not exclusively a hockey, judaism, or star trek blog. i am half hockey, half hope, or whatever tf jane austen said.
collector and curator of underappreciated hockey players (dmitry kulikov, stevie lorentz, ondĆej pavel, nikolai kovalenko, the entire roster of the washington capitals apparently).
i'm always happy to get asks and messages, or be tagged in an ask meme, even if we're not mutuals đ anon is literally only off because gentiles have been getting a little too comfortable throwing around the word "kike" here on pesach baran's internet. if someone wants to do that, they can spend the time to make a new account, or they can do it with their blog name attached đ other than that, i love to get asks and talk hockey (or star trek, judaism, ace attorney, etc etc)
hockey:
1. colorado avalanche 2. florida panthers 3. washington capitals
also: vancouver goldeneyes
i AM a little hater about other teams sometimes, but it's not that serious. i still have players i find endearing on every single team, and i love to be friends across battle lines đ
please understand that i have already processed the stages of grief regarding hockey players that have shitty political views. i am not interested in bringing purity culture into watching hockey âđ
tags to note (or block, whatever makes you happy):
i try to tag player names with all hyphens and diacritics. please let me know if i mess one up!
recurring events i tag with the full year (sometimes i just forget to tag entirely. you can also lmk if i miss one of these). a partial list of examples: #worlds 2024, #met gala 2024, #oscars 2024, #asg2024, #scp2024, #olympics 2024, #four nations 2025 and so on.
#avs lb, #panthers lb, and #caps lb for liveblogging games
#for the archives usually long (sometimes VERY long) posts about players(/their careers/their relationships) or teams. i don't always agree with the overall argument of these posts, but they're cool and interesting and i want to be able to find them again.
#fosterposting for when i take pics of cats we're fostering
#wip wednesday for stuff i'm making. when my hands and arms are healthy, i knit and cross-stitch.
How Washington spent the past 20 years recruiting Alex Ovechkin
by Emily Kaplan for ESPN 7.16.26
It's no longer enough to draft a franchise player. Now you have to keep him.
Across hockey, you'll often hear the adage: "Even Wayne Gretzky was traded." But today's NHL has entered a new era -- one in which stars have more influence and more tools than ever to shape where they play. Brady Tkachuk forced his way to Florida. Quinn Hughes' future dominated league conversations before he landed in Minnesota. Dylan Larkin's trade request from Detroit is the latest reminder that franchise players expect a say in how their careers unfold.
"I think some organizations aren't lining up with the timeline of certain players," said Brian MacLellan, president of hockey operations for the Washington Capitals. "You have a little bit of a mismatch and I think people are more assertive about going about it now. I think sometimes it's fair for a player to decide that."
Which makes Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin feel increasingly like exceptions.
Twenty-one seasons after arriving as the No. 1 pick, Ovechkin signed another one-year contract this summer, extending one of the longest player-franchise relationships in modern professional sports.
How do you build an organization a superstar never wants to leave? From the outside, the explanation seems simple: loyalty, and of course, winning.
But after talking with the people who built that relationship, another answer kept surfacing: trust.
"In the beginning we had to earn his trust," MacLellan said. "I think we have it now."
Ted Leonsis and Alex Ovechkin pose with the Stanley Cup in 2018.
WASHINGTON WASN'T SEARCHING for its next superstar in 2004; the franchise was desperate for relevance. The Capitals had just torn down their roster after a failed attempt to shortcut contention with Jaromir Jagr.
"He was the highest-paid player in the league and he didn't like Washington, he didn't like the team, he didn't like much of anything," owner Ted Leonsis recalled. "We ended up trading him to New York. That was painful because it was our shot to go from a middling team to a great one. There was no real buzz. There was no excitement. There was no global or national attention on us. Our business was not strong."
The Capitals practiced in Piney Orchard, a public rink outside Baltimore that Leonsis readily acknowledges wasn't close to NHL caliber.
Then the Capitals won the 2004 draft lottery. The scouting presentation wasn't flashy. Grainy DVDs shipped from Russia flickered across a television as the hockey staff walked Leonsis through the teenager they believed could change the franchise.
The summer after the draft, Leonsis invited Ovechkin to his house for a barbecue. Leonsis, the son of Greek immigrants, values family over everything. It didn't take long for Leonsis to realize Ovechkin, who grew up in Moscow, felt the same way. They spent the afternoon swimming, playing basketball with Leonsis' children and chasing the family dogs around the backyard.
"And he felt at home immediately because that's what his life is like growing up," Leonsis said.
Leonsis told Ovechkin: "The reason we were able to draft you is because we're not a very good team." Then came the promise: Washington wouldn't become great overnight. But the facilities would improve, and the organization would keep investing until it was worthy of its new franchise player.
Capitals general manager Chris Patrick said he believed that first conversation established the relationship that followed.
"Ted was still a relatively new owner when we drafted Alex. Ted has been really good to Alex and good to his family, and I think Alex really respects Ted for that," Patrick said. "There's a mutual respect for each other's worlds and where they fit in the organization."
THREE YEARS LATER came a pivotal moment. As Ovechkin and Crosby began to dominate the league, most expected Ovechkin's second contract to look like the one his rival had just signed: five years, $43.5 million.
Instead, longtime executive Dick Patrick walked into Leonsis' office with a different idea.
"If this kid keeps playing the way he's playing," Patrick told him, "the next time he's a free agent, Montreal, Toronto, New York -- everybody's going to want him."
Rather than negotiate another bridge contract, the Capitals offered Ovechkin his unrestricted free agent deal years before he ever reached free agency: 13 years and the opportunity to become the NHL's first $100 million player.
Leonsis pitched it as not only security for the player but stability for the franchise.
"We're committing this to you," he recalled telling Ovechkin.
Leonsis remembers stepping up to the podium in 2008 at a news conference. He announced Ovechkin wasn't signing for five years. He was signing for 13.
"The place went crazy," Leonsis said. "We had permission to believe that we can be a great sports organization and a great city."
By the time Tom Wilson was drafted in 2012, the organization was beginning to resemble the one Leonsis had promised Ovechkin eight years earlier.
The day before the draft, Wilson had second interviews with a handful of teams. Longtime scout Ross Mahoney, who still runs the Capitals draft, greeted Wilson. Mahoney could sense his energy.
"He said, 'Hey, Tom, you're an honest player. We love your game. Just be yourself,'" Wilson recalled. "And I remember that so vividly because in a world of intimidation and you're a 17-year-old kid and who knows what's going to happen and all that, I remember being able to take a breath and being like, 'Wow.' And I remember that about Washington and I don't remember much about other teams."
RELATIONSHIPS AREN'T TESTED when everything is working -- they're tested when nothing is. The Capitals emerged as one of the league's best teams under Ovechkin, his longtime linemate Nicklas Backstrom and defenseman John Carlson. They were able to lure key free agents and trade for veterans to supplement the homegrown talent. They won the Presidents' Trophy three times in a seven-year span. They geared up for long Stanley Cup runs. And then they lost to Pittsburgh in the playoffs, again and again.
The outside noise grew louder. Was Ovechkin incapable of winning? Should Washington break up its core? Should its captain look elsewhere?
"There was tension," MacLellan acknowledged. "It was teetering. The year before we won, we were on the brink of making a lot of changes."
Leonsis said he felt his own pressure.
"I did not want to be the owner who couldn't win a Stanley Cup with Alex Ovechkin," he said. "I did not want Alex later in his career to come to me and say, 'You have to trade me.'"
Wilson said he knows just how easily the story could have ended differently.
"There were a couple years there where it got tough and everyone started pointing fingers at each other. Ovi easily could have said, 'All right, I'm out. I'll go somewhere else,' But in his mind, I think he was always seeing it through," Wilson said.
"That's so rare nowadays to have the belief in yourself and your city and your organization to be able to go through those tough times and be on some bad teams. And what a great feeling when you finally get it done. That's legendary status. If you go chase a championship and get it in another city, yeah, you're a Stanley Cup winner, but you're maybe not a legend."
Ted Leonsis and Alex Ovechkin watch a video during a ceremony honoring Ovechkin becoming the NHL all-time goals leader.
MACLELLAN INSISTS THOSE years before Washington's 2018 Stanley Cup fundamentally shaped the relationship -- but behind the scenes, they still were earning Ovechkin's trust.
Every major organizational decision required another conversation. A few times a season, the front office executives meet privately with Ovechkin -- not to ask permission, but to explain the team's thinking.
The conversation included: "What type of player do you think we need?" "Here's what's available." "Here's why we made this move."
"We don't always agree," MacLellan said. "But the communication's always been there."
The same approach became especially important during the moments most likely to fracture the relationship.
The Capitals traded Dmitry Orlov, one of Ovechkin's closest friends, in 2023.
This past season, they traded Carlson -- who had spent 17 years with the organization, and was the team's second-longest tenured player -- while sitting only four points out of a playoff spot.
The moves rattled Ovechkin. In their meeting, MacLellan said the front office told Ovechkin: "We're not packing it in here. We're just reloading. Let's see what we do on July 1."
At 40, his contract was expiring. For the first time in years, the question wasn't whether he could still play, it was whether he would keep playing in Washington.
After the Capitals missed the playoffs, Ovechkin said his decision would come down to three things: family, health and the chance to win another Stanley Cup.
THE PAST FEW months, the Capitals had to imagine something they had spent more than two decades avoiding.
"This was the first time in a while -- maybe the first time ever -- that we went into an offseason planning a with-Alex and without-Alex scenario," Patrick said. "Yeah, it was definitely kind of surreal to say it."
Washington acted aggressively. The Capitals traded for crafty winger Jordan Kyrou, inked veteran Alex Tuch to an eight-year deal and signed former Blue Jackets captain Boone Jenner in free agency.
That helped Ovechkin decide he wanted to play in Washington for his 22nd season. Ovechkin called Patrick the day after free agency opened, and they hammered out a new contract in "about 10 minutes," per Ovechkin.
"I'm very excited for the team and for the fans as well because on paper, you can see our team is one of the best teams," Ovechkin said. "But now we have to work for the Stanley Cup, for the playoffs first and then the Stanley Cup."
The Capitals know they'll never replace Ovechkin. The harder challenge is making sure the next franchise player never feels the need to leave. Wilson already sees that responsibility as his own. Wilson talks openly about wanting Ryan Leonard, Cole Hutson and the next generation to feel what he felt when he arrived.
"I hope those guys want to play in D.C. for their entire careers," Wilson said. "I learned that from Ovi."
Real progressives back smart ideas that improve lives â and reject nutty ideas that would ruin neighborhoods.
Iâm tired of being told that, to be a progressive, I now must swear allegiance to crazy ideas.
Iâm a strong Democrat, with a winning bipartisan track record. Iâm rooted in progressive ideals and policies: criminal justice reform, Green New Deal, Medicare for All, free education, clean air and water. These are ideas I have fought for my entire adult life.
But some people in groups like the DSA are pushing an agenda FAR outside those ideals. Supporting Hamas is not progressive. âNo police, no prisons, no bordersâ is not progressive. Celebrating the murder of Israeli civilians is not progressive. These ideas are REGRESSIVE.
If there were no police or prisons, if anyone in your neighborhood could do whatever they wanted, while politicians cheered on terror groups â would that represent PROGRESS to you? No, that would be a step back. Those are REGRESSIVE ideas.
On the other hand, if everybody could see a doctor when they got sick, get a good, free education and breathe clean air â would that represent progress? Yes. Those are PROGRESSIVE ideas.
They are NOT the same thing. And the difference matters.
Some defend the far left by claiming they only want Nordic-style social democracy. If that were true, I might applaud them. I want those policies, too! But what does universal healthcare have to do with Hamas? With abolishing all law enforcement? With erasing all borders? With treating every wealthy person as a villain? Ideas matter. And these are terrible ideas.
Right now, extremists are trying to sneak backwards proposals into our party, hoping mainstream Democrats are too frustrated with MAGA and the Democratic Party establishment to notice.
But we see you.
Yes, we want our Democratic Party to be a big tent. But we donât need âparty poopers. So STOP pooping in the punch bowl â and telling us the turds are ice cubes.
They arenât. And we are smart enough to know the difference.
Opposing peace means opposing resolution of the conflict
At a pro-Palestinian demonstration today in London, one marcher carried a homemade cardboard sign bearing the words:
âNO PEACE BITCHES!!â
One sign obviously does not represent an entire protest.
But still, it captures a real suspicion of the word peace among parts of the movement.
For some pro-Palestinian activists, peace gets treated like another word for surrender. It means asking Palestinians to accept the loss of land or a future without genuine political rights.
But endless war cannot be the answer. A movement that wants to prevent Palestinian suffering should also be committed to finding a political solution that prevents the next round of suffering.
This is why the pro-Palestinian movement needs to also be pro-peace.
So what does being pro-peace mean to me?
1. It means ending the bloodshed
The first purpose of peace is to stop people being killed, maimed, displaced and traumatised.
That may sound obvious. But every new round of fighting produces more bereaved families, more destroyed communities, and more people with powerful reasons to hate the other side. We canât ignore this. It needs to endânow.
2. It does not mean total surrender
Palestinians should not be expected to abandon their national aspirations or accept a life without dignity and political rights. Israelis should not be expected to accept permanent insecurity or the possibility of their countryâs destruction.
3. It requires a genuine willingness to compromise
Itâs easier to favour compromise when it means the other side giving something up.
But real compromise means accepting that neither side will receive everything it wants.
Any vision that requires millions of people to leave, submit or live permanently without rights cannot be treated as a serious peace proposal.
We need compromise. But that compromise needs to be fair, and on both sides.
4. It means recognising the humanity of the other side
Not every Palestinian is responsible for the actions of Hamas. Not every Israeli is responsible for every decision or action of the Israeli government or IDF, either.
An entire population cannot be treated as collectively guilty for harm inflicted on the other side.
Peace requires maintaining that distinction. Even when anger makes collective blame popular.
5. It means rejecting revenge as a political programme
The desire for revenge is sometimes understandable in the context of great suffering or atrocities.
But revenge wonât produce a stable future.
One atrocity does not reverse another. One grieving family is not healed by creating another grieving family.
6. It means accepting that peace is made with enemies
Peace is rarely made between parties that like or trust each other. It is made between adversaries who conclude that coexistence, however imperfect, is preferable to endless destruction.
7. It means choosing the future over the past
History cannot be used as a permanent veto over the future.
At some point, both peoples must decide whether their children will inherit an obligation to continue the conflictâor an opportunity to escape it.
âNo peaceâ may sound defiant. But there is nothing particularly courageous about condemning another generation to fear, hatred and funerals.
I think a lot of foreign relations discussions would be made vastly more productive if we all just switched to calling it âsubsidized military vendor lock-inâ instead of calling it âmilitary aidâ
Like. Yes, itâs also an exchange of value, sure, absolutely. Itâs even an extremely worthwhile exchange of value if youâre a country like Ukraine. But so is lots of vendor lock-in?? Using Amazon cloud services is a good business decision because they are a good deal, and a bad business decision because they make it difficult for you to ever switch away from AWS. Both sides of that are true and real!
âHow does sending this country free weapons do anything other than give them free weapons?â is a wild thing to have to keep explaining to people over and over again in a world where most people already understand that Google search is free because Google is trying to be an unassailable tech monopoly. The nuance here isnât difficult to understand, and for most people it isnât even a new concept, but for some reason as soon as you call it âmilitary aidâ everyone forgets that theyâve ever heard of such a thing and you have to start fresh and explain how it all works as though itâs Babyâs First Antitrust. There are real and substantive discussions to be had on the other side of âwhat even is the actual value proposition hereâ, and Iâm getting kind of sick of always needing to start from zero for basically no reason
jamie drysdale shows up in philly january 2024 fresh off the Trade Conversation with trevor and coots takes one look at his sad puppy dog eye pug face and attempts the man to man captainly "we support Any And All Identities" talk with meaningful eye contact. jamie, alarmed & deeping hetero cosplay: "i'm not homophobic". tk attempts cool mature i'm a guy too haha advice that is so incomprehensible jamie ends up with a top ten list of places him & nolpat went to in their prime and a cryptic message about metaphorical concussions? possibly? (tk does not get drunk and break no contact with patty to text drysdale's like you if you were nice). owen tippett sends him links to lgbtq groups in philly and jamie sends back an orange heart emoji. they think they've successfully allied up and he gets it. he does not get it. danny briere who is now an Adult starts a dialogue. he starts it with "i was young once too.." and jamie thinks he's getting kicked off the team. sanny, who dealt with tknp many moons ago, just pats jamie on the back and leaves it. jamie is sure he's getting kicked off the team. trevor shows up at camp a year and a half later fresh faced and smiling and jamie's heart stutters and he goes oh. oh. coots tells trevor we support Any And All Identities on this team and trevor (mildly insulted) says i'm not homophobic. tk tells him "we don't support homophomic [sic] language". danny briere starts summoning spirits to bring g back. denver barkey shows up in december starry eyed and gushing over his ldn knight boyzz & especially easton cowan. tzjd start making meaningful eye contact about having the Gay Conversation with the rookie. coots says we support Any And All Identities and barks says oh sick man i totally agree dw i'm not homophobic!! porter and alex show up in march and coots hypes himself up in the mirror to tell them We Support Any And All Identities Hem Hem and porter says sick man my buddy's gay. coots falls to the floor sobbing. matvei michkov is torturing rick tocchet in rick's secret dungeon basement where tocc was torturing him first. danny is communing with the spirit of mike richards.
we have to start running a massive PSA campaign to young gay people so everyone understands there is a difference between being a dom and being a top and between being a sub and being a bottom. and also that sometimes you are neither a sub nor a bottom and you're just like shy. we need to be handing out flyers we need ads at every train station spreading the word
