| Original Message |
Anonymous (no login)
Posted Mar 28, 2012 2:48 PM
So I’ve been coming to this site for almost 5 years now since my son introduced me to it when he was in Bantam. My youngest son is a Pee Wee and plays AA in the GTHL. Who cares?
Well no one really should at this point. What is the point of this posting then? Well it’s season’s over time now and it’s time to lay down my gripes with minor hockey, compared to when I played in the MTHL in the 70’s.
1) Hockey is a business today – Even for non-profit organizations that still exist. It’s about making money or in the very least it’s about not losing money – nowhere in that statement is it about developing a child to be a better citizen.
2) The leagues (EVERY ONE OF THEM) are so watered down that every league has far too many teams and nowhere near the number of players to fill those teams. Look at every division in every league – there will always be two or more teams at the bottom with fewer than 3 or 4 wins (think about this – they play each other three or four times!). This goes hand in hand with number one, but it’s also separate.
3) Everyone thinks their son or daughter is going to the NHL – Parents of hockey children are absolutely the most demented group of individuals I have ever met. When I first got into hockey 12 or 13 years ago, we went to the game, we had fun, we yelled and screamed and we took our kids home. Now we do the same, but we come home and we call each other fucktards online, and we start rumours about coaches and players – then we just open a beer, fart and try to regain our composure.
Did you know this (mom or dad)?
There are about 300,000 kids in Ontario participating in minor hockey and in history, 2087 kids from Ontario have played one or more games in the NHL – that over a 90 plus year span – if you were a mathematician, you’d probably start agreeing with the posters who tell you that young Billy is going to be great in the beer leagues. Your kid IS NOT GOING to the NHL – trust me. I am right about 10000 times for every time I am wrong – a Las Vegas dream!
4) Coaching – Why are so many of the coaches so damned paranoid? Everything in coaching land is about a conspiracy. I once had a coach tell me that the GTHL’s schedule makers worked against our team, because a dad of a kid that we cut was friendly with the GTHL. Bullshit.
5) Referees – There are a few refs left in the GTHL that are truly good guys. They take the time to talk with the kids, explain to them that they will call this or that and generally call a good, if not great, game. But most refs in the leagues these days are doing the game a huge injustice by not holding discussions with the coaches or players when asked to explain themselves. They come and call the game and leave with a wad of cash in their pockets. They remind me of union workers really – they care about hockey about as much as a garbageman cares about the stuff he puts in the truck.
So if you’ve gotten this far, you have successfully read my piece of art about nothing. A rant of sorts. By after scouring through N54 I got sick and tired of reading about all these parents who just feel the need to call someone a fucktard because they don’t know as much about minor hockey as they do. To those neophytes, I congratulate you. You are virgin material in terms of minor hockey. Go forth with your lack of knowledge and enjoy your son or daughter’s experience, because the guy who just called you a fucktard is not going to sleep a wink tonight, because he is so caught up in ensuring his son Billy makes a AAA team this spring – even though it’s a last place team with a lot of A and AA cast offs making up the roster.
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