Serena Williams' hair during Roland Garros in 2003 / Serena Williams' hair during Wimbledon in 2003 / Serena Williams' hair during the Miami masters in 2003 (photos from Getty Images)
Top 5 players? (of your interest and/or skill iyo)
tough because i think things like this are very difficult for me to put in definitive terms *but* if i base it on a mix of interest and skill and (predominantly) whomever my brain is thinking of at this current moment in time:
5. jocelyne larocque
100 lives for every stay-at-home blueliner but especially joce <3 even though she has an accounting degree and pedigree dogs and was once a sceptre and you can’t move a centimetre without PWHL media reminding you that 38 is the oldest a person has ever lived to be. excellent defensive stick and so patient... wall pinch legend.
4. donald brashear
the photo of him arm-wrestling ovechkin... he used to shower at the rink with his giant dog... he learnt russian for the sashas... i think of him frequently and i’m super upset that the roxy fever episode concerning him has seemingly disappeared from the internet? i feel like most people know him either from all the ‘better 87 jokes’ or the incident with mcsorley but i think most people should know him for himself. i rly do hope that he’s doing alright wherever he is.
3. fanuza kadirova
of course i’m thinking of her... rip charge <\3 she’s been so fun to watch and so interesting to rotate especially re: russian players coming into the PWHL and what that looks like. i love her personality and the way she reads offensive plays... neat player who i hope is on the charge for many seasons to come.
2. PK subban
this isn’t a value statement per se but the NHL has very few players who *want* to entertain, who understand that beyond everything professional spectator sports are about spectacle, and PK was one of those players. gamesmanship. watching his highlights and cursing bergevin forever and ever. as a sens fan i feel like this is wrong but you can’t deny how good he was... he was in a jackass film! he’s divisive and interesting and was mentioned in a jpegmafia song. and of course there’s his thing with price.
1. artyom zub
shit-stirring keyboard-playing yoked shutdown defender who has become a kind of local legend. what else could you want.
ottawa charge presser got me in fucking shambles!!!!! people really said they didn't deserve to be here but my raggedy team built on nothing but chaos and whimsy and the change in boston fleet's wallet they stole along the way showed up for coach carla and they did it for her they really fucking did it and when coach carla started crying I started crying
thank you 2025-2026 ottawa charge for another beautiful season. nothing hits quite like the clown hockey you put me through
we'll see who's smiling when certain members of the montreal victoire reach the gates of the afterlife and have to weigh their souls against a single feather
I'm listening to a podcast with Fanuza, and she says she loves keeping diaries and prefers only paper ones. She says she found her childhood diaries and wrote in them that she wanted to play in Canada or America.
Iga Swiatek of Poland and Naomi Osaka of Japan after their round of 16 match at the WTA Rome Open tennis tournament, in Rome, Italy, on May 12, 2026. Swiatek won 6:2, 6:1.
this is kind of difficult to answer seeing as i respect very few coaches... i also think that ice hockey as a sport tends to be one that’s not as heavily impacted by coaching as opposed to a piecemeal game like rugby. i guess my rubric would evaluate whether the coach understands where the team is, what the team needs, what the players need, can the coach meet the players where they are, etc. some of these will thus be serious answers while others will be purely from an entertainment standpoint.
5. bruce boudreau
idk if this is a copout or if i just live in Caps Land but i think he must be the first coach described as a players’ coach to genuinely live up to it. resuscitate run-and-gun hockey. bring back the cardiac caps.
4. john tortorella
i do hate this man but i genuinely think you have to consider that he is by far one of the most entertaining coaches in the league. by dint of observing the caps i’m most familiar with his tenure in the metro so i’ve enjoyed watching his Ovechkin Thing play out over the years. if i ever forget all about the NHL i know i will remember john.
3. paul maurice
i think the bulk of the panthers’ success under maurice mainly arises from their extremely competent front office, but if i had to liken maurice to anyone it’d be rassie erasmus. i don’t think there exists a better analogue for the florida panthers in the sporting world than the springboks.
2. darryl sutter
by all accounts an extremely strange man, and again i think the kings’ success could largely be attributed to lombardi and co. (and quick), but i think it’s interesting that he had such a lasting effect on the organisation’s ethos. you can tell they still very much approach things with the ‘it’s a 3–2 league’ mindset at the forefront.
1. jacques lemaire
i am numero uno devils hater but i love the sort of weird vortex he pulled the league into by virtue of the way he coached his teams. i love to think about the philosophy of The Dead Puck Era, whether it’s actually remarkable or just part of a greater trend that happens within sporting leagues. i like that he made mario lemieux throw a strop. unfortunately in my heart i am a divisive person who loves high-scoring systems and also The Neutral Zone Trap. i contain multitudes, etc.
annaxmalina
jacobvanloon
janainaart
stormborns
germansingergirl
