Au contraire my friend ! What we have here is an excellent discourse of NHL information, sprinkled with a delightful flavoring of music, history and geopolitics. And kid yourself not, as you need to look no further than the main article here this afternoon, to find a “vortex of totally irrelevant discussion”. Talk about blind sheep blindly following the blind shepherd ! Anyway, the business of having pride in our Western Conference “based” teams is very important for many of us. You Easterners get all the media coverage and attention. In fact, about the only time you people take notice of us, is when it’s time for your annual “butt-kicking” in the Stanley Cup final !

Person B: I’m not sure friend, though it’s safe to say that he must be “good” people …

Hey man, thanks for your kind words ! Anyway, we’ve gotta have some fun around here, right ? Seriously though, I do believe that we’re going to get our game back shortly, probably by the 2nd or 3rd week in November. Now a lot of people have said that I’m “nuts” with regards to my suggestion that this impasse is nothing more than a “contrived” delay to the start of the year. Well to hell with them I say, as they were saying the same thing about me this spring, when I said that our LA Kings were destined to win the Stanley Cup ! Now on another note, it’s positively hilarious how these Easterners think they’re “all that” and that we in the west are a joke, eh ? … because further from the truth you couldn’t get ! The simple fact of the matter is that the “balance of power” today lies squarely in the Western Conference. The only thing the East has over us in the West is more media coverage. Other than that, they’re a completely “inferior” conference in literally every conceivable way. And one more thing … I’ll level with you by admitting that you Coyotes were the only team we Kings really feared in last year’s playoffs !

*** Special video selection for the Phoenix Coyotes ***

“hang in there friends, you guys are gonna make it” …

Fehr is going to drive this lockout as long as he can, so he can remain (in his eyes) relevant.

No way the season starts on November 2.

The answer to your question “who might start strong?” is provided by your own inset picture … why the LOS ANGELES KINGS of course ! Look, for things like this you always refer to the most recent evidence available. And for that, you need to look no further than the last NHL game to be played, which you’ll recall was on June 11th of this year … you remember, that “lil ol” King’s 6-1 thumping of the East’s so-called best ! In all seriousness though, Bettman’s successful bid to remove October from the schedule, has now actually served to make us Kings even stronger than was the case already. “We” more than anybody needed “time” this year. Not so much to rest and repair, but more so to get over the inevitable “blahs” which always follow in the wake of incredible emotional “highs” like we experienced this past June. The bottom line is that the King’s juggernaut is going to pick up right where it left off last year. “Our’s” is a dynasty of “multiple” successive championships and it all starts again in about two week’s time. GO KINGS GO !!!!!!!!!!!!

ps: for the record, the other teams listed above are essentially nothing more than “flotsam” for lack of a better expression … and that’s so, notwithstanding the fact that the Flyers likely “mean well” ?