5 on 5: The Production Line

We Want Wings!

It’s a special game for us with the Red Wings tonight.  One of us hails from the Motor City and still has deep roots there.  Call it a mixed marriage… 

So we’re going to flex our wings and reach out, not around, to some Red Wing pals of ours there – the three guys behind The Production Line - Rob Discher, Michael Petrella, and Chris Hollis. 

Now in its second year, TPL is easily the smartest, snappiest, winged-wheel blog there is.  We got to know these guys through Rob, a DC work colleague originally from Detroit, now on work release and living in Austin, Texas, USA.

In fact, his colleagues, also natives of the Motor City, are now on the coasts in Seattle and NYC.  No matter how far they’ve wandered from home, their passion for the Wings remains strong.

The last time you'll see one of these here

Beyond their sharp writing and the ability to work cultural references that makes us look like yokels, TPL is known for their ‘Loss Candy’ posts.  When the Wings drop a game, the boys post red-hot pics of scantily clad, (SFW) women to ease the pain.

And the exclusively heterosexual trio, bowing to pressure from their many lady fans, started to include beef/boeuf cake shots as well.  Bravo!

To commemorate tonight’s Caps – Wings contest, we exchanged a set of five questions for each other to answer, 5v5 if you will. Hilarity ensues.

We nearly hurt ourselves trying to be more clever than they, and our responses were posted on their site earlier.  Today we return the favor and give them the bandwidth they so richly deserve.

Our Questions, their answers:

#1: Our serious question: what does Hockeytown miss most about Olympia?  And are you offended by DC working to claim the title of Hockey Capital?

“The Joe and I basically came into the world at the same time.  My dad has some great memories of the old Olympia, but for me, all of my game day memories are at our current barn.  There are a handful of scenarios that could land the Wings in a new/different location not long from now, and as someone who just went to a game at the Joe Louis Arena last weekend, I’ll say that this will be a MAJOR bummer for me.  I love that building…$9 beers and all.”

Part 2…Am I offended by DC trying to claim Hockey Capital?  No, not really.  There is one and only one Hockeytown, and that’s Detroit.  Hockey Capital seems like a bit of a stretch for a team whose last big playoff push ended by getting crushed by the Wings in the finals, but DC has always been a town of hyperbole.  I say go for it.  Who are you really competing against anyway?  Ottawa?”

#2: TPL is well-favored for its loss-candy.  Be honest: whose idea was it to incorporate boy loss-candy, and who’s the best at picking the hottest guys?

“Hollis, Petrella and I are all students of history.  We understand full-well that when the will of the people goes unheard, all hell breaks loose.  Loss Candy was my idea originally, and it probably (definitely) started when I’d look up pictures of hot chicks after a loss to console myself.  I assumed that our readers would be similarly entertained with the SFW images following a Wings meltdown. 

What I failed to realize is that half of our readers are female and have no (or none that they admit to) interest in barely clad pics of Brazilian chicas.  As has been a pattern for most of my life, when enough women bitch about something, I usually fall in line, as I did here.  We get our male loss candy by submission from our female readers and most of it comes from Twitter. 

Every once in a while we run out of a stockpile and I have to look it up myself.  I put up a shot of Dan Marino there once as a joke when that happened and all hell broke loose.”

#3: The Caps’ Sasha Semin loves him some Mickey D’s. TPL already made the world safe for curly fries; if Nicklas Lidstrom were to open up a fast food chain, what would it be called and what would they serve?

“This is obviously a trick question, as we all know that Lidstrom is a heavy investor in the Ikea Café meatball franchise.  Were he to start another business, I am sure that in addition to having everyone’s order out in the most efficient manner, they’d have the cleanest restrooms on the planet. 

It would be staffed by a bunch of 50 year olds who all looked like they were 25 and people would get fired for even the slightest incompetence…like putting mustard on the bottom bun or oversalting the fries.”

#4: The Cap’s “Red Rockers” cheerleaders are often called the “Red Knockers.”  If you were in charge of the Wings squad, what would they be called, and what would they wear?  And what would Tim Gunn say?

“I regret to inform you that the Wings don’t actually have cheerleaders.  Outside of the Southeast Division, I think they’re actually pretty rare (please provide pictures to prove me wrong).  I’ve seen the talent there in Washington and down in Carolina.  I’m jealous. 

If we had our own squad though, I’d like us to take a more “diverse” track and bring in the crew from the 2002 epic Drumline starring Nick Cannon and Zoë Saldana (and Orlando Jones, btw…what the hell happened to that guy?).  Not sure how we’d account for the traction issues they’d have out on the ice, but chances are the lines at the pisser during the intermissions would be a hell of a lot shorter if we had talent like that occupying people’s attention.

I would bring Tim Gunn immediately on this project as a senior advisor.  After days of wardrobe discussion where he walked around saying “this concerns me,” we’d eventually settle on a barely-clad thong ensemble for the guys and girls.  He’d begrudgingly sign off on the idea with a brief “make it work,” and we’d get on with our mission of blowing people’s minds with inventive dance and beat routines.”

#5: If the Red Wings were a great American novel, which one would they be?

“I’m trying like hell to turn this into a Catcher in the Rye answer…one of my all-time favorites. I’ll go with a two-part answer here: The Wings themselves are Moby Dick, chasing after that savage beast (the Cup) and in some cases, following it to their peril. 

The Wings fans are “modern classic” Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas…a strung out bunch of madmen barreling through the open desert of the regular season, towards the playoffs and into the later rounds with our two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half-full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers… a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether, and two dozen amyls.

HST was chasing the American Dream.  We’re after the Cup.  The mental states and physical deterioration caused by the pursuit of each are probably about the same when it’s all said and done.”

OT: If you weren’t a Wings fan, which team would you follow?

“Tampa Bay.  Not a fan of the town, but I’ll support any team Stevie Y is involved in.”

SHOOTOUT: If it’s the Wings and the Caps in the Stanley Cups finals, what’s the wager?

“Hard to say right now, but I am positive that whiskey will somehow be involved.  Let’s discuss a month from now, eh?”

Their Questions – Our Answers:

#1. Hypothetical: Calvin Klein is rumored to be opening up a slot for a new male model and it’s up to us to nominate someone from our respective teams to nominate someone to fill that slot.  In a nod to the overwhelming majority of our female readership’s sentiments, TPL heartily nominates the ravishingly handsome, yet wildly incompetent Jonathan Ericsson.  Who counters for the Caps? 

“The gifted, sun-kissed and sightly fall-downy Alex “Sasha” Semin.  His breathtaking, model-like looks make this the easy choice.  In fact modeling is the only line of legitimate work that might pay him more than he’s getting now. The “Sasha” hat-trick: a highlight reel goal, an offensive zone stick penalty, and an inexplicable loss of balance.”

#2. If the Caps were a classic cocktail, which one would they be? 

“Beer and a bump.  They’re the sort of drink you know is going to catch up to you in the end, but you play with all the same.  This is why we consulted noted mixologist Matty G in DC to create several new Caps drinks.”

#3. Your plane over Northern  Africa is shot down.  You are dying of thirst and will bleed to death within 10 hours unless you get proper treatment.  Out of nowhere, Brooks Orpik shows up driving an ambulance and offers assistance.  What’s your move? 

“We’ insist on mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, and we drop our pants and cough without prompting.  We then grab the sat-phone, get McPhee on the line and try and work out a trade…rough-trade!”

#4. Rumor has it (as it has for about a half-decade now) that Anderson Cooper will soon be off to bigger, better things.  CNN approaches PuckBuddys for advice on someone on the Caps roster to replace Cooper on the late’ish night prog AC 360.  How many people do you nominate and get declined with before you settle on Ontario native, NHL veteran Mike Knuble? 

“1st – “Bed-down with Boudreau!”   2nd – “Fight Night with Sasha”   3rd – “KnewsNight with Knuble!” (Already missing Anderson’s tight black t-shirts…)”

#5. If you could bed down one Disney character in an evening of enchantment, who would it be? (standard TPL fare)  

“Craig: Kurt Russell in his “Computer Wore Tennis Shoes” days.  Doug: Methy, the lesser known but hottest of Snow White’s dwarves.”

Thanks guys.  We hope to see plenty of Loss Candy tomorrow morning.  And if it goes the Caps’ way, Sasha Semin will do just fine.  We’ve got plenty of his pics to share with you.

Note: Our pals at OnFrozenBlog also got to play the pen pals game with TPL.  It’s a very good read and they actually talked about hockey!

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3 Responses to 5 on 5: The Production Line

  1. michelle says:

    Bring on the Sasha pictures :D

  2. Mark417 says:

    I’m not sure I catch the reference, but isn’t the use of the word “nuclear” (in all of its pronunciations and spellings) outside of a newscast a little… inappropriate this week?

    • Craig says:

      Mark – We’re normally pretty sensitive and you’ve got a good point. We replaced it with a familiar Caps chant. Thanks.

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