Our motorcade was stuck in traffic in Ottawa last evening when word reached us Jacques Martin had decreed a skate-til-you-puke session as punishment for laying an egg in Vancouver on Wednesday night.
Point made, and much thank-you-sir-may-we-have-another-ing from the veteran players.
We would merely point out that Guy Carbonneau also ordered a bag skate in the first month of last season after a particularly egregious loss to the Maple Leafs.
And we all know what happened to him.
At least Martin had the good sense to do it on a day where he knew his charges would have two days to recover before playing their next game. Veteran move on his part.
And not all comparisons to last year need have negative tinges - at least they made the playoffs, right? Right? Oh.
It would also appear Carey Price went all Ed Belfour-y after the game, doing some impromptu remodelling of the visiting dressing room at GM Place.
A trip through the haphazardly-organized French Immersion archives reminds us that Price suffered through similar shellings last season, but typically reacted by taking it out on his sticks or goalie equipment - although there was at least one instance of suspiciously raw-looking knuckles and in another case the assembled hacks engaged in a spirited debate over whether there had actually been tears of rage welling in his eyes.
It's okay, let it all out son.
At least he cares, as the great American poet J.R. Cash once said, he's got gravel in his guts and spit in his eye.
Beyond the actual smashing of knuckles against drywall - at least he had the sense not to injure himself by thumping something harder, like a plastic water cooler, or Travis Moen - we were heartened by the laughable a-big-boy-did-it-and-ran-away cover-up attempt with a strategically hung towel.
As any regular reader of this wretched thing can attest, we have a strong fondness for the amateurish and slapdash.
And it all kinda makes you think the old Denis Lemieux character from Slapshot ("Tassez-vous de mon chemin, tabarnak!") isn't so much of a caricature after all.
Or maybe it's a chicken and egg thing where entire generations of goaltenders believe this is how they're supposed to act.
Which makes our head hurt.
