Poor Little Penguins

Penguins Take Precipitous Fall From the Top
(Joe Lapointe, New York Times)

Twice the Stanley Cup champions, in 1991 and 1992, the Penguins are caught in hockey’s perfect storm. They have a low budget, the National Hockey League’s oldest arena, poor attendance and the worst record among the 30 teams. On this night against the Lightning, most of the scattered customers sat quietly, as if frozen. Even the beer stand behind the center-ice seats was closed.

I don’t follow sports. I don’t follow hockey. I don’t follow the Pens. But I do remember with fondness back in 91 and 92, my friends Chad, Al and Ivan, and perhaps others, sitting in my apartment sometimes to watch the Pens playoff games. I would sit behind my computer and pretend not to watch because sports was beneath me and all, but I watched, and watching Mario do his tricks was indeed fun, even if I had no conception of the rules of the game at all. It even prompted me to watch a few more Pens playoff games in later years, and even go to one in person a couple years ago with Rebecca and Chris. It was fun. I enjoyed it. I saw Mario do his thing, although not quite as nice as in 91 and 92, and they lost.

Anyway… shame to see this kind of story about them. Sniff. Oh well! Now I’ll go back to knowing absolutley nothing about this sort of thing for the next year. Just happened to stumble on the article. :-)