Da da da daaa da da da daaaaaaaa da da da da da da daaaaaaa da da da!

Bout time. It'll be nice to open up that spot.
7 games, 1 goal, -6...
Welcome back Jeremy Morin.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

As most of the beat writers shed a single tear for him.

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Team Cutler.

As they should. I once lived in Rockford, right Spanky?

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I thought he was okay and we'll probably see him again. Did they announce Bickell is coming back?

Smith didn't make the most of his callup. Can't defend him. He was expected to give a spark to the bottom six that had been lacking with Bickell quarter-assing it out there, and he wound up being just as invisible. Sucked that he couldn't get it going, but calling him up was the right thing to do. They couldn't have kept putting Bickell out there, nor could they have replaced Bickell with John Scott this whole time. He just blew it.

That said, there's some serious strawmanning going on over at Second City Hockey that I don't feel is entirely fair to the guy. They seem to be taking the tack that someone, somewhere said that Ben Smith would be a superstar for this team, and now that he is not, those people are the same idiots who romanticize Reed Johnson and Aaron Gray, and why must we forever fight the meatballs. I think most fans get that he was a low pick who spent all four years in the NCAA, which generally translates to "high-end fourth-liner." I can't dig it up because, y'know, the search function here is an established punchline, but I'm pretty sure I said he could at best be a tenacious checking-line winger who amasses more garbage goals than average, and I don't think I was alone on this. This griping that finally we're rid of Everyone's Favorite Grinder feels contrived to me, I guess. Whom would you rather dress?

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Let me put on my shocked face...

hold on...

...

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team Mully & Hanley
team Meatpants

So I guess it's Jesse Rogers who has been fetishizing Ben Smith. As far as hockey talk goes, Jesse Rogers really is no more than "someone, somewhere." I already know the SCH guys have the best thoughts on hockey. Beating up on stupid old Jesse Rogers seems like fish in a barrel to me, and this whole war against liking Ben Smith seems like nothing so much as an opportunity to have a hockey analogue of Taking Down Meatball Heroes as done on B&B.

To wit:



With all due respect, this angle doesn't really work when you're talking about two white guys. I didn't know anti-Scandinavianism was a scourge upon our fair sport. People get frustrated with Stalberg because he plays alongside the Big Four and shits his pants every time he's perfectly set up. If it were Ben Smith squandering one picture-perfect pass after another from Kane, Sharp, Toews, and Hossa, everyone would be on his ass, too.

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Well to be fair, you'd have a tougher time finding someone in this town where it wouldn't be considered "shooting fish in a barrel"...

But I don't think it would matter. They probably do the Bernstein schtick on all the writers, like Rosenbloom<3 and Rozner (my guy!!!)

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team Mully & Hanley
team Meatpants

I'm frustrated with Stalberg because never have I seen someone so fast be so completely unable to ever break away.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

That would take instinct and anticipation... good luck getting that from him...

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team Mully & Hanley
team Meatpants

He's this generations Ken Yaremchuck

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

At the risk of sounding like a deplorable Ben Smith excusemonger, it has to be noted that he had mostly been playing on a line with Dave Bolland, who is eminently far from 100% and has been for a while now, but has been trying to play through it with little to show for it. IR Bolland till he is at 100%, and move Sharp or Kane back to center for a while. Bolland is a remarkable bellwether for the fortunes of the team: when he's on his game, the Hawks roll; when he's off, they're directionless. That the Hawks have banked points while he's been this bad is fortunate but unsustainable overachievement. It's no surprise that not just Smith, but Bickell and Frolik as well have been non-entities since Bolland was hurried back from his foot injury.

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