Pirates and Animosity

It's been awfully quiet here in the Cheap Seats lately, save for a little admin update on the blogger playoff pool - which for most of you is probably just a momentary distraction, nothing more. I don't know if I've just watched too much hockey lately or what, but somehow I've lost a bit of my babbling mojo. Scientists are currently working 'round the clock for a cure, but in the meantime I've decided to resort to outright stealing.

That's right, having lost my own creative spark I am going to become a blogger pirate, sailing the interweb seas in search of insightful posts that I can tweak and call my own.

Yo ho ho and a bottle of...whatever makes this loooong summer a little bit shorter.

My first adventure in plundering comes from my good friend Elly over at No Pun Intended. With the Penguins out of the playoffs she finds herself faced with the same dilemma so many of us face - who do you root for in the postseason when everywhere you turn, you see evil? As a way of sorting out this conundrum, she helpfully breaks down the Eastern Conference on the piss-off spectrum. No verdict was reached, but it was interesting to see how a Pens fan views the conference foes.

As Caps fans, though, I think we probably see a few things differently and so I've made a few adjustments. We'll start with the Northeast Division:

• Buffalo Sabres - One of the more recent rivalries to emerge, stemming from a series of unfortunate incidents and lopsided wins this season. Throw in a few thousand friendly drunken Sabres fans filling the Phone Booth with "Let's Go Buff-a-lo" chants and you've got yourself the makings of something good...or horrific. Of course, let's not forget the way the Caps smacked them hard back in the 1998 playoffs. Hasek's blocker being hurled at Bondra's head is a particularly vivid image...as is Juneau's glorious OT winner. In Buffalo. Ah, memories.

• Ottawa Senators - Aside from a few scuffles in recent games and one playoff meeting, there doesn't seem to be much bad blood between the two nation's capitals. We've got our yokes of shame, they've got theirs.

• Toronto Maple Leafs - This may be the Habs fan in me, but...ick. Any team that has Darcy Tucker automatically takes a step down on the hatred scale anyways, and Mats Sundin has decided to make the Caps his own personal chew toy (as so many others have). Hard to like the Laffs, that's for sure.

• Montreal Canadiens - I'm recusing myself from this one. I don't think I can provide an accurate snapshot of the Caps-Habs relationship, but if anyone has any thoughts please toss in a comment.

• Boston Bruins - Not so much a rivalry per se, but the synchronized sucking of the Caps and Bruins has led to some entertaining games with a few fireworks. It's hard to tell if the games have just been so evenly played or if both teams were just so bad that you couldn't tell the difference. Either way, there's not really hatred as much as a mutual understanding that better times have to be on the horizon.

...don't they?

Next up...the Atlantic Division.

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