Man, I hate the Leafs and their jackass fans.

Went down to Rexall last night for the Oilers-Leafs pre-season game. Almost as many Leaf fans there as Oilers fans. Damn I hate the Leafs and their awfully rude fans. Really, I think I may hate them more than the Flames and their fans.

Notes from the game:
- Raffi always seems to play like crap when I go to the Rex. Or else he'll score early at the start of the 2nd period when I'm still stuck in the line for over-priced food and pop. Don't know what it is, just usually seems to happen that way. Especially when I wear my Torres jersey. I did wear my Stoll jersey last night though.
- Matt Greene is still up to his old tricks, taking 3 penalties a game, the Leafs scored on one of the power plays provided by Greener. He really needs to learn to control his stick better.
- Denis Grebeshkov is like Greene in that he was out of position too many times and makes bad passes. He redeemed himself by scoring the OT goal though. Greene did nothing to redeem himself. He's lucky the boys killed off the penalty that carried over in the OT session.
- Horcoff is the man! Scored the tying goal, set up the 1st goal and the OT goal. He was forechecking and backchecking like nobody's business and was fairly decent on the PK. He was on the ice for the 2nd Leafs goal, but it wasn't his fault. Greene gave it away and Syvret blew a tire at the blue line.
- This Trukhno kid is pretty good, too bad the Oilers can't sign him, not even to a minor league contract as the Russian Hockey Federation says he will be re-entering the draft in 2008.
- As much as I liked Jussi Markkanen, Garon is so far looking like an upgrade in the back-up goaltender position. He made some spectacular saves. I'm sure Roli will get more nights off than he did last season with Garon being able to handle a higher work load than MacT gave to the Juice last season.
- Carter on his 'pro tryout' session so far is a bust. He left midway thru the 1st period after being hit twice on the same shift. I really didn't notice that he was gone until midway the 3rd. Found out later via the Oilers website that he suffered a concussion. Maybe Lowe should have brought in Lindros as a pro try-out instead of Carter. Lindros has more upside than Carter does. Sadly, I think the Big E may just retire.
- Coligano was looking good, very speedy, but no finish. Reminds me of Todd Marchant. Hopefully he remedies that in the AHL as we don't need anymore Marchant type players. At this point I can't really see him making the opening day playing roster. There are still 5 pre-season games to go, so I could be wrong. He could be a solid 2nd line player if he learns how to finish in tight. He was exciting to watch.

That's pretty much all I got. I'll try to do post-game reports for all the games I happen to go to at the Rex. Next up for me is the Oilers-Flames pre-season game Wed. Sept 26. Not like anyone reads my blog anyways, but I like to pretend that someone does.

Did I mention how much I hate the Leafs and their fans? Just making sure.











EDIT: I think I was thinking of a different Russian player that was at the Oilers rookie camp, because upon further investigation, Trukhno is a 4th round Oilers draft pick from 2005 and is signed to an entry level contract. My bad.