The story going around is that the NBA playoffs have been a bit of a dump. It's easy to see why people think that, because there have been plenty of blowouts and none of the conference finals have produced a close game in eight tries. What we want from the playoffs are moments and performances that we can now remember, and it's hard to do that when games are decided in the second or third quarter.
This, of course, has led the #PleaseLikeMySport hockey brigade to once again shout how great the NHL playoffs are, and their style every spring. Which isn't really true either. Just a handful of OT games, and not many more close encounters which weren't boring either. Both playoffs have been somewhat gray.
The story going around is that the NBA playoffs have been a bit of a dump.
It's easy to see why people think that, because there have been plenty of blowouts and none of the conference finals have produced a close game in eight tries. What we want from the playoffs are moments and performances that we can now remember, and it's hard to do that when games are decided in the second or third quarter.
Reviews:- check out the post The Flames cost us a truly transcendent momeright here.
This, of course, has led the #PleaseLikeMySport hockey brigade to once again shout how great the NHL playoffs are, and their style every spring. Which isn't really true either. Just a handful of OT games, and not many more close encounters which weren't boring either. Both playoffs have been somewhat gray.
As I usually do, I'd like to blame the Oilers' terrible third jerseys and all the fans wearing them in the stands because Oilers goaltender Mike Smith lost sight of the puck and passed a Mahomes shot from range. . . And I will It really was a #HereComeTheOilers moment, in fact it should have been THE #HereComeTheOilers moment.
Nothing would have defined that era of hockey in Edmonton more than watching a dive-bomb shoot serially toward the net 400 feet away. Smith immediately jumped in search of someone to blame after sniffing a record that took a good two seconds to find and would have been the iconic image fans would use to tell their kids what the Oilers looked like these days. -this. Rarely is a decade distilled into such a clear and powerful picture. Game tied at 3, Lamas with momentum. If they had tied the series at 2, as the gods had clearly ordained, there might not have been the greatest pivot point in a playoff series in hockey history since...eh well, Steve Smith shot one into his own net in another series between these two teams. .
And then a few minutes later the Flames failed to erase a dunk, Oliver Kylington lost position to Ryan Nugent-Hopkins by a rebound, and a moment where we could have built something really meaningful was lost under the label of a simple blunder. . .
Game 4 was sort of a study in the entire life cycle of an NHL goaltender.
Jakob Markstrom has been terrible for Calgary in every series, and this one got off to the worst possible start. Hockey doesn't have a #TOOTBLAN monster hashtag, but it probably should after this:
Markstrom would be hit twice more in the first, and it sure looked like he had fully doubled. But Markstrom managed to pick up the pieces, the Flames came back and made that save minutes before Mike Smith went blind for a few seconds:
On the other hand, Smith has been stellar for the Oilers since they retired him in Game 1, which is a phrase that makes my eyes twitch and my jaw drop. But he's still Mike Smith, and calamity and hilarity are still bubbling just below the surface. It truly would have been life-affirming if Markstrom had struck the right balance when Smith was attacked by bees that only he could see.
But no. The Oilers got the winner. None of this matters anymore. We had something important and fundamental, but we saw it turn to sand and slip through our fingers. Everything can be so fragile.
