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kakusu-shipping · 8 months

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OMG YOUR DELTARUNE S/I LOOKS SOOOOO COOOL TELL ME ABOUT THEM!!!

Thankyou thankyou!!! They're the Vessel from the beginning of the Survey Program, and follow Kris around as a ghost narrating. Sort of the Chara to their Frisk, but with a lot more backseating

They don't control Kris, per say, like the player in canon Deltarune, but they do have more than just the power of being really annoying and can sway Kris without their input. Obviously, Kris isn't a big fan of being told what to do against their will and tends to fight back as much as they can.

They try not to be too annoying to Kris and stay in their lane as just an observer, but sometimes a choice comes up that they get entirely too excited about (like giving the plush to Berdly in Chapter 2, or giving affection to Ralsei) and end up accidentally forcing Kris to go along with them. They rarely notice when they do this, and Kris is unable to convey their lack of control to them, making their relationship very uneven.

In the Light World no one but Kris can see them, and they can't go very far from Kris on their own, where in the Dark World they can move at will and can even physically interact and be seen by everyone else, though Kris is still the only one who can hear them, so they tend to still stick pretty close to them.

They can also possess Kris to fully influence their choices and speech, though they only did so once and it was on complete accident. Kris described the experience as taking a Back Seat to their own life, fully conscious but unable to do anything. They've sense sworn to Kris to never do this again, it's the one thing Kris trusts them on.

I haven't yet decided if they're something that's always been with Kris, or if they're a new thing that appeared around the start of Chapter 1. That's probably a decision that'll change as we get more chapters and more information on Kris themselves

This Self Insert doesn't have any self ships attached to it, per say. The Vessel is very attached to Berdly and Ralsei but in a much more "Kris you should date these people" way, which makes Kris incredibly uncomfortable so they try to keep to themselves about it.

#Emile's Arts #Thankyou for asking #I didn't want to START the ask off with it AGAIN but I DO have multiple Deltarune S/Is fdkgjdfkg #This one in particular is just because I like Kris' dynamic with the Player and wanted something more physical about it #Basically an 'I am Kris' absolute least favorite person ever' kind of self insert #We'll... probably get better fkdgjdkf #The possession plotline I most certainly only set up to be an angst moment down the line #Break Kris' trust by possessing them again to stop them from something or something like that #I love the red string halo so much #I think the Red String of Fate soulmate story should be used more in horror it's a VERY good visual #you are doomed to be stuck with me #We are physically tied together #It's fun to me #Thankyou very much Devin again for asking!! You're the best!!!#These sketches are ass but it's almost 3am fkgjfdkg #They themselves don't really know where they come from either btw they're just. Here. And are very excitable #Kris refers to them as It and everyone else uses They #They don't really care any pronouns are fine

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sonicunleash · 2 years

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waithold on Kris deltarune

OOOOOO YEAS MY NAMESAKE

Kris (Deltarune)

Sexuality Headcanon: they have major bi swag to me like off the CHARTS like its insane like you know how when its really hot you can see the waves in the air. thats what the raw unfiltered bi swag coming off them looks like

Gender Headcanon: Well there's not really much to headcanon they are they/them nonbinary for real. I don't have any particular image of whether theyre more feminine or masculine or whatever but I imagine they play around a bit with both. but also I don't think they think that hard about how they present at all theyre just at that part in their life where they just wear whatever fits and looks alright enough

A ship I have with said character: krismasusie is soooooo good and so real all of their different dynamics i could say so fucking much about with kris and susie being the outcasts that both parallel and oppose each other but then find catharsis in their similarities and kris and noelle being old friends who used to be so close but have since drifted apart and nonetheless they still know each other so well-- enough for noelle to still notice that when the player is controlling them they are different. honestly I haven't thought as much about krismas as krisusie but well if you ever want to talk to me about them im listening

A BROTP I have with said character: I don't think i have a particular brotp for them yet but god am I curious about their dynamic with asriel. For dynamics we DO already know about i think lancer is a little like a little brother to them.little beast who is so cool and silly and they will make sure he knows he is so cool and then they are searching for him with susie because well they lost him in the dollar store because he found the birthday cards isle and found the ones that play sounds.

A NOTP I have with said character: eehhhh kris/berdly is boring as hell. kris would never ever Ever return feelings for that bird but i will admit berdly's unrequited crush is really funny. key word unrequited i think if berdly asked them out kris would go into the lake

A random headcanon: tbh I haven't thought about them enough recently to have anything on the top of my head but utsup fan kris is so fucking real. I think asriel was a vocaloid fan and passed it on (forced it on) kris through sibling osmosis and now thats all they listen to. the utsup is completely just kris though i think asriel is just a little scared by metal music. also they are so incredibly disabled.

General Opinion over said character: Admittedly I'm not as ill as i could be but i have a feeling this is just gonna be one of those cases where they just gotta marinate a little longer. like i think when the next chapters come out I might start from the beginning just so i can get the whole experience of the characters again and then it'll hit.

#long post #ask game

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ramblings-of-a-mad-cat · 3 years

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I'm not in the hphm fandom anymore but just... What do you think of the roleswap au? The au where everything is the same except MC is the Jacob and Jacob is the MC of hphm. Jacob would definitely be more persistent and determined in finding MC, and he will not tolerate Merula's sh*t for two seconds (if given the opportunity and strength he would dropkick her to the Forbidden Forest). Jacob also doesn't care about romance, so he rejects everyone that asks him out and goes by himself in some romance tlsqs. MC would be viewed as someone who was nice and calm, but secretive and probably hiding evil intentions. They would definitely not rant about the cursed vaults, instead people would be like "MC was nice, albeit a little weird but aren't we all? And then one day they just went up and left...". Jacob was expelled in canon, but I think in this au MC doesn't, instead they disappear near the end of the school year (Jacob was expelled in his third year right? MC would dissapear in third year as well). I don't think Jacob would even befriend half of MC's friends, and if he would they would get in fights and end their friendships as the years goes by. One of the only friends Jacob truly cares about is Rowan. At first Jacob let him stay because he pitied Rowan, but as the story progresses he recognizes that Rowan truly loves and cares for him and that he, Jacob, was an asbolute jack*ss of a friend, so they get closer together. My thoughts end here, let me know yours!

See, this is intriguing but I'm not at all sure that I understand the concept. Because, more than any other characters in the game, MC and Jacob wouldn't really make sense for this given how malleable they are. Jacob and their Sibling are the two characters who most of all have their personalities open to interpretation. Jacob arguably less so, given that he appears onscreen as a regular character outside of MC's control as of these days...but that doesn't stop the fandom. Everyone has their own version of MC...but everyone also has their own version of Jacob. The headcanons surrounding these two are endless and each player has a different story to tell with them. Just as an example, the idea that Jacob doesn't care about romance? My Duncan x Jacob shipping heart is offended, offended I say! Okay nah, I'm kidding, but you can see the point. All that said, looking at the story from the interpretation that you offer, I'm definitely intrigued.

Like if we interpret Jacob as the protagonist of HPHM, in the sense that the character we meet in the Portrait Vault would replace MC in their role, well, that's definitely interesting. Trouble is, aside from the inherent personality traits, which like I said are malleable...a lot of what these characters experience is dependent on their particular roles. Would Merula treat Jacob any differently? Would she still have a crush on him and openly try to pursue him? Or would she have the same dynamic with him that she has with MC? Gotta say though, I love the whole idea of MC appearing calm but having implied evil intentions. I don't know why, it just reminds of the hints and theories about Kris Dreemurr. Either way, Jacob not befriending half of MC's friends is another curious concept. Not sure how it would happen because the story forces most of these friendships on Jacob and I mean, what is he gonna do, rebuff people? A lot of these characters are friendly to MC because MC has always been polite to them and not for much other reason. I dunno, it would be interesting if Jacob didn't have the friends that MC did so he wasn't able to form the Circle when the moment came. Come to think of it, now Jacob and MC are reminding me of Stannis and Renly respectively...

#HPHM Analysis #Hogwarts Mystery AU #HPHM Jacob #HPHM Jacob's Sibling #Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery

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junker-town · 4 years

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The Bucks might have the best bench in the NBA, too

The Bucks are pretty great even without Giannis on the floor.

Why the Bucks can rest Giannis Antetokounmpo so much and still dominate.

The driving force behind the best team in the NBA is Giannis Antetokounmpo, a landslide favorite to win his second straight MVP award who’s dominating at an unprecedented velocity that defies comprehension.

The Milwaukee Bucks have spent at least the past 18 months accumulating pieces specifically designed to support him, within a system that was conceived to channel Antetokounmpo’s relentless aggression in some of the most effective ways basketball has ever seen.

But the ongoing subplot that distinguishes Milwaukee from every other contender takes place when Giannis and fellow All-Star Khris Middleton are not in the game. There’s an ironic duality at play: the Bucks are perceived as top heavy, but they also have the best bench in the league, with a net rating that’s more than double what it was last season.

Mike Budenholzer strategically deploys lineups that don’t feature Antetokounmpo or Middleton early and often; they’re outscoring opponents by 3.4 points per 100 possessions—a margin on par with the Houston Rockets and Denver Nuggets. Somehow, their effective field goal percentage goes up, with an offensive and defensive rating that hovers near the top 10. It’s almost like if Quentin Tarentino cut 45 minutes of Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio’s screen time from Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood and still got 10 Oscar nominations.

What’s happening is far from common, especially during a season defined by excellent dynamic duos that most coaches are forced to stagger. The Los Angeles Lakers are the only other contender holding their head above water when their two best players aren’t on the court, but the difference between the two teams is that L.A. doesn’t go out of its way to sit Anthony Davis and LeBron James at the same time, and has spent half as many non-garbage time possessions without both on the floor. Their success is a small-sample size byproduct of minutes that include games when one of Davis or LeBron did not play at all, with some three-point luck sprinkled on top.

Elsewhere:

—The Los Angeles Clippers are, despite having two Sixth Man of the Year candidates, exactly average when Paul George and Kawhi Leonard aren’t in the game.

—The Houston Rockets are bad when Russell Westbrook and James Harden sit.

—The Utah Jazz are anemic without Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert.

—The Philadelphia 76ers fall apart without Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons.

—The Denver Nuggets can’t score or defend without Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray.

The surprising component here is, being that every role player was installed to revolve around Giannis, one might expect them to float out of orbit when he and Middleton rest. Those two demand double teams and the type of attention garnered by a select few around the league. Instead, the Bucks finesse their way through possessions with the same “protect the basket and don’t foul” defensive identity that then kickstarts an unselfish offensive ecosystem. Opposing teams that are relieved to see Giannis and Middleton on the bench are dead before they knew what hit them.

“Our lineup is so crazy,” Bucks wing Sterling Brown told SB Nation. “I feel like we’ve got the deepest roster in the league.”

Most of the characters are recognizable. Kyle Korver, Robin Lopez, George Hill, and Ersan Ilyasova are well established veterans who know what they’re doing and couldn’t care less about individual accolades. But there’s an additional spunky boost provided by Donte DiVincenzo, Brown, and Pat Connaughton that adds a necessary energy to both sides of the ball. At the very end of the bench sit D.J. Wilson and Dragan Bender, two young, skilled, and versatile bigs who slide into Milwaukee’s scheme when injuries call upon them to do so.

It’s funny: These players were targeted by Milwaukee’s braintrust because they complement Giannis (and, to a lesser degree, Middleton). They all do, but have arguably been even more prolific without him. It’s almost a happy accident. When Giannis is on the bench, Brown, DiVincenzo, Korver, Robin Lopez, and Ilyasova all see their True Shooting percentage spike. Hill’s falls from 69.9 with Giannis to a still-impossibly-awesome 66.5 without him.

(Sidebar: Hill is averaging more points per shot attempt than every other guard who’s played at least 300 minutes this season, and a literal coin flip can determine whether his one pull-up three per game will go in. He’s a fireball who deserves Sixth Man of the Year consideration and may even be Milwaukee’s third-best player in this year’s playoffs. Incredible season so far by him.)

It’s a San Antonio Spurs-ian philosophy that’s built on trust. Budenholzer believes in everyone on his roster, and puts his money where his mouth is by letting them all play together as a standard part of his rotation. According to PBPStats.com, the Bucks are fifth in the percentage of their possessions with zero starters on the floor, despite the fact that they obliterate the other team when all five or even four starters are in the game.

“I thought when we were in Atlanta that was one of Bud’s big strengths,” Brooklyn Nets head coach Kenny Atkinson, who spent three years on Budenholzer’s staff, said. “He had no qualms, whether a guy was resting or guys were out, that those other guys, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, A) they were ready to play, B) he trusted them and gave them opportunities. You see what he does with Giannis and those first guys. If they’re up 15, most coaches will say ‘Man I gotta keep my best players in.’ I think Bud says ‘No, I trust those guys. I trust the whole roster.’”

There are many benefits that spring from not having to keep at least one All-Star on the court at all times. Avoiding overexertion is a big one. Giannis is averaging a team-high 30.6 minutes per game while Middleton is at 28.4.

“Obviously it lets their main guys take care of their bodies more, and thinking about the long term and what’s down the line, so I’m obviously in agreement with that philosophy,” Atkinson said. “It’s not always possible depending on the roster you have, but it’s really an intelligent way to approach utilizing your roster and he does it better than anyone.”

Another perk is how it lets the Bucks bumrush opposing bench units with more talent than they’re meant to handle. Lately, a good example of that occurs near the start of the second quarter, when each team typically mixes an equal balance of starters and reserves. (Eg. Sometimes a star will be on the court with four bench players.)

But Milwaukee has instead rolled out its starting five—with Korver instead of Wes Matthews—and let them feast on second units. It’s unfair, and partially explains why the Bucks are the best second-quarter team in the league.

Not all of the lineups that don’t have Middleton or Giannis are void the other three starters, but most are. And in them, everyone can shoot. All are capable defenders. They work together with constant body and ball movement that coalesces with a splash of clever interplay that never stops leveraging the gravity that was originally acquired to make Giannis’ life easier.

It’s a lean, polychromatic attack that hits from all sides. Plug a hole and water starts gushing even harder from somewhere else on the wall.

“I think within the motion and the different things we do offensively, they’re kind of developing a bit of a deeper understanding, awareness of each other, and little nuances that they either do on their own or, hopefully, we’re helping them a little bit,” Budenholzer said. “They’ve been good.”

Korver, in particular, must be accounted for at all times; as he flutters across the floor, his movement is tracked on every single possession, to the benefit of all four teammates. Watch how Jordan Clarkson takes himself out of this play defending a simple pick-and-roll between Hill and Lopez because he’s mirroring Korver. Then, once Lopez goes into his spin move, Collin Sexton suddenly remembers about Connaughton in the corner. Offense is spacing and spacing is offense.

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They love running Korver off stagger screens, where he’ll start in the corner then race to the top of the arc for a catch-and-shoot dagger.

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Even when it’s not the tightest offensive execution, Korver’s gravity causes defenses to freak out. And help defenders know their own man is a spot-up threat just standing still on the perimeter, so nobody knows when it’s OK to rotate off.

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The first objective in most possessions is to work the ball side to side and force the defense to flatten itself out.

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The most frustrating part about defending this is how the Bucks audible in a split-second to a different variation. It’s a game of cat-and-mouse the defense rarely wins:

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As a whole, they constantly move with a precise volatility that can’t really be game-planned to stop. Here, right before Ilyasova split cuts for a layup, Kemba Walker thinks he needs to switch onto Connaughton, while Rob Williams is (perhaps a bit too) worried about Lopez on the opposite wing.

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Look how confused everyone on the Chicago Bulls is before Connaughton puts back Korver’s miss. It’s as if nobody else was in the gym:

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They. Never. Stop. Moving.

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On defense, Milwaukee’s bench executes the same principles followed by the starters. They protect the paint by dramatically sagging off non-shooters who insist on standing behind the three-point line. How they guard the pick-and-roll is technically matchup dependent, but against a vast majority of tandems they’ll drop the big and fight over the screen. That thought process also applies to dribble hand-offs.

Here’s Zach LaVine curling into one, mistakenly thinking Dragan Bender will be occupied by Cristiano Felicio’s roll. He drives into a crowd instead of kicking it out to Kris Dunn, who’s shooting 27.8 percent from the right wing this season, and is purposefully left all alone.

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The Bucks are still way better when Giannis and/or Middleton are on the floor, but it’s frankly bizarre how often these all-bench units cut deficits and extend leads as consistently as they have. Stuff like this isn’t supposed to happen, and their unexpected success is a humongous boon for a team that ostensibly doesn’t even need it.

Everybody wants to be the Spurs. Once upon a time, Budenholzer’s Hawks were the closest thing, even getting dubbed “Spurs East” back when they rolled through their conference in the middle of the decade. But the way these Bucks look and play and sacrifice and support their best player is the most kindred reproduction seen since Tim Duncan retired. It’s a tried and true formula Budenholzer witnessed first hand.

As undeniably critical as Giannis and Middleton are to the Bucks winning their first championship in 50 years, getting across-the-board buy in from everybody on the roster is what’s turned them into a prohibitive favorite. The best team might not only have the NBA’s best player, but also its best bench. That’s petrifying.

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dsudis · 7 years

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March 26, 1997: The Greatest Hockey Game Ever Played (As Determined by Red Wings Fans)

...Literally, there was a vote. During the 2004-05 lockout, the Detroit Red Wings released a DVD set of five games, and they had fans vote on which games they wanted. This one, played seven years earlier during the regular season for no special stakes (in terms of championship or league standings, anyway) was the runaway #1.

The thing you have to understand about this game, which plays out the violence in hockey on a truly epic scale, is that it is all about an emotional narrative. It is, in fact, all about revenge--and, from the Detroit perspective, all about standing up for your friend against a bully, and with your friends against all of the bully’s friends. It is the final act of the kind of sports movie no one would ever make.

was

awesome.

And there was so much blood. Like. A lot of blood. A Detroit paper ran the headline BLOODY GOOD the next day, over a huge full-color image of a bloodied Colorado player. I will try not to get too gleeful about the violence (which, on March 26, resulted in zero serious injuries) but, uh, this was a formative hockey experience for me, so bear with me.

FIGHT NIGHT AT THE JOE: THE SWEEPING HOCKEY EPIC, under the cut.

So to set the stage: In 1995, the Quebec Nordiques, a team who had played since 1972 in Quebec City, ran into fatal financial problems and wound up being relocated from the heart of Canada--the spiritual home of hockey--to the city of Denver, which had no particular hockey culture or history or, so far as anyone could tell in 1995, any interest in hockey.

Though the players had been in the league as long as anyone, many of them transferring together from Quebec to Colorado, the brand new Colorado Avalanche tended to be viewed as upstarts because the city and the ownership were new to the NHL. Some new additions were also made to the team, including future Hall of Fame goalie Patrick Roy, and Claude Lemieux, who had been on the New Jersey Devils team that swept the Detroit Red Wings, 4 games to none, in the Stanley Cup Finals in 1995.

In the 1995-96 season, the Red Wings dominated the NHL, winning 62 of 82 games (a win record that still stands today). As an Original Six team that had waited 41 years for a championship victory, they were the polar opposite of the brand new Colorado Avalanche--who, playing in the same division as all three California hockey teams and the Oilers at their lowest post-Gretzky ebb, sailed to victory in their division and right on into the playoffs.

The Red Wings met the Avalanche in Round 3 of the playoffs that year, the last round before the Stanley Cup Finals. For all of the above reasons, the Avs were a particularly hated opponent--and the personalities of their coach, Marc Crawford, and figures like Roy and Lemieux on the team, did not shy away from that dynamic.

The Red Wings, meanwhile, were coached by Scotty Bowman and captained by Steve Yzerman. Bowman was famous for mind games--but he didn’t tolerate any player speaking out of turn, and was never bombastic in his own remarks. Yzerman was--kind of Jonathan Toews before there was a Jonathan Toews, the quiet serious captain, except he was ten years into captaining his team by then, still hoping to break the Cup drought for Detroit.

The playoff series between the Avalance and the Red Wings was... scrappy, but within pretty normal bounds, until a brief incident by the boards during Game 6. Claude Lemieux hit Kris Draper from behind at the boards, causing Draper to fall face-first against the dasher at the bottom, breaking his jaw.

You may notice that this happened directly in front of Detroit’s bench--and directly in front of Detroit’s #25. That’s Darren McCarty, who normally played on a line with Draper (the third line, nicknamed the Grind Line--they were far from the best or highest-scoring players on the team). McCarty was a good friend of Draper’s, and it was normally his responsibility to protect the small and speedy Draper on the ice.

This will be important later.

Draper went on TV the next day with his jaw swollen to the size of a softball, one black eye swollen shut, and said he only wanted an apology from Lemieux. The hit itself wasn’t spectacularly vicious; accidents happen. Still, it’s normal to express regret when someone gets badly hurt.

Lemieux not only declined to apologize, he insisted that he had made Draper famous, made him plenty of money, made his career.

And then the Red Wings played Game 7 against the Colorado Avalanche, and the Avs won. The Wings went home empty-handed for the forty-first season in a row.

And then the Avs--then Claude Lemieux--won the Cup.

In the following season, the 1996-97 season, the Red Wings and Avalanche played each other four times. They met in November, in Detroit, and the Avalance won, 4-1. They met in December, in Colorado, the Avalanche won, 4-3. They met on March 16, in Colorado, and the Avalanche won, 4-2.

And then they met in Detroit, at the Joe Louis Arena (named for Detroit’s most famous boxer) on March 26, 1997, and the Red Wings had had enough.

There were two fights in the first ten and a half minutes of the game, but things stayed pretty normal until 18:22 of the first period, which is when all fucking hell broke loose.

Peter Forsberg (Colorado) and Igor Larionov (Detroit) were both European skill players, not normally prone to fighting--but a collision near the boards led to the young Forsberg punching Larionov while he was down, and Larionov, seven years older and several inches shorter, surged up with a couple of punches of his own and tackled Forsberg to the ice. The two linesmen rushed in to break them up, leaving only the referee to keep order among the other ten men on the ice--who happened to include, at that moment, both Claude Lemieux and Darren McCarty.

Kris Draper, just then, was on the bench, watching.

Now, here’s the thing about fighting in the NHL: it is really regarded as a matter of honor, like a duel. When two players want to fight, to settle some score or to rally their team, there is a way that fights start--a little pushing and shoving and chirping, and then two men square up. Fighting is often referred to as “dropping the gloves” in hockey, because that is the most iconic way players communicate that they’re ready to go: drop the bulky protective gloves and hold up bare fists. There is often a moment of circling, and then someone lunges in to grab their opponent’s jersey with one hand and throw a punch with the other.

(They have to grapple in order to fight, due to Newton’s third law: the force of a punch would otherwise propel a player backward out of reach on his skates.)

So. After all of this, Lemieux and McCarty are on the ice together, play has already been stopped by a fight, and McCarty wants to fight Lemieux--who hurt his friend, his linemate, and refused to apologize, who has triumphed twice now over his team--and after a single punch, Lemieux...

Turtles.

As you can see, McCarty has dropped his gloves. But Lemieux still has his on, and is using them to hide his head. In hockey cultural terms, he is refusing to square up and face the fight his actions have earned him. He’s easily as big as McCarty, perfectly capable of defending himself in a fight, but he refuses to engage.

So McCarty reaches down, yanks his helmet off, and starts punching him in the head.

Now, there are still four other guys from each team on the ice watching this, and they all know that the linesmen and ref are not going to intervene--they normally don’t until a fight has run its course or both players are down on the ice, and in this instance they are also painfully obviously outnumbered. You can see in the top photo, other players are converging on McCarty and Lemieux.

Patrick Roy, the Avalanche goalie, was one of the first to arrive--this is a fairly dramatic moment, as the fight is happening at center ice, and Roy was at his goal all the way on the Colorado side, so he skates almost a hundred feet as fast as he can--only to be tackled mid-air by Detroit player Brendan Shanahan, to stop him from interfering with McCarty.

(There are no good stills of that moment, but I’m gonna put the video at the bottom of this post, so you can watch the whole thing and, believe me, it’s beautiful.)

Shanahan and Roy went down to the ice and pretty much immediately Colorado player Adam Foote grabs hold of Shanahan to pull him off Roy--protecting the goalie is a strong principle for defensemen in all situations, after all. Shanahan and Foote wind up detaching to fight, which would have left Roy free to go after McCarty again, except that the Red Wings goalie, Mike Vernon, also skated out to center ice to engage Roy--leading to the fantastic spectacle of a goalie-on-goalie fight at center ice.

Remember how I mentioned that a Detroit paper ran the headline BLOODY GOOD over a bleeding Colorado player the next day? It was a picture of Patrick Roy after this fight, and it was this image or one very much like it:

But the whole Roy-Shanahan-Foote-Vernon altercation and the two proper standup fights it spawned were really only about the Red Wings protecting McCarty as he punched the shit out of Lemieux, the original villain. So how did that turn out?

With all the fighting--and officials--converging on center ice, McCarty wound up dragging Lemieux to one side. Over to the boards directly in front of the Red Wings bench, in fact, where Kris Draper was sitting.

McCarty slammed Lemieux’s face into the boards, repeating the same thing he had watched happen to Draper ten months before, now with Draper watching.

Lemieux’s jaw was not broken, however. He went on to play the rest of the game, as did Roy and the rest of the players involved in the fights.

There were another five fights over the course of the rest of the game; a total of 18 (paired) major penalties for fighting were given out. (McCarty, for his actions in the brawl, took a double minor penalty for roughing, requiring the Red Wings to play one man short for four minutes.) The teams also scored five goals apiece somewhere in there, sending the game into sudden death overtime.

The game-winning goal--in proper conclusion-of-a-sports-movie fashion--was scored by...

Darren McCarty!

With assists from...

Brendan Shanahan and Igor Larionov!

The Red Wings finished the season second in their division, while the Avalanche finished first in the league (as the Red Wings had the year before). And just as they had the year before, the Red Wings and Avalanche met in Round 3 of the playoffs--but this time it was the Red Wings who won, and the Red Wings who went on to win the Stanley Cup.

And the game winning goal of the final game of that series was of course scored by none other than the hero of Fight Night at the Joe: Darren McCarty.

So! Now you are ready to watch all the fights in their proper context, right?!

Here’s the Wikipedia article on what they term the Colorado Avalanche-Detroit Red Wings Brawl

And here’s the video--probably ripped from the DVD set the Red Wings released in 2005, so it’s from the Detroit broadcast and features Detroit-partisan commentary:

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#detroit red wings #march 26 1997 #fight night at the joe #bloody wednesday #fighting #darren mccarty #kris draper #claude lemieux #patrick roy #colorado avalanche #in retrospect i wonder if lemieux had a concussion or a history of concussions #and was trying to avoid getting hit in the head for that reason #and his teammates were likewise trying to protect him #but he still didn't have to be such a dick okay #blood #hockey

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deskcoin64-blog · 5 years

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John Paxson and Gar Forman had yet another disastrous media day following the Otto Porter trade

The Bulls quickly lost any fleeting goodwill they gained in the Otto Porter trade by opening their mouths.

The trade, given the context of the team’s current standing, was defensible. Even if said context allowing for this move to make sense just pointed towards more reasons why they should be fired, in a vacuum (sucking out the life of every Bulls fan) it’s ‘fine’.

But then John Paxson and Gar Forman spoke to the media. And the reporters there did great work in questioning GarPax on their many failures and any changes they will make due to them. The whole thing is linked below, but sorry to spoil the ending: the answer is ‘nah’: they offered no introspection or analysis suggesting anything was even wrong, let alone something that required change in process or management.

Later in the afternoon, Paxson - who would up dominating the presser quickly after giving the first answer to Gar - went on the Bulls radio flagship 670 The Score and was questioned further by hosts Danny Parkins and Dan McNeil.

It’s a lot of GarPax for one sitting, so without further ado...

in no particular order:

John Paxson had a public meltdown over his inability to sign stars

It was building up throughout the Parkins and McNeil interview, where they were asking Paxson about how he and the team are perceived, and why it made them effectively opt out of signing free agents this summer.

Paxson both said that perception doesn’t matter (oh, no...) AND that he doesn’t believe that perception actually exists. But if it did exist, that it was actually ‘misinformation’ that was driving it and that’s our fault not theirs.

Just listen to this, at one point he called media availability “an interrogation”! He made weird comparisons to the Chicago Bears! This is the lead basketball decision-maker for the franchise!

(video above, direct link here)

If Parkins wanted to troll here, he had every right to instruct Paxson to ‘be specific about this misinformation’ since Pax was going with that tactic constantly throughout the interview. When being confronted simply with “well, Anthony Davis?”, Paxson said he basically didn’t believe it was due to the franchise.

Paxson then self-owned by saying they can’t even get in the room, let alone be turned down:

“Until you get an opportunity to get in front of people then how do you know how they feel about you?”

(Yet another weird example of Paxson wanting to be told to his face he sucks)

Paxson further got up in arms when referencing a fan protest (I thought he didn’t pay attention to this stuff?), and when asked about his Christmas day interview where he suggested this would be his last rebuild if it didn’t work , he not only said that wasn’t true but used this as an example of the media running with things that he meant tongue-in-cheek. There was a bit in there about “maybe it’s true” but overall, nope: we don’t even have that glimmer of hope that there will be actual accountability from ownership, Pax was just jokin’ around.

My Coach, My Philosophy - is Jim friggin’ Boylen

Maybe the worst ‘news’ of the day was Paxson’s continued backing of meatslab-with-a-whistle-lanyard Jim Boylen as a non-interim head coach.

When asked what exactly is it Boylen does around here, here was Paxson.

When you’re in it every day with someone, you find out who they are. And one thing we’re really pleased about and we talk to Jim about this because we’re such a young team, is just the teaching component of the game to our guys consistently every day. That first week with the whole Boston game (a 56-point loss) and that was a bad way to start, but when you’re in it with him every day you see his passion, his commitment, and the care he has for his players and our organization. So we feel he’s doing the right things. He’s trying to get our guys to understand what being a professional is, and to play hard every night and practice hard every day. So we’re doing fine with Jim. Jim’s been great in terms of communicating every single day. We’re on a good page there.

A question I have is whether ‘teaching’ really is the most important thing here for the HEAD coach, and if so why they have so little in terms of assistant coaches and veterans on the roster. They mentioned the need this summer to use free agency to add ‘the right veterans’, yet also said that was important last summer and they didn’t but that wasn’t a mistake (they did concede it was ‘a challenge’).

Later on the radio interview he was followed up with in particular about ‘that whole Boston game’, and bristled (!) at the terminology that it was a ‘near mutiny’. And no he didn’t say “there was no ‘near’, it was a mutiny” he instead diminished it as “just a little miscommunication”.

It got heated further when asked about the players contacting the union, as Paxson was yelling FAKE NEWS (not literally, but still ugh) because “we were told by the league they were never contacted by the union”. That’s not the same thing as the players contacting the union!

In the press conference Paxson answered this when it came to Zach LaVine calling out Boylen.

“I’m not going to get into day-to-day personal things,” Paxson said. “I know Zach is an incredibly talented player. Jim is an incredibly competitive coach and person. We need Zach. He’s got a unique ability to score. Coach-player relationship can be difficult on any level. I played for the greatest coach of all time, and sometimes relationships with players for him were not always smooth. That’s not to say there’s anything going on with Zach and Jim.

So yet again: this doesn’t matter, and actually it isn’t even real.

And it’s one thing to ask for Paxson to trash his hand-picked coach, but how about simply saying that things haven’t gone well, and you’re evaluating? He had no problem saying that when it came to Kris Dunn. But Boylen is apparently way safer, and Paxson confirmed the plan as it stands now is for Boylen to be coaching the Bulls next season. Luckily for us Paxson is a liar and changes his plans all the time?

Paxson defended the coaching instability and his “number of rebuilds” in general in the radio hit, not realizing that in the cases he cited - like other Central Division teams having higher coaching turnover(?)- nearly all other franchises typically have more than zero regime changes over 16 years when not competing for championships.

Essentially, all Paxson has when he’s defending Boylen is saying that Boylen’s doing stuff that we can’t see. Because even he admits that it’s not carrying over to games and the actual results fans have to analyze are all poor.

He made a point to go with this statement:

We can’t control perception. I’ll say this again: The only people who really know are those of us in the building

The Jabari Parker signing wasn’t a mistake, it actually turned out well

This was expected, where Gar Forman said that signing Jabari Parker actually ‘worked out well for us’ because they could use the expiring contract to get Porter.

Obviously horseshit rationalizing, but even worse was their quick dismissal of the signing being a mistake. It was short term, a “roll of the dice”, and sometimes it doesn’t work out.

They were rightly questioned (by Joe Cowley) as to their scouting process when it came to determining Parker’s fit on the roster, and GarPax both took this totally normally.... Kidding, they viewed it as a personal attack on their old-ass (sorry, ‘veteran’) scouting team and owned it as Gar and Pax’s decision, ‘their scouting process’ is fine. What?

They still have no idea how to value 2nd round picks

I mean, this hypocrisy is as clear as day:

Then later they were questioned (this time by Darnell Mayberry) about why they were the ones sending a 2nd round pick in this Porter trade even though they were helping the Wizards out of the luxury tax (and removing a ton of future money too).

Of course Paxson led with “it’s very easy to sit there and criticize” and Gar Forman literally asked for examples of teams getting picks for taking on money - whoa boy- and then talked out both sides of his mouth saying that the Wizards needed to shed money but they also had to send them a pick to help them shed money elsewhere. And then whatever this means:

“We do things that if we feel we have to make a deal or want to make a deal and that’s what it takes, we’re going to do it. And that’s what we did yesterday.”

Paxson has a new job circumstance to whine about: the buyout market

Yes, the executive who can’t tell you fast enough how difficult (and difficult to understand) everything is, now took a shot at the NBA’s buyout market:

“I know there’s a lot of talk and rumor around the league about buyouts,” Paxson said. ”We have not spoken about that. Internally as an organization, the discussions we have had center around the whole buyout process in general, and in a lot of ways, it hurts the trade market when there’s all this belief that guys are going to be bought out. I certainly think it hurt us in this case. So we are not committed to anything right now.

When pressed by KC Johnson about Robin Lopez in particular being a ‘good soldier’ while the ultra-competitor was instructing his team to lose games, Paxson said ‘players should honor their contracts’.

Gar Forman - dynamic informed executive

I can’t believe this guy can’t help convince NBA stars to play for his team:

But ok maybe he’s more of a details man....

Ok but maybe he at least empathizes with his customers in a reasonable way

oh.

Being so insular fuels their own wrong ‘perception’

This is really important - the Bulls can’t self-scout or realize where they stand in the league. They cited themselves as being ‘in the beginning of their rebuild’ and not being ready yet - but didn’t they go into this season thinking they would be?

They did mention “the optimism” they had before the injuries early in the year. But the outside said they weren’t actually going to be good - remember the Vegas line?

So what happened according to Paxson?

“This year it’s been more painful than we thought, given when we started healthy and excited on Day 1.”

“Those things have changed over time. And when our guys have been together, candidly, we probably haven’t played at the level you would hope. But with that said, over the last two to three weeks, we’re seeing some signs. We’re not winning games, but we’re seeing signs of offensive improvement, which is good.”

So instead of trying to reflect in maybe thinking their internal analysis was wrong, there was somehow nothing wrong with their process yet they didn’t fail in execution to making this a competitive team that great players would want to be on.

Yet the friggin’ Knicks could do this.

New York will be in the game this summer, I’m sure. We are not at that stage. Is it a black eye? No. I don’t consider it. That’s our aspiration.

Aspire to be the Knicks!

Finally, Paxson had a very telling line in the radio interview, where he simply stated something very clear about his operating philosophy:

“I try very hard not to look back”

That pretty much says it all. There won’t be a change because nothing is wrong, and nothing is wrong because they don’t know it’s wrong. Everyone else is misinformed, only John Paxson and Gar Forman know the truth.

Source: https://www.blogabull.com/2019/2/8/18216605/john-paxson-and-gar-forman-had-yet-another-disastrous-media-day-following-the-otto-porter-trade

#read more #see more #check it out #interesting #learn more

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thrashermaxey · 6 years

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Ramblings: 2018-19 Breakout Candidates (Mar 22)

Around this time last year, I looked at some breakout candidates for the 2017-18 season. Specifically, I looked for players who failed to reach 55 points who stood a good chance of clearing 65 the following year. This is something we’ll do again, but first let’s look at how last year’s breakout candidates have faired:

2016-17

2017-18

Injured Superstar

Points

Kris Letang

Taylor Hall

Jonathan Huberdeau

Aleksander Barkov

Alex Galchenyuk

Tyler Toffoli

The Renaissance

Points

Anze Kopitar

Patrice Bergeron

The Classic

Points

Conor Sheary

Jake Guentzel

Andre Burakovsky

Matthew Tkachuk

Max Domi

Anthony Mantha

Jonathan Drouin

Sam Reinhart

Bo Horvat

Mikko Rantanen

Sebastian Aho

Robby Fabbri

Dylan Larkin

Christian Dvorak

Nick Schmaltz

Brayden Point

Post-Hype Sleeper

Points

Brandon Saad

Nathan MacKinnon

Elias Lindholm

Gustav Nyquist

Chris Kreider

Jakob Silfverberg

Throw enough shit at the wall and something’s bound to stick, am I right? Still, this is a pretty good success rate for a list made in March of last year, well before the draft, free agency, coaching moves and training camp have provided added information. In particular, the injured superstar and renaissance sections provided a bounty of good options. If you bagged Kopitar, Barkov, Hall and Huberdeau there’s a good chance you’re dominating your league.

On Tuesday I looked at a bunch of guys who fit the injured superstar or renaissance tropes, although I wouldn’t necessarily bet on a good chunk of those getting to the 65-point plateau. You could also add Auston Matthews, Jeff Carter, Alexander Wennberg, Kyle Palmieri, and Mika Zibanejad to the injured list.

With those two lists sections well pegged, let’s run down our other two tropes:

The Classic Breakout

This is the archetype with the most potential because players typically peak early. Everyone should be looking for players in years 3-5 around ages 20-23 who might pop up in a bigger role next season. One of the best indicators of future success is 5-on-5 scoring rate. Several names jump out with over 2.0 P/60 at 5-on-5 as youngsters including:

Points

P/60

Nico Hischier

2.56

Jake DeBrusk

2.38

Vinnie Hinostroza

2.34

Ondrej Kase

2.3

Travis Konecny

2.26

Kyle Connor

2.19

Danton Heinen

2.13

Adrian Kempe

2.1

Ryan Hartman

2.07

Kevin Fiala

2.04

Tyler Bertuzzi

2.03

Alex DeBrincat

2.02

Sonny Milano

Off that list I’d rank them:

Hischier

Fiala

Konecny

Connor

DeBrincat

Everyone else on that list probably needs more time for a bigger role to emerge. These five have grabbed large roles and could explode with even more usage.

Hischier has been helped by Taylor Hall’s MVP run, and may not be quite as fortunate if Hall takes a step backwards. On the other hand, Hall has also been helped by Hischier. This is a duo that should stick for the foreseeable future. Get Hischier some top power play unit time and he’ll bust out.

There probably aren’t any more minutes for Fiala to grab on a loaded Preds roster. He’s just so damned good that he can’t be left off.

Konecny took off after getting promoted to the Flyers’ top line. Can he carry that over in a full season there? What if Giroux regresses again? Still without top PP time there’s another level for Konecny to hit, although the path to more PP time is blocked.

Connor is entrenched on Winnipeg’s top line and top PP unit. There’s so much young talent in Winnipeg that he could conceivably be phased out. On the other hand, he should improve with each passing year.

DeBrincat probably has the clearest path to a breakout. What he accomplished without much PP or Patrick Kane exposure is truly remarkable. It seems inevitable that DeBrincat will fill the void left by Artemi Panarin as a dynamic goal-scoring righty across from Kane.

Other players who didn’t hit the 2.00 P/60 mark who I like nonetheless:

Points

P/60

Pavel Buchnevich

1.99

Andreas Athanasiou

1.99

Nick Schmaltz

1.98

Oliver Bjorkstrand

1.79

Timo Meier

1.7

Jesse Puljujarvi

1.47

Nolan Patrick

1.4

Pierre-Luc Dubois

1.31

This time last year I wasn’t big on Schmaltz. I am now. He’s already locked in as Kane’s centerman. Give him another year of growth and let’s see what he can do.

I don’t like that the Rangers are removing talent, but there are some indications that they aren’t intent on being bad for long. They could make splashes in free agency this summer that vault them back into contention. You could also argue that the less available options for Alain Vigneault to block Buchnevich with the better. Buchnevich seems destined for stardom. He’s as good a bet as there is for a breakout. It’s a matter of when, not if.

The rest of these guys might be a couple of years away but have flashed intriguing upside.

The Post-Hype Sleeper

Points

P/60

Ryan Spooner

2.85

Nick Bjugstad

2.51

Charlie Coyle

1.94

Anthony Mantha

1.81

Matthew Tkachuk

1.73

Bo Horvat

1.83

Sam Reinhart

1.36

With how much information there is out there these days, basically anyone who appeared on last year’s breakout list but failed to breakout becomes a post-hype sleeper. Is there a MacKinnon on this list? Unlikely, but I really like what Tkachuk and Horvat have to offer.

Tkachuk appeared on the verge of busting out this year until injuries caught up to him. It’s also worth noting how much the shooting percentages worked against the 3M line this season. With better 5-on-5 results Tkachuk could have been near a point-per-game pace. He proved himself the best net-front option on the Flames, which opens up big potential alongside Johnny Gaudreau.

Horvat and Brock Boeser lit the world on fire for a few weeks early on before injuries derailed both of them. Let’s see what they can do in 82 games alongside one another. I’d bet on both eclipsing 65 points.

Who do you think might go from sub-55 to plus-65 next season?

Watch out for a suspension to Brayden Schenn after this hit to the head on David Krejci:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Schenn's hit on Krejci. Schenn was given two minutes for charging. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/stlblues?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#stlblues</a> <a href="https://t.co/s5CaCZuEDl">pic.twitter.com/s5CaCZuEDl</a></p>— Cristiano Simonetta (@CMS_74_) <a href="https://twitter.com/CMS_74_/status/976641051829198848?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 22, 2018</a></blockquote>

Amazingly, Krejci finished the game, but you never know with head injuries. The Bruins can’t afford to have any more players get banged up.

Ryan Donato scored again. That’s four points in two games for the rookie. Hot start and in top-six minutes. He could prove very useful these next few weeks.

Sidney Crosby, ladies and gentlemen:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Sidney Crosby's hand-eye coordination remains undefeated <a href="https://t.co/hfL90DVgsj">pic.twitter.com/hfL90DVgsj</a></p>— Dimitri Filipovic (@DimFilipovic) <a href="https://twitter.com/DimFilipovic/status/976621428953948160?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 22, 2018</a></blockquote>

Dylan Strome was recalled yesterday and not one of the fake recalls he has experienced in the past month. He got into the lineup for 12:18, including secondary PP time, and scored his second career goal. It’s been awfully slow getting his NHL career going but he has destroyed the AHL.

I’m more interested in the top line options for Arizona, however. Derek Stepan has 10 points in the last 10 games. Clayton Keller has 19 points in the last 20 games! Brendan Perlini has been in the mix with those two but hasn’t been productive. Richard Panik has been up on that line and has points in three straight.

Due to concerns over concussions Mark Borowiecki is going to start turning down fights. Smart choice. The league has swung away from the use of enforcers and fighting in general, but there are still a few reliable scrappers. Scratch Borowiecki off that list. For those in multi-category leagues, this will hurt Borowiecki’s value. Although he is still liable to take a bunch of minor penalties, as well as piling up massive hit totals.

While we’re on concussions, there are some interesting results from a study on the careers of players after suffering concussions:

Navarro said players who had publicly reported concussions were compared to players who didn’t. The players with concussions had a 14.6 per cent chance of playing in the NHL five years after the injury. Players who didn’t have reported concussions had a 43.7 per cent chance of being in the NHL five years later.

That’s alarming but doesn’t necessarily mean that having a concussion leaves a player marked for failure. Fantasy relevant players are going to earn more chances to rediscover their play by virtue of having previously put up large point totals. It also helps that those point totals tend to lead to long-term contracts that buy financial security and a guaranteed roster spot. However, even in the case of players on long-term deals there is the fear of long-term injury reserve as has befallen players like Marc Savard.

If you haven’t yet, please check out Cam Robinson’s latest Top 100 Draft Prospects rankings.

Thanks for reading. You can follow me on Twitter @SteveLaidlaw.

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-2018-19-breakout-candidates-mar-22/

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