OldTimeHockey wrote:
Squanto wrote:
Powerplayer was run off these boards for repeatedly pissing people off, and breaking the site rules. Nothing more than that.
I get that you want to defend Vanek when you feel he's criticized unfairly. To me, it just gets to be too much when nobody is saying anything, and you have to scream FUCK YOU VANEK HATERS every time he gets on the scoresheet.
Just my .02.
EDIT: And because some people get confused, I'm not talking in super secret mod language that you should stop screaming about Vanek haters every 45 seconds. I just personally find it annoying.
When the hate is so strong (I mean some people have gone as far to call him lazy and out of shape due to the expression on his face when he plays....whole threads about that on the Sabres website prior to reworking it so no one posts there..which I think was a Golisano/Regier mandate.) (Sarcasm in case certain people didn't get it.)
As such, the love will be as strong. Its never gonna go away. Annoying? Sure...funny when people get annoyed by it, you bet.
Passive aggressive much?
Yeah, I kind of started everything when I jumped on PSP for finding a reason to criticize Vanek retroactively. Definitely mostly my fault. My big thing is I hate confirmation bias, and I feel that it is responsible for 90% of the Vanek hate, and probably 90% of the hate for every player that winds up being a scapegoat. People form an opinion and allow occurrences that support that opinion to become obvious, and occurrences that refute it to become nearly invisible. Sekera has played probably 40 really solid game this season, but those ten bad games keep people hating him. The same thing is true of Vanek, and I bet if Connolly popped off an 80 point season, it would happen with him.
I thought the assertion that Vanek was invisible last night was one of those instances. He led the team with five shots on goal, and had a few prime scoring chances in front of the net. I don't honestly see how that can be construed as invisible. If you want to harp on him for not burying those chances (and he definitely should have buried the one), then that's at least accurate, but I think that saying he simply was nonexistent last night was flat out wrong and indicative of ignorance and that confirmation bias.