Reading the NY Post will never be the same with Sean Avery’s departure to the Dallas Stars. I never watched him play hockey (actually, the only time I watch hockey is during Sports Center highlights and, usually I change the channel anyway) but he provided great entertainment with his Hollywood hook-ups and late-night hijinx. Now I’m not going to claim that I know much about hockey, but I do know that the Rangers were a much better team with Sean Avery in the lineup. Were his teammates tired (jealous) of seeing him sprinkled all over the gossip columns? Maybe. Were they fed up (wish they had the balls to do it themselves) with the way Avery ran his mouth constantly (and made Marty Brodeur his b*tch in the playoffs)? Probably. But, they will be plenty angry when they fail to make the playoffs next year courtesy of Avery’s absence…

So it’s a month later and I still haven’t fully vented my frustration over the Rangers’ second-round defeat at the hands of the Pens, but this should kind of give you an idea of how I’m still feeling: last night, ESPN flashes one of those newfangled updates on the bottom of the screen where they give you the current situation in a big-time sporting event. This one read something like “Red Wings on a power play with 2-something minutes left in the 2nd OT.” I haven’t watched a minute of this series ’cause I’m boycotting the NHL until the Blueshirts take the ice next October (you’ll find out why in a minute), but I figured I might as well tune in to see the Wings knock off Diver Crosby in humiliating 4-games-to-one fashion.

Well, the Wings never scored, and almost 10 minutes into the 3rd OT, Jiri Hudler got whistled for a 4-minute double-minor for high sticking Rob Scuderi– this led to Petr Sykora’s game-winning goal– to which one of the announcers (I have no idea who it was, I’m sure you could look it up somewhere) responded with something along the lines of: “That’s gotta be a double-minor. If you get your stick up around the face and draw blood, the referee has to give you four minutes for that.” Really??? Cause I’m still waiting for that 4-minute double-f@#king-minor to be called on Ryan f@#king Malone after he went all Thomas Hewitt on Chris Drury’s left cheek during the second period of Game 5.

I’ve stayed away from talking about the Rangers’ 4-1 series loss to the Penguins till this point… and I’m going to keep on refraining because, quite frankly, swearing uncontrollably may make for good comedy, but it won’t make for a good blog. Though there are some other things I’m willing to talk about on this relatively slow news day…

– Joba’s blown save: Yeah, that’s exactly what they call it when you come in to hold a lead in the late innings and blow it, regardless of whether Mo is actually the guy who would eventually come in to close it out (it only becomes a “hold” when Mo notches the save). The thing that worries me the most about this (Aside from the fact that he continually went to his 2nd (slider) and 3rd best (curveball) pitches instead of going after guys with his 95+-mph-heatseaker… and oh yeah, the fact that he gave up that bomb to Dave freakin’ Dellucci. I could live with it if it was Travis Hafner, but Dave Dellucci??? The guy isn’t exactly Kirk Gibson.) is that there were visible tears in his eyes when he retreated to the dugout… and despite all the sarcasm this blog is rife with, that’s not an exaggeration by any means. In fact, I’m surprised his waterworks (no, not that kind, you pervert) didn’t land him on every Red Sox blog from here to farthest reaches of Sox Nation. The Great Mariano had to endure tougher defeats before he became the G.O.A.T.– cough-cough Game 4 of the ‘97 ALDS cough-cough– and yet you never saw any tears well up in his eyelids, ever. I hate to say this ’cause I love Joba to death, but if he’s having a nervous breakdown over blowing a game in early May, I don’t want to be there for his reaction when he gives one up in October without an assist from a million swarming bugs. My gut tells me he’ll bounce back from this… but he better, otherwise the Yanks’ problems will be a lot bigger than any of us could have imagined.

- The Knicks’ coaching search: can this thing just end already? I know Donnie’s trying to do his due-diligence, but seriously, there’s really no other way to go here but Mark Jax. I hear ya, I hear ya, I like Mike D’Antoni too, but the guy walked into an ideal situation in Phoenix and now wants to leave when the going gets tough, which leads me to believe he’s not into the whole “franchise building” thing like Larry Brown. Plus, Donnie Walsh should be charged with murder if D’Antoni gets the gig ’cause his shortened rotation and break-neck style will put Eddie Curry six feet under by mid-November. And alright, Avery Johnson ain’t bad either. But he’s been the coach of a team that quit on him in the playoffs 3 years in a row (basically from Game 3 of ‘06 Finals on). Considering all that, how long would it be before the Knicks quit on him? Maybe the second week of training camp? Let’s just end the charade and hold the Jax press conference. I know he has zero experience and so-on and so-forth, but the guy’s gotta get his start somewhere, doesn’t he? Might as well be with a team that’s starting over from scratch, not to mention the one that plays in his hometown. The expectations will be low and he’ll get a fair amount of leeway– well at least as much leeway as you can get in NYC– which will be good for a rookie coach coming into a rebuilding situation. Seems like a no-brainer to me. Then again, these are the Knicks, Donnie Walsh or no Donnie Walsh running the show.

Alright, I promise you’ll hear from me about the Blueshirts in the near future… just as soon as I’m done constructing an effigy of Gary Bettman to light my bonfire this weekend.

Newsflash: until the NHL fixes it’s officiating problem, NO ONE WILL WATCH IT!!! I mean I know this sounds absolutely ridiculous so bear with me here, but if one team can go around the ice shoving their sticks up their opponent’s face guards (and draw blood, no less) without repute, while the other can’t so much as breathe on their opponent without a whistle being blown, then the whole “impartial officiating” thing just goes flying out the f#@king window. Technically, Game 5 isn’t over yet, but for all intents-and-purposes it was the second the refs stepped on the ice for their pregame skate.

“We here highly resolve that Sean Avery’s spleen shall not have been lacerated in vain…” — Abraham Lincoln

No one’s talking about Malkin’s slew-foot on Paul Mara apart from the fact that it was obviously a dirty play, so I just want to get this on the record here before it becomes a story at some point in the next couple of days: Malkin probably guaranteed that there’ll at least be a Game 6 back at the Garden because he’ll be watching Game 5 from his living room courtesy of Colin Campbell. Now I’m not saying what he did was anywhere near Chris-Simon-territory, but if you try to take out a guy’s legs while he’s going full-tilt not once, but twice, then I’m thinking it’s gonna cost you some ice time… which is pretty ironic considering Malkin drew a penalty shot in Game 4 (thankfully he crapped his pants and barely got it on net anyway) by way of, you guessed it, a dive. It’s to the point now where calling them “classless,” like Mara did after the game, doesn’t even do the Penguins justice anymore.

He may not be the Gipper, but as Abraham Lincoln once famously said, “We here highly resolve that Sean Avery’s spleen shall not have been lacerated in vain”…

And in case that didn’t provide enough motivation, here’s some more…

The Yankees are horrible right now– which may seem like a ridiculous statement given the fact that our 14-14 record sh*ts on our 9-14 start last year (we were actually 13-15 after 28 games, but I’m trying to make a point here), but it’s true nonetheless– and the Rangers are even worse. I’m to the point where I’m watching these games expecting pretty much anything and everything to go wrong– from the Yankees hitting weak a$$ inning-ending grounders for the upteenth time with the bases loaded, to the Blueshirts taking one moronic, game-changing penalty after another… to the world ending. Seriously, you name it and it all seems possible right now.

I should probably be more pissed about the Rangers’ despicable display in the Eastern Semis, but I’m not. Like I said after Game 1, it’s pretty hard to go nuts considering it’s blatantly obvious that the refs have been mandated to hand Sidney Crosby the Cup on a silver platter. That’s not to say that we’d be up in the series if all things were equal– the Pens are legit, there’s no denying that– but when they’re playing 9-on-5 all game, every game, getting your a$$ handed to you becomes a foregone conclusion.

The Yankees though?! Wow. Where do I even begin? I mean this is beyond painful to watch. Our hardest hit balls are dribblers to second base and flares to left-field, (Though kudos to Robbie for hitting that dinger. Can’t wait to see his next one about 3 weeks from now.)… and call me crazy, but something tells me the runs aren’t going to come pouring in anytime soon with A-rizzel and Jorgie on the shelf. And then you’ve got Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy well on their way to making Paul Wilson and Bill Pulsipher look like f@#king Hall-of-Famers. I don’t know where the Aaron Smalls and Shawn Chacons are going to come from this time around, but we better find ‘em, and find ‘em fast. Otherwise Ohlendorf, Hawkins, and Albaledejo are going to go the way of Paul Quantrill, Tanyon Sturtze, and Scott Proctor before them and feel lucky just to be able use their right hands to hold their d@#ks when they piss by the time June rolls around, let alone use them to throw a baseball.

This is something the Rangers might wanna watch… except they should forget about the fact that they’re the bad guys in Mystery, Alaska and go about their business like they’re Russell Crowe and Co.

After being robbed of my childhood time-and-again by all those bullsh*t calls MJ got against the Knicks, I am not about to have my adult fan-life ruined by Gary Bettman’s elaborate conspiracy to shove Crosby down our throats by giving him all sorts of phantom calls in the hopes that everyone will fall head-over-heels in love with the NHL when he wins a championship. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking, “If Bettman wants fans, wouldn’t it make more sense then for the Rangers to win the Cup?” And if you’re also still wondering why no one gives two sh*ts about hockey, there’s your answer. The Blueshirts can’t let this go though. None of this “we take the high road/we win with class, we lose with class” garbage. I want everyone from Tom Renney on down to the equipment guy complaining their a$$es off about that Game 1 hose-job. Sure, we should’ve never let the Pens back in that game, but giving up game-winning goals becomes a lot easier when the opposition’s leading point-man has the linesmen in his back pocket. I don’t care what kind of ridiculous fines Bettman metes out, someone has to make an issue of this. And if no one cares? So what, at least we’ll go down fighting. Oh yeah, and the Yankees suck… alright, I’m done. Everyone enjoy your Friday night!

Alright, let me just come out and say it: the Penguins scare the crap out of me. Not only do they have wunderkind Sidney Crosby running shizz, but I’m not even sure he’s the best player on his own team– to me, it’s the Pens’ leading goal scorer, Evgeni Malkin. Add Marian Hossa into the mix, and yeah, you can figure out why I’ve wanted no part of them for weeks now. But you know what? The Rangers are going to pull this thing off. Now I’m not entirely convinced that we’re gonna go all “1994″ on everyone this year, but this does remind me a lot of that championship season, particularly the part where the Blueshirts knocked off an arguably more talented, but greener, Devils team in the Conference Finals. Yeah, the Devils should’ve won that series at least 2 different times, but it was the Rangers’ guts and savvy (aka Mark Messier) that saved the day. Now 14 years later, it’ll be the likes of Jagr, Gomez, Drury, and Straka leading the more experienced Rangers in a matchup with the NHL’s darling up-and-comers. And sure, this isn’t the Conference Finals either, but it might as well be considering either the Rangers or Pens will streamroll whoever comes out of that Habs/Flyers series.

Beyond experience though, there are two main reasons why I’m going to go against my gut (how often does that work out?) and pick my boys: 1) We obviously have superior goaltending, which is the ultimate advantage to have in postseason hockey, and 2) We won the season series against the Pens 5-3 and, unlike in most other sports, head-to-head regular season records in the NHL are usually a pretty good indicator of how a playoff matchup will turn out– i.e. the Rangers went 7-0-1 against the Devils in the regular season and, well, we all know how that series went. Pick: Rangers in 7

Hello SC nation, remember me? Your favorite writer is back from a brief hiatus. Luckily I haven’t really missed much because A) As much as I enjoy playing hockey and watching it in person, I couldn’t give a rat’s ass about the NHL playoffs. B) I love basketball, but I find the NBA about as exciting as skin cancer and C) I love baseball, I love the Red Sox, but it’s tough to get emotionally invested in a game when you know there are 153 of them left to be played. (The MLB season is so ridiculously long that someone who knew absolutely nothing about baseball would probably think I was exaggerating there, but no, that is actually the case in April.) That being said, there are a few noteworthy items that I feel compelled to briefly comment on in a segment that may or may not become a regular thing for me and is tentatively titled, “what the hell are you supposed to be?”

Hank Steinbrenner is a f#&@ing clown: When it was announced that George’s son would be taking over for him, I made the mistake of taking this news seriously. I was completely unaware that this was just an elaborate Saturday Night Live skit where Darryl Hammond pretends to be George Steinbrenner’s son and does a caricature of George, ranting and raving more than George does in real life and making comically ludicrous comments. Well done SNL, you duped me. I do find the whole, “my daddy was rich enough to own his own baseball team, so that makes me more qualified to manage a baseball team than any of the professionals hired by my pops, and also makes me more knowledgeable than a man who spent fifteen years catching in the major leagues about handling pitchers” routine exceptionally humorous. And to top it off he called anyone who would not insert Joba into the starting rotation (insert the best GM in baseball to get zero respect from his owners and newly hired manager who happens to be a beloved ex-Yankee) an idiot. Truly high comedy. I rank this skit right up there with “More Cowbell.”

Speaking of Joba, while watching the Sox-Yanks on YES last week I saw a commercial for a show where Joba was interviewed with his father. I didn’t see the actual show, but in the commercial we saw Joba laughing at one point and he looked exactly like that kid in high school who wasn’t officially retarded but everyone knew he was straddling the line between “can pass as normal” and “should probably wear a hockey helmet at all times.” Every school had at least one of these kids right? Needless to say, I was delighted to see the new pride of the Yankees shown in this light.

Chad Johnson is a f$%^ing baby: Chad Johnson isn’t happy playing for the Bengals and having been the second highest paid receiver over the past three years. He is demanding that he be traded or he will sit out next season. I LOVE that Marvin Lewis and the Bengals have responded with, “Go ahead, sit out, we’ll be happy to save all that money.” I just hope the Bengals front office is solid enough to really see this through to the end and not bow to the pressure come September. The truth is, Chad is an overrated, overpaid, under-producing infant that needs to be coddled and throws a fit when Marvin Lewis has anything harsh to say about him. He’s been lucky enough to benefit from the talent around him on the Cincinnati offense and probably isn’t even the best receiver on his own team. I really do hope Chad has to sit out this entire season. Perhaps it will show him that he is NOT bigger than the team. Unfortunately though, it probably won’t.

Danica Patrick is a f*%&ing winner: In case you didn’t hear, Danica finally got her first IndyCar victory this past weekend in Japan, to which I responded, “They race Indy cars in Japan?” I am happy for Ms. Patrick. I thought all the criticism that was directed her way for not having won a race was a little unfair. I don’t know a lot about racing but I’m pretty sure there are a bunch of guys that never win a race at the top level. I will say I was pretty shocked to hear that she won though, because we all know how awful women are at driving.

MFH is f$&#ing lucky: I received a grand jury summons a few weeks ago, and it came as a total shock to me (though still not a shocking as a chick winning a driving competition) that for grand jury duty one must report twice a week for TWO MONTHS. Needless to say I was not interested in that. On the first day I had to report we were all herded into the court room and after a sleep-inducing speech by the lady in charge our juror numbers were put into a bingo-type device. There were about sixty people there to fill up 23 slots so odds were I wouldn’t get picked. And if the 23 who were selected all got season tickets to the Giants I would never have been selected, but since the 23 numbers that came up got jury duty, of course my number was pulled. Next came excuse time: “I have two kids with cancer and I need to take care of them.” “My son just tried to commit suicide.” “I have a medical condition where I can’t sit for an extended period of time, here’s a note from my doctor.” (Note from the doctor is always clutch. All you kids out there listen up, find the kid in your class most likely to become a doctor and become his/her best friend. Doctor’s notes can be key in so many situations: “Rob missed work, not because he was hungover, but he was actually sick again for the third Friday in a row.” “Adam will be missing the next week because of emergency surgery, not because it’s supposed to be 80 and sunny every day.” “The massages Matt has been getting are medically necessary and should be covered by his health insurance.” “Scott needs steroids because of a testosterone deficiency.” “Brian needs medical marijuana because of his unusually high anxiety.” You get the point.) So after all of these great excuses for not serving on the jury the lady asked, “Does anyone else have a problem serving?” I raised my hand because I DID have a problem. I had better things to do with my time. I mean it was two days a week for TWO MONTHS. So I boldly stated, “I don’t have a good excuse, it’s just a busy time at work right now and would be much easier for me if I could serve sometime in the future.” Well SC nation, you should have seen the look on the face of “suicidal kid guy” and “double cancer child lady” when the woman in charge replied with, “ok, what would be a better time?” Not only that, but I wasn’t almost killed by any crazy woman drivers on the way home. How’s that for luck?

Any women who want to take issue with my comments about their driving abilities (or lack thereof) can comment below or email me at mfh@subwaychatter.com

I’ll start worrying about the Penguins tomorrow. For now, I’ll just continue basking in the glory of being the 2008 Hudson River Champs.

Get used to these Yankee sh*t-shows. I know I picked them to win the AL East, but that’s looking about as probable as Jason Giambi reaching 50 RBIs at this point. I don’t think any of us realized just how badly Hughes and Kennedy were going to struggle, and that’s likely for two reasons: 1) the Yankee hype machine made them both out to be aces-in-waiting, and not necessarily with their words, but with their actions– if you don’t trade two prospects for one of the greatest pitchers of this generation (Santana), well then you tend to expect big things; 2) Joba Chamberlain– he’s so ridiculously awesome (great kick save tonight, by the way), we just assumed those other guys would be also. Too bad they aren’t. Along those same lines, is anyone else down for moving Ross Ohlendorf into the rotation? He’s got pretty good control– way better than Kennedy was supposed to have, at least– and he throws 96– the number of years Kennedy will have to pitch to get his ERA under 5. Or freakin’ bring Kei Igawa back if you don’t want to do that. I mean I’m willing to try anything at this point ’cause I’m getting pretty fed up with the automatic losses 2 out of every 5 games. I’m not necessarily saying the outcome won’t be the same, but at least we’d be trying something new.

Oh, one other thing… since I’m in such a Boston-y mood right now, I figure I should let you all in on a little secret– I’m going to be rooting for a Boston team the next couple of days. Nooooo, not the Red Sox… what, are you crazy? It’s the Bruins. If they really do pull this thing off, then the Rangers will get the winner of the Caps/Flyers series in round 2, which would be a much better draw than the Penguins. Hell, I’d like to avoid them altogether if we could, but something tells me we’ll have to go through Sidney Crosby and Co. at some point if we want to play for the Cup. Seriously though, the Canadiens are a joke. They don’t play the body, they don’t charge the net, they don’t have any goons– which is a prerequisite for winning in the postseason– and, well, they just… they just… play like non-heterosexuals. Actually, on second thought, they better win this thing and then hopefully the Caps can come back on the Flyers, ’cause then we’ll get a shot at those va-jay-jays. And if you thought Sean Avery was great in the first-round, imagine the field day he would have in that series?

In addition to hitting up Yanks/Sox on Thursday night (almost wished I hadn’t), I rolled up to Boston to visit some old stomping grounds and such this weekend. Problem was, I didn’t have internet access like I thought I would, and hence, Subway Chatter remained in mid-week mode while all kinds of crazy shizz took place over the last 48+ hours (Zeke getting canned and the Rangers making good on my prediction just to name a few). In any event, I’ll be sure to catch everyone up on what’s been happening… or, more accurately, I’ll be catching up with the rest of you…