Wonderful!

It is being confirmed that the 2012 Winter Classic will be Flyers v Rangers. Wonderful! I was just saying the other day that I don't get to watch these two shitty teams enough on NBC and Versus. Thank goodness the league no longer is focusing solely on the Devils, a team that has more playoffs appearances (19) and more Stanley Cups (3) in the past 21 years than both of those teams. Seriously, it's about damn time.

In unrelated, I'm not effing bitter about the effing Flyers and Rangers news, the Devs are going to retire Scott Niedermayer's number on Dec 16. In my opinion, this is well-deserved and entirely appropriate. I am not one of the fans that tell him eff off because he played his last 5 years in Anaheim. Those fans are complete idiots and need to have their head examined. Come on, he went to Anaheim to play with his brother....not the Rangers, not the Flyers, not the Isles, not the Bruins. Stupid Anaheim - 3000 miles and one conference away. He is 3rd in all time games played for the club, is one of 5 players to have won all 3 Cups with the team and has long been a model citizen on and off the ice. Five years as a Duck does not make him anything less than a Devil. In fact, when he goes into the Hockey Hall in a few years, he is going to be wearing red. So get over it.

For more info on Nieds big night, including quotes from Lou, check out the Fire and Ice blog.