It's Blogger Day Again!

It's blogger day again...a/k/a I got credentials bitches!





This one was a little last minute but being that I am jobless it's not like I have any commitments to get in the way. Plus, it's my second favorite team in the league, the New Jersey Devils! The thought of seeing Martin Brodeur wondering around the back had me giddy!

So I headed down to Phillips Arena early Saturday morning. At 9:45 the guy that sets up blogger day met us outside of Phillips Arena and we went in for morning skate.




Moose chatting with Anssi before morning skate.





Moose stretching out.





Max Afinogenov had his son on the ice skating with him. He's a tall boy, almost as tall as Max.





One of the many things I love about Moose, anything for a save!





So I'm sitting there watching morning skate and I see a guy come up the stairs and have a seat. I did a double take...it's Doc-freaking-Emerick! I'm a huge Doc and Chico fan and was so excited to see Doc.





The guys skating around.





Also watching the morning skate...Devils GM and newly inducted Hall of Famer, Lou Lamoriello. Lou is known for keeping his team on lock down and not really allowing a lot of access to the team. I am sure blogger day would NEVER happen in Jersey. I looked over a few times and he was actually scowling at us.





Peverley isn't scowling, but he is definitely wondering what we are doing there.





Whoa now Moose! I know Pavs did it for a few seconds, but we don't need you going all Jacques Plante on us.





By request, some Anssi Salmela.





A rare occasion, Hainsey isn't chatting. He looks like he is about to though.





It's Czech-&-Slovakia....get it? Czechoslovakia. Yeah yeah bad joke, but it made me laugh.





Group pow wow.


While watching the morning skate, we were joined by Natalie Taylor, the rink side reporter for the Thrashers. You know Natalie as the pretty blond chick who does the player interviews and other in-arena pieces...not games such as Win it All, that's that goof J Bird. I always called her Sco-Jo because I think she looks just like Scarlet Johanson. ANYWAY...Natalie joined us and chatted for a while. I learned a little of her background which was interesting and that she wrote all of the "keys to the game" she did last year as well as the material for the interviews. She's no window dressing, the girl knows her stuff. I also found out she likes my blog. After my head stopped swelling and I was able to focus again, I was very flattered. We had a cool "girl power" hockey talk. It's always good to meet other chicks that love hockey!




After morning skate we went back into the locker room area to watch Coach Anderson give his game day speech, that's always fun. Then we hung around for a bit and got to speak with Max Afinogenov!


What really impressed me about Max was how warm, friendly and chatty he was. I was expecting someone a little more stoic like Slava. There were never any one word answers and he smiled and joked again. He is really soft spoken and we all had to move forward to hear him. Once again I asked no questions, but really enjoyed the ones that were asked. Max was asked how he liked playing in Atlanta as opposed to Buffalo. Max said that he was born and raised in Moscow and was used to a big city with a lot to do. Buffalo was much smaller and there weren't as many options. He had friends and family, but not a lot to do. He enjoys living in a large city again. And of course, he enjoys the weather. Max was also asked about what Coach Anderson said when he made the team as far as Anderson's system and what role he was supposed to play. Coach Anderson told him to be himself. He also talked about coming into a situation where there were several Russian speaking teammates and how that helped him acclimated.




Max also posed for a picture with his bear that the Atlanta Thrashers Fan Club made. These bears were the talk of the town and helped raise quite a bit of money for the Atlanta Thrashers Foundation.


Well I didn't see Marty Brodeur or any other Devil in the back. (I did see head coach Jacques Lemaire, he looked mean) I did however see Doc Emerick. I saw him standing there looking in his bag and I had to say something!! I went up to him and said "you are Doc Emerick." (duh) He said yes. I told him I was a huge fan. He was soooo nice. He asked me what my name was and where I was from. A few minutes later he came over and chatted with the rest of the bloggers and asked what exactly we were doing and talked about how cool it was. SOO nice!




I over heard Doc saying that since the Devils played last night, only a few were skating in the morning skate. Of course you know the great Martin Pierre Brodeur was NOT gonna be one of those. He was laying up in the bed at the hotel ordering room service or something.

On the ice for morning skate was Yann Danis.





Pierre-Luc Letourneau-Leblonde. He was definitely out there and I'm 75% sure this is a picture of him.





I know this goon, Andrew Peters. He's a newer Devil and still growing on me.


The morning portion of the blogger event was over and it was time to head home and rest up for the game!