Flyers

Marcus Hayes Skewered Claude Giroux Today with Boundless Monty Python (and Jesse Jackson) References

By Kyle Scott

Published: Nov 8th, 2013 · 11:05 AM EST

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Thanks to reader Derek for bringing this to my attention. I check almost daily for a Marcus Hayes sonnet, and it’s always the day I forget that he pens a gem.

Hayes, too, is unhappy with Captain Claude, and he decided to voice his displeasure via Monty Python references and one Jesse Jackson groaner. To the excerpting machine! Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V! Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V! Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V! Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V!

IN THE MOMENT of crisis, like a famous (if fictional) ginger who predated him, Claude Giroux was nowhere to be found.

 

That’s right: He scarpered off, left Hal Gill and Wayne Simmonds and Ray Emery and Andrej Meszaros, Goat of the Night, to explain why the team with nine points in 15 games needed 20 minutes afterward to cleanse its collective soul.

Which, of course, recalled the famous fictional forebear:

Brave Sir Robin ran away.

Bravely ran away away.

When danger reared its ugly head,

He bravely turned his tail and fled.

Yes, brave Sir Robin turned about

And gallantly he chickened out.

Bravely taking to his feet,

He beat a very brave retreat.

 

In no sport does that mean more. The NHL actually seeks a holy grail of sorts, a cup named after a lord from which they long to drink the draught of fame, if not life, eternal.

This team has one win in its last five games. It was humiliated by Washington, 7-0. It squandered a win late against Carolina last time out. It has scored two goals in its last four games.

Did it need a players meeting? Sure.

Did it need its captain to abandon it? Hardly.

 

Gill, a Lancelot of sorts, stepped in and allowed that the meeting had a Jesse Jackson feel: Keep hope alive, that sort of stuff. The season is long, things can turn around, et cetera.

Simmonds – this team’s dauntless Galahad – refused to allude to the meeting’s contents, but he was transparent enough: “We’re just not penetrating, not getting quality shots, we’re thinking too much about passing instead of shooting.”

Meszaros, the Bedemir of the bunch who kicked the clincher past Emery, said, “It’s good we talked. Straightened some things out.”

 

In no sport is chemistry as elemental as in hockey.

The degree of endurance required, for the entire roster, is borderline superhuman.

The amount of pain suffered by every man is borderline masochistic.

The person who holds this together is not the coach: It is the captain.

By word, by deed, by sacrifice, by accountability.

We know that Sir Robin, last night, lacked them all.

I truly have no idea how that man collects a paycheck with a straight face. Does he even collect a paycheck? Maybe he was laid off five years ago and receives one only due to a glitch in payroll. Will someone please fix that glitch so this thing works itself out? I like to avoid confrontation whenever possible.
http://youtu.be/Z7dROcm_SbY

You’re right, Marcus– movie references are fun!

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In related news, Hayes has only favorited two Tweets since that time we discovered his Twitter account had favorited a bunch of porn Tweets and Hayes claimed he was hacked.