Much ado about nothing

Much ado about nothing by Ovi's haters. Oh well, there might be some innocent morons bystanders who believe the haters.

But this post is not for the two categories described above. This is for Ovechkin's fans who might run into this on some message board or on a hockey forum. So you need to be informed and prepared.

I saw the video yesterday and just shrugged, there was nothing there. But then the story was re-tweeted, the video was re-posted all over and I couldn't believe how many tweets were going out there. That's why I'd like to thank Dave Stubbs of Montreal Gazette and his blog "Habs Inside/Out".

Here's what he wrote:

OK, not that Alexander Ovechkin needs my support, but here's a little background on his pregame kicking of snow on the socks of the young Canadiens flag-bearer that's got so many folks' knickers in a twist.

Here's the YouTube video of it (image at left is from the RDS feed).




When Washington emerges from their room across the Bell Centre rink, every Capitals player turns a few quick warmup laps. Not Ovechkin. Not last night, not for Game 3 Monday. Ovie sprints absolute full bore across the ice to the Caps bench, hits the brakes and immediately takes his seat at the end, beside where the Habs' backup goalie sits.

Other players need the fast laps to get pumped. But Ovechkin does this. Game 3, he came so hard that his stop nearly sliced the stray cable of the cameraman kneeling on the ice to shoot the Habs coming onto the rink. He'll do the same for Game 6, if there is one and if he's not in the starting six.

The good news is, this flag-waving kid will live forever on YouTube. Too bad for him the snow from Ovechkin's skates melted on his socks, or he could have sold them for a pile of dough on eBay.

But imagine if Ovie had slipped. They'd still be taking the kid off the boards with a spatula.

Watch how Ovechkin hits the brakes, his skates are turned away from the kid, if he really wanted to spray the kid, he could've turn left, instead he turns right to avoid spraying the kid.



Here are some tweets about it from Nate Ewell, Director of Media Relations for the Washington Capitals:

nateewell: 1) Kid shouldn't stand in front of our bench 2) guarantee he's bragging to friends about having snow sprayed by Ovi

nateewell: @emptynetters I know you're doing your job mocking the Caps, but there's zero harm here. And the kid should. Not. Be. There.

More from Sean Leahy, Puck Daddy:

The young flag-bearers are members of the Montreal Canadiens fan club selected before each game, according to the team.

While the anti-Ovechkin crowd will see this as a classless act because it's, well, Ovechkin, you just know that that kid is somewhere in a Montreal-area elementary school right now bragging to his buddies about getting snowed on by the Washington captain. He probably has the YouTube video favorite'd.

(Update) More reaction from Montreal:

By DAVE STUBBS, The Gazette, April 23, 2010:

The Capitals then won the series Wednesday night with Snowgate.

Incredibly, a fuss has been made of Ovechkin's Game 4 pregame sprint across Bell Centre ice en route to his team's bench.

In stopping sharply, even spectacularly, he kicked up snow on one of the Canadiens' two young flagbearers. The dash is something he does in every rink, but this time it was a boy, not the boards, who caught the spray.

(That the kid surely was an autograph-signing hero at school yesterday, a star on YouTube who has a story for his future grandchildren, seems to have escaped those ripping hockey's most exciting player for arrogance and disrespect. No matter this is a superstar who adores playing in Montreal and generally is excellent with his young fans, or that no one complained about the routine during Washington's two regular-season visits here.)

The Capitals had yesterday off, but Ovechkin was made aware of the commotion in a text message from team spokesman Nate Ewell. He replied that the gesture was done playfully, without ill intent, and he thought the youngster would get a kick out of it.

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