Hockey and HR overlaps

[olivermoss]

Sens could easily have a large chunk of the fastest growing demographic in hockey fall in their lap. Just, a giant pile of money fall in their laps, and they are working hard to make sure it doesn't happen.

The Sens, on top of everything else, signed a famous homophobe this morning. As a goalie, even!



One thing that's been awesome about the show's reception had been the very positive and even thoughtful reaction from some hockey podcasts. While I prefer What Chaos over all, one of the Empty Netters guys nearly having a meltdown because he was worried for a second that the show was going to have a bad ending instead of a happy one was an amazing moment. When even the straights are literally sick of popular gay stories being tragedy, that is saying something.

It also shows how off-putting the constant tragedy can be, one of the guys was clearly worried that the show and characters he'd gotten invested in were going to get a tragic ending.

Anyway, because hockey podcasts have not only been big boosters of the show but also doing some of the most interesting media analysis, some of us were a bit worried when the synopsis showed that the big bad in the final book might be an evil podcast. We don't have a reaction from Empty Netters yet, but again, showing more nuance than we give them credit for, What Chaos is actually looking forward to it because they trust her writing.

And, lets be real, while the show's reception has been infinitely better than expected, if the events were real, the backlash being lead by a conservative podcast is very plausible.

Also, they are going to have Rachel Reid on this week! Which is amazing.

Comments

[rekishi]

I didn't know that about Reimer, not that I'm surprised. (I've been away from hockey for a decade and I try not to pay too much attention to the homophobia aspect.)

Jesus the Sens have just been a clusterfuck the last week or two. I didn't even know about the Ulmark romours until they brought it up. (And I still don't really know what's going on there ffs.)

I wish What Chaos had an audio only version. I CANNOT with video essays where people are just talking. I just can't. (buuuut I skipped all of the episode analysis etc stuff, because that's not my cuppa tea)

[olivermoss]

I am sure other players are homophobes as well, but refusing to take part in the Shark's Pride stuff is what he's best known for. He pulled the whole 'it's against my religion' shtick, and then parted ways with the Sharks. That's what cemented the Sharks as a team that takes LGBT+ stuff seriously and not just as performative. I don't know the full details, but he's part of why the Sharks have a lot of out-of-region fans.

I don't care about the Ullmark rumors, even if they were better sourced. It's dumb. But the complete meltdown over it was insane.

[rekishi]

Ah, western conference stuff. Not that I don't pay any attention to the West,it's just hard. I think the last time I even heard of Reimer he was with......Toronto I want to say? Yes that sounds about right. The NHL really needs better brass, jfc.

Yes, that's two statements now? I don't get it. That's the Streisand effect right there.

[olivermoss]

I live out here, so I am more aware of the Sharks. We've been playing do-si-do with them in the division rankings. Also, they are heavily recced as a good team for HR fans to latch onto.

Yeah, I like teams where the management appears to have functional adults.

[rekishi]

oh yeah absolutely, I know. All I know about the Sharks is that someone in their front office signed Erik Karlsson to an 11.5 M cap hit, which I don't necessarily consider reasonable. That's like...the extent of my recent Sharks knowledge and the guy isn't even playing for them anymore. I'm happy of HR leads to more hockey fans! Even when the Sharks or the Kraken play a matinee, it's bedtime here. I think they finish their third period around the time my alarm goes off in the morning. 😅

Yeah.......well. Let's see what will happen next with the Sens.

[olivermoss]

Yeah, geography is a problem for West Coast sports viewership in general. I am jealous that you aren't constantly hearing about Celebrini lol. He's great, but the hype around him can be a bit much.

[rekishi]

I mean, I was a Pens fan in the 2010s who didn't worship the ice Crosby was skating on ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[olivermoss]

Oof, that was probably worse. Celebrini's not on my team and also Bedard exists. And in a year or two we'll see if McKenna is what some people hope.

I'd appreciate Celebrini and the Sharks if I didn't have to deal with their newbie fans.

[rekishi]

I mean, I don't mind Sidney, he's very good at hockey! But like. If they hyped him less, maybe he'd also get hit less. (In the 2010s, there's younger guys now)

What're the newsbies up to?

[olivermoss]

The sharks are just off of a long, painful rebuild and are starting to take off, which is exciting. I have no issue with people jumping onto a team as it's coming together. They've got two young stars on the same line... who have sleepovers together... a lot of the people getting into hockey from HR are headed there...

There is every reason to think they are going to become the dominant team in the West and hold it for a long time. I keep getting people acting like they are the Objectively Correct team to choose and if you don't pick them then you are uninformed and/or don't want to hang with the gays. And that is like... exactly how to annoy me, those two accusations. I have to remind myself that most of the fanbase probably is nothing like the excited yaoi fan influx that team is getting.

Yes, The Future Is Teal, but I am attached to my squids.

[rekishi]

Literally the only thing I know about the Sharks is that someone gave Erik Karlsson 11.5 M annually in a cap that should not have paid anyone that much money, much less someone on D. Which good for him - generally speaking - but damn. And that's what I know about the Sharks. OH and that Dany Heatley pleased for them for a while.

And yeah, we talked about the HR crowd being shuttled there but... I mean, let's see how many of those stick around. I mean I wish for more hockey fans, casually or not, but modern fandom is so....exhausting.

[olivermoss]

Yeah, and they are bringing in that aggro fandom energy. I mean I was probably that hyper once, but goddam some of them are sore losers *and* sore winners.

[rekishi]

ouch. but that indeed sounds like "this is why we can't have nice things" fandom

[muccamukk]

I have wondered if having Brian Burke so involved in Hockey Central has shifted the podcast culture one way or another.

[olivermoss]

Huh, I wonder. I am too new and also don't get Sportsnet here so I can't weigh in at all, but that would be interesting to know.

[muccamukk]

I think you can get the podcast without subscribing to the network, but IDK what its popularity is vs. other hockey podcasts.

[olivermoss]

I think Spittin Chicklets is either the biggest or one of the biggest. From what I've heard thy are at least not terrible.

Tho, a lot of the times people are pissed about cultural stuff and freaking out over DEI, it's not podcasts that specialize in that topic, it's ones that specialize in being outrage merchants. Someone threw a fit recently about hockey becoming too soft. I forget who it was, but he got laughed off, especially since it was clear he didn't have a clue.

[james]

Personally, I am wondering if the Kraken front office are noticing if their sales for their recent Pride shirt went off the rails. ;-)

[olivermoss]

That design was amazing. I am pretty sure they noticed that they ran out of stock early in the night at the game.

[mistressofmuses]

Ugh on the signing choice.

I'm actually delighted by straight dudes worrying about the gay romance ending sadly. (Not like... gleeful that they were worried, just... happy they were invested and cared.) I sympathize with that feeling, because I HATE worrying that the thing I'm invested in is going to end badly, haha. And it has been so common for so long.

(Yes, caveats for genre: I love horror, and often those aren't happy endings. But queer literature especially has gotten smacked with the tragedy stick so often, either for Hays Code type reasons, or just the idea of tragedy being more beautiful and deep and real. Blech, hate it.)

Very cool that they're having the author on!

[olivermoss]

It really says a lot about what queer stories are allowed to exist in more mainstream spaces that they were that worried about Seriously Bad Things happening despite all the assurances.

Tragedy has it's place and is important, but when it's the only flavor is destructive. Also, queer lives ending badly gets less backlash, it's more allowed to exist in the mainstream, dating back to the publication of The Well of Loneliness.

[mistressofmuses]

It really does. Like, yes, there's been some progress made with queer characters existing and having happy stories... but it's still niche enough that someone outside that target audience would worry about the Bad Ending.

I don't *mind* tragedy per se. I read a lot of horror, lol. But getting to the point where only one kind of story is allowed does screw badly with everything - the creatives, the audience, the mainstream. (And the same can be said for people who insist that only light fluff should be allowed. All kinds of stories deserve to be told!) But yes. There's a long history built up of queerness only being allowed if it ended in tragedy, or for tragedy to remain the more "acceptable" form for queer stories to take if they pushed into the mainstream.

[olivermoss]

One thing I like about Jacob Tierney, and one of the quotes I need to track down, is that he's keeps saying that stories like HR need to also exist. He doesn't think we need any one kind of story, it's the lack of variety, the lack of joy that is the problem.

Gritty realism, tragedy, horror, etc, we need all of this. But yeah, only letting one thing in the mainstream has been suffocating. Also, if it's so suffocating, and it's alienating most of the potential audience, there's several problems there. It's bad for queer media and it's also bad for representation. People debate good/bad representation like it's their job, but what is the point if the rep is never even seen?

[mistressofmuses]

The lack of variety is a huge problem, and seems to be a fairly constant battle when it comes to media. Whether it's all tragedy and misery all the time, or whether it's chaste sweet hand-holding... it should never be only one thing allowed.

But you're right: there's a good chunk of a potential audience that doesn't even know what's available to them. We've had a decent variety available for a while now, at least within smaller niches. But when it comes to the mainstream? Yeah, it's still samey enough that people have assumptions about what they're going to get. And then that sucks for the things that ARE trying to do something different, because how many people write things off in advance because "oh, canon gay? I bet it'll be sad."

[olivermoss]

I mean, I'd started writing off anything people said was 'canon gay' because I don't want YA and/or finding out it was a 5 second subplot. A LOT of people didn't expect the show everyone was calling 'the gay hockey show' to actually be actually gay, especially not unequivocally so. There were a lot of tiktoks from people expecting mild queer coding or the show to be slashy and being surprised that wasn't the case at all. It was kind of funny.