pack in it, closes the hood of the cake box and then, for good measure, seals it with a four-inch sticker.
“Wow,” I said. “That’s a lot of packaging for a single cupcake.”
He chuckled under his breath.
Ahhhhhhhhhh…. America!
Location: Battle Creek, MI. Level of stupidity: Dirty
Stick-raise to Steph (both for submitting the photo and suggesting “Level of Stupidity” content).
SUNDAY| Kalamazoo
1:45 p.m. — Arrive at Center Ice Sports Bar inside S2 Arena, laptop in tow. Research hockey information and statistics, sipping on coffee.
3:15 p.m. – Interview Scott Parse, Kalamazoo native, current Los Angeles Kings rookie.
3:50 p.m. — Tape stick in rink bar.
4:00 p.m. — Start getting dressed in locker room with Horan Hockey League boys.
4:40 p.m. — Take the ice.
5:00ish p.m. — Score a goal.
6:30 p.m. — Sweaty, tired, head to locker room. Team wins two of three games.
6:45 p.m. — Post-game beers with the boys in the rink bar.
8:00 p.m. — Laptop back out in bar, begin writing Parse article.
9:50 p.m. — After much tinkering and marinating (not this writer, the article), file this.
Went to the K-Wings game Saturday night.
Exceptional.
Hockey is back in Kalamazoo. After nearly a decade of watching bushwackers with sticks, the prime-cut, Grade-A meat has returned to a building and a town that was used to mouth-watering passes and smooth, silky skating for the better part of 30 years.
The new/old/bullshit IHL, this ain’t.
These ECHL guys are slick. Passes are tape-to-tape, regardless of speed, time or space … shots have big-league starch on them … skating is fluid and effortless … the creativity on offense is brilliant … and the SIZE of some of these m-effers, especially the K-Wings, whose coach, Nick Bootland, apparently thought he was fielding a team in the National Football League: 6-5, 244 pounds (Olivier Legault); 6-7, 230 (Tom Morrow); 6-3, 210 (Jordan Grant); 6-4, 200 (Matt Jones).
The San Jose Sharks assigned Jones here last week, so Bootland doesn’t get credit for that one. However, the fact an NHL club has influence on anything in this organization instantly yanks this town back to the 90s, when the hockey was good and the bonus babies were rolling in and out of here in their Beemers and Burberry suits.
Then there was this Saturday night: Middle of the third period, tie game, 4,400 rowdy-as-all-get-out fans buzzing beneath a smoky haze from pre-game fireworks that lingered all night and provided a dreamy aura … and William D. Johnston, the man, the team owner, Mr. Kalamazoo, and his gold-plated Stryker buddies dancing to between-face-off music in the aisle in section 6.
Yes. Hockey has returned to Kalamazoo.
Daaaaaaaaance to the music.
*
My friend and very knowledgable hockey pal Steph made a good point Sunday: if you’re Western Michigan University’s hockey program, given what’s unfolding across town at Wings Stadium, do you even TRY to market to anyone but WMU students?
The K-Wings aren’t only fun to watch, they’re also 5-0-0. And, hey, the Broncos are 4-0-0 (and 0 and 0 and 0 and or however the CCHA is keeping its standings this season), too — but, well, they’re the Broncos. And Jim Culhane is still their coach. Cue the mid-season meltdown.
Just got off the phone with Rich Hammond.
The Los Angeles Kings pay him (full-time) to go everywhere the team goes and blog about every little scrap of information from every practice, home game, road game, roster move, locker room laundry cycle, etc., for the team web site.
Rich is also a fantastic guy.
I emailed him out of the blue Saturday and asked if he’d track down some quotes and provide me with insight for a Gazette article I’m working on about Scott Parse, the Kalamazoo kid who made his NHL debut for the Kings in Phoenix last night and did this (click on the link to Jarret Stoll’s second goal).
Rich emailed me back promptly Saturday, then spent nearly 15 minutes with me on the phone Sunday talking about Parse, the Kings, and his own career (turns out he covered the team for the LA Daily News before landing this gig.)
I’ve met a lot of journalists over the years who are very protective of their turf. They don’t say hello, don’t look at other colleagues, don’t hand you a plate while standing in line for free press box pizza … and sure as hell don’t share information.
Rich? Rich is cool. He asked Kings coach Terry Murray questions about Parse for me and, in the next couple of hours, will have the quotes transcribed and sent to my inbox, probably with a nice little e-bow or something wrapped around them.
There is hope in the world.
I’m planted on my mom’s couch Friday night watching reruns of Will & Grace with her and my brother (post-birthday party fun) when the BlackBerry rattles: an email from Howard Thomas, my editor at the Kalamazoo Gazette. He wonders if I can get in touch with Scott Parse, a hockey player from Portage who has been in the Los Angeles Kings’ farm system the last couple of seasons.
“It appears he’s making his NHL debut Saturday,” Howard writes.
Oh.
Having covered Parse during his days at the University of Nebraska-Omaha – which necessitated at least one feature story per season — and again last year, when he recovered from a screwed up back to have a pretty good season with AHL Manchester, I had his cell number stored in my phone.
(Note: This is rare. Typically, universities and pro organizations don’t provide player cell numbers, but since I’ve pretty much turned into Parse’s personal hometown beat writer — and because he left me his number in a voice mail during our very first game of phone tag three years ago – dinging his mobile on the eve of his NHL debut was no biggie.)
RRRRRRRING … RRRRRRRING … RRRRRRRING … click
A slow, groggy-sounding voice.
“This is Scott. Leave a message.”
I do, then go back to watching Will & Grace, thinking I probably won’t hear from him until Monday – the day Howard wants to run the story. Hell, maybe Parse will never call back. Less than two minutes later:
BZZZZZ … BZZZZZ … BZZZZ…
The BlackBerry dances on the arm of the couch. It’s Parse. At LAX. Minutes from boarding the Kings’ team charter to Phoenix.
“Hey, Rick.”
I congratulate him and ask him if he’s definitely suiting up Saturday night.
“It’s not official yet, but it looks that way.”
Cool.
*
Look for the article in Monday’s edition. The plan is for me to interview Scott sometime Sunday, after the Kings return from Phoenix and before their evening tilt against Columbus at the Staples Center. By the way, Parse should play both games. Teams don’t usually call a guy up so he can wear a suit and sit in the press box eating popcorn.
**
Small world alert: One of LA’s media relations people is Mike Kalinowski, who I met eight years ago when he was doing radio play-by-play for the UHL’s Rockford IceHogs and I was working PR for the Kalamazoo Wings. I emailed Kal last night to tell him about the article and ask if I could get a quote from Kings coach Terry Murray. He responded instantly, just before the team went wheels-up to Arizona. I love the small world of hockey.
***
Another thing: The K-Wings play their first home game of the season tonight (I’m going) against the Reading Royals, who are LA’s ECHL affiliate, who Parse spent time with last season. Weird.
