Monday's column

Amen, Wendy. And I'd go even farther and say that is the truth for every level, of every job. Period. You are right about that. Everyone has an off night. And it's not like these guys play once or twice a week and that's it....they practice nearly every day, they give private lessons, they do lots of other hockey-related things as well. And some have second jobs and families. I know you all don't give a rat's butt about that, you just want your dollar's worth because God forbid, that is all that matters. But they are human. I'm sure none of those thing ever bother any of you in your job, whatever that is (and I'm sure it is in the public eye, where everyone can criticize you for not smiling when you are out there when you are having a bad night at your job, as well). God help you ever be married to a player, date one, know one, or have one for a son. Ever. Maybe you'd have a bit more compassion for them if you did. Or, maybe not.

Wow. I think that may qualify as my most negative post ever.

Nice comment Hit, think IF he gave 100% he would score 40-50 goals.

Good point Wendy! This type of stuff goes on in every league of every type!! For us to set here and think that we get 100 percent every game from everybody is to be very naive! When a player like PC says something like that I guess I will just have to admire his honesty. There are days I dont bust my ass at my job either. So if we want to see 100 percent bustbutt play then we will have to have a 40 game regular season then go right into the playoffs. We ALL know that wont happen. Just my thoughts here people nothing meant against ANY BLOGGER!!!!!! Outahere at warp factor 10!!!

But if you choose to look the other way on this and find it hillarious that paying would like for their team to give effort.....then I really don't know what else to say.

I have played Sports ever since I was walking. The one thing I was taught at every level that I played was this...play the game like it is the last time you will ever play it....because it might be your last time.

Find me a coach on Earth that would love to hear one of his players admit that they don't effort.

Just throwing out 2 names.....Bob Knight. Gene Keady. Both legends in coaching that we all know. How would these coaches react to this?

You could pick any coach really. In most situations a player like this is gone.

Why is PC exempt? Why do some players get held to different standards on this team?

That is the problem I have with all of this. That is why the marketing approach this franchise is using is unfair to alot of the players on this team. If you sell insurance and have your picture on the scoreboard 25% of the game selling that insurance....then you don't have to give the team your fair effort, and what is worse? You can come out and say that you don't give it an honest effort and some people will applaud you for it.

This is messed up all around. The more I sit here and think about this, the more PO'd I get. Gotta go away before I do the Brad MacMillan commercial to my PC.

I made a funny, even though I am hot.

I give PC credit for standing up and saying it. He could have ducked the question or not answered, but he answered it honestly. He didn't tell me what he thought I wanted to hear, either. I'm sure he knew he'd get this reaction, too, but he stood up to it. Good for him.

I think they need to shorten the season. I have to admit I'm tired after WATCHING them play four games in seven days. I certainly didn't have my best at work today. Doesn't mean I didn't try, it just wasn't there. I wouldn't mind if they didn't start the season until November and started the playoffs the first week of April. Those of you who get to watch them for fun, may disagree, though.

Hit I guarantee you that even that undeafeated 1976 Indiana team had games where certain players were not playing at 100% every game. It isn't a deal where the entire team gets together and says "Hey guys, let's take tonight off". It is different guys on different days for different reasons. If the team is talented enough then most nights as a team they will overcome it and win anyway. PC is an aging player with a real job, a real family and a "real life" outside hockey. He has other considerations. That doesn't mean he doesn't care about the team or the game. But when his wife or kid is up sick all night or his real job isn't going as well as it should on a given day, just like you or I would, maybe you don't show up for your game that night with the same amount of energy as you would if everything was going 100%. Not to mention nagging aches and pains that take their piece of you more and more as you get older.
I didn't read anything in his statement that made me believe he doesn't care. I do think that this collection of players who have known nothing but winning for the last two years might coast more than a collection of players who have never won together which is why I want to see the roster blown up.
But let's not make PC out to be a villain here just because he is at the point in his life where LIFE may sometimes get in the way of him being 100% as a hockey player. I get it, I accept it. But I don't want to see it again for another season.

I totally lost myself on my first paragraph....

I think I meant paying fans.

But I don't know why it is such a hard concept to grasp that when you step onto a court, field, the ice, whatever the surface you play sports on, that you give it your best effort no matter what age, level, paid, volunteer, whatever sport you are involved in, always you give your best effort. That is what sports is. It is competition. Not a place to tank it and admit it.

It is one thing to have what BLB calls an "off night" and another thing to admit you don't always give it an effort.

That is what I am so dang mad about. Have all the off nights you want. But at least try hard. I wouldn't complain.

The only time I dog on a player is when they give no effort. And I think they deserve any of the wrath that fans give them for that poor effort. Most players, real player, will agree with that.

Tom Brady was asked how he felt when his fans booed them in the playoffs when they got smoked.....he said we deserved it, we didn't give a good effort and guys didn't play hard, if I hadn't been playing in that game, I would have booed us too.

There isn't a person on here that is going to convince me they put in 100% effort every day they go to work. Fans can have idealistic expectations of the players because they pay for tickets. Fans can also claim that it's only roughly 76 games that a player goes through versus them having to work a full year at their jobs. But I would contend that a hockey player, even at this level, puts in more physical effort and sacrifice of his body in one day of work than most fans do in a week - maybe a month. For those fans who work for an employer, how do you suppose your boss feels when he or she feels you've mailed it in for the day and they still have to pay you for it?

Let's also not forget the players also have to go to practice every day and to the gym for supplemental workouts to keep in top shape. It's just not realistic to expect someone to be 100% every night. Sure the players want to be and some obviously put in more effort toward that goal than others, but be honest with yourselves when making these comments.

I sure don't have it in me to give 100% every day I go to work. It doesn't mean I don't want to or don't still try awful hard anyway. I know for a fact my boss expects 150% every single day, but my boss has been known to be unrealistic. Blake knows what I'm talking about. Ask him when his last day off was.

I'm not trying to bash anyone for making a comment. I respects differing opinions. All I'm saying is be realistic with expectations. Martin Brodeur is the best goalie in the wold (disclaimer - I'm a Devils fan), but he mailed it in in the Olympics against the USA. Does that make him less of a goalie? No, it means he didn't have it that night.

Maybe P.C. will regret the comment going to print, but he said it and it was the truth. I don't begrudge anyone or telling the truth. In fact, I'd rather P.C. tell me what he said in the column than to have him try to BS me and make me believe the players are giving it their all when everyone at the rink knows they're not.

*Notice how I used paragraph breaks? It sure makes these long posts a lot easier to read (subtle hint).

Snuff might be on to something, how about next year the komets set up an exhibition game against a team from the OHL, maybe the plymouth whalers.

Dang it, I found at least two typos in my post. After a month away from work on injured reserve I still can't go 100%.

You know, I get what Hit is saying....about giving an effort, I do get it. But how can you tell? No one has really ever answered that. OK, so PC just busted it out and told us all that sometimes he does not. But a lot of you have accused the various members of the team of dogging it this year in particular. NO one has really ever really given me a good answer on how they know this is going on. Are you people in the locker rooms? Did I miss another press conference or interview like PC's one before where another player admitted to not trying more than once? I played baseball when I was younger, and you all know I have a kid who plays hockey. So I had my off games in baseball, and I had my games where I tried my butt off, and I was just just a really bad player. Hence, never made it out of Little League. Some people would probably say I never really tried because I sucked at it. But I really did try, every game. I just never got a home run, was never the game stealer that some of the other girls on the team were. Oh well. Not my sport. (I was better at tennis, Hit...LOL) And the games where my son does not have any goals, any assists, and has a minus rating, I can still see when he gets into the locker room, mainly, if he has really, really put forth the effort. He's either exhausted, or he's sorta tired (he's usually so tired he can't remove his own skates!). That's why I want to know how you people know how these guys are or are not giving it their all. Sure you might watch them every night. But do you go home with them? Talk to them honestly and straight after the game in the locker room when they can't move?

And....any "fan" who boos their own team is not really a fan. Season ticket holder, full price jersey or not. We go, and no matter how crappy they may or may not play, we're there to see them play. Positive Patty, reporting for duty! LOL...

Dangit, Chad....the "hint" about paragraph breaks would have been better 10 minutes before I wrote my book....LOL...great post, though.

My last day off? Hmmmm.... Now there's an interesting question.

Wait....reporters GET days off? I am in the wrong profession.....I knew it!

Yes, that's the ideal, and yes, coaches are going to expect that. What boss doesn't want 100% from their employees all the time? But a good boss or coach also realizes that that isn't going to happen every single day for too many reasons to name. Not to mention that I'm sure even coaches have nights when their minds aren't fully focussed on the game. And though it is a game, it is also these players jobs. Being a professional athlete is a very different animal from playing recreationally. It's like this. I love ice cream. But if it was my job to eat ice cream every day 24/7, there would be days that I wouldn't be quite as enthusiastic about it. That's just the way it it goes.

Everyone has a right to their opinion. Thank God for that.

But you can tell when a player is cruising. He skates half speed, he doesn't go to the net, he doesn't go to the corners to fight for pucks, he doesn't take the body at all. Those are things we all can see from the past 3 months that has frustrated us at times, compared to the last 3 games where we see guys doing the little things to win. Playing aggressive, playing in front of the net, taking the body, fighting for pucks in the corners.....and they look darn good doing it and it is obvious it makes a difference when the team plays that way, look at the results.

Answer me this question honestly....

Is it fair that a player like Matt Woodard comes into Fort Wayne, does everything that is asked of him, plays hard every shift (or it seems), plays out of position as a forward to make way for others playing less hard than him at times, and Matt gets waived and we can now suspect that players on this team didn't always give it a full effort and were allowed to do so because of one of the following reasons.....Politics, Marketing, Community Ties, Their Local Job, their personal life, whatever the reasons?

I call it double-standard.....and Matt Woodard is not my favorite player by any means, he is just an easy example.

So does Al Sims tell his players:

"I want you guys to play hard every shift, give it a good effort, that is unless you have a very good reason not to, or I guess you don't have to listen me if you are exempt because I can't trade you and I can't waive you....but the rest of you guys that I can trade or waive, you better play your butts off..........or else"

For the record, as a former multi-sport athlete (even into my early 30's), who has an ultra-competitive attitude, I agree completely with what Hit is saying about giving the effort every night.

I was just saying that I understand why players don't have 100% every night. But I also don't believe that gives anyone the right to coast. Put in the best effort you've got. Sometimes it'll be 100%. Sometimes it'll be 75%. But it should be everything you've got on that night.

If you give a half --- effort I'll BOO=so lets cheer when they stink or don't try??????????????

I liked Woodard, but I make no assumptions as to why he was waived. I'm not at the practices. I'm not in the locker room. I have no idea what's going on behind the scenes. All I know is that the coaching staff felt he was the one who should be released. I have faith in Sims and the Frankes to make the right call or at least the best call they can at the time.

Chad Ryan has got my message.

Your best that night that you are trying as hard as you can to give, might only be 75% due to injury, fatigue, shin splints, hang nail, in grown toe nail, death in the family, credit card debt stress, eating too much ice cream in Wendy's case............

But Chad understands what I am saying. Try as hard as you can. If you can't do that anymore....you are cheating yourself, your teammates, and your sport.....and at that point, it is time to hang it up.

It might be PC Buddys time.

Nobody ever claimed pro sports or life was fair.

Fair answer Wendy.

But doesn't it strike you odd that players give half efforts admittedly and also have jobs that prevent them from being released or traded. They have job security.....

Whereas a new comer to the team has no security and might be held to a higher standard and might get less playing time.

I agree talent might be judged more or less in these situations.......But who do you want on your team, guy that busts his tail, or guys that admits he doesn't???

Is this blog on "central time"

So Blake, does that make it right?

Interesting debating technique with that answer. Kind of like the Ron White Technique. I won't say it on here, some might have heard it before. LOL

Life is not fair and pro sports are not fair......I can't argue that one. Who can?

But you have to admit that it is BS that some players live by different sets of standards.

Next you will tell me that it is ok that PC dogs it because he played on 2 teams that won a cup.....right?

There are all the cliche's in the world for this. "You only get out of it what you put into it" is the one that comes to mind. Of course your boss knows you aren't at 100% all the time, that's why he isn't paying you more. We are all human.

P.C. may have spoke the truth for him, but believe me there will be some guys in that room that are offended. FW I am trying to understand from your post which side of the debate you are on. I am not so upset that P.C. has come out with this, it is the timing that has me concerned. The stars seemed to be coming into line and I hope it will continue.

Now Junior Hockey, I live no more than 30 minutes from Guelph, Brampton, Mississauga and Kitchener. I can get to London in 45 minutes. The hockey is great for your team every 3 or 4 years. There are some exceptions to this like Sarnia who have had super Midget drafts and found diamonds in dirt.
The reason is you have to have older, stronger players who are stars bringing along the next crop of younger players and hope you can compete. You have 4 year cycles in other words.

I have been to two junior games this year, they were very good. Even saw Taylor Hall play. He is good.

Moral, I will be driving 6 hours on the weekend to come watch the Komets. I am close to someone on the team, but I will continue to come to Fort Wayne when he retires.

The Reason. Best atmosphere,most tradition, best bang for the buck and best damned minor pro hockey town in North America. That's why.

And Alan, I am not "smootching" LOL

I like the paragraph break too, Chad.

I give, Superfan.

No more effort from me on this topic.

Who cares.

Maybe if more fans would stop caring, then more players would start caring if effort matters to the fans.

Plus, Superfan knew that I'd be the one that this would drive the most nuts.

Now would I do that? Bwa-ha-ha, bwa-ha-ha!

I have no idea what time it is on, MB.