I’m So Sick Of The Golden Knights

Defector · 4 months ago · 67 views

The Colorado Avalanche are not an easy team to root for. They are a deep, übercapable team with few weaknesses. Their star scorer is a weirdo but not in a particularly endearing way. They have their Cup already. In any other year, in any other matchup, I'd be pulling for someone else to have their turn. But in this Western Conference Final, the Avs might as well be Team North America, for all the hopes and goodwill of the hockey world they're carrying. Over the next week or two, I want very badly for them to kick the Golden Knights in their golden nuts. I'm not sure if a professional sports franchise can be ontologically evil, but if one can I know which one it is. This is not, as Vegas fans insist, a matter of pure envy because they keep winning. Or at least it's mostly not that. Sure, the Knights have been immutably successful over their limited existence, and no, their loyal supporters have yet to pay the Suck Tax, which is what truly bonds fandom. But lots of teams win. Few do it with such mustache-twirling cartoon villainy. Even without their track record of circumvention and cutthroatery they're remarkably despicable at the moment, in ways ranging from the odious to the petty. They signed Carter Hart, who was cleared of criminal charges but not his actual actions in the Hockey Canada sexual assault scandal, when no other team would, and of course he's thriving as their starting goaltender. Following their second-round clinch, they refused to speak to the media over some imagined slight or other, drawing a startlingly robust penalty from the NHL that was clearly a reward for their collective body of asshole work. They're currently denying their former coach Bruce Cassidy permission to interview for another job after they fired him in March, a move pretty much without precedent and which has drawn the ire of the NHL Coaches’ Association. If It would do any good I would emphasize the hypocrisy involved, given that their current coach, bespectacled grump John Tortorella, was that hated media until just two months ago, and was only able to guide the Knights to the playoffs because his last team gave him the permission to interview. But accusations of hypocrisy carry no weight against unrepetant scoundrels.