A LITTLE HAWK TALK

A LITTLE HAWK TALK

Thoughts While Awai ting the Big Game

 And so this is what it comes down to. One of the closest, craziest and best NHL playoff series most of us have ever experienced  has its finale Saturday night. The winner moves on to play for the Stanley Cup which at this point is almost anticlimactic. After all we've been through, our team and us, shouldn't we get the Cup  immediately?  There's a good chance whoever wins Saturday will wind up with it anyway.

  This bruising,bumping,nail biting, table banging , foot stomping roller coaster ride through Round 3 is almost finished and someone  is going home devastated  and disappointed...not to mention tired, and I don't mean a good kind of tired.

    There is nothing in sports like a Game 7. I collect 'em. There is almost no sport with a best of seven playoff format that I won't watch when the final game decides the winner. And this time I have a considerable emotional investment.

      I've jumped, high fived and yelled through our good times and cursed, retreated and shut the television off in disgust when we went bad. I decorated the house in Hawk and took them all down when I felt my fandom had been betrayed. A wise friend said you must experience the low points with your team because it makes the high points more joyful and that is correct. But I can't stand seeing my team, from whom I expect so much, fail to deliver. We are fortunate that in Chicago we have one team from which we can expect excellence..a team with the heart of a champion. When they sleepwalk through an opening period or cough up the lead in 37 seconds, I don't take it very well.

       I don't want anyone to be the kind of fan I've become. During game 4 the stress of the fight made me retreat from the bar in which we watched the game. I found a cozy spot on the deck outside and watched from the window to get out of the emotionally charged atmosphere. Sometimes during these games I have to get away. I wish I could enjoy the good and tolerate the bad a bit better. But I've had my sports spirit broken so many times over the years, the prospect of the one team that can deliver the payoff for avid fandom failing to play to its capabilities and bring us what we deserve just makes me want to retreat until things are more to my liking. Heck, I was in the yard last year when a group of friends in  my house watched The LA Kings score the deciding goal that eliminated the Hawks in Game 7 and deprived them of playing for a Cup they would have won.  I would've staid in the yard until the new season started if they hadn't come and got me! And with the memory of that awful ending still dancing in  my head, into the lions den I go again under the same circumstances but we've gone from a King to a Duck. I don't want us to crash and burn again, goals short of our ultimate goal.

       Who knows what's going to happen in Game 7? I've never been the kind of fan who blindly believes. They're gonna win....support the team! Never Give Up! All that sounds great but I read and I listen and I digest the thoughts and feelings of those who know more hockey than I will ever know and I like to think I am a fairly knowledgeable fan .

        Here's why I like the Hawks. They've been there before...it's difficult to think that they can be thrown into any situation they've not seen previously and to which they can't adapt. A bunch of Californians without the passion for hockey possessed by midwesterners chanting "Craaaawwwww-foooorrrrd" at our goalie and making noise for the home team shouldn't mean a thing to the Hawks. I'd rather be playing at home, but the environment is of no consequence.

      Also, the Hawks have been finding the net pretty often the last two games. The Ducks goalie ,Frederik Andersen has been netminding more like Hans Christian Anderson . This guy is not en elite goalie. He has made some quality saves but the Hawks have beaten goalies with much more talent than this guy. You might remember the Minnesota Goalie, Devan Dubnyk, was the hockey flavor of the month, lauded as the NHL's hottest goalie until the Hawks pantsed him in 4 straight games. I'm sure some of that had to do with the Wild defense but you get my point.  Fred Andersen is going to take down the mighty Hawks? For the second straight game, Fred tied his playoff record for most goals allowed-4. (he let in 4 in game 6 cuz one was an ampty netter). This is not a good time to become porous, Fred.

        The Ducks coach, an egg shaped fellow with ruddy cheeks, Bruce Boudreau, may have been a little too forthcoming after Game 6 when he admitted that for the first time in this series, the Ducks lost their composure in Game 6. So let's see... we have a suddenly swiss cheese goaltender and a team the coach admits lost their way right here on the eve of Game 7. "We turned into a bunch of nervous Nellies", Boudreau said. Yikes. You never want to hear that about your team, especially as Game 7 puck drop nears.

         AND, for the first time in this series the Hawks stars shined brightly. The guys who we depend on to come through were there and they were sniping. We have not seen that collection of goal scorers in this series previously. Putting Kane and Toews on the same line is generally an option Coach Q uses when the situation is desperate and the result is more often than not what you saw in 6. That is hockey dynamite- two genuine NHL superstars skating together and making magic with a hockey puck.If the Hawks stars  come to play again in 7 it is tough to see how they won't come away with a ticket to the finals.

          Plus, we have Duncan Keith, a mountain of a hockey player who is being referred to in other worldy terms for his play in the post season. We are looking at the best defenseman to ever skate in Chicago.

            History indicates that the Hawks get better the longer a series goes on.

BUT!   Here's why I like the Ducks.

While the place the Hawks are playing shouldn't effect them, it sure seems to effect the Ducks. They respond to that stupid chanting their Californicated fans present them with and it is hard to argue that they do not. The Ducks have not lost a game in the entire post season in regulation time. And even then they've only lost once. This is a team that won't go down on their home ice. 

    Toews and Kane will not be playing on the same line this time around. The offensive jolt that gave the Hawks was nice but now things will be different. Kane and Toews will be split up because on the same line, they make the second line (on which Kane plays) weaker and more vulnerable. They share the wealth when they split up these two. But, you say, the second line didn't seem to suffer in the Game 6 victory without Patrick Kane.  True, but because we were at home, Coach Q had the last line change and he could schedule that lessened second line against any Duck line he chose. Now that Anaheim has last line change, Q  doesn't have the luxury of winning the match up game. If you see Kane and Toews on the same line at some point Saturday, it would mean we are in trouble.

     The Ducks are a big, bruising team whose strategy has been to hit the Hawks hard and often to wear them down and slow them down.Often it has worked, Thursday it did not. But you KNOW that in this game 7, the Ducks are going to hit even harder and more often than they have previously. This is gonna be a slugfest and I won't be surprised if we see our first real fight of the series.

       Ryan Kessler and Cory Perry are the Toews and Kane of the Ducks and they have been more impressive than the Hawks twosome in this series. That might be heresy but it is also true. Just as it is true that the Ducks have been the better team over these 6 games. They were eliminated in game 7 and round 3 last year just like the Hawks and they are determined not to let that happen again.

       I'm not going to predict this. The Hawks have a maddening habit of giving their best only when they must. By all accounts Thursday's elimination game was their best game of the series. Will we get the Hawks team that flies around, practices puck possesion, offensive creativity and a Keith-Crawford combo that can't be penetrated? Or will they come out ,"nervous nellies" themselves, letting the Ducks feed off the momentum of the crowd and the prize that awaits the winner? They will do anything not to lose this in front of their fans who will be surfing next day no matter what happens.

      Pay close attention to the first ten minutes. That might tell you alot about the next 50.

       Go Hawks!

THE FINAL DAYS OF DAVE

      I "inherited" Johnny Carson and his Tonight Show from my folks. That was my first exposure to TV after dark and

I am forever grateful to my parents for that . Johnny was the best talk show host ever and I firmly believe he will reign

in perpetuity.

      But David Letterman........he was all mine. I discovered Dave with no help from mom and dad. 

      Dave was a smart ass, a guy with a different angle and a new perspective.He was a cynic with an edge to him and

he was unquestionably cool.

        There he was, doing things on TV that I'd not seen done before...a comedic horse of a different color and

appointment television besides. From morning to late night, there has been no one quite like Letterman.

         Sure, Dave lost out on his dream job...hosting The Tonight Show. He lost to a glad handing, generic, formerly

funny comedian whose humor was mild and populist  and Dave  finished second to Jay Leno regularly. But that only

added to his appeal and his legend. Because Dave was a non conformist, rebellious into his golden years with a shot

of adrenaline provided by late in life fatherhood.

         Thus two camps were set up-those that favored warm milk and Leno at bedtime and those who liked the rim shot

and a beer comedy of Dave.

            Dave has been phoning it in for a few years now. He stumbles and stammers  through a monologue

unapologeticly, good jokes laid to waste by a confused and sometimes uninterested delivery.  The stuff he once did

so well- dealing with the common man utilizing razor sharp wit and a bad attitude is handled now by minions named

Biff and Andy and Todd....serviceable acolytes all but none of them were Dave and it was never the same.

             Letterman seemed almost content to rest on his laurels and his massive contributions to pop culture and

television history and he earned that so no criticism  of him is offered here.

              Yet Dave still had life in him and that would be evident when he got to show his skill as an interviewer,  a man

who unlike his network competition, refused to shy away from asking the tough questions .He held his own with the

players from the world stage, leaders and pundits who undoubtedly were taken by surprise by Letterman's intellect

and insight. Dave took stands, defended his beliefs and made no bones about where he stood.

                His final nights in our television lives are disquieting to him. He is uncomfortable with public love and

he blanches at celebrity tribute and affection.

                Dave, like Johnny,  his TV hero before him ,bids America a heartfelt goodnight Wednesday and in doing so,

takes his place in the firmament of true television stars. And David Letterman got there by throwing spitballs and

brickbats and poking at the medium that made him great.

                 And we've loved every minute of it. 

#justice4jacob

Like many of us, Jacob was a worrier. A worrier because his mom is a warrior...she is a cancer survivor and he worries about her because by all rights he should have lost her some years back to this Berkett's Lymphoma , a mother of 3 special needs kids. He worries about her well being, he worries about his brothers ,their dog and the two cats... and to help them out, Jacob recently took a job at Jewel in Rolling Meadows out there on Kirchoff Road. It was his first job and he was proud to be in produce--the section to which he was assigned. This new employment would help pay the bills for his financially strapped family and put a few bucks in his own pocket, the better to one day buy a car.

For months before he got this job, Jacob was involved and invested in an annual fundraiser to benefit St.William Parish. He was an important part of a show that was in rehearsal. Jake likes to make folks laugh and he's good at it, and he was sharing his talent for the benefit of a church to which he did not belong.

Upon being hired, Jacob made it clear to the manager of the store that he was willing to work any hours to which he might be assigned...but as the event he had been working on for months was near, he said that there were just 3 days he would not wish to be scheduled. Those nights were dress rehearsal and the two days of the event. He wrote down the days he would not be available for the benefit of the store manager.

Jacob went to work in the produce section of the Jewel on Kirchoff Road and he enjoyed the job even when the produce manager called him  an idiot and chided him when he didn't understand something. "This isn't rocket science," the produce manager sneered. And he wasn't aware that Jacob heard him mumble "Idiot".

And just as Jacob had worried, when the week of the big event at St.William arrived, the store manager scheduled him to work the 3 days he had asked to be free to fulfill his obligation to the other volunteers at the charity event.

He met with the store manager and reminded him of his unavailability for those 3 days but that manager claimed he didn't remember that particular condition. Jacob said he would be glad to work extra hours, any day..he wanted that job and he wanted to be there for those depending on him at St.William. The store manager would have none of it. Jacob asked if he would be fired were he to work the fundraiser those 3 days.

"I don't fire people," the manager said. "People fire themselves." Jacob reminded the manager that he had written the request for those 3 days off down for the manager weeks ago. But it seems that request had been lost. "And if it's not written down, it didn't happen," Jake was told.

Jacob stood up for what he thought was right, He showed up for his duties at the fundraiser and he sacrificed a job he liked and needed ..even with the verbal abuse.

Put in a situation where he needed to decide between a job he needed and a charity event that needed him, Jacob chose the latter even though he was put in a  bad situation needlessly. Surely Jewel would not shut down if one employee was allowed to give back to his community- an ideal that one would think Jewel would applaud instead of block.

The store manager didn't get back to me as I had requested, so Human Relations became involved and promised an investigation into the incident would be conducted.

"Please know the information shared (by you) will be treated seriously and followed up with appropriate action taken," said Melissa Hill, Jewel's director of Public Affairs and Government Relations. She promised the HR department would be contacting Jake.

A week later, nothing had been done and no one had called Jake as had been promised. A letter to Ms.Hill asking why nothing had been determined resulted in an email from another member of Jewel's HR department.

"The status and results of the investigation are confidential,please know that any appropriate action needed, will or have been taken."

But no one had ever called Jacob so that's a hell of an investigation...not talking to the victim. When I pointed this out, magically, Jacob was called. This "investigation" is ongoing.

At the least, Jacob should be issued an apology from that manager of the Jewel on Kirchoff Road for putting Jacob in a situation like that--forced to choose between his job and his community obligations,and for good measure, an apology for being called an "idiot" by a produce manager who certainly doesn't display the people skills most stores would like to see in their employees. Maybe an invitation to work at another Jewel location to help mom with those bills. And as I mentioned earlier, shouldn't a store like Jewel celebrate employees who involve themselves in the community? Doesn't it show character and good moral fiber and isn't that what most employers seek in a new hire? Well, not at the Jewel on Kirchoff Road it seems.