Tavares Saves and Everyone is Fleeing Jersey!

Well, I for one am fully stoked. John Tavares is officially a New York Islander. I will say that I was slightly disappointed that the organization actually did what the fans wanted. Hear me out on this. The Nassau Coliseum had between 8,000-10,000 fans there for the draft party. Most of whom had a few drinks in them (not that the Coliseum's management helped with that since only Doolin's Pub in the basement was open to serve beer). I figured, while sitting in my usual section of 315, that I was gonna hear something along the lines like "The Islanders trade their First Overall Pick to Toronto for Olaf Kolzig and a bag of pucks" or "With the Number One Pick the Islanders choose Brett Lindros, Jr.". Then after this announcement someone, probably from section 315, was gonna yell "LET'S TEAR THIS PLACE APART!!!" and an all out riot would commence. People from the Islanders and the Coliseum would be fleeing in terror while the fans fast track owner Charles Wang's plan for a new building by destroying the current one. Obviously this didn't happen and the fans are happy for now. It's the least we could get after a dreadful season. Let's just hope Tavares and the rest of the team can keep the fans happy. He already did a good job saving the Coliseum.

So apparently unless your first name is Martin and your last name is Brodeur you do not want to play in Newark, New Jersey. The Devils lost Brian Gionta, which is really no surprise cause it was obvious he was gonna get overpaid from somewhere and that somewhere being Montreal which gave him a $25 million contract over the next 5 years. The Devils also lost Michael Rupp and John Madden to free agency as well which is frightening since these two players seemed to be core players of the franchise. It can't all be about the money for all of these former Devils. Lou Lamoriello must have somekind of loyalty from his players. I mean it seems to work out well in Detroit, which is the only other consistent contender in the NHL in the past decade. There must be something in the water in Newark that makes everyone flee that ridiculously awesome arena. My main question being a non-Devils fan is this; when is Zach Parise going to be an UFA? And are the NY Rag$ not going to have enough room under the salary cap to not afford him? Well on the bright side the Devils did manage to sign one free agent... Yann Danis. I guess with as much playing time as he's gonna get behind Brodeur it didn't matter who they signed to fill that role. I guess the moral of the story seems to be that no matter how you clean the place up, it's still Jersey.

And coming back full circle to the Isles... I'm currently watching episodes from the first season of "30 Rock" and I noticed a nice shout out to the Isles. It's a conversation between Liz Lemon (Tina Fey) and her boyfriend Dennis.

Dennis: I wish the place would've burned down with me in it.

Liz: Why, what happened?

Dennis: My Islanders lost tonight.

Liz: Doesn't that happen a lot?

Well hopefully that conversation can be a thing of the past. At least on the brightside the Islanders still get some notice on national television (also see the NBC show "Life").