Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Halpern's Done Playing Nice

Earlier today we caught up with Dainius Zubrus. Now another former Caps pivot is making news, and this time it's not for his on-ice performance (or lack thereof). This odd little nugget comes to us from Mike Heika's blog via Kukla's Korner:
Jeff Halpern is responsible for Mike Smith's injury, but the Stars said it was not a fight. Halpern and Smith were playing 'the rebound game' after practice when the two started to get very competitive. Halpern then (they say) accidentally slashed Smith while going for a puck that was in the air. That led to a verbal confrontation which was very heated. I was in the locker room, so I didn't see it.
...
"You get caught up in the game and, unfortunately, it led to an injury," Halpern said. "Anytime you're part of that, you feel bad for the other guy involved and realize it was just a game. That's awful for him and bad for our team."
Uh huh.

Of course, it serves Smith right - he should've known better than to mess with Halps. And let this serve as a lesson to all of you - we Potomac boys are both tough and crafty with various forms of weaponry. Smith is probably lucky Halpern didn't have his gaffi stick on him.

8 comments:

Joe said...

Yeah, and I held my own against him in a middle school hallway scrap.

JP said...

Where'd you go to high school, Joe? Churchill?

Anonymous said...

What happened to Smith?

JP said...

Bruised arm, apparently.

Anonymous said...

why do i even read espn?
http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/powerranking

besides the fact that they have us in bottom 10...

hmm caps 3-0, NYI 2-1, caps beat islanders,

NYI-# 12
CAPS # 20
Makes perfect sense to me???

Anonymous said...

Hey,thanks for the link to the Metro article. I always liked him while he was here.

Anonymous said...

mike s,

Notice ESPN ranks Atlanta higher as well, since they're just "in a rut."

ESPN isn't the only group ranking things this way. Just visit any sports website. Obviously, they all get their rankings and "opinion" from the same place.

So the Caps and their fans are optimistic about this season. Buzz during the summer was good. Now that the season has started, the Caps are 3-0-0, so the optimism continues. Compare that to other teams, which have gotten off to rocky starts (for whatever reason). These sites opine Ovechkin needs to simmer down, Clark is crazy and Kolzig's too old. Sure, we'd like to see a better PP and some guys back on the ice, but to count them down now?

How old is Hasek, again? And how far did they go the last two seasons?

Are the Isles relying on one line--again? Where have I read that before! The Isles were one of the laughingstocks of the league over the summer (along with Edmonton). Now they're teh awesome because they've got Comrie.

And these same sports reporters, despite facts staring them in the face, continue to insist certain teams will do well this season, like Toronto. Read anything published by The Hockey News. They're so full of crap. The hockey media have short memories and contribute to the poor showing NHL hockey has on the TV. With Dennis Miller coming aboard at Versus, we'll see further damage.

Anyway, OT: Halp's got to get them boys motivated, any way he can. They're ranked 18! From ESPN: "The Stars handily beat the Bruins. That's what they and the rest of the NHL are supposed to do, right? When Dallas matched up against Colorado and Nashville, they lost 4-3 and 5-1, respectively. The good news: Mike Ribeiro's expected return from a high-ankle sprain will give the Stars more offensive options."

See?

Unknown said...

way I heard it, Halpern just started beating the s*** out of Smith after Smith said something. odd, but amusing. way to go, Halpy.