Vox Populi 2013
 

http://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-raci...-voting-begins

Thoughts on the nominees? Was anybody left off? Write-ins are allowed. I can't remember if that's how Paynter made it last year or if they added him to the poll after an outcry.

This is the horse racing equivalent of winning the Lady Byng Award.

The only difference is that the you get your name etched on a cool trophy for the latter:

I was scared to google that. Based on the name, I thought it might've been the Miss Congeniality equivalent in the adult film industry.

Yeah, it's just a hockey award for the player who demonstrates the highest level of sportsmanship while also demonstrating a high level of play.

If I ever won an award like that...I'm pretty sure I'd slash some across the head Marty McSorley style and try to instigate a bench clearing brawl in the very next game I played.

The Buffalo Sabres of the Mid to late 90's were one of my all-time favorite Sports teams. They had about five of the biggest goons around. Rob Ray, Brad May, Matt Barnaby, Bob Boughner, and Wayne Premeaux. They were assembled by a drunken Indian named Ted Nolan who won Coach of the Year in 1997 and not only got fired, but was basically blackballed after the very season in which he won Coach of the Year.

That was such a dirty, gritty, nasty, cheap-shotting, goon squad of a tough team. I had both a Rob Ray and Matt Barnaby Jersey. Would wear Buffalo Sabres gear everywhere. They were the most badass sports team in the history of modern sports.

This was one of the Classics:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMOU4Ogzb5I


It starts at about 20 seconds in. Matt Barnaby fakes an injury, and than jumps the Goalie when he's not ready.

damn classic, remember that like it was yesterday.

Another legendary moment. A fan in Quebec takes on the Buffalo Sabres bench and gets pummeled by Rob Ray:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vp7ApYx6Qbc

Although I respect your opinion on many things, including this topic, I have to say that the late 80's Red Wings would have mopped the floor with them. Probert and Kocur were the two baddest MF's to ever lace em up.

Just like the Mike Venezia Memorial Award?

Almost every jockey I've met is extremely nice and tries to be friendly.

I actually had one of the jockeys, Anthony Stephen, give me and my girlfriend sealed up chapstick, with a picture of himself and his riding accomplishments on it. Strawberry vanilla flavored.

If you can fit your riding accomplishments onto a thing of chapstick, you still have a ways to go...but he, like most jockeys, is very friendly and very nice to people at the track.

With a hockey player, Gamesmanship is a much better quality than sportsmanship, in my opinion.

I'm old enough to remember Probert and Kocur and they were both way better fighters than anyone the Sabres had.

However, those Ted Nolan teams with the Sabres had some flat out goons and dirty, cheap, cheap players who always instigated stuff.

You couldn't watch a Sabres game without seeing shenanigans at some point in the game. They're the only team I can ever remember from growing up, who could put 5 legit goons on the ice at the same time if they wanted to.

Here's another 6 on 6 brawl between the Sabres and Flyers. This one from 1997.

It gets real good at 1:05 into the clip.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zgXAyr0-r0

More Sabres and Flyers from '97. This is the 3rd different game with even the goalies fighting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oavBYx6sf8A

That one got good at 56 seconds in.

Probert and Kocur were so tough, that after a while, no one bothered to challenge them.

Except Tie Domi!

...and Troy Crowder. I remember growing up and watching those games. It actually got to the point in Detroit where you would look at the schedule to see who the Wings were playing and thinking "great, that means Probie is going to fight _____, or Kocur is going to fight ____." And, if somebody like Domi or Crowder would get the upper hand on one of them, there was a re-match that was talked about until the next time they played.

For Bob Probert to lose a fight was the end of the world.

The Domi fight was great. I have never seen anyone smile while fighting.

I am a bit (cough, cough) older so I'd like to bring to your attention the name engraved on the Lady Byng trophy as recipient two years running...Stan Mikita(66-67. 67-68)

On his wikipedia page I found the following:

In his early years, Mikita was among the most penalized players in the league, but he then decided to play a cleaner game and went on to win the Lady Byng Memorial Trophy for sportsmanlike conduct twice. Mikita's drastic change in behavior came after he returned home from a road trip. His wife told him that while their daughter, Meg, was watching the Black Hawks' last road game on television, she turned and said, "Mommy, why does Daddy spend so much time sitting down?" The camera had just shown Mikita in the penalty box again (from Mikita's autobiography "I Play to Win.")

What the page does not say is that Stan announced to the press at training camp that he was going to 'clean up his play" and then proceeded to play exactly as he had before....chippy, elbows first, etc, etc. but because he had told the press he was 'clean", the refs stopped looking at him.

ps....the Broad Street Bullies were pretty tough

Give me the cast of characters that played against the Hanson brothers in the final game of Slapshot..................:D

It begins and ends with Oggie Oglethorpe

Well played.................