Pittsburgh Sports, Opinion and Politics | Just Watch the Game Blog

I’ve been saying for a while now that sports fans need to grow up.

I think we’ve all seen plenty of evidence of over-the-top, stupid behavior at games and plenty of evidence of what appears to be arrested development.

I think it’s all about a lack of perspective. The games are on their way — if they’re not there already — to becoming incidental to the extraneous activity.

We now have 40-something adults doing things at games that you used to only get from teenagers and college kids.

That would include the whole replica jersey phenomenon.

Fans seem to be in competition with each other to show who is most dedicated to the team.

What better way to do that than to beat someone up for wearing the jersey of an opposing team?

You would think that nobody over the age of say, 12, would be enough of a moron to boo an anti-cancer message on the stadium big screen simply because it was being delivered by opposing players.

That would be selling the Flyers’ fans short.

Of course, the blogger for Puck Daddy goes on to say that he’d be disappointed at any fan base that didn’t boo under those circumstances.

This is not your typical hockey fight:

Serious injuries are rare in hockey fights. They usually look a lot worse than they are.

Jay Beagle found out the hard way last night that there’s always a chance that you’re going to lose consciousness and shed blood.

Beagle and the rest of the league also found out that it’s not a good idea to take cheap shots at the Penguins’ star players.

Beagle hit Kris Letang in the face and knocked his helmet off a few seconds before he was confronted by Asham.

When Beagle did that he also sent a message to the people who want to ban fighting in the NHL. He showed them what would happen to star players if there was no price to pay for the guys who take shots at them.

Sidney Crosby will be coming back soon.

I have a feeling that Asham is not going to have a lot of patience for anybody who decides to take a cheap shot at him.

What Asham did after the knockout was low class, but give him credit for saying so in the locker room after the game.

Meanwhile, Beagle should be glad it was Asham he ran into last night instead of Steve McIntyre, the Penguins official star protector.

He’s 6’5″, 250.

Sidney Crosby wore a black helmet at the morning skate today.

So did every other player on the ice.

That could very well mean that he has been cleared for contact.

Geno Malkin skated this morning, which could mean that he’ll play tonight against the Capitals.

Tonight’s game is a good one for people who say that they don’t watch meaningless games in October.

Under normal circumstances –injuries aside –this would be a game involving three of the five (when healthy) best players in the world.

Why would any sports fan consider having the option to watch that a bad thing?

Don Cherry is the most viewed/listened to hockey commentator in Canada.

Whether he’s the most respected is another story.

He’s taking a lot of heat up north for calling some former NHL enforcers “pukes and hypocrites” for saying that playing that role in the NHL can lead to drug and alcohol problems.

And he thinks that the NHL’s new Prefect of Discipline is overreacing.

Here’s a good report on CBC with responses from some of the goons.

None of this should be surprising anybody in the NHL. The NFL went through the same thing. Eventually the players will figure it out and find a safer middle ground,

Now, in between Steelers, Pitt and West Virginia football games, we will be able to do more than talk about games.

Tonight we can start watching hockey games that count.

The Penguins in Vancouver is a late start but it’s also a pretty good one and it could be a Stanley Cup Final preview.

Versus makes it a doubleheader with the Flyers and the Bruins, which could be an Eastern Conference Final preview. It’s also Jaromir Jagr’s first game as a Flyer.

The man to watch in the early part of the season is Brendan Shanahan. He’s the NHL’s new Prefect of Discipline and he showed in the preseason that he’s not going to have any patience for illegal hits to the head.

I have a feeling that, before the month is out, we’re going to be reminded of what we missed when the Penguins had to play a third of the season without Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin.

Drop the puck.

It’s hard to believe that the Penguins will be playing a hockey game Wednesday night.

They don’t wait long in the NHL before they start playing exhibition games- training camp starts Saturday.

The best thing about hockey season beginning is that there will be even less focus on the pathetic, aggravating, stinking Pirates.

There will also be real games to watch in about in three weeks.

The Penguins will be a legitimate Stanley Cup contender with or without Sidney Crosby.

Here’s a a nice capsulized look at what each NHL team is dealing with going into training camp.

ESPN.com started its training camp tour in Pittsburgh.

Be sure to check out my show from noon to 2, Mon-Fri on TribLive Radio. I’ll have plenty of hockey experts on all season long, including some of the top NHL.com, ESPN, Versus/NBC and TSN analysts.

I think you’ll find it more interesting than listening to what Steve from McKeesport thinks on The Fan.

Donald Fehr is the Executive Director of the NHL Players Association. The NHL CBA expires one year from yesterday.

The NHL has a salary cap. It also has an owner in Detroit who says he hates the cap because it prevents him from spending as much as he wants.

If you liked how things were going for the Penguins before the lockout and the introduction of the salary cap, you’ll love this quote from Fehr:

“The debate at the table is hopefully going to be driven by numbers and it’s not going to be driven by philosophy,” Fehr said. “Having said that, the league with far and away the most stability and the least problems is baseball, and that’s true since ’94. It’s the only one with no cap.”

If there is no salary cap in the NHL, the Penguins become the Pirates.

And it’s pretty obvious that the players love Donald Fehr.