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WEDNESDAYS #9 vs. GERIATRICS:

(vol. 9W, no. 9; newsletter by h.s.)
For our scrimmage against the Gerrys, I made the bold move — of which I take full responsibility — of implementing “Bizarro Strategy.” For those of you unfamiliar with these stratagem, it is when the forwards play defense, the defense plays on offense and Brian Newcomb plays with himself. The idea of “Bizarro Strategy” is to shake the lines up a bit and break the routine of playing the same position week after week. I'd say this idea “sounds good on paper,” except as I'm writing this it sounds like a thoroughly stupid idea, one that will inevitably lead to a disastrous result (ain't hindsight great?!).

So, we entered our scrimmage with a full 11-man roster at which point Brian Newcomb “volunteered” to play with the enemy, er, Gerrys. Brian, for the remainder of this newsletter, will be referred to as “Traitorous Piece Of Crap” or “TPOC” for short. So TPOC suited-up in his Geriatrics jersey that he just happened to have in his bag and Team Bizarro was ready to take to the ice. Of course, Dave, Glenn Farkas and BB didn't fully grasp the Bizarro concept so they were at their usual places (no one is quite sure where that is), but suffice to say things looked pretty different out there. While I was admiring my handiwork of re-crafting the lineup, I got a stick to the crotch, followed by a puck to the crotch. Then things got bad. The Gerrys got on the board with a 5-on-0 play in front for the 1-0 lead, which they took in the first break.

For the 2nd period I was all set to scrap the noble Bizarro gameplan, but by this point TPOC had briefed the Gerrys on our weakness — namely goaltending — and had obviously tipped them off on how to score on me — namely by shooting the puck at me. We dug ourselves into a two-goal hole, but then on scrum in the crease we came out with a penalty shot opportunity by Chris “Dr. Pepper” Goione. Chris didn't waste any time on beating DePipp and we were back in the game, baby! That is, until I gave up two more goals. Fortunately, by this time Russ felt badly for me and put in a pair to make it a 4-3 game (assists to Dave and Chris) and, after a six-goal 2nd period, we went into the final break again trailing by only one.

In the 3rd period, TPOC (who was skating like the wind after shedding the burden of his Wednesday night Pirate jersey) actually scored. The only thing I would say in our defense was that no one was really covering TPOC because he never gets those shots on net. Who'd of thunk it. Glen Chambers pretty much threw away his chances at the Lady Byng in the 3rd, when he took his eighth penalty of the evening, but we still somehow closed the gap on a late deflection (goal credited to Allen, assist to Roger). Trailing again by only one goal with 1:00-minute remaining, we pulled the goalie (and things were looking up!), but an emptynetter by the Gerrys ended the night's scoring.

Without a doubt though, the high point of the evening was getting yelled at by the owner of GoodSports who was cruising around the parking lot after the game in his $90,000 SUV. Actually he only told us to keep it down and maybe sit at the tables out front, but that didn't stop a still-wired TPOC from saying “Oh yeah, you want a piece of me? You think you can take me?!” Needless to say, we all kicked the crap out of TPOC.