My photo of Willie Mitchell on Flickr

I was contacted a couple of weeks ago by a representative of the David Suzuki Foundation about using a photo that I had taken in one of their promotional videos. As it turns out, Devon from the DSF was actually a former intern at the radio stations where I currently work, so it was nice to make a connection with someone who has progressed in their career and on to a great opportunity to work for an organization that I have a lot of respect for.

The photo itself was from the 2008 Canucks Superskills competition at GM Place. I shot it with my Canon S5 IS, and it’s one of my more favorite shots of Willie as he was just skating around in circles during a brief moment of downtime. Anyone who goes to see enough Canucks games knows that he’s a constant mover on the ice when nothing else seems to be going on.

The video was put together to spotlight an ongoing effort on the B.C. coast by the Coastal Alliance for Aquaculture Reform (CAAR) to help preserve the fresh salmon from the effects of sea lice that comes from the salmon farms in the same areas.

You can see more Cause An Effect videos on the DSF website. Many thanks for to their organization for asking me to use the photo in their video.

While being held up on the couch yesterday afternoon with some sinuses getting the best of me, I got a quick message on Flickr requesting my permission to use one of my photos on Wikipedia. When I discovered that it was for Vancouver Canucks legend Kirk McLean, I was glad to fire back a quick response and say hell yeah!

The shot itself came from what has become an annual tradition for Rebecca and I, the Vancouver Sun Raise-a-Reader day.

Here’s the original shot of McLean as Rebecca is handing him her copy of that day’s Vancouver Sun to autograph, adding to our collection of papers from previous years.

This is actually the second photo I’ve been asked my permission to use on Wikipedia. While it’s not being used as the primary photo for the entry, this photo is also being used on the entry for the current mayor of Surrey, B.C., Diane Watts.

I have never been close enough to the Stanley Cup to really even see it prior to today. The one day I go to work without my camera, it decides to roll through the front door at work and pay the place a visit. In a mad scramble, I was able to snag a pic with it via cellphone, not to mention the opportunity to touch it as well as take a good look at it.

The one thing that struck me was how scratched it is. That’s not surprising, and I think it’s a lot like seeing people on TV and them not looking the same as they are in real life. It’s been through a lot, not to mention that its century old lifespan lends to have a little bit of wear and tear to it.

The cup was in town tonight for the Vancouver Giants home game where they honored legends of the NHL. The Giants even dawned the jerseys of the last team to win the Stanley Cup in this city, the Vancouver Millionaires[wiki] in 1915.

Back then, all you had to do was be a proven team and issue a challenge to the reigning holders of the title. A far cry from the 82 game regular season and playoffs consisting of four rounds, best of seven series. This point was only driven further into my head when I got home tonight to turn on “Hockey: A People’s History“[wiki] on television. A must see for any hockey fan.

Alas, one day, Vancouver’s name shall appear on this cup once more as champions.

Photo credit: Rebecca Bollwitt on Flickr

I’ve also spotted the posters on the sides of buses, and there is a good chance that you will see the rest of The Crazy Canucks crew on them, if not on posters at SkyTrain stations as well. This one is located in Granville Station. Bring on the graffiti.

Things really got busy on us this past week, but I can finally stop blaming work getting in the way and start pointing the finger at hockey. More importantly, we’ve been doing some neat stuff with The Crazy Canucks podcast in anticipation of the coming season.

First and foremost, the new design for TCC has been launched. This is the first step in bringing some new elements of social media to the podcast, and it is an official design by sixty4media.

If you’re on Twitter, then be sure to add @thecrazycanucks to your twitter stream and get all the latest updates as they are published on TCC.com, plus anything else we decide to through into the stream. Also, if you’re drinking the Facebook kool-aid, join the The Crazy Canucks Facebook group and stay in touch with our army of supporters on there.

And there’s more!

Photo credit: miss604 on Flickr

The Canucks (yes, the organization) brought your favorite podcast crew in for a photo shoot at GM Place to get our faces and Canucks gear for some promotional stuff that will launch later this month. We can’t be sure how, where, or to what capacity these photos and video footage will be used, but it was exciting to come in and be apart of something like this, simply because we’re all fans.

Photo credit: miss604 on Flickr

Special shout out to Richard Loat, who also was invited to this promotional gathering. He’s the man (in the middle of this picture above) who created the Vancouver Canucks Fan Facebook Application. Nearly 150,000 people are using that application on their Facebook profile. Not bad for a kid barely over the age of 19.

Photo credit: miss604 on Flickr

So as we hang on to the last days of summer in Vancouver, there is some satisfaction that hockey is coming. It dulls the pain of cooler days, less sunlight, and rain, but I’m certainly beginning to get excited.

Alanah and Rebecca have their posts up about this day as well, and you should stay tuned for more stuff from The Crazy Canucks. It should be a good season.

Pure brilliance. However, how does one teach a cat to eat spaghetti, yet alone talk Canucks through song? That’s talent.

As cool as the weather has been in the lower mainland in the past week or so, it makes me think about one thing: the coming 2008-2009 hockey season for the Vancouver Canucks.

To help get you and me both prepared for this, I figured I’d go back on some key points from the end of last season while looking ahead to this next one. Of course, these are the things that stick out the most to me, so feel free to add your comments. And if you are a Vancouver Canucks fan, you’re probably doing the same thing as me when someone asks you your opinion on what to expect come this fall. You’re probably shrugging your shoulders and saying, I’m not really sure.

The passing of Luc Bourdon

For me, this is really how last year ended. I was going through my day when news started trickling around work about this rumor. As the details came in, the air seemed to get sucked out of the building for me that morning.

If you know anything about my day job, the world of radio that I live in brings me very close to these players, and I’ve had my share of elbow rubbing with Luc Bourdon. I’m just some tech guy, so there wasn’t that much of a relationship to even speak of. That doesn’t change the elation I felt when I was there on the night the team was determined to get him his first NHL goal. I also witnessed his second one, a shot so hard that it got stuck in the back of the net. All I could think about is how much better this kid would get over the next few seasons.

To take a cue from Sean at Waiting for Stanley, this young boy would finally be able to stop throwing up in the back of his mouth and get his nerves in check to become a recognizable force from the point.

It won’t be that way, and I will certainly miss the opportunity to watch him grow into a great NHL player, yet alone becoming a man. Luc was on the cusp of a potentially great career. A young guy whose life was far too short and will be honored at the home opener on October 9th.

Luc Bourdon and his first goal in the NHL – Photo credit: Canucks.com

The GM: Out with Dave Nonis, in with Mike Gillis

Enter the next, strange focal point at the end of last season. I had often wondered about Dave Nonis[wiki] taking the fall for a string of questionable trades and signings ahead of last season (Marc Chouinard[wiki] being one guy that sticks out the most in my mind). He wasn’t the worst GM, but there have been others who have done better, especially living the shadow of Brian Burke[wiki]. It was with that, in my opinion, that he became the fall man for poor performance of the team and was given the pink slip.

Things got interesting after that. The Aquilini’s had their first, big decision to make as recent owners of the team, and many of us fans hoped that their heart would bring us something that would bring as much faith to the team to truly match the amount of sold out games at GM Place.

Enter Mike Gillis[wiki], player agent turned general manager.

It still makes me pause for a second when I ponder that selection, even this many months after it happened. It was my co-worker, the diehard Oilers fan, who told me the news, and I recall saying, “Who the hell is that?”

I don’t follow as much of the business of the NHL as others, but I was quick to learn that this was the same player agent that represented the captain of the Vancouver Canucks, at the time (and we’ll dive into this later), Markus Naslund[wiki]. He’s a former NHL player now representing NHL players to various organizations. At the press conference for his official hiring as GM, I was a little more impressed with his ambitions with the organization, but the fans haven’t seen a ton to really throw their weight behind the guy. We’ll have to come back to his performance around mid-season before we really know what this guy is going to do for us.

Trevor Linden retires

Photo credit:
Rebecca Bollwitt on Flickr

Another night that I was very fortunate to be in attendance was the final game of the season for the Canucks where Trevor Linden received numerous ovations and a huge outpouring of love for a man who has captured a city’s heart like I have never seen before.

I know that’s a cliche, but the guy is just a hockey player. Of course I know that he’s more than that, but when you break down the nuts and bolts, that’s all he was. He also donated his time to charity, but he has achieved a level of greatness that only a few other people have done in an entire lifetime. I’d bank that he’s only halfway through his own.

Once again, with the day job, I was there when he made his announcement, and it was tough to hold back the emotions. I haven’t had nearly the amount of experience to appreciate what I was witnessing, but I did have the chance to shake the man’s hand and tell him congrats on a wonderful career. That’s a moment I’ll long remember.

Update – Sep. 4, 2008: The Canucks announced today that Trevor Linden will be honored at the Dec. 17 game against Edmonton, and his number will be retired to the rafters.

So long to the West Coast Express

It’s true that the West Coast Express ended when Todd Bertuzzi was sent in a blockbuster trade to Florida for our man in the net, Roberto Luongo (so you can’t say that Nonis never made a good trade). However, when you see Brendan Morrison head off to the Anaheim Ducks and Markus Naslund making the jump to the New York Rangers, the chances of a reunion are officially done. That era is over.

When this all went down, I had to wonder if this is the worst thing to happen. The writing was on the wall, and you really can’t stop a free agent from doing what they want with their career. It’s their choice to decide what will happen with their time in the NHL when the contract is up, so these two guys decided to do something that is in their best interest. I support that but hope that their respective teams fail when it comes to any direct competition with the Canucks.

On top of that, I hope that fans who have been calling for their heads are finally happy to exist with a team minus Naslund and Morrison. Your wish has finally come true, even though Bertuzzi[wiki] is back in our conference with Calgary. That almost seems like karma, but that remains to be seen.

Gone baby gone

So who else has left the confines of GM Place?

Going through a quick list, we already know that we’ve lost Luc Bourdon, and I have already mentioned that Trevor Linden, Markus Naslund, and Brendan Morrison have departed in their own ways. Ryan Shannon was re-signed and then recently traded away to Ottawa, Byron Ritchie is off to the Swiss League, third string goalie Drew MacIntyre took the free agent train to Nashville, and the same can be said about Mike Weaver, now with St. Louis. I might have missed some others, but those are the notables to me.

That might not seem like a lot in terms of hard numbers, but the face of the team has changed dramatically.

Update – Sep. 4, 2008: Brad Isbister has also left us for Ottawa.

The next C

On the heels of mentioning the departure of Markus Naslund, that means Vancouver has an opening for the captain of the Canucks. The next two candidates for the C, Morrison and Linden, are both gone so before we get into new faces of the team, who would be the most likely person on the current roster to be the next captain?

For me, my money is on Willie Mitchell. It’s not a choice based on stats or brilliance as much as it comes down to a guy who plays his butt off. He is willing to block the shot, throw down the gloves, and argue it out with the referee on a bad call. He’s seasoned and understands what the game takes. It also doesn’t hurt that he’s a B.C. native, something fans can get behind as well.

Other candidates could be Matius Ohlund, Sami Salo, or Ryan Kesler, but I’m not sure how any of those fellows fit the role as well as I think they should. Kesler is certainly a young player with a ton of potential, and I could be comfortable with him as the captain. However, Salo and Ohlund are players who don’t give me the heart and grit that I see Vancouver as in need of.

Even though my mind is pretty set on Mitchell, I can’t help but think back to the early days of Ryan Kesler when he went head to head with the captain of the Calgary Flames, Jerome Iginla. Kesler was quoted as saying that he didn’t know if the Flames’ captain fought, but he found out pretty quick when Iginla dropped his gloves within mere seconds of Kesler dropping his own. It’s pretty gutsy for a young guy to do against a veteran like that, but it makes me feel like I could survive if #17 wore the C over #3.

The Mats Sundin epic saga story of a comic strip graphic novella

When it comes down to it, I don’t care where Mats Sundin[wiki] plays. I just want this story to be over. Give us a decision and move on. All I ask is that if he signs with Vancouver, do not make him the captain.

New faces, familiar names

So what else has Gillis nabbed us to help fill in the gaps? Well, it’s not all such doom and gloom, but there are a lot of new faces coming into Vancouver.

Pavol Dimetra, Steve Bernier, Darcy Hordichuk, Kyle Wellwood, Ryan Johnson, Jason Krog, Rob Davison, Mark Cullen, and the recent addition of Lawrence Nycholat from Ottawa. Nolan Baumgartner is making his return to Vancouver as a free agent, and Curtis Sanford, Zach Fitzgerald, Mike Brown, Rick Rypien, and Nathan McIver have all be re-signed. I only mention those re-signings because of the likely-hood of seeing these guys a little more this year.

That’s a lot of new faces, but all we are asking for, as fans, is a little more scoring. That will make us and Luongo mighty happy.

Shrugging my shoulders

So what are we to expect this season? I have no idea. Even the intrepid DaveO has said that he doesn’t know what’s wrong with him. The excitement for the kickoff this October just isn’t there like it has always been, and I’m not that far behind him in saying that.

What is there to get excited about? Who are all these new guys? What will the lines look like?

On one side of the equation, there is the unknown. On the other side of it, it’s what we don’t know that will be exciting to watch unfold, but if we’re living on the cellar floor come the all-star break, life won’t be so grand.

Still, there’s a little electricity that is growing in the air as we are just a few weeks from training camp from kicking off in Whistler. There is also a lot of excitement that comes with a hockey season spent getting together with friends to catch a game at a pub, and some of the best people to do that with are my Crazy Canucks buddies. We’re gearing up for a third season of the podcast, and it’s hard to believe that we’ve made it this far.

Bring on the season. No one expected that the first year under Coach Vingeault would have seen the Canucks in the playoffs, and even that year was one of speculation at the start. Here’s hoping for another year like that.

I’ve already made mention of this before, but today it’s official. Trevor Linden[wiki] is leaving the game of hockey.

No matter how little of time I have been an avid Canucks fan, there is no way to easily say how incredible of a person Linden is. Even though the career is over, it’s not about being sad. He never won a Stanley Cup, never blew away the masses with his talent on the ice, nor did he really set any notable records that will live forever in the history of the NHL.

When it comes down to it, he’s just another guy.

That’s easier said than what he actually means to the city of Vancouver and to the legions of Canucks fans around the world. He is who he is, and if you don’t know him already, then you don’t know an amazing person.

The day job took me very close to the events as they unfolded today. Running around to help out at the press conference to having him pop in at the home base for interview with the media #131, there is something that strikes you about the guy. Deep down, he’s still the same 18 year old kid that was drafted into the NHL twenty years ago, to this exact day.

And every time I was in the same room as him, he was nothing but smiles.

It gives you some comfort to know that people like him are out there in the big dollar business of professional sports. Even though he could walk into nearly any place in Vancouver and be treated like a king, he’d still give you the time of day and directions to the nearest Tim Horton’s. Hell, today it felt like he’d even give you a lift there in his car, he’s just that awesome.

Photo credit: retrocactus on Flickr

You know, when the Canucks missed the playoffs after this season, I thought my world of being involved and/or following hockey would slow down. I thought that we would all be saying our farewell to Trevor Linden, find out who wins the cup, get some new draft picks, make some off season trades, and then get ready for the preseason with that yearly glimmer of hope.

Wow. What a bomb shell.

Actually, I take that back. I kept asking friends, co-workers, and Crazy Canuckers as to what they thought about Dave Nonis[wiki] and his job being in jeopardy as GM of the Vancouver Canucks. Something inside of me just felt uneasy about his role for a better part of the season, more so at the tail end.

My feeling about it all is that he was a good general manager of the organization. After that, you can’t say much more. Sure, there was the blockbuster trade for Roberto Luongo, but that isn’t a ton more to speak of after that. Willie Mitchell, yeah. After that, it’s been a lot of pickups and trades that were not the strongest or memorable. They were just… good or okay.

There’s not a lot to say about his activity in the last few years as being great or prolific, but he wasn’t half bad either.

Nonis had the passion and desire to be good at the job he held. There is no doubt about that. What works against him is what didn’t happen. An incredible goalie with a strong defense in front of him didn’t produce the goals, points, and playoff birth that could have kept his job.

However, this wasn’t my decision to make, nor can I say that I’m 100% in agreement. The only reason I say that I can’t be surprised is the fact that we have new ownership of this team, and this team is a business. The Aquilini’s are a business minded group of people. They are also lifelong fans. Nonis had those things working against his job, no matter how much the team he is in charge of spends on the disabled list or doesn’t produce on the ice.

Darren Barefoot mentioned to me on Twitter how Nonis should have been able to finish the last year on his contract, and I agree with that. The year after the lockout saw a lot of shuffling around the league, and we were a team built for a different game than what came about that season. The next season saw something different for this city: a real goalie. This year was a nightmare of injuries.

With his contract in mind, I think Nonis had a plan. One more year left, he can’t finish that vision that he had, and we’ll never know if that script would have played out for the better.

They say that a true test of a general manager is proven in five years. The contract gave him four, but he only got three. When I do those calculations in my head, combined with all the ups and downs of the days of Nonis, the one thing I keep coming back to is concern as a fan. Concern that we now have owners of this team who can prove themselves that much better in half the time than one man did in three. If they can do that, then I’ll be really impressed.

Zanstorm has a really great post that made me think a little bit more about my point, and I think it still stands. His break down of what Nonis did during his tenure in Vancouver is a tad mediocre in the proof, so like I said. He did… okay.

It’s really no secret, but I’ll say it again. In 1994, I was cheering for the New York Rangers in the Stanley Cup Finals[wiki].

I know that might sound hard to believe, but it was only about six or nine months prior to that when I really sank my teeth into hockey, all because of NHL ’93 on the Sega CD. I was 15, growing up where football rules the fall, basketball is king of winter, and baseball consumes summer. That video game taught me a lot, especially about this Patrick Roy[wiki] guy that played for that Montreal team. I couldn’t score against those freaking Canadiens[wiki], so I started playing as the Habs. I was nearly unstoppable.

That June of 1994, I remember watching Pavel Bure[wiki] more than I recall Trevor Linden. However, the thing I recall more was how incredible of a battle that series was. I sat and watched the games in the kitchen, enthralled with ESPN’s coverage, wanting so badly for the Rangers to win only because of Chris Farley’s sketch on SNL where he portrayed the annoying, drunk, baseball fan in the stands of Yankee Stadium, crying out, “Go Yannnkkkeeeeess!”

I’d find that clip on YouTube, but it’s nowhere to be found. Needless to say, I sat there with my best impression, “Go Raaaannngggerrrss”. At the same time, I remember a dislike for Brian Leetch and Mark Messier that remains to this day. I was more of a Mike Richter fan, and goalies were the thing that dragged me into an interest for hockey, even if I have only played roller hockey, in the first place.

Still, the crowds in Pacific Coliseum[wiki] were insane, and it made sense to me as to why the Canucks held such an advantage over the Rangers when they played in Vancouver. The players had heart. They had support. There was a love for the game that only New York could try to buy into. It was mesmerizing. On top of that, I had no idea that I’d be working at that place nearly 13 years later.

Ten years after that cup run, I recall hearing a little bit here and there about the Canucks. Once Rebecca became apart of my life, I was taught a lot about the legacy of what came before and after that time, and that was enough for me to finally shed my years of wandering for a team to follow. The Rangers were just a one time thing, Chicago never really appealed to me, and Colorado was pretty cool during those Roy years.

But how does this all tie into Trevor Linden? I can’t really be sure, but all of that history came back to me when I watched him on the ice this past Saturday. It was in that moment at the start of the third period where you understand how amazing, beyond just being a hockey player, this guy is. He’s not the greatest to play the game as much as he is one of the best, true men among men that only comes along once and a while.

Yes, he has dazzled with the way he has played the game over the past 19 years. Some days have been better than others, and he didn’t get the brilliant send off that he deserved in a 7-1 loss for the, potentially, last game of his career. Even though I have only had the chance to really pay attention to him in the last three years, I still get it.

It’s not that he was the greatest hockey player to have ever lived. It’s simple character and class that I have a lot of respect for, and that is hard to come by these days. That was the chill that I felt when they players backed off the red line at the start of the third period on Saturday night. Trevor just wanted them to get the period started, but the crowd won out, forcing him to acknowledge the noise of 12,000+ who would stick it out to the end of the game.

And if this story plays out like the media expects it to, Trevor Linden will retire this year, and Markus Naslund will move on from Vancouver. What a huge void to fill in this city.