The final days of Slow News Summer: Tackling readers' craziest ideas

We’ve made it to the end of Slow News Summer.

Well, almost. There are still a few weeks until the NHL is well and truly back. But my schedule for that period is mostly filled, with projections to make, longshot award swings to miss, oddly specific predictions to miss even worse, and a trusty bizarro-meter to fire up. It’s going to get busy around these parts.

But not quite yet. For one more week, we’re still firmly in Slow News Summer, the annual dead zone where nothing is happening and no idea is too dumb. We started almost two months ago with a post about syllables, so the bar for nonsense has been set pretty high.

How do you beat something as pointless as arguing over how many syllables are in Cale Makar’s name? By asking the readers, of course. So last week, that’s what I did.

>> Read the full post for free at The Athletic

Remembering a time your team got smoked by a some kid making his NHL debut

If there’s one thing every NHL fan agrees on, it’s that anyone who bangs on the glass during play should go to jail. But if there’s a second thing, it’s that our favorite team is always getting lit up by some random rookie playing his first career game.

You know the drill. You settle in to watch a game, only to notice a player on the other team doing the old solo lap initiation. Immediately, you get that sinking feeling. Players making their debuts always seem to have magic powers that turn them into a cross between Bobby Orr and Jacques Plante. But only, it goes without saying, against your team.

Or do they? It turns out that some teams have a stronger claim than others when it comes to this stuff, as I learned by going through all 32 teams and searching for the most productive games anyone had ever had against them in their NHL debut.

A few quick ground rules: These are regular season debuts only, not playoffs or (obviously) preseason. And we’re not counting those first few games in 1917 when the league was brand new and everyone was technically debuting. Sorry, fellow olds.

Other than that, any debut by a skater or goalie is fair game. Let’s find out how bad your team has really had it when it comes to these punk kids.

>> Read the full post for free at The Athletic

Who wins an all-time roster battle of NHL stars based on how Stanely Cups they won?

After a summer spent on failed GM theories, contrarian takes, and blockbuster alternate history, we’re going to keep today’s post nice and simple. It’s an idea that’s been sent in by a few of you over the years, most recently reader Stephen C., and I’ll admit to being surprised we haven’t done it already.

Let’s make some all-time rosters based on how many Cups a player won.

That’s it. Just a nice fastball over the heart of the plate to take a swing at. We’ll go through the best players, check how many Cups they’ve won, and assign them to that team. Then we see which one is best, and then ideally spend the rest of the day arguing about it in the comment section.

>> Read the full post for free at The Athletic

The Contrarian: The Canadiens’ cap situation is bad, and other fake NHL arguments

Welcome back to The Contrarian, the feature where you state the obvious and then I tell you why you’re wrong.

It’s been over a year since we’ve done this, because I forgot I’ve been waiting for you to come up with some worthy challenges. But with Slow News Summer crawling along, this is as good a time as any for me to do what modern sports media is apparently supposed to do best: Argue loudly and aggressively for positions I may or may not actually believe in.

>> Read the full post for free at The Athletic

Help me become a better contrarian

Hey folks…

It's been a while since we've done an edition of The Contrarian. A reminder: You send in a statement that you think is obvious or inarguable, and I’ll try to come up with the contrarian view.

We've done a few of these, and the ones that work best find that sweet spot of feeling difficult but not impossible. "Mark Messier was a bad signing for the Canucks" and "Ray Bourque's Cup win was good" worked great. Stuff like "Connor McDavid is good at hockey" or "Ice is cold", not so much. Your job is to set me up, not stump me completely, although a little degree of difficulty should keep me sharp.

Send me your sure-thing statement via email at dgbcontrarian@gmail.com.