#meg.askbox

[larsnicklas]

Omg finally your inner hater is back. Ngl I just followed you the whole time for this. Please bring back the L*eon hate, we all need that.

help !!! this is so funny !! honestly i would say by like january i was back to feeling a normal level of vitriol about the o.ilers (which is to say, baseline dislike but not anything passionate) but then i watched them today and i could feel the hatred rekindling in my heart. l.eon got taken down behind the net and i felt my bloodthirst rising i was like mmm delicious do it AGAIN......

[larsnicklas]

what is it with MC and WSH that has people being so weird about their peers

i fear the official marketing does not help lol but it’s like. it’s all fine i am glad folks are having fun! i just think it’s silly to think you’re better than other fans who are doing the same thing as you LOL bc what….. you somehow think your guys are ?? morally superior…? hockey fans never learn fr fr it’s crazy we’re always having the exact same discourse over and over again ahahaha

[larsnicklas]

obsessssssedddd with them saying “you need to pick a goalie” and petey tap tap tapping the mic and saying “anyway… brock” and THEN they said “no, we said a goalie” and petey said “well EYE said brock!”

mr. buble said okay yes go ahead elias you make this pick!! and elias went head empty JUST brock he was like. i have one job and it's brock on my team!!!

[larsnicklas]

What is that people don't understand about Barky?

eh i think it's less that he's misunderstood as it's.... idk. that he flies very under the radar by choice and tends to be overshadowed by flashier personalities. on purpose. i guess if there's one thing i'd say — with the caveat that none of us know the guy personally! — i don't really think he's shy at all, which is how he was described a TON when he was younger. he speaks when he has something to say and has always had yappers in the leadership group to balance things out lmao. but he's so funny!!! and tbh the older he gets the more he lets his personality show on camera i think lol

i, a longtime nicke enthusiast, am used to basically all of this and even drawn to these traits, and therefore voraciously consume every longform sasha interview/piece that is available to me in order to kind of get a grasp on what makes the guy tick. here are a few of my favorites + a few highlight videos for fun!

SASHA MINI PRIMER ⬇️ aka an incomplete but lovingly curated collection of required reading/videos/essential moments below the cut!!!

📰 Sushi With Sasha: Barkov jests that all being captain really means is, “I have to open my mouth sometimes.” [...] The fact Barkov cracks wise about his quiet ways, though, is in line with a defining characteristic — knowing how to pick your spots, both with the puck and one-liners. “Yeah, that’s exactly it,” says Pittsburgh Penguins defenceman and fellow Finn Olli Maatta. “Definitely not the loudest guy in the room, but when you get to know him he has almost like a sneaky sense of humour.”

🎥 32 Thoughts: Barkov Reminisces About Panthers Magical Playoff Run (he is so cute in this. hair fluffy. smiley. sweet.)

📰 Q&A: Sasha Barkov is home in Finland and discusses his love of chicken wings, Jaromir Jagr and the Miami Heat: How fast does that car go? Well, 65 is the speed limit, right? So, 66. But I think it would hit 200 if you really pushed it.

🎥 Aleksander Barkov Shootout Goals But They Get Increasingly More Impressive (what it says on the tin)

📰 The NHL’s new Patrice Bergeron? Panthers’ Aleksander Barkov fits the bill — ‘He does everything right: Affable as always, Barkov, despite his short offseason, looked noticeably more jacked than he’d even been during the Panthers’ tremendous playoff run. He smiled and extended his hand before discussing his motivation to captain the Panthers back to the spot that had been so grueling to get to in the first place.

📰 Barkov Keeps His Cool: It’s right after one of those long days of work at the rink in November that Barkov, known better around the locker room as “Sasha,” has me on his car’s speakerphone as he works to traverse through a bit of traffic around rush hour. In the background, vehicles can be heard zooming and honking around him. But just like he does on the ice, the Panthers captain is keeping his cool. As he maneuvers through congestion with his foot tap dancing on the pedal, he doesn’t talk much about his extension, but rather of the first time he attempted to traverse the highways of South Florida as a fresh-faced, 18-year-old hockey prodigy during his rookie season in 2013.

🎙️/ 🎥 The Hockey PDOcast Episode: Aleksander Barkov's Defensive Impact and How He Does It (analysis of barkov as a player with accompanying video clips)

🎥 Panthers Celebrate Captain Aleksander Barkov (this video is so fucking funny to me because joe t.hornton just talks for ten seconds about how big sasha is. which. yeah real.)

📰 Dwyane Wade crashes into fan at Heat game -- Panthers star Aleksander Barkov: Barkov said he would like to see Wade at a Panthers game this season. The Panthers play at BB&T Center in Sunrise, which is 35 miles north of AmericanAirlines Arena, where the Heat play. Barkov predicted Wade would get a standing ovation from Panthers fans and said he wouldn't let boards stop him from trying to see Wade during that game. "I'll try my best to fly over him," Barkov said.

🎥 Ask Me Anything | Aleksander Barkov (this is where he says his dream golf quartet is his ex bf his current work wife and his dilf mentor)

📰 Q&A with Sasha Barkov: Fast cars, Miami sports and his first move as NHL commish: Yeah, the palm trees were cool and he really liked the ocean. But he also liked to drive. To do that, he needed to head to the DMV and get himself a Florida driver’s license. “I don’t have a car but I have the license,” Barkov said during his first training camp with the Panthers in 2013. “I failed the first time because I didn’t understand the questions.”

🎥 Laine and Barkov go to town on Finnish chicken wings (literally just a minute long video of them eating chicken wings LOL)

🎥 ALEKSANDER BARKOV VS. PAVEL BARBER | HockeyShot Shootout Challenge! (silly trickshot video... fans throw rats at sasha and he's like thank you :D... it's like an artificial sheet on the beach, sasha is very cute)

[larsnicklas]

drat going after arty... u were not my enemy prior to this but ur climbing the ranks quite steadily... do NOT be rude to baby goalie bc u shot a puck at the post instead of the net

i will leave you with the wise words of my valued twt mutual and goalie defender:

[larsnicklas]

I don't know why they are crying about cross posts on lb tags when theses posts aren't actually tagged they'r just not censored when they are the ones posting hate on matthew's tag daily including multiple him getting punched or hit by that rapist like it's some sort of fun thing

yeah i feel like the majority of the time people don't mean for the posts to end up in the other team's lb but the tumblr search function is so sensitive! but it doesn't surprise me that they haven't thought that through and think that cats fans are so obsessed with them that people would be posting in the oil tag on purpose LOL. it's okay they just don't know how the site works AND they're pissy that the team they've been told all season is so exceptional and special and chosen by the hockey gods is running into the buzzsaw that is the p.anthers!!

[larsnicklas]

hi meg!! i am humbly asking if whenever the spirit moves you to gif some hockey men if you would consider immortalizing ekky and benny's tender friendship cup day in gif form 🙏 https://twitter.com/FlaPanthers/status/1825554605490512346?t=2ETvkRX4tGWgw36skpziJg&s=19

omg YES i fear i have been swept into the offseason vibes but i've been bookmarking videos to gif on twt and this one immediately got tabbed for gifing!! if elon ever makes bookmarks public my bookmarks are going to be so funny because it's just like various videos of hockey men embracing other hockey men, and then occasionally baseball men embracing other baseball men, and then h.aikyu fanart (idk i'm going through something here) and then also like. occasional recipes or restaurant recs 😭😭😭

[larsnicklas]

🎤 what are some older hockey Narratives or Events or Occurrences that folks who have gotten into hockey fandom in the past 4 or 5 years might have missed that you think they would find entertaining + fun?

i chewed on this through several very mindnumbing administrative chores and i'm probably STILL forgetting so many good ones! thank you so much.....

i would not actually wish a labor lockout on anyone again but i WILL say. the 2012 lockout really gave us some things to cook with. it's the whole *waves hand* disruption of routine, and sticking guys in places they usually weren't, playing with players they usually weren't; it gave us LORE, man. it also gave us, by which i mean Capitals Fans, ovi bothering nicklas every day until nicklas went to play in moscow with him, which is so romo of them

do the people these days know that dylan l.arkin and zach w.erenski were like........ attached at the hip.... do they know they were boys together.....

i don't think guys are doing starcrossed then reunited to win a cup together then starcrossed with diverging paths again like mike r.ichards and jeff c.arter these days. i know this is like, not a rare pair or anything like that but i just think it's one that still deserves oxygen in the year of our lord 2024. do they count as old man yaoi yet? or are they just middle aged yaoi at the moment? please weigh in

brioux family christmas cards

i suspect nobody really cares about the caps young guns era except for caps fans BUT since we are both caps fans: if hockey tumblr cared about the caps they would be feral for the young guns polycule i think. there was really such an energy with those four LMFAO. also do you remember their glam rock intro video they did. that was an event to ME

WAIT i'm adding this. i miss carey p.rice and pk s.ubban... those guys made me care about the C.ANADIENS that is so so impressive. oh to see a triple low five again... we didn't even know how good we had it....

[larsnicklas]

hockey xenophobia is such a strange brand of insane to me bc why are so so many old ass men in the canucks draft announcement posts complaining abt the first pick being swedish and even going so far as to complain that the second pick, despite being canadian-born, had swedish immigrants for grandparents. like genuinely wtf is ur problem. get a fucking grip. a guy who might just be an actual nazi was picked in the top 20 and this is what we're bothered about?

u spoke not a single untrue word here!!! it’s that stupid pervasive belief that north americans have that euros (and particularly swedes) are soft it drives me nuts lol. i know the c.anucks draft a lot out of sweden but it’s like. they have a robust and very good euro scouting department with a proven track record of success why wouldn’t they continue drafting out of there?? anyway a team full of finns and swedes just won a stanley cup so i think the nucks should continue as they are 😌

[larsnicklas]

tears in my eyes. guys i think you overestimate the intensity of my feelings about leon. i hated leon for like six months in a fleeting "lingering bad vibes from two teams i really enjoy playing the o.ilers in the postseason" way not in a "i wish for his failure and demise" way!!! 😭😭😭 i have no real beef with him i just have a fleeting SPORTS beef which is different!!

BUT yeah i mean. you're not wrong about the contracts! it's gonna be a balancing act for sure in the coming years, and not necessarily one i think most nhl front offices are able to successfully navigate! MY ideal scenario is both of them leaving the o.ilers and immediately winning subsequent cups with their respective new teams like i think that would make me smile a little.

[larsnicklas]

when did sasha say that about leon?? 👀

summer media sesh :>

[larsnicklas]

can twitter stop trying to get me to care abt the bruins goalies i’m abt two seconds from muting their names

no like same. i’m so sorry i think they’re very nice and wholesome but i quite literally do not caaaaaare. i think they should continue on as they have and i DID like s.wayman being santa for u.llmark’s kids. that’s extremely cute!! but i think people should stop shoving them into my face and maybe i would care more 😭🙏

[larsnicklas]

he is so embarrassing why is he going after a baby goalie that saved 42 sog when it will just make people drag his own shit ass goalie that got pulled because he's extremely bad at his job

i think historically speaking that man has a poor brain to mouth filter when he’s a) tired b) has just lost and c) has had it up to HERE with the media and all of those boxes were ticked (has played thirty min back to back games; outshot the pdo wunderkinds 45-18 and still lost; is under even more media scrutiny than usual with an all canadian second round)! i’ll defend him a little here LOL give him his time to have his tantrum it’s because he really is a fierce competitor and losing genuinely pisses him off 😭😭😭 it WAS embarrassing and sour grapes of him to say alskaksjs but the rest of the presser was pretty levelheaded, and arty got his shot in too with the “which one 😏” so all is fair in love and war (the stanley cup playoffs)

[larsnicklas]

personally it's hysterical to me that they are leaning sooo hard into the 1942 parallels because the key momentum shift in 1942 was that the red wings coach was so incensed by the calls in game 4 he went out onto the ice and fist fought a ref, leading to his suspension for the rest of the series. if there is ONE thing i know pomo is NOT gonna do!

right like 😭 if you’re grasping at something that happened 80 years ago under a completely different set of circumstances and when there were 6 teams in existence like……. be serious…..

[larsnicklas]

HELLO!! puckpocketed on main here to ask What do you mean with those tags… what politics got in the way of Cagnoni getting a team canada invite..? 👀

ALSKSKS it’s uh me being a little biased because i watch cags and the hawks so much! but hc tends to be very married to their guys; if you basically don’t break into the national lineup when you’re 16 it’s a lot harder to get in as you get older, even if your play merits at least a camp invite — which cagnoni’s definitely did. this year’s hc team specifically was very baffling to me because it could not be more clear that they could have used more good puck movers on the back end and cags deserved at least a look at camp and an opportunity to play his way on! hc leadership of late also tends to fill by role/position instead of just taking the best players available, and they decided they wanted size and a heavier, more defensive style for their blue line overall. which uh how’d that work out??

[larsnicklas]

"idgaf abt the oilers but i hope this drives players away because wtf"

this is not bashing the other anon but I don't think they care since that team have one of the worst group of people in the nhl and the ones seen as "good people" like mcloser and drai are always publicly praising them like how they said that rapist is so nice such a good guy and shit

yeah i mean! i don't think any group is a monolith and i do think there probably are players out there that would be more hesitant to join an organization helmed by bowman

but i would just, as an aside, caution against viewing the oilers as some outlier on this. the team you (general you, not you specifically, anon!) root for is not immune to defending their rapist teammate and that's a fact! i know it's tempting to want to feel moral superiority over other fanbases but you gotta resist it lol. the only side any of us should be on is the side of any victims and survivors, it's really not about team colors