Somewhere on the Eastern shore of Japan You know, one of the biggest arguments against puck bunnies is that they tend to focus less on the game and more on the fun drama surrounding the game. And so what if they do? Hockey culture can be very fascinating in the skankiest form of the word. What you don’t realize is that with the rise of Twitter, all you true blue hockey fans out there are starting to pick up the puck bunny tendencies yourselves. Oh, the hypocrisy!
For some reason Twitter gives the hockey fan the right to do one of two things. The first is troll and attack at great length, or threaten the life or job of, any hockey fan they don’t like for whatever reason. My personal favourite is when people attack me for making a non-hockey related tweet. I’m sorry, but when did I become a hockey reporter, or NHL spokeswoman? It’s like I’ve somehow risen above human status, and couldn’t possibly be a real person underneath the puck obsession. Yet it’s fine when they tweet whole conversations about the coffee they are drinking. Interesting… Anyway, the second thing the majority of hockey fans seem to use Twitter for is kissing the firm, gladiatorial like tushies of the hockey players themselves.
OMG @AnyNHLPlayer you have the best taste in music.
OMG @AnyNHLPlayer it’s, like, so hilarious that you make the same joke in every tweet.
OMG @AnyNHLPlayer the team you contributed nothing to while you were a member really misses you.
@AnyNHLPlayer OMG, man, I saw that movie, too! I actually didn’t like it, but if you did, then I’m sold.
@AnyNHLPlayer OMG please RT me because it’s my birthday and, like, you RTing me validates my existence or something, right?”
Now, in all your self-denying wisdom, can you please explain to me how this absolutely ridiculous behaviour is in any way different from the “puck bunnies” that attempt to stroke the ego of your shared hockey deities, as a means to stroke something else? Oh, is it because you “actually like hockey.” You, “actually understand hockey.” You, “have his game worn jersey.” You’re “a guy.” Please. Start familiarizing yourself with the term “jock sniffer.” It’s the first step to recovery, after all. And to be fair, I rarely see a puck bunny act as desperately as the hockey Twitter community. And, also note, these bunnies tend to have the guts to coo similar shameless flirts as those listed above to the hockey player in person, whereas you tend to hide behind a damn computer screen. Who’s pathetic now?
What I really don’t get is why Twitter endears hockey players to the fans in the first place. It has taken the completely opposite effect on me. It actually makes me deeply reflect on some of my past life choices, and regret ever letting myself get entangled with far, far, far too many of them… far! Mind you, I do know from experience that players aren’t always whom they pretend to be online. But isn’t that the same for almost everyone? The difference is hockey players have a lot more to prove so they go to greater lengths with their avatars. However, even with great personal effort on the part of the player as an individual, there still seems to only be five types of hockey players on Twitter that are the main recipients of all your 140 character love songs.
1. @TheProducer: This player seems to be begging for some type of medal because he has the same XM radio in his over priced whips, as the rest of us. Listening to ALT Nation has somehow translated, in his mind, to superior knowledge of the music industry, which he would obviously have a career in, if it weren’t for that pesky hockey. And being the nice little suck ups that you are, you let him continue to live in his dreamworld where he is the only person on the face of the earth that listens to Radiohead.
2. @TheChronicEndorser: This player tweets to make himself feel like the next Gretzky by acting like any sort of product or clothing he uses or wears is some sort of endorsement because he’s the obvious s-h-i-t! Please tell me you don’t actually go out and buy the same toothpaste or water as he does, just because he tweeted about it, and you want to try and connect with him on some creepy level. @TheChronicEndorser is the funniest in his AHL form when he can be found feigning endorsements to prove to the fans, and himself, that he’s a somebody even if NHL GMs wouldn’t trust him to fill in even as a benchwarmer. “Blahblahblah Sports is the ONLY place I get my skates sharpened!” Really, so if I go there, I, too, can hope to fall short of the mark and achieve total mediocrity? Beautiful.
3. @TheFashionista or @TheSeanAveryesque: “I tweet about fashion because I want to fuck models. I know about fashion because I want to fuck models. I’m kind of a bitch about fashion because I want to fuck models.” We get it. And no we don’t care that your plaid shirt, which looks like the ones they have at Walmart for $10, by the way, has a designer tag that most of us have no idea who or what it is. Well at least I don’t care, but I suppose you probably do. Bear in mind that I don’t actually follow ANY NHL players on Twitter, and that I’m also in my Uber Cunt phase right now, if you haven’t already noticed.
4. @PermaPRMode: This is the player that never makes an original tweet, yet you still praise him like his three daily predictable tweets are somehow literary genius:
Tweet #1: @PermaPRMode: Just had a great skate this morning with the boys. Bring on the #VisitingTeam!
Tweet #2: @PermaPRMode: On my way to the rink. Huuuuuuuuge game tonight!
Tweet #3: @PermaPRMode: Huuuuuuuuuge win/tough loss tonight! The energy in the building was amazing as usual.
Wow. Exciting.
5. @TheInappropriateFlirt: The player that uses his Twitter account to flirt publicly with any blond, or skinny, or over-tanned, or half naked, or tit-pic’d avatar that shows up in his @mentions. When will guys learn that if a girl chooses to show parts of her body instead of her face in her profile pic, it’s probably because it ain’t all that. Who am I kidding, this is the very age of the butter face, after all. But still, if you act like this line of tweeting is anything but mildly amusing in its pitifulness, then I don’t even want to know what levels you drop to when you make your contribution to the alternate dimension that is the Twitter feed. Of course, public flirtations always lead to public dramas, so I guess there’s some attraction to following this particular player.
So there you have it; the extent of the hockey player contribution to Twitter in a nice little package. If the world wasn’t composed of a terrifying majority of jock sniffers and celebrity whores, then I’m sure Twitter would have already completely destroyed whatever image hockey has attempted to maintain. You know, if I haven’t single-handedly done that already, as they say.
Countdown to my sabbatical in NHL Land: 85 days. Please note that I can’t guarantee that I’ll be out of Uber Cunt mode by this time. Enjoy!
