Once again, it's the time of year where everyone tries to be extra awesome in this month. You never know exactly who's watching! [Santa?]
So for this year, I've gone and talked about the project for awesome 2019 video as the Chace Numata Scholarship. It was started as a return back to the Erie community for the outpouring of respect from the fans, teammates and alumni.
In November of 2019, the Erie Otters of the OHL hosted a Scholarship night where they featured their neighbor Erie SeaWolves efforts. They designed a jersey that looks like a baseball jersey most commonly worn in UPMC Park next door. I thought the design looks really nice and melds the two teams well with a non clustered design. I'm sure they are going to be a huge collectors item that people will want to grab quickly.
You can check out my video I've done for this year's event, but of course, you should pretty much consider donating to the Scholarship fund.
This week's game is inspired by all the hype from this upcoming game between the Pittsburgh Penguins and Toronto Maple Leafs. It's Phil Kessel's first game against his old Toronto friends. In this episode, I am trying to focus on telling you just how many memories I've gathered from attending Pens games vs Maple Leafs at both Pittsburgh Arenas.
I've also kept up on the October "Breast Cancer Awareness" and "Hockey Fights Cancer" theme. Please consider donating anything you can towards finding a cure or for more medical research.
I am currently 1-0 in this season vs. the CPU.
So, no matter what I've done here during this video game in the series. I'll probably do a rematch over Halloween between these two teams. Yea, I've used the Penguins more times than any other team in the game, but I've been trying to stay current.
Do you have an idea to feature two teams in the next "Game of the Week" series? Then go ahead and leave a comment in the box below or wherever appropriate.
I don't know what happened to the original version of this week's game. When I went back to listen to my commentary to see if everything worked, the audio was not on at the time and missed a lot of what I had said during the game. The video below is actually a re-taping of the live feed from my twitch broadcast.
This week's episode was inspired by the re-broadcast of my Game 4 appearance at the Erie Insurance arena.
If you would like to see an idea or a match-up for Game of the Week episode, leave a comment below or on the youtube channel page. Or through the proper social media channels.
As the tradition continues to grow, the long historical Canada Day Cup Tournament will now be played live on the website (via Twitch). I had originally planned to do this last year, but thanks to my previous misfortunes with my latest laptop, I wasn't able to broadcast it. This year however, I was able to get things done in a more entertaining way.
I also did some preliminary matches with Team Canada and Team USA prior to the tournament. It got out of hand right away and Team USA won that one. We'll see if maybe Team Canada gets some revenge on July 4.
If you're not too familiar with the series, the tournament works like this. Each year, I hold a simulated tournament with each of the 8 Canadian NHL franchises. From there, I go through a match-up with the Provincial rivalries like TOR-OTT and MON-QUE with VAN-WPG and EDM-CGY. Of course it's quite an exciting breakdown and I keep up to date with the way that the Free Agent Frenzy on opening day plays out so that the teams are all square.
This years results were seen on Twitch and then later uploaded to YouTube where you can watch on the video below.
Since I've been doing it for 13 years, it's also one of the longest running traditions here on the Confession of a Hockey Fanatic weblog. I'm hoping to spin this off into a "matchup of the week" type video series were I upload a bunch of games to youtube for your enjoyment.
So, Happy Canada Day to all my Canadian readers! Please party safe and responsibly.
Previous Canada Day Champions
2002: Toronto Maple Leafs
2003: Edmonton Oilers
2004: Quebec Nordiques
2005: Montreal Canadians
2006: Montreal Canadians
2007: Winnipeg Jets
2008: Calgary Flames
2009: Vancouver Canucks
2010: Toronto Maple Leafs
2011: Quebec Nordiques
2012: Edmonton Oilers
2013: Ottawa Senators
2014: Montreal Canadians
2015:
Well, we've made it again for another great year for our 13th anniversary blog post. I want to thank each and every one of my readers who have stopped by to read my blogs and to comment on my work. But it is certainly no time to get nostalgic - but a time to continue to be the first hockey blog and the most innovative content. Yes, not only was I the first of my kind, but I was also the first to integrate audio, video and live-streaming podcasts as complimentary content.
I've had plenty of new things around here recently with the addition of the sponsors, the Insticator trivia app, and the live look at my NHL 15 games via Twitch. Be sure to stop by more frequently and play around with the new social media installed on the website.
I've also planned some new content with the youtube vlog where I'll be doing some live video game streaming, kind of like a "game of the week" thing. If you'd like to sponsor it on upcoming videos, please check with me in the regular social media channels.
But here is my newest video that I've made and debuting here for the 13th anniversary. I've had seen these chips around in the grocery stores locally and wanted to let you all know about them. I've seen some other taste testing videos and wanted to try doing something like that on my channel. On the back, I noticed that the Penguins were merely looking for more income for their main charity Pittsburgh Penguins Foundation, but it's not the first time that the Penguins have put their logo on food going all the way back to Fleury Flakes or City of Champions (with Max Talbot). If you also look around, you'll find the other endorsements of Captain Morgan Spiced Rum and Co-advertising Snapple/Sheetz. For the Penguins, it's boldly entering a new era of revenue. I don't remember when the last time the Penguins had done this. (The Mario bun bar and the Jagr Peanut Butter were straight up player endorsements.) Is this sort of thing common among other teams in NHL markets?
(Special thanks to Cheeky Tam for the inspiration to try a video like this one!)
What always feels like a great big national holiday, the NHL trade deadline is met with a lot of hype and anticipation from every hockey fan in North America. Any trade could make or break a team. In my opinion, the cascading result is going to focus onto some of the teams that are on the bubble (just out of the playoffs looking for a boost back in the playoff hunt). Toronto, Detroit, Minnesota, Dallas,.. I'm looking to each team to make a blockbuster deal at the 3pm.
As Penguins fans now know through learning the hard way, the way to build a championship team is through avoiding messing with team chemistry. They have been mentioned a couple of times linked with several
Let's take a look at the trades that have led up to this trading deadline thus far:
To the Florida Panthers goes goaltender Roberto Luongo (aka "strombone" for his twitter handle) for young prospect Markstrom.
To the St. Louis Blues goaltender Ryan Miller and Steve Ott for goaltender Jaro Halak and...
The one only universal force that brings people around the world together more than hockey is the spirit of Christmas. So, this year, the annual Christmas tradition of a video greeting is in the all-inclusive intentions. I hope that other fans might voice themselves more in to finding what kind of content they expect from Confessions of a Hockey Fanatic in 2014.
From us here at the Confessions of a Hockey Fanatic weblog. Have a very Merry Christmas. May all your hockey dreams come true for one 24 timespan.
I hope that Santa Claus knows how to shop at Shop NHL.com.
One of the best ways to give on the holiday season is to give to those in need. Every year, I highlight a special hockey related foundation to highlight for the Project for Awesome website campaign. It's a great way to get introduced to new funds and charities that really need the attention and money to keep hope (and awesomeness) alive into the next year.
This year, I've chosen to highlight the Mandi Schwartz Foundation because it's a situation that became a heart-felt story where a young woman was in dire need of help. Whereas I think hockey fans are so special, the true goodness in everyone shines through when one of our own is in trouble.
At the season's end, the tradition of holding a championship parade allows for all the fans to come from all around and salute the newly crowned champion. It's a great time of celebration and parties where hard work and dedication finally pays off for only a handful of hockey teams.
Here is where Confessions of a Hockey Fanatic is proud to present the champions of 2013 list. We are hoping that this will be the first video in a new tradition that will carry on every off season.
Check out the video below and celebrate with me if your team as won a championship this season. If I left out a team or two, then add them down in the comments section below with my apologizes.
But if your team didn't win the championship, - there's always next year.
The latest Confessions of a Hockey Fanatic video is up and available for viewing.
This topic today is all about playoff beards and how popular they've become. It's been a standing tradition that the NHL hockey players disregarded some of their hygiene routines during the playoffs so that they can turn their attention to their job. But hockey fans are a different breed all together. They often pick up on the same things that their favorite players do and call it solidarity.
The hockey playoff beard is such an overwhelming mainstream phenomenon that hockey teams often organize it into charity causes.
What would you rate my hockey playoff beard in the video? Do you like it? Am I more "distinguished" now?
Even though we don't have much NHL hockey to talk about yet this season, there's still a reason to celebrate in the holidays.
So, continuing with the tradition of posting up a blog in front of the tree. I've pre-recorded this message to all my subscribers that I've been gaining over the past year. Please take a look at the video and subscribe to it afterwards.
If you want, you can even leave your holiday greetings in the comment box below or over on the channel. I've got a lot of great new things expected for 2013. Be sure to keep checking in from time to time.
Thanks again, guys and gals.
See you again soon on BlogTV. Of course, I'll film a little of the party over there as well.
