Well, this was nothing like it.

There was in fact a really high quality illicit feed of Pittsburgh's CW up and running last evening, so we were able to see this affair in all of its glory, and we can tell you:
Everyone is on PCP.


Except Stevey, who only has to strangle a woman within inches of her life to attain his success nightly, and feel damn good while doing it. Unfortunately his supply of Pittsburgh hookers has probably moved on to greener pastures, so the Pens were able to pull it out towards the end, winning the game 3-1.

When the teams were actually skating, this had the air of a regular season game. When they stopped to air out their laundry it became not only ridiculously preseason, but reminiscent of bull elephant seals biting each other's throats:



This possibly happened because Jared Boll was selling shitty weed.


Why on earth was Kris Letang so angry at Jakub Voracek? The world will never know. But Jakub got his ass handed to him.

ALASKAN STORM Tim Wallace fought Dorsett. It was kinda random:

But the real majestic event of the evening occurred when for some bizarre, unknown reason, Malks and Fat Rick attacked each other:

And Rick got his ass handed to him.
Frigging unreal fight, just for the fact that it happened.

Of course, some Pens scored:



And everything was generally a-okay.
The subservient bull elephant seals retreated into the surf and all was right with the world.

We have 150 Hair League entries btw. Exactly. We can accept 50 more before we have to shut the club down and put out the fire. Who's in?
Bet everyone's feeling a lot more confident about picking Ktang now, huh?
Well, it's preseason. Don't get cocky.

Final notes:
- Simon Despres is already awesome, if he does another year in junior he's going to be a hot commodity. Develop, baby, develop.
- Ratchuk is a stupid name.
- Can we please continue to play Gary Glitter after goals? We need to keep some vestige of 90's Pittsburgh skeeze in the building. Just insulting. Damon Albarn is for wins and wins only.
- The alternative three stars were eaten by this seal:


GO PENS.

You, too, may have gone through the day today feeling like nothing was real.
Even if it was fairly meaningless hockey, the Penguins were going to play tonight. If you're like me, you were just trying to get through and on your way to a place where hockey could enter your life once more.
Mike Lange's dulcet tones.
Phil Bourque getting really excited.
Oh. . .and you know where everyone was going to be tonight:

This preseason we're not giving awards (at least not all the time), but Consol Energy Center gets the inaugural Jizz Award.

Early in the game, Mike Comrie did something:

If you were listening on the radio in some faraway land trying to pick out your outfit for tomorrow, you jumped up and down and squealed in a circle and were like HOLY SHIT MIKE COMRIE. This is what I did. Don't hate.


Malkin was nonplussed.


Brad Stuart and Tyler Kennedy made love.


Sidney Crosby wanted to make love, too, but only with the ice inside the net.


Jesse Boulerice beats the shit out of the man who broke his jaw, just because this seems like the appropriate time.

Ryan Craig begins his takeover of the world, and we have our first GROUP HUGZ shot of 2010-2011.

It is at this point that Chris Osgood threw a temper tantrum and demanded that someone bring him pulled pork.
So Johan was on his way to get some pulled pork and extra lard cakes for Chris but Brooks Orpik was in the way. What shall henceforth be known as the Pulled Pork Affair sent the rest of the game into an utter murky, liminal space of death and fatty foods.

Ruslan Salei tried to fix things early in the second, but not much was happening, and Osgood still hadn't received his pulled pork. Babcock did not appreciate the course that the evening was taking:


Dan Bylsma, on the other hand, was very entertained, and was pleased, as he had forwarded a lot of the pulled pork in the building to his old team, the Anaheim Ducks, for Bobby Ryan to sample.

The search for pulled pork became dire when both Brett Sterling and Ryan Craig (again) scored past Osgood. Franzen called from the locker room and said that Osgood's Pork Concierge had been found bound and gagged in a broom closet attempting to smuggle illicit food items into the arena. The hounds were called off, the mission was deemed useless.
Both teams spent the rest of the game taking penalties and some child named McCollum was put in net for the third. Glad to be relieved, Chris clutched an old t-shirt on the bench which he seemed to think bore the lingering odor of bacon grease.

ALTERNATIVE THREE STARS


1. Malkin

2. Letestu


3. A KFC Double Down

As you may know, the best thing to come out of this game aside from the five goals was the #chrisosgoodisobese hash tag on Twitter.
Share and explore.

GO PENS.

Just something about this picture that suddenly makes all of the shenanigans of the last year okay, that makes Consol Energy Center okay, that gives us a supreme sense of confidence about the coming months.
Like looking at the future.

You probably support the Mellon Arena memorial idea that Matt (PensBoozeAnger on Twitter) came up with that Pensblog is propagating and which you may have heard mentioned by Mark Madden before he awkwardly segwayed into a discussion about the Tennessee Titans. Come on, this would be cute. A little unsure how it would look considering the partitions in the window, but worth a look fersher.

If you're not hopping on Twitter to read a blow-by-blow of training camp (i.e. those of us who can't make it due to other obligations or egregious geographical inconvenience), you're missing out. Check out the following:
PensDeptoTFP/JoeDepto
EricP55
pghpenguins (obviously dur)
Any other good ones? Leave them in the comments.
Hockey is the only reason that we're on Twitter (with the possible exceptions of winstonbananas and SpigotTheBear).
Get some. Learn some.
Go Pens.

A vote has been passed to demolish the Civic Arena, which we can now call it again since Mellon's naming rights expired over the summer.
The only question probably is when, since there will probably be court battles involved in saving it.
It would certainly be nice to find a way to use it again, but we all know that the cost-effectiveness of converting it into a usable structure for other purposes versus putting in a fucking parking lot is an obvious choice for bureaucrats. You can't have another arena competing with the Consol right across the street; it causes a lot of event-planning ambiguity and nightmares. A proposition we've heard floating around is turning it into some kind of atrium-community-center but it would cost a lot of money to convert, probably more money than you will make in your lifetime. We don't know what's best for the Hill since we don't live there. Let's just say: it'll be a sad day when the Civic Arena is gone.

When the fuck is training camp? Oh, this weekend? fjklsdfjsdlfjdsklfhndsjkslkfjdsklhl

blah blah Jordan Staal foot infection blah blah blah.  He will get better soon and we have faith.

Go Pens.

People are already upset that they didn't get the chance to pick Mike Comrie, but all's fair in love and war. Maybe you should have waited to pick your team, or maybe you should have compared the ratio of casual pics on Google image search in which he is wearing a hat.


In regards to duplicate teams:
We had no idea that this many people would enter. So far nearly 100 people have done so. Obviously there is a finite number of teams that can be created, and there will be duplicates. Basically it doesn't matter unless duplicate teams are involved in the top 3 rankings at the end of the season. If it turns out that a HUGE amount of people are tying at the top, we'll launch into a playoff round before distributing prizes, in which you will be forced to pick different players, and it is possible that different criteria will be set for points.
Seeing as the Hair League is 100% experimental, we obviously don't have all of the kinks worked out.
We're equally surprised at the volume of entrants as it is still Summer in Hockeyland and our attempts to plug it to bigger sites failed. We expected 30 people, maybe 50. The response has been overwhelming and we are working on advanced technology (like AutoSum in Numbers) to keep track of your scores.
There's no way in hell we'll be posting all of the scores every week, just maybe the top 10-20 depending on how the points are distributed. We will post each player's point total. You can add three numbers together and keep up with your own score. You're not retarded. If you're super lazy you don't have to do it until the last day of the regular season--but really, we're not babysitting you.
It is a Hair League. Let's keep this point fresh in our minds.

Eventually we'll post a list of thoughts and feelings regarding certain picks. We don't want to unduly influence any future picks. These are truly delicate matters.


whatever.
CAN SOMEONE PLEASE DROP THE STUPID PUCK OMFG.
go Pens.

We’ve decided to try our hand at organizing a fantasy game this season, but it’s a little bit different from any fantasy hockey you’ve ever played before. We will be awarding fantasy points based on ... hair. Seriously. We’re posting this way early so that we can work on the necessary technical details. We’ll basically be managing this the old-fashioned way, with a spreadsheet, because there’s literally no other way to do it, and we want the time to make sure everything is put together properly. Here’s how it works:

• If you are interested in playing, you must pick three players from the current active Penguins roster.
• We will assign points throughout the season based on appearances of each player’s hair.
• We will update points throughout the season for each player and post the top ranking entrants.
• There will be a grand prize winner and two runners-up. Prizes TBA but previous winners of Puck Huffers prizes can testify that we’re pretty good at them. PH Staff will be having teams but we won’t be eligible for prizes, obviously.
• One team per person, please. We’re tracking your IP addresses and if you’re seriously willing to cheat to win a hair-based fantasy league, you’re a dick. If we find out that you have cheated and your team has placed, we reserve the right to send your prize to somebody else.

Rules/mechanics:

1. 3 points will be awarded for each video on the Penguins website in which a player’s hair is fully visible (no hat, helmet, etc.) The primary source of these points will likely be posted interviews.
2. 5 points will be awarded for every press photo of that type that we can find (most likely on daylife.com).
3. 5 points will be awarded for an intermission interview during a game without a hat or helmet.
4. 10 points will be awarded for a player being seen in-game or on the bench without a hat or helmet. (3 points only if this is before/during the national anthem[s], between periods, or after the game has ended.)
5. You may lobby for points to be awarded to a player if you find something that we haven’t seen--for example, if you are watching the game on a different network or you find a photo that you think is worthy of points in a magazine or different news site. Take a screenshot/picture for proof and e-mail it to us. If we approve the new source of points, the person who submitted gets 2 extra points awarded to their team, and every person who has the submitted player on their team gets the proposed points.
6. If a player is put on LTIR, you are expected to submit a substitution. If you don’t, none will be made. The player can still earn points while on injured reserve through press photos and interviews and submitted material.
7. If a player is traded during the season, you are expected to submit a substitution, but if you don’t, we will replace him with the with the person who has earned the nearest amount to the traded players’ points without going under.
8. We also understand that at this point, the Pens’ roster for opening day isn’t set in stone, and that the roster fluctuates throughout the year. In the event that one of your players is demoted to WBS before the season begins, you must submit a substitution, or have your team disqualified. If the player is demoted during the season, you are expected to submit a substitution--if you do not, however, none will be made. The player can still continue to earn points, however material/photos from WBS Pens-related media and games will not count. The evidence of hair must appear during an NHL broadcast or on the Pittsburgh Penguins website. If the player is called up on another occasion he will continue to earn points. Go with your gut as to whether to substitute him or not--the substitution cannot be revoked if the player is called up again.
9. 7 bonus points will be awarded on the last day of every month to each player who has sported a significant amount of facial hair (beyond scruff/five o’clock shadow) at any point during that month. This includes mustaches. 7 points only, even if he has a beard the whole friggin’ month--facial hair is not the heart and soul of this game.
10. Points begin being awarded when the puck drops at Consol Energy Center on October 7th. Any pregame ceremonies/anthems/press circuses at that game will not count.

Like any fantasy game, we believe that success in this game will be due to a combination of knowledge and luck. You need to know what sorts of in-game situations are likely to happen to certain players, what their media presence is like. You could also benefit from picking someone entirely out of left field and getting lucky. Be smart, be lucky. Or just have fun.
Sound good to you? Thought so. Enter using this form:

Good luck to everyone. 
May the best hair win. Go Pens.