No More Nomar—With Nomar Goles to Tally, Slats' Stats Man Goes Out ... Then Sather Says "Let Seymour Goles Go In"

NEW YORK—New York Rangers general manager, Glen Sather, announced today that team statistician, Nomar Goles, resigned shortly after the Blueshirts 1-0 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins. The search for his replacement, however, didn’t last very long.

Apparently Goles had been under a lot stress since the Rangers opening night’s 5-2 victory over the Florida Panthers. Since that game, Goles was deeply concerned because the Rangers simply weren’t scoring many.

Having been shutout in two consecutive games, scoring only 8 goals in the last 7 games, and posting a league low 13 goals for the season, the only name the supposedly high-powered Rangers have been living up to is Nomar’s.

According to Goles, he felt personally responsible in some way. “It’s as though my name has put a curse on the whole team. I told Glen (Sather) on Sunday that the team might be better off not having me around. With my brother (who was an unemployed statistician) available and just as technically qualified as me, it seemed like a good idea to make a change,” said Goles.

On Tuesday night, apparently Sather agreed. Having watched Nomar Goles for the past two games, Sather said, “let Seymour Goles go in and hope that we start winning”. And with that, Nomar resigned and his brother, Seymour, immediately was in as the Rangers new statistician.

“It’s all for the best. I felt like the Maytag repairman for much of the season. Not having any work to perform is sometimes harder than having too much. I also took a lot of flack from what happened last week,” Nomar said.

Nomar was referring to having pronounced Brendan Shanahan’s goal scoring ability “dead” last Wednesday. The obituary entitled: R.I.P.—Shanahan’s Scoring Succumbs to Old Age After 19+ Seasons was published by the Hockey Humorist on October 17.

As to whether the new team statistician, Seymour Goles, might be willing to alter his brother’s findings on Shanny’s scoring ability, Seymour is uncommitted. “I’ll have my eye on Shanahan’s goal scoring, but I’ll have to see more,” said Seymour.

Meanwhile, Sather remains optimistic that this move will help the Rangers turn their disappointing season around. “Seymour Goles is a name that the whole team can rally around. It will be our new battle cry. Besides, at this point I’ll try just about anything,” said Sather.

Humorist’s Hindsight: Let’s hope that this same-day double play works out better than the last one Sather pulled. After signing both Scott Gomez and Chris Drury within hours of each other on July 1, the yearly $14+ Million dollar duo has combined to average barely over a half a point per game each (9 points in 16 combined games), while showing very little chemistry with their linemates.

I also find it quite interesting that both Nomar Goles and the Hockey Humorist received quite a bit of criticism over what was said in R.I.P.—Shanahan’s Scoring Succumbs to Old Age After 19+ Seasons.

Today, Larry Brooks of the New York Post and Dubi Silverstein of the Blueshirt Bulletin both expressed their concerns over whether Shanahan’s age is a factor in Shanny’s scoring decline. Here are the links: Post and Blueshirt Bulletin.

Brooks even quotes some of the same statistics that I used in several of my articles, such as the fact that Shanahan had only “scored six goals in 29 games before his Feb. 17 concussion” last year. Too many Ranger fans either seem to be unaware of these facts or are just ignoring them.

Although Shanahan’s scoring may have stopped, my pursuit of this subject matter will not.

Bruins & Bad Boston Ice Bounce by Blueshirts as Slap Shots Strike Down Straka

BOSTON—Despite a much improved team effort, strong defensive play and another stellar performance by goaltender, Henrik Lundquist, the Rangers never got the bounce they needed (and deserved) while losing 1-0 in a shootout to the Boston Bruins.

Ordinarily the story of 1-0 shootout would be that neither goalie, Lundquist or Manny Fernandez, allowed a goal during regulation or overtime. Or perhaps it would be about the game-winning shootout goal scored by Bruins forward, Phil Kessel. However, this was no ordinary game—thanks to the maintenance crew at the TD Banknorth Garden.

Either the Garden maintenance crew never found out about the time change for today’s hockey game (from 7 pm to 4 pm) or they donated their services all day to the Boston Red Sox in preparation for night’s playoff game at Fenway Park.

Regardless of the reason, when the referee and players were ready for the drop of the puck at 4 pm, the Garden ice certainly was not. All game long (for both teams) the puck hopped, skipped, rolled and bounced over sticks, skates and everything else. In fact, during the waning seconds of regulation time, one bizarre ricochet off the boards went right through the Boston goal-mouth and nearly deflected off Fernandez into the net.

Icy gravel would have provided a better playing surface than that cold, chippy concoction of crap on which the Rangers and Bruins were forced to skate. The puck, which wouldn’t sit down or cooperate for anyone, acted like a stubborn, untrained dog who needed a good smack on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper.

To put this issue in its proper perspective, today’s ice in Boston was equal or worse than the most horrid ice conditions I’ve ever witnessed at Madison Square Garden. Given that I’ve been a Rangers fan since the early 1970’s, this is an indication of how outrageous and insulting it was to watch today’s game.

Adding injury to insult, Rangers forward, Martin Straka, received an unfortunate break after bravely blocking two blasts off the big stick of Bruins defenseman, Zdeno Chara. According to the Rangers team-owned (or NHL owned—depending on who wins the lawsuit) website, Straka broke a finger on his right hand.

This is especially bad news for a struggling Rangers team that is already playing without injured forwards, Sean Avery and Marcel Hossa, and who have scored a league low 13 goals.

Despite Straka’s injury, the Rangers outplayed Boston for most of the game. After holding the Bruins at bay through three first period Boston power plays, the Blueshirts outshot the Bruins 22 to 10 the rest of the way.

This game was certainly close enough that under normal ice conditions, it is very possible the Rangers might have lost anyway. On the other hand, the Rangers might have prevailed and picked up both very-needed points. It’s a shame that a fair outcome hit a bad patch of Boston ice and hopped out of everyone’s collective reach.

With the talent-laden Pittsburgh Penguins up next for the Rangers, it will take bounces and breaks of another kind to prevent the Blueshirts from falling three games under NHL .500 this early in the season.

Big Scoop Needed to Clean-Up Blueshirts' Bullshit After Blueland Blowout

ATLANTA—Bottom-feeding Atlanta was the latest team to “kick the crap” out of the Rangers … and boy did it stink!

Bolstered by boisterous Blueland* boosters, the Thrashers thoroughly throttled the Rangers throughout tonight’s tilt. The game’s final score of 5-3 was no indication of how one-sided it was for 50 minutes.

Although one could say that Rangers goaltender, Henrik Lundquist, was good enough to keep the Rangers in the game early, it is a moot point because the Rangers didn’t bother to show up for the game at all.

Before the Rangers finally exerted themselves midway through the third period, Atlanta had already built an insurmountable 4-0 lead on goals by Pascal Dupruis, Slava Koslov, Todd White and Bryan Little. Marian Hossa later added the fifth Thrasher goal.

Third period goals by Dan Girardi, Brendan Shanahan** and Scott Gomez would have given the Rangers a respectable result, if they hadn’t just lost to an Atlanta team who came into the game with a record of 0-6-0 and a league worst 4.50 goals against average.

In reality the Rangers play dropped another level, going from the gutter to the sewer.

In trying to direct blame at specific Ranger players, the human body unfortunately doesn’t have enough fingers (or toes) to accomplish the task. But one player who simply cannot escape my finger’s poke is Rangers defenseman, Thomas Pock.

Pock, perpetually posing as a practice pylon, proved to be the perfect replacement for much-maligned, Marek Malik. Although Pock had his share of giveaways (with at least one egregious offender), he probably didn’t quite match Malik’s nightly quota. This, however, was only because Pock was too busy watching Thrashers skate around him all night, while letting other Thrashers plant themselves in front of the net as goals were being scored.

Overall, Pock had a minus 2 rating for the evening and was on the ice for 3 of Atlanta’s 5 goals.

Even the three late Ranger power play goals weren’t much consolation for the Blueshirts special teams, because the Rangers managed to give up 2 power play goals and a short-handed goal themselves.

This chemistry experiment is quickly turning into a dismal failure, while mad professors, Tom Renney and Glen Sather, desperately continue their search for the missing combination of ingredients. Should they fail to find the winning formula, the Rangers laboratory will soon be boarded-up and declared a disaster area by New York governor, Eliot Spitzer.

*Blueland is the nickname for Atlanta’s home rink, Philips Arena.

Humorist’s Hindsight: **That was no misprint—Brendan Shanahan actually scored a goal. This just goes to show you that even an old, broken clock is right twice a day. Now should Shanny net another 25 or 30 goals this season, I will be happy to issue a public apology over my last post entitled: R.I.P.—Shanahan’s Scoring Succumbs to Old Age After 19+ Seasons.

R.I.P.—Shanahan’s Scoring Succumbs to Old Age After 19+ Seasons

NEW YORK—Brendan Shanahan’s goal scoring ability has died after more than 19 highly successful seasons in the NHL.

The attending statistician, Nomar Goles, pronounced Shanahan’s scoring “dead” after a final but futile effort to resuscitate it during the waning moments of the Rangers 3-1 defeat to Ottawa last Saturday.

“Mr. Shanahan’s goal scoring ability had been in a steady state of decline for nearly a year now,” said Goles.

In his final 38 regular season games of 2006-2007, Shanahan scored only 7 goals on 154 shots—a shooting percentage of 4.5%. In this season’s first 5 games, Shanahan has scored 0 goals on 32 shots, including a goalless 13 shot performance against Ottawa on his “goal scoring deathbed” last Saturday.

“At the end, his vital statistics showed no signs of life,” said Goles.

Goles was also quick to point out that Shanahan’s concussion from last year was not a contributing factor to his scoring demise. According to Goles, in the 29 games preceding the concussion Shanahan had only scored 6 goals on 116 shots—a shooting percentage of 5.2%.

“This was just a matter of age finally catching up to a great former goal scorer,” Goles said somberly.

Shanahan’s scoring is survived by 627 regular season NHL goals and 58 NHL playoff goals. No final arrangements for his hockey sticks have been announced.

Humorist’s Hindsight: I want to make it crystal clear that the obituary (above) was figuratively referring to the “goal scoring ability” of Brendan Shanahan. It was not in any way meant to be a literal obituary for the man, Shanahan, who is physically alive and healthy.

Furthermore, I admire Shanahan as a person and still in some ways as a player. He is not only a class act, but also a great leader in the locker room, a hard working player, and a formerly great goal scorer. I wish him a long, healthy and happy life after his playing days are over.

As a Rangers fan, however, I’m hoping that his playing days are over ASAP. As the statistics prove, his goal scoring ability (at least in the regular season) has virtually disappeared since December 9, 2006.

Also, since he has been on Broadway, Shanahan has showed no chemistry with Jagr, Prucha, Gomez, or Drury—thus ruining most lines on which he’s played. Because he also can’t score on the power play and nobody is scoring goals on defections or rebounds off his power play shot, he has no business being on either power play unit.

Shanahan’s outrageously inflated salary this season of $5.3 million is a cap crippling calamity, whose effects will be felt both this season and next. With a little luck, maybe Shanny has been talking with Chuck (Charles Schwab) about structuring a “Retirement Plan for Old Man Shanahan”. And if Shanahan is the team-first person that he claims to be, then he will implement that retirement plan before his bonus sets in, because that course of action is truly in the best interest of the team.

Combustible Chemistry Causes Rangers to Self-In-Sen-erate in 52 Seconds

NEW YORK — In one of the oddest reported occurrences of spontaneous human combustion, 19* men simultaneously blew up in front of over 18,000 horrified witnesses.

Although the entire explosive event took less than a minute, one scientist, who happened to be on hand, had a handle on how it happened.

“Whenever you combine very potent and efficient Canadian firepower with MSG ice, sloppy defensive play and too many new player combinations, there is always a small chance of having this kind of freakish result,” said Korean chemical engineer Yu B. Sik.

Fortunately, since the fireworks finished so fast, the fire department never had to be called. Although Ranger head coach, Tom Renney, was unavailable for comment, Brendan Shanahan took “a shot” at giving the players’ explanation for the Manhattan Meltdown. Unfortunately, like all of his other shots this year, Shanahan was off target with his comments—missing the microphone by a good two feet.

Amazingly, despite the horrific happenstance, all 19* players survived and are expected to be in the lineup Thursday against Atlanta.

*I gave backup goalie, Stephen Valiquette, an exemption because he didn’t play. However, this is only an honorary exemption, because had Valiquette been in net, things might have gotten worse yet.

Humorist’s Hindsight: Let’s face it. Even if the Rangers hadn’t self-imploded by giving up 3 goals in that minute of misery, they had no chance against the vastly superior Senators. Ottawa was so clearly the better team in every phase of the game. This includes being bigger, faster, more skilled, quicker to the puck, more physical, having a better transition game, etc.

At this point Ottawa is like a well-oiled, fine-tuned industrial machine, while the Rangers are like a rich kid’s rendition of an out-of-sync gadget thrown together for a science class project. It seems hard to believe that in the next 6 months the Rangers are going to be able to catch up with their Canadian counterparts.

It also doesn’t help that the Rangers have next to nothing left in the salary cap kitty with which to purchase any meaningful machine parts before the trade deadline.

At the moment, I can only think of 2 funny aspects to the Rangers slow start to the season:

1. That anyone could have seriously believed the Rangers were Stanley Cup contenders, given that they will almost certainly have to get past Ottawa in the playoffs, and
2. That Glen Sather shelled out over $5 million to Brendan Shanahan this season, believing that he was still a formidable goal scorer—despite all the contrary evidence over Shanahan’s last 38 regular season games of 2006-2007. Details of Shanahan's "sinking ship of a scoring shot" from last season are found in the middle of this August 3rd article.

With 5 more goalless games to start this season, Shanny’s Fanny is going to get an “old” fashioned, verbal butt kicking by the Hockey Humorist in posts that will appear sometime before Thursday’s game in Atlanta.

Cap-Strapped Rangers De-Cap-itate Cap-Happy Caps

Although the final score of 3-1 might not be indicative of de-Cap-itation, the Rangers total domination over the first two periods (in puck control, shots on goal and scoring chances) certainly does.

Besides, I’ve been waiting all summer to use this headline, and with only 3 games left against Washington, I might not have had another chance to use it this season.

For the Record: The salary cap numbers that I used for writing the above headline are accurate. According to NHLSCAP.com, the Rangers currently (before the potential signing of Dave Scatchard) are the fifth tightest cap team in the NHL, while the Capitals are the second loosest cap team in the NHL.

Humorist’s Hindsight: Mrs. Nylander may have escaped her Edmonton exile and Michael may have Cap-italized with an overpriced and over-extended four year contract (taking him past retirement age), but the Nylanders will never hoist the Stanley Cup. Despite their improved roster, Washington is just not going to be a prime time playoff performer.

Speaking of retirement, don’t you think it’s about time for Stan Fischler? By doing the unthinkable—simultaneously rooting for and appearing on the telecasts of the Rangers, Devils and Islanders—he’s made me sick to my stomach for years. But his comment on today’s MSG telecast should have had Rangers fans replacing their Rodent TV bricks with Fischler Barf Bags.

Fischler actually made a serious comment about expecting Ryan Hollweg to become a consistent goal scorer. I’ve checked with the local bookies and the odds of Hollweg achieving this science fictional leap of logic is listed right next to the odds of the following two scenarios: 1) Christian Dube and the Ferraro twins making a 2007 comeback for the Blueshirts, and 2) hell freezing over before the Ottawa game.

Rumor has it that the three ex-Rangers and Hades have had more takers than Hollweg.

For those who have wondered what happened to the Hockey Humorist over the past two months, the answer is two-fold. I simply don’t have the time anymore to write those long-winded, amusing, fact-filled, opinionated, semi-fictional stories.

Also, notwithstanding the loyal readers who enjoyed and understood my humor, it became obvious that most hockey fans are looking for facts, opinions and arguments, instead of laughs.

That having been said, I’ve decided to re-emerge with a change in format. I still intend to offer my opinions, while using facts to support them. And I still intend to focus on unique and amusing angles of NHL hockey (especially pertaining to the Rangers), while leaving the other traditional blogs and websites to provide you with most of your information. The difference is that I’m going to write in shorter snippets, as opposed to verbose storytelling.

With a Time Machine and a Therapist—May Rangers Have Run Ruff-Shot Over Sabres

The following morsel - reshaped, recooked and reflavored by the imagination and slightly warped mind of The Hockey Humorist – was inspired by an original idea of the esteemed Hockey Rabbi.

It’s mid-August in the dead of summer with NHL activity nearly frozen still. At this time of the year hockey fans have two choices: either look ahead to next season at what might be, or look back to last season at what might have been. For the moment I propose that Ranger fans do the latter…

FLASHBACK! Madison Square Garden—May 1, 2007 at 9:44 PM. It was the most pivotal time of the entire roller coaster season—smack in the middle of an excruciatingly exciting, see-saw playoff series between the Rangers and Sabres. In dramatic fashion the Rangers had just evened up the series at 2 games a piece, when a controversial no-goal decision in the waning seconds allowed the Rangers to cling to victory by the “skin of their crease”.

Following game 4, Sabres head coach, Lindy Ruff, looked lost, and the answers he was searching for were not coming easily. How had his Presidents’ Trophy winning team dropped two straight games to a team who hadn’t beaten his squad all year long? Why was his offense, who could seemingly score at will during the regular season, having so much trouble lighting the lamp against the Blueshirts? What were the Rangers doing defensively to slow down his team’s warp-speed skating skills?

If the Sabres swords were silenced for good over the next two games, how would he ever be able to show his face in the city of Buffalo again—especially when the Sabre fans considered the 2007 Stanley Cup to be their entitlement? And finally, what could he possibly do to turn the tide when his ship and the series seemed to be sailing off into the sunset without the Sabres onboard?

Trying to put his best face forward, Ruff’s spoke optimistically—but he wasn’t fooling anyone. Ruff, who even later admitted the Rangers had “scared them to death”, was clearly a man in trouble that needed professional help.

It was at this fork on the road to the Stanley Cup, when the super-series met the super-natural. As Ruff exited the Garden, he was greeted by some eerily familiar music and two cabbies—one of whom bore a striking resemblance to the late Rod Serling, while the other was … NHL commissioner, Gary Bettman?

Bettman, trying to lure Ruff into his cab, attempted the best Yellow Medallion Taxicab driver impersonation he could muster up—but like most of Bettman’s endeavors to raise revenues (even one as simple as collecting taxi fare), all he did was screw it up. So given the choice between riding with a live, incompetent commissioner or a dead, neurotic writer/director, Lindy made the same choice that any sane hockey fan, player, or coach would have made—Ruff rode with Rod.

As this strange pair drove into the night, Serling began to explain to Ruff that many of the characters in his classic sci-fi/fantasy TV series faced similar dilemmas to the one that Ruff was now facing. And just when they were at the crossroads in their respective lives, these characters would unlock their proverbial doors “with the key of imagination”. Often, they would find their way and their answers by experiencing new places, new cultures and new ways of thinking.

Serling told him that now, through the dimensions of space, time, mind, and hockey blogs, Ruff will be rewarded with this kind of life changing (and possibly series changing) opportunity. As Serling stepped on the gas, the car and its two passengers were transported through some type of worm-hole in the space-time continuum. Once he saw the signpost up ahead, Ruff knew he had cleared Manhattan and had just crossed over into The Twilight Zone.

Serling dropped Ruff off in front of a synagogue, whose location could have been any city in the country. It was here that he was met by none other than our own Hockey Rabbi. Lindy’s first impressions of him were quite positive, as the Hockey Rabbi seemed to have a calming influence on the ruffled and riled Ruff.

As the two men walked towards the Hockey Rabbi’s office, Ruff couldn’t help but notice how those around him seemed at peace with their culture and their lives. Although he had no idea how far he was from Madison Square Garden, Lindy’s mind seemed to be a million miles away from the turmoil he had left behind.

Once in the Hockey Rabbi’s office, Ruff (noticeably more comfortable) laid across the sofa with his feet up on its side. He began pouring out all of his troubles to the Hockey Rabbi. He spoke about how his seemingly invincible team was proving to be very vulnerable, and that he was having trouble handling the burden that came with the fans and media having such high expectations for the Sabres.

The Hockey Rabbi responded with a quote from the Talmud (one of Judaism’s holiest works): “The burden is equal to the horse's strength”.

Ruff said that the strategies which had worked all season long were no longer working. He kept asking himself whether he should make changes or stay with the system that had been so successful. The Hockey Rabbi countered with the Yiddish saying: “Better ask ten times than go astray once”.

Then Lindy confided in the Hockey Rabbi by sharing his biggest fear of all—self doubts about his ability as a coach and whether he had what it took to overcome such adversity. Turning back to the Talmud, the Hockey Rabbi said, “Doubt cannot override a certainty”.

As the Hockey Rabbi addressed each of Ruff’s issues, Lindy’s spirits soared while his confidence climbed. Just as Serling had suggested, this previously unfamiliar culture and way of thought gave Ruff the fresh perspective that he needed. Empowered by his new found wisdom, Lindy was all smiles now as he noshed on a knish (snacked on a potato pancake).

By the end of the session, he was in Olam Haba (Heaven—sort of). The therapeutic breakthrough led the two men to perform an extremely vigorous, celebratory “Hava Nageela” type dance in the middle of the Hockey Rabbi’s office.

During the dance, Ruff’s athleticism became apparent as his powerful legs kicked over racks of books, the Hockey Rabbi’s souvenir hockey pucks, the knish and its dish, and everything else that got in the way of Lucky Lindy’s size 12 shoes. Ruff gave the Hockey Rabbi such naches (fatherly pride) for all that he had achieved in such a short time.

The next day, after traveling (with Serling) back through the worm-hole and meeting up with his team in Buffalo, the rejuvenated Ruff knew exactly what to do. The first order of business was to have the Sabre players replace their hockey helmets with Sabre-themed yarmulkes (skullcaps or beanies), which left the team scratching their heads—and not because of itchy material.

The next course of action was to change the menu at the HSBC arena for game 5. All beer was replaced by varieties of Manischewitz wine. All ice-cream was served in a Cohn. Popcorn was replaced by grebenes, French fries replaced by potato latkes, etc. As far as hot dogs were concerned—no problem. But Ruff made sure that the HSBC management and their purveyors answered to a “higher authority”, and only kosher hot dogs would be placed in their challah (Jewish bread) buns.

Just before the opening face-off for game 5, everything was looking rozewe (rosy) for Ruff. That is until Lindy received some really Ruff news from a Sabre team official— the Hockey Rabbi wasn’t a real Rabbi at all. In fact, he’s an attorney who is of all things: A RANGER FAN!

Apparently Sabre surveillance tapes (of game 4 at MSG) showed the Hockey Rabbi in the seats behind the Ranger bench, wearing a Jaromir Jagr jersey and passing out business cards—thus “spilling the beans” on this buttinski (a derogatory Slovak slang word for attorney).

Ruff was shocked, utterly panicked and once again lost. Lindy proceeded to botch every conceivable coaching maneuver and strategy over the next two games. Among other things, he continuously mismatched line combinations, repeatedly received bench minors for too many men on the ice, and was frequently overheard calling all his players either Scheider, Halpern, or Cammalleri—the last names of the only Jewish hockey players in the NHL.

At the end of this fiasco with the Sabres being humiliated and eliminated in 6 games, Ruff’s mind (along with the Sabres patience for his blunders) finally snapped—leading to a complete mental breakdown.

All kinds of thoughts started racing through Ruff’s head, such as: Did Serling set me up? Was I just the butt-end of a posthumous, surreal Serling reality show? Instead, should I have boarded with Bettman? What am I thinking—how could anyone rely on Bettman? I must be crazy for even considering it! What’s happening to me? How could the season have collapsed so suddenly?...

At the press conference that followed game 6, Ruff was in no condition to speak to the media. He was, however, sitting within earshot of the press conference under a doctor’s supervision. Dehydrated and hungry, the doctor had given Ruff a bowl of chicken soup. Why chicken soup? Well, for one “it couldn’t hurt”—and besides Ruff was not in the frame of mind to realize the cultural significance of his meal.

On the podium, Buffalo GM, Darcy Regier, addressed the media and told them that Ruff was suffering from a rare condition called Neuro-Hockrabitis. Regier tried to ease the concerns of the media, team and fans by reassuring everyone that the Sabres were sending Ruff to the best clinic in the world for this rare condition. This would take Ruff’s mind completely away from the past week’s events. After the media naturally asked where the clinic was, Regier innocently answered, “Jerusalem”.

Immediately as Ruff overheard the location of his impending medical treatment and convalescence, the entire week’s nightmare replayed through his head. As the image of Serling entered his thoughts, that eerie music started playing again and just as quickly as he had entered it, Lindy abruptly exited The Twilight Zone…

BACK TO REALITY - As you obviously know, Lindy Ruff never saw the Hockey Rabbi on that fateful day in early May. Instead he gathered himself, regrouped his team and led them to a 6 game victory in the series over the gallant, but overmatched Rangers. However, as is often the case in dreams, there was a “kernel of truth” in the fantasy we just experienced.

It turns out that the Hockey Rabbi does offer his services to those people (who after living through the Rangers-Sabres playoff series) are in most in need of it. Who might that be? Why the Ranger fans of course.

The Hockey Rabbi would be happy to provide a personal consultation with any Ranger fan…for $400 per hour. What!!! $400 per hour??? Remember, I told you that he was an attorney, not a therapist nor a real rabbi. In fact, I understand that a group of Ranger fans are paying the Hockey Rabbi quite handsomely to file a lawsuit on behalf of Henrik Lundquist (against his teammates) for lack of support in game 6.

Naturally this might invoke from you the usual series of lawyer jokes, such as the “Lawyers take everything joke” - A reporter outside of a courtroom asked a defendant clad only in a barrel: "Oh, I see your attorney lost the case!" The defendant answered, "No, we won." ­­­Or perhaps you prefer—Question: What's the difference between a good lawyer and a bad lawyer? Answer: A bad lawyer can let a case drag out for several years. A good lawyer can make it last even longer. And so forth and so on…

But never one to allow himself to be holding the short end of the hockey stick, the Hockey Rabbi’s response would probably be: "Zolst farliren aleh tseyner achitz eynm, un dos zol dir vey ton". What does that mean? Never mind, but I can assure you, he just got even!

However, before you jump to conclusions about the Hockey Rabbi, you should know that he is quite generous in many ways. For openers, he asked nothing in return for giving me the original idea that was twistingly morphed into this post (thus earning him the post’s primary assist).

Also, if you go to http://www.hockeyrabbi.typepad.com/, he will treat you 24 hours a day (365 days a year—except on the Sabbath and other Jewish holidays) to wisdom, insight and commentary about the New York Rangers and the rest of the league—AT NO CHARGE!

A Metziah! (Such a Deal!)

For the Record: There is no lawsuit being filed by The Hockey Rabbi against the Rangers players or organization. He is a real estate attorney, who charges reasonable fees for his services. The non-translated insult at the end of the post is a real Yiddish insult that roughly translates as: "May you lose all your teeth but one, and may that one ache.” Also, it is unknown whether Lindy Ruff actual wears size 12 shoes.

Finally, I want to clarify that in the dream sequence of my story, Lindy Ruff’s fictional character was portrayed as embracing the Jewish culture. Ruff’s character freaked out because once he discovered that The Hockey Rabbi was a Ranger fan, he realized that he had been mentored by someone who was rooting against his team. The character’s reaction was not intended to be a display of anti-Semitism.