There was an awesome interview yesterday with Brian Burke, general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs, about whether the NHL is ready for an openly gay player. Burke’s son, Brendan, was gay and died two years ago in a car accident. Brian Burke has become a strong public advocate for gays in sports. Here is [...]
Posts Tagged ‘NHL’
Rangers drop Sean Avery, assign him to minor league club
The NHL career of Sean Avery is in limbo after he was cut by the New York Rangers and assigned to the Connecticut Whale of the American Hockey League. His agent said Avery was considering playing in Europe if he did not join the Whale. We’ve been big fans of Avery for all the stands [...]
Moment #62: CBC airs “The Last Closet”
Part of Outsports’ series on our 100 most important moments in gay sports history. Media, 1993: “The Last Closet,” the CBC Radio’s hourlong special on gays in sports was groundbreaking, exploring a subject that was little talked about in the media. They took the title from something I said in the interview about sports being [...]
Blackhawks win first Stanley Cup since ’61
Patrick Kane scored on a bizarre goal four minutes into overtime to give the Chicago Blackhawks a 4-3 win over the Philadelphia Flyers and the team’s first Stanley Cup title since 1961. The Blackhawks won the thrilling series, 4-2, in which there were two overtime games. Kane’s goal was strange because he seemed to be [...]
Hockey playoff beards — Ugh!
The NHL playoffs are in the conference semifinals, and along with them comes the worst hockey tradition — the playoff beard. I mean real beards, not some woman used for cover. It’s a tradition to start growing a beard at the start of the playoffs and not shave until the season is over. Normally hot-looking [...]
Canucks can have as much sex as they want
Vancouver Canucks coach Alain Vigneault, whose team plays the Los Angeles Kings in the NHL playoffs, has no problem with his players having as much pre-game sex as they wish. While the coach said the team can control the diet, workout and even sleep regimen of the players, sex was something out of his control. [...]
Mikey and Jimmy’s NHL preview
Editor’s note: Mikey writes the awesome blog HockeyKidMn and lives in Minnesota. Jimmy did an amazing job blogging during the Olympics from the Frozen North. Both also play hockey, and they have teamed up to write an NHL preview. It’s a great complement to Joe’s NHL guide, which is not written like he’s texting. All [...]
NHL jerseys big sellers in tropical Liberia
Liberia is a West African country that has a tropical climate, no electricity grid and where half of the people live on less than $1 a day. It also a place where the concept of ice hockey is totally foreign. Which is why it’s strange that among the most coveted items are NHL jerseys. Bonnie [...]
NHL players say they have gay teammates
Outsports reader Kevin tipped us off to this interesting nugget in a poll of 50 NHL players for ESPN the Magazine. Via the Puck Daddy website: “Do you think you have any gay teammates?” Forty-two percent said yes, they believe there’s a gay player in their locker room. Share on Facebook
NHL Winter Classic: let’s play two?
The NHL Winter Classic, thanks to successful outdoor games at Buffalo’s Ralph Wilson Stadium in 2008 and Chicago’s Wrigley Field this year, is quickly becoming a New Year’s Day tradition. Now the National Hockey League may be expanding it. Multiple sources are reporting that the league plans to turn the next Winter Classic into a [...]
More proof hockey players are manly men
In the aftermath of the Pittsburgh Penguins’ seventh-game Stanley Cup victory at Detroit, Red Wings star Nicklas Lidstrom revealed the reason he missed the final two games of the Western Conference semifinal series against Chicago: he had surgery after being speared in the testicles by Chicago’s Patrick Sharp in Game 3 of that series. Lidstrom [...]
Wanna see a champion? Visit Pennsylvania
A couple of months ago my friend Kurt and I were walking around downtown Philadelphia after lunch. We passed a steakhouse that opened recently and has become a favorite spot for celebrities. We saw a guy with a beard and some bruising on his face outside the restaurant and we both had the same thought: [...]
Good ratings news for NHL, NBC
Granted, the May sweeps ended and the summer television doldrums are upon us, so many network programs are in reruns. Plus, Saturday night has become a true dead zone for network television. Taking all of that into consideration, though, NBC and the NHL have to be happy with the ratings for the first two games [...]
Stanley Cup Finals Preview
The more things change, the more they stay the same. For the second consecutive year the NHL season wraps up with a Detroit Red Wings-Pittsburgh Penguins final. Let the battle between Motown and the Steel City commence! Last year the Red Wings won in 6 games. Despite the addition of Marian Hossa near the end [...]
The Rematch….Wings vs Pens
This is what I’m talking about. The Detroit Red Wings against the Pittsburgh Penguins for the Stanley Cup Finals. It doesn’t get better than this. The Penguins Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin are on fire with 28 points a piece in the playoffs so far. But don’t ever count out the Red Wings, even if [...]