Sens Army

I figured that since I had been meeting other teams all season that it was time to actually meet the home team. With that though in mind, I took Thursday morning off work and heading down to the Sens practice at the Bell Sensplex.

I got to the arena at around 9:30, just in case some of the players decided to show up early. Now, the funny thing about practices at the Sensplex are that the Sens get dressed in their equipment at Scotiabank Place and then drive over to the practice arena in their gear. Seeing players drive up in full gear (including helmets), except for skates, is one of the funniest things I've seen from professional hockey players.

There were four of us waiting for autographs before practice. It was actually a good thing too, not because I needed help knowing who the players were, but because three or four carloads of players would all arrive at the same time. Its tough to get more than one guy ata time when you are by yourself.

Players began showing up shortly after ten o'clock. I had already met some of the team so I let a bunch of players go by without bugging them. I did grab autographs from Erik Karlsson and Alexei Kovalev before the practice. Karlsson was a great guy. I guess its good to get players early on in their career before they become superstars, that way they still have a nice graph. Soon his signature with just be "EK". I'm almost sure of it. The AAA bantam tournament was happening at the Sensplex at the same time as the Sens practice and people soon began to notice. Crowds filled the practice arena to watch. I decided I would head back outside after a short while to make sure I didnt miss any of the players as they came off the ice.

After the practice there was only myself and one other guy waiting for players. Most of them were more than happy to sign autographs. Spezza, Carkner, Regin, Sutton, and Cullen all signed for me after practice. Alfie and Phillips didnt practice on that day, and for some reason Fisher, Volchenkov, and Neil decided that they didn't want to sign on that day. I hear that Neil is actually a pretty bad signer. He just ignored us when we called him to ask for a signature. Strange how the good players signed.

Superman's Dead

Sure, he died in the comics and then came back or something like that, but this title refers to the hit song by Our Lady Peace.

I first saw OLP way back at the very first Edgefest at Lansdowne Park. They were headligning the event along with Collective Soul, I Mother Earth (their last tour together) and Tea Party. It was an all day show and was great.

For those who aren't that familiar with the band, I will give a brief background. OLP is an alternative rock band that formed in Toronto in 1992. The band has sold over five million albums worldwide, won 4 Juno awards, and won ten MuchMusic Video Awards - the most MMVA's ever awarded to any group or artist. Thank you wikipedia for those stats.

Now, what surprised me even more about the whole situation was that they were performing at Centrepoint Theatre, about five minutes from my house. Centrepoint Theatre is a very small facility and makes it pretty easy to meet celebrities there. So, when I heard about the concert I figured I would swing by and see if I can meet them.

It wasn't great weather for waiting around outside. There was a slight drizzle and I was worried that my picture or the autographs might get ruined, or worst of all, what if the band decided that they didnt want to stop and sign?

We waited around after the concert for about an hour and a half and talked waiting for the band. Finally they came out and each band member signed my picture. There was a seller there also with eight pictures to try and get signed and he only got one signed as well. The guys seemed really nice and chatted it up with a few fans that were also waiting.

Thanks for reading. Stay tuned for my next blog about the Ottawa Senators.

Easier than shooting fish in a barrel...the Edmonton Oilers

I never realized how easy it is to meet certain teams. This was exactly one of those times. After the Leafs practiced at the Mastercard Centre for Excellence (still a terrible name considering it's the Leafs' facility) the Edmonton Oilers were scheduled to practice in the same rink. Let me rewind a bit first.

After the Leafs had entered the arena to practice, one of the e-bay sellers was telling people that Edmonton was having an open practice at the Ricoh coliseum and that it was open to the public. My sister's boyfriend looked at me right away and I mouthed that the guy was full of shit. I later heard that the Tampa Bay Lightning had practiced there earlier in the week and around 30 people had shown up. I guess the sellers had gotten screwed because they couldn't get as many things signed as they would have liked. Still, what an ass the guy was for trying to get people to leave.

Shortly after the Leafs had started practicing, we saw Shawn Horcoff walking through the lobby of the MCE. I wish I had my pictures on me at the time because everything we had was in the car. We went outside to grab them and just in time as another cab was pulling up. Out came Oilers captain Ethan Moreau and Sam Gagne. Both were great guys and signed everything for everyone.

Sam Gagne pretty much did a sit down signing for all the collectors. I swear he even did a last call and everything.

After this we decided it was time to go outside to try and grab the rest of the Leafs. After a couple of minutes of waiting we saw the Edmonton Oilers bus pull up to the players entrance. Unfortunately we weren't able to get anywhere near them on the way in. Things would get better though as the security would leave right after all of the Leafs were gone. Amazing. We were able to walk right into the arena to watch the Oilers practice, but fans weren't the only ones there.

A huge surprise to the afternoon was meeting one of the guests that was in attendance.... none other than Oiler great Paul Coffey. He was there with his two sons and in a bit of a hurry, but I was able to get an autograph on an oilers logo.

After the practice was done a lot of the collectors went outside to wait by the bus for the players to exit the arena. My sister, her boyfriend, myself and one other guy decided to see how close we could get to where the Oilers locker room was though. It was raining outside and we didn't want to get our pictures all wet. Sure enough, we were able to walk down the stairs and stand pretty much right beside the locker room. The only thing were were told was to make sure we were on the stairs. No problem. There we were able to call over players as they came out of the locker room.

Pat Quinn was doing interviews for the media immediately under us before we went down the stairs.

Some of the players that left the ice early had already gone out to the bus. Unfortunately, we missed Dustin Penner, Fernando Pisani, and Shawn Horcoff. Oh well. There were still plenty of guys to meet. The first player we met was Jeff Deslauriers. The guy was tall. Nice guy. Was happy to sign and take pictures.


We then grabbed pictures with Andrew Cogliano and Mike Comrie. Too bad Hilary Duff wasn't around.
Right after that, head coach and coach of the gold medal winning Team Canada World Junior team (last year), Pat Quinn, came by. I guess you have to be that big to end the career of a legend like Bobby Orr.
The last guy that came out of the room was a former member of the Sudbury Wolves, Zack Stortini. He was awesome as well, willing to sign and take pictures.

I guess if your team is in the basement of the NHL your players are happy to sign for everyone! But, like my sister's boyfriend said, it was easier than shooting fish in a barrel.

As a quick bonus picture, the three of us went to Brampton to catch the Battalion game and met injured CHL 2009 player of the year Cody Hodgson.

This guy will definately be a star with the Canucks if he can stay healthy.

Stay tuned for the next post....

Puttin' on the foil with the Toronto Maple Leafs

What a day!!! On Friday, we decided to take a vacation day off work and head down to Toronto to see if we could catch the Leafs at practice. I heard its a good idea to get there early, so we arrived at the Mastercard Centre for Hockey Excellence at 9am. The practice wasnt until around noon. We stood right beside the door where the players would enter as we had never been to the facility and were unaware of the security procedures.

Before security came, we saw head coach Ron Wilson park and head towards us. He said "Hi guys" and I was thrown right off guard. I though Wilson was a cold guy, so I was surprised when he spoke to us. I quickly asked him if I could get a picture with him and he said "No, no pictures". Again, I was caught off guard lol.

When security finally came they told us that we had to stand at the curb at the end of the parking lot. We would then need to yell to the player and ask if we could grab a signature and if they said yes we would be allowed to go to them. There were only about seven of us waiting for autographs and it was clear that these guys were sellers as I was told they were there everyday.
Many of the players seemed to just ignore us as they walked into the practice facility, as the players that arrived early were closer to the doors and farther away from us. Many of these guys I would try and meet on the way out after practice.

As more and more guys started showing up, they began to acknowledge us and some stopped to sign for us. J.S. Giguere was a great signer as he was the first player I got on that day.

Mikhail Grabovski was a great guy also. He had no problem signing and stopping for pictures.

Phil Kessel on the other hand, was a complete jerk and wouldnt sign for anyone or even acknowledge that we existed as he walked by us. We then saw "The Monster" Jonas Gustavsson who didnt say anything but had no problem stopping to sign and take pictures.


As for the rest of the guys, Dion Phaneuf gave us the old "I'll get you guys on the way out". Same story from Beauchemin. Damn. As all of the players had finally arrived, we heading into the MCE to watch. We quickly noticed that a lot of the guys weren't on the ice. Phaneuf, Kessel, Kaberle, Orr, Beauchemin, and a few others didnt take to the ice. We watched for a short while and then figured we should head back out to see if maybe those guys were going to leave early. Unfortunately, we missed them all. They had all already left. Balls.

I was able to get a few guys on the way out though. I didnt have too many pictures for guys to get signed, but I was able to grab an autograph from Luke Shenn.

I was also able to grab photos with others on the way out. I got a picture with Nikolai Kulemin, Carl Gunnarsson, Wayne Primeau, John Mitchell, Garnet Exelby, Jamie Lundmark. I also was also able to grab a photo with injured Mike Komisarek. On a side note, he is pretty bitter towards the Habs I guess. He wouldnt sign any Montreal stuff.

One last picture I wanted to show was with Notre Dame standout and current Leaf, Christian Hanson, who just happens to be the son of Dave Hanson from the movie Slapshot!!! He said that he won't watch the NCAA Frozen Four now that Notre Dame is out.


Stay tuned for my next blog....the Edmonton Oilers!