Quote:
Originally Posted by Henry Fool
I will say this for the fans in Calgary: the reactions to Sven being on the fourth line or potentially scratched have been more mature than what I've seen from Minnesota fans, many of whom are pretty insecure about their team and always expect things to go wrong. So when Granlund drops his stick a few times in a game, the worrying begins, and the press start asking pointed questions from Yeo about whether he belongs in the league at all. With Flames fans and Sven the worry is always more about whether he's getting a proper chance to shine.
Bärtschi is more strongly built than Granlund and a bit more sheltered in the Flames lineup. Granlund has been getting a rough treatment in some games.
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the comments about Wild fans are true. Not for all (of us), but true enough for a stereotype. Minnesota sports fans (of which I am one) are odd. You combine a natural passive-aggressiveness that's bred into Minnesotans anyway, with a deep and abiding love for hockey (to the point that it's a clear and material part of our overall identity) against a backdrop of an experience with pro hockey (and pro sports in general, with precious few (2) exceptions) that is fraught with heartache and disappointment, combined with the gross indignity of actually losing our team, which then proceeded to go and do the one thing that would have validated us and our identity in Texas, of all freakin' places.....I'm not asking for you to cut us a break on our angst and fickleness, but I'm just trying to put it into context.
The team also built him up as Finnish Baby Jesus, and we suffered through some rough years under Riser that amassed to having a pathetic dearth of talent - not to mention high-end talent. So we were ripe for this kid to come in and Landeskog the heck out of the league - which obviously was unreasonable.