The Commander
I really wasn't sure how to open this...because I'm writing it with some serious rage. My creativity isn't quite flowing past the bile that I'm gagging on at the moment.
I'm a pretty nice guy, I try to be respectful of people and stuff. I limit my criticisms to open ended subtweets and passive aggressive shit, I try to stay away from the SJW type stuff that a lot of people get involved in, not because I don't believe in a lot of the good people are trying to do or because of my own values. I'm just not really that type of person.
But man, when you take something I love and enjoy like oh..... Sabres hockey and make a complete mockery out of it, man I get a little punchy.
This one's been building up for awhile, but it's coming to a head these past few weeks.
It's time to face facts. The off-ice department of the Sabres is a complete fucking embarassment.
I'll start with the easy thing: the decision to not live stream the Prospects Tournament. This is a layup for me to be mad about.
I don't live in Buffalo, I can't go to this fucking thing and buy hot dogs and beers and hats. Does that make me any less of a fan? Does that mean I shouldn't be able to follow the prospects that I've been waiting on for a few years while the actual garbage hockey team was dressing waiver wire fodder and trading away actual good players to get these kids?
The frustrating thing about this is that I know it's not a financial decision. It can't be, right?? I mean, there's a literal plaza and complex of hockey related shit down there that cost 14 billion dollars. There's a sports bar that draws a buttload of people. I know, even aside from the fact that the owner is a kajillionaire, they can't be hurting for money.
If you're not going to stream it as a decision of some type? Just tell me why. I might not (ok, there's no way I would) accept your reasoning, but at least I'd know why you're being dickish about it. And hey, if I'm wrong and you want to squeeze money out of people, I'll pay $10 to watch the tournament online, because I'm stupid as shit. Give me the option. Give me SOMETHING besides ignoring the outcry and telling me it's on the shitfucking radio like I want to watch Phil Housley and this is 1982.
Otherwise, I'll just happily sit here and point out that the fucking Nashville Predators, in the smoking hot hockey hotbed of NASHVILLE FUCKING TENNESEE is streaming theirs.
That's the easy one, EVERYONE is pissed about the streaming thing.
I really wasn't sure how to open this...because I'm writing it with some serious rage. My creativity isn't quite flowing past the bile that I'm gagging on at the moment.
I'm a pretty nice guy, I try to be respectful of people and stuff. I limit my criticisms to open ended subtweets and passive aggressive shit, I try to stay away from the SJW type stuff that a lot of people get involved in, not because I don't believe in a lot of the good people are trying to do or because of my own values. I'm just not really that type of person.
But man, when you take something I love and enjoy like oh..... Sabres hockey and make a complete mockery out of it, man I get a little punchy.
This one's been building up for awhile, but it's coming to a head these past few weeks.
It's time to face facts. The off-ice department of the Sabres is a complete fucking embarassment.
I'll start with the easy thing: the decision to not live stream the Prospects Tournament. This is a layup for me to be mad about.
I don't live in Buffalo, I can't go to this fucking thing and buy hot dogs and beers and hats. Does that make me any less of a fan? Does that mean I shouldn't be able to follow the prospects that I've been waiting on for a few years while the actual garbage hockey team was dressing waiver wire fodder and trading away actual good players to get these kids?
The frustrating thing about this is that I know it's not a financial decision. It can't be, right?? I mean, there's a literal plaza and complex of hockey related shit down there that cost 14 billion dollars. There's a sports bar that draws a buttload of people. I know, even aside from the fact that the owner is a kajillionaire, they can't be hurting for money.
If you're not going to stream it as a decision of some type? Just tell me why. I might not (ok, there's no way I would) accept your reasoning, but at least I'd know why you're being dickish about it. And hey, if I'm wrong and you want to squeeze money out of people, I'll pay $10 to watch the tournament online, because I'm stupid as shit. Give me the option. Give me SOMETHING besides ignoring the outcry and telling me it's on the shitfucking radio like I want to watch Phil Housley and this is 1982.
Otherwise, I'll just happily sit here and point out that the fucking Nashville Predators, in the smoking hot hockey hotbed of NASHVILLE FUCKING TENNESEE is streaming theirs.
That's the easy one, EVERYONE is pissed about the streaming thing.
Oh but there's more...there's SOOOOO much more.
How about trying to buy merchandise from the Sabres Store when you live out of state? I just bought a jersey from there a couple of weeks ago. The process itself is easy, you call up, tell them what you want, the person goes to check stock, confirms said stock, takes your info and places the order.
You see the problem I have is that I was charged $25 for shipping UPS Ground on a $180 order. Look here Sabres, I understand that you're not Amazon and don't have your own logistics company to offset the cost of doing this type of business. I mean, sure, charge me for shipping if you need to. But $25 for standard UPS is fucking ridiculous by itself... let alone when I'm spending $180. Also, since I don't live in the area, I can't take advantage of any sales that the Sabres Store has, so maybe free shipping on a $100+ order is a nice gesture, I dunno...I'm a sucker for trying to support my fucking team. I just don't want to get bent over so thoroughly when I do so.
My retail spending habits aside, HOWEVER... The biggest, and most egregarious problem with the Non-Hockey portion of the Sabres office is the god damned Twitter account.
The motherfucking Twitter account. The cringe-inducing, make your butthole pucker up nice and tight while you follow along with it Twitter account.
How about trying to buy merchandise from the Sabres Store when you live out of state? I just bought a jersey from there a couple of weeks ago. The process itself is easy, you call up, tell them what you want, the person goes to check stock, confirms said stock, takes your info and places the order.
You see the problem I have is that I was charged $25 for shipping UPS Ground on a $180 order. Look here Sabres, I understand that you're not Amazon and don't have your own logistics company to offset the cost of doing this type of business. I mean, sure, charge me for shipping if you need to. But $25 for standard UPS is fucking ridiculous by itself... let alone when I'm spending $180. Also, since I don't live in the area, I can't take advantage of any sales that the Sabres Store has, so maybe free shipping on a $100+ order is a nice gesture, I dunno...I'm a sucker for trying to support my fucking team. I just don't want to get bent over so thoroughly when I do so.
My retail spending habits aside, HOWEVER... The biggest, and most egregarious problem with the Non-Hockey portion of the Sabres office is the god damned Twitter account.
The motherfucking Twitter account. The cringe-inducing, make your butthole pucker up nice and tight while you follow along with it Twitter account.
I'm not sure when this all started, and I'm certainly not the first to voice the dissatisfaction here. If you want to go back a few years even, I believe most people started to take notice of this when the account started egregiously retweeting shit like OMG IM AT THE SABERS GAME WITH MY BESTIESS!!! during games instead of providing any sort of game information whatsoever. The outcry over this eventually led to the creation of a different account for this pandering nonsense, which I guess is fine if you get off on being noticed by the Sabres Twitter account for showing up to a game - that's cool, you deserve it after the last few years. Go nuts.
It's not that the Sabres Twitter is BAD. (Yes it is). I mean it serves its purpose in a very basic way. It tells you there's a game tonight, it gives you some video of the players telling you they need to go out and give 100% and all the other cliched nonsense that the media drags out of those guys. That's fine, I'm ok with that - it's important.
God forbid the Sabres Twitter actually had some decent original content to push out to us, though... funny videos, getting to actually KNOW the players, things like that. Other teams do this. Other teams EXCEL at fluff pieces like that - they get the players to buy in and do skits, and all sorts of fun things. I know the Sabres have some seriously talented people working in the Team Coverage department - shit, Kevin Snow was awesome before he left for greener pastures, Ian Ott is a totally normal dude who seems to get it, no other team has someone as dedicated to coverage of the teams' prospects as Kris Baker, Chris Ryndak was one of the most insanely talented bloggers in the Sabres blogosphere before he was hired.
The problem is, you don't seem to hear from these quality gentlemen very often. The Sabres Twitter pimps the fucking hell out of that god awful Hockey Hotline show with those two idiots that host it - but I'd LOVE to see more original content from these talented people represented here. The blatant lack of self awareness of CK ANAL as he curates the content on @BuffaloSabres is what seems to drive everyone fucking nuts though. Holy fucking shit. When you're hosting a prospect tournament in your own barn, featuring one of the best hockey prospects of the past 15 years...your best play after the team decides not to stream it... is to tweet the most barebones information you possibly can with a vomit inducing amount of Emojis?
We really can't do better than this? We can't find anyone better to run the public facing side of your social media presence than the person who uses the tool like you sat them in the "HERES WHATS COOL AND HIP ON TWITTER 2015!!" introduction class, gave them the password, and let them spam the red 100 emoji 15 times a tweet non-ironically?
It's not that the Sabres Twitter is BAD. (Yes it is). I mean it serves its purpose in a very basic way. It tells you there's a game tonight, it gives you some video of the players telling you they need to go out and give 100% and all the other cliched nonsense that the media drags out of those guys. That's fine, I'm ok with that - it's important.
God forbid the Sabres Twitter actually had some decent original content to push out to us, though... funny videos, getting to actually KNOW the players, things like that. Other teams do this. Other teams EXCEL at fluff pieces like that - they get the players to buy in and do skits, and all sorts of fun things. I know the Sabres have some seriously talented people working in the Team Coverage department - shit, Kevin Snow was awesome before he left for greener pastures, Ian Ott is a totally normal dude who seems to get it, no other team has someone as dedicated to coverage of the teams' prospects as Kris Baker, Chris Ryndak was one of the most insanely talented bloggers in the Sabres blogosphere before he was hired.
The problem is, you don't seem to hear from these quality gentlemen very often. The Sabres Twitter pimps the fucking hell out of that god awful Hockey Hotline show with those two idiots that host it - but I'd LOVE to see more original content from these talented people represented here. The blatant lack of self awareness of CK ANAL as he curates the content on @BuffaloSabres is what seems to drive everyone fucking nuts though. Holy fucking shit. When you're hosting a prospect tournament in your own barn, featuring one of the best hockey prospects of the past 15 years...your best play after the team decides not to stream it... is to tweet the most barebones information you possibly can with a vomit inducing amount of Emojis?
We really can't do better than this? We can't find anyone better to run the public facing side of your social media presence than the person who uses the tool like you sat them in the "HERES WHATS COOL AND HIP ON TWITTER 2015!!" introduction class, gave them the password, and let them spam the red 100 emoji 15 times a tweet non-ironically?
Holy motherfucking shit. @BuffaloSabres is run like the Twitter for Applebees for fucks sake. I realize that the Buffalo Sabres are a #brand, but sports teams aren't like types of laundry detergent. They have history, they have colorful characters, they have a never-ending stream of #content. And I'm motherfucking insulted that your Twitter account panders to people like there's a buy one get one free sale on you at Target this week.
Look, people who follow you already LIKE you. They've already "bought" the product. This nonsense like "no arena giveaways," "no web streams of shit," "no dressing up Patrick Kaleta like Shrek" needs to stop. I'm not asking you to be the LA Kings Twitter or whatever. I'm just asking you to not be the fucking Orbitz Twitter. It's a fucking embarrassment. Give me a sense that you actually know who Derek Plante *IS* when he's going to be on Hockey Hotline - he's a guy who scored one of the Top 5 Goals in the fucking franchise history by the way. Cover the prospects game better than your goddamned AHL franchise did for starters...that shouldn't be hard. Don't tell me the score of the fucking prospects game and in the same fucking tweet, spit in my fucking face and tell me I can listen to it on the radio like this is 1957 and Jack Eichel is crinkling paper to make fire sounds effects after he scores. Stop using Emojis non-ironically like a 13 year old girl who just figured out that they are a thing that exist on her fucking Hello Kitty iPhone. When the rest of the league is doing a #fun thing like watching the Mighty Ducks movie and tweeting about it, having fun, making jokes with each other - don't be MIA.
Eyes are going to actually be on you soon and I'd prefer they know Jack Eichel as the motherfucking cock of the walk, not the USA flag Emoji.
If you need any fucking help, and it's clear that you do, it's right down the hall - maybe you can Periscope your walk over there:
Look, people who follow you already LIKE you. They've already "bought" the product. This nonsense like "no arena giveaways," "no web streams of shit," "no dressing up Patrick Kaleta like Shrek" needs to stop. I'm not asking you to be the LA Kings Twitter or whatever. I'm just asking you to not be the fucking Orbitz Twitter. It's a fucking embarrassment. Give me a sense that you actually know who Derek Plante *IS* when he's going to be on Hockey Hotline - he's a guy who scored one of the Top 5 Goals in the fucking franchise history by the way. Cover the prospects game better than your goddamned AHL franchise did for starters...that shouldn't be hard. Don't tell me the score of the fucking prospects game and in the same fucking tweet, spit in my fucking face and tell me I can listen to it on the radio like this is 1957 and Jack Eichel is crinkling paper to make fire sounds effects after he scores. Stop using Emojis non-ironically like a 13 year old girl who just figured out that they are a thing that exist on her fucking Hello Kitty iPhone. When the rest of the league is doing a #fun thing like watching the Mighty Ducks movie and tweeting about it, having fun, making jokes with each other - don't be MIA.
Eyes are going to actually be on you soon and I'd prefer they know Jack Eichel as the motherfucking cock of the walk, not the USA flag Emoji.
If you need any fucking help, and it's clear that you do, it's right down the hall - maybe you can Periscope your walk over there:
That's cute. #RockTheRalph https://t.co/e5prkIYg4c
— Buffalo Bills (@buffalobills) September 15, 2015
You can block me at @essbeeay if you're so inclined. I already know you're petty enough, and I already know I won't miss anything.
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