Someone already said Capital Punishment but...

Quite a while back I was subjected, thanks to the friendly requirements of CapsChick's blogger playoff pool and the fact that Flamesblog writer Duncan was the one to win round one, to write a big old Flames lovefest. I thought the pain was over. Considering that we had just ousted them, it wasn't even that hard to do! And then the finals come around and the winner is a Capitals fan, so now the whole lot of us have to write glowing posts about the Caps.

I didn't think it would be so bad. I mean, they have Ovechkin who makes hilarious commercials, sings painfully badly, and golfs uh...not quite as badly? And that's good, right? Right? Except oh, what was that, Elly used all those already? I knew I shouldn't have helped her out when she had to do this last week or two weeks ago or whenever. Well since we're on the topic of Ovechkin, I can bring up those ridiculous little stick drawings of his, right? Crap, the other Ellie got that already?

Well okay. What's left? Outside of the fact that if you wander over to their website right now you get a weird little black and white jersey striptease (seriously) - not much, right? They only even have one Czech! But one is better than nothing, so there's a starting point. Jiri Novotny (though you've all excuse me when I say Hudler is still better, right?), gets a few points just for his first name. Even better, his best friend is Ales Kotalik - and we all know how I feel about certain other players bearing that name. Tragically he was stolen away (along with a first-round draft pick) from Buffalo (who got Dainius Zubrus and Timo Helblin in return) at the trade deadline this year. While a lot of Buffalo fans seemed to go crazy for Zubie, Novotny didn't really do a whole lot. With 6 goals and 13 assists this season his numbers aren't anything spectacular - but six of those assists did come in a span of 17 games after joining the Caps, second on the team to only Semin (with 9) in assists during that time. And at 23, he has plenty of time to improve, even if he was...okay, all but (and that might even be pushing it) forgettable this year. If only he had as good a season as the Czech soccer player of the same name?

Well, that attempt to find something to love in the Caps might have failed kind of miserably...but it still counts, right? Oh come on cut me a break, I'm doing the best I can. If nothing else, I found myself a reason to like the Caps - and don't you doubt me for a second, after the debacle that is Ty Conklin you should know me at least that well.