Hello my Hockeyz!!

Hope everything is going well. I have been taking some time down from the radio show, as I am working on some tech things, updating the website and preparing some new features for the upcoming season. So, during this downtime, I am attempting to write notes to as many of my listeners and fans as possible just to say hello, provide a few updates, and to give you the latest contact information. For the website, please visit http://www.bluelinetalkradio.com to see what things will be coming this season. You can follow the fan page on facebook at www.facebook.com/bluelineradio and on twitter I am at @bluelineradio.

I hope you’re following my program regularly, and if not, I invite you to come check it out again. This upcoming season I am planning to grow the listener community a little more, and to provide more chances for interaction amongst our fans. Additionally, I am asking listeners to consider supporting the program, by signing up for a paypal subscription of only $5 USD per Month. Your support will help the program grow and helps me to bring you more independent and original radio content . If you’re in a position to support, please visit www.bluelinetalkradio.com/support and read more about the “We Need $5″ campaign.

I am grateful for your recognition of my program and for being a friend/follower on Facebook. I am excited and getting ready for this upcoming season, and I hope you are looking forward as well. Thank you kindly, and please stay in contact…

–Millian, The BlueLine: Hockey Talk Radio

Steeped in a tradition that spans three centuries, the Stanley Cup is the most storied trophy in all of professional sports. To raise it means you’ve won it, and to win it means you’ve survived an epic journey fraught with untold difficulties. Ross Bernstein, the best-selling author of more than 40 sports books, including The Code and Slap Shot Original, interviewed more than 100 current and former NHL players and coaches who have had privilege of raising Lord Stanley’s holy grail above their heads after winning hockey’s ultimate prize.

Raising Stanley features more than just tales about the ecstasy of winning, however. It’s about the honor, courage, and sacrifice shared with teammates; the playoff beard; the dramatic Game 7s; the closed-door captain’s practices; the coaching wisdom, and the “playoff make-up” (the cuts, stitches, and bruises that inevitably appear on playoff faces). Superstars of yesterday and today also share funny and poignant behind-the-scenes stories, from bench-clearing brawls to rookie hazing initiations to hilarious tales about where some of the game’s biggest names have taken the Cup during the off-season. Raising Stanley is a must read for any fan who wants to know what it takes to be a winner both on and off the ice.

About the Author:
Ross Bernstein is the best-selling author of nearly 50 sports books and has appeared on thousands of television and radio programs over his career, including CNN and ESPN, as well as in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and USA Today. As a nationally recognized motivational speaker, Ross uses sports as a metaphor for life and for business to energize and inspire his audiences, ultimately getting them to think differently. Ross’ program “The Champion’s Code,” which is based on his three “Code” books with Triumph, not only illustrates what it takes to become the best of the best, it also explores the fine line between cheating and gamesmanship in sports as it relates to ethics and accountability in the workplace. For information please visit www.rossbernsteinspeaking.com.

AUDIO INTERVIEW – 12/13/10
Click Here to Listen

So for the 2010-2011 NHL Season, I have decided to spend a few bucks and hook up DirecTV to my home. They were running a special for a two-year commitment, where I got a bunch of HD Channels, Versus HD and NHL Network HD for $39.99 per month, which was half the cost of our local cable TV provider.  The box and installation were also free. Yes, I will have to shell out the additional 4 easy payments of $42.95 for Center Ice, but after two years off, I think I can manage it.

Here you find the evidence of me being in love with, not only my television, but NHL hockey broadcast in HD. When I tuned to the channel they were playing replays of the 2010 Stanley Cup Playoffs. It was like the most radical empire to all which is radical.  NHL 2010-2011, HIT ME!!!

HOCKEY: A PEOPLE’S HISTORY:
At a Montreal skating rink in 1875, the puck is dropped on a new sort of game. It’s fast and punishing, and on this night hockey is transformed from genteel sport to seething spectacle. Hockey: A People’s History is

CBC’s epic series chronicling the story of a game and the soul of a nation. Born as a game of survival against the snow and ice of a Canadian winter, hockey gave a new country it’s first heroes and champions. The story of hockey is the struggle of class and gender, as working class men and women fight for their place in a rich man’s game. It’s the dreams of towns and their teams, where rogues and roughnecks do battle with hockey barons and bluebloods. Hockey is where Canada’s cultures collide and rivalries divide.

It’s also a game that unites us like nothing else can. In a tale that spans two centuries, this bold new series Hockey: A People’s History documents the power and passion of a game and the country that gave it life. The DVD is a 6-pak containing all 10 episodes of the series in english and in french, plus more than 200 minutes of bonus content including behind-the-scenes features; historical hockey featurettes, extended interviews with hockey greats Gretzky, Dryden, Bowman, Cherry, Wickenheiser, and with Tom Cochrane; directors’ commentaries.

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ABOUT MICHAEL MCKINLEY:
Joining us for an interview is Michael McKinley, author of Hockey: A People’s History. Michael and I discuss the book and how it came about, the additional material added in the revised softcover edition, the future of the game based on history, the Olympics, KHL, expansion and his choices for Stanley Cup winner in 2010-2011.

Michael McKinley is a journalist, author, documentary filmmaker, and screenwriter. A Vancouver native, he was educated at the University of British Columbia, and then at Oxford University. While in England, he also wrote for The Guardian, The Daily Mail, Los Angeles Times, and Sports Illustrated, before returning to North America. Since then he has written many feature articles for the Vancouver Sun, National Post, Saturday Night Magazine, Chicago Sun-Times, New York Observer, New York Daily News, Los Angeles Times, and has won national newswriting awards.

He has also written several books on hockey, the most recent being “Hockey: A People’s History” and “Ice Time,” the companion books to the ten-part CBC TV series “Hockey: A People’s History,” to which he was also an on-camera contributor.

McKinley’s first feature film as screenwriter was “Impolite“, winner of British Columbia Film’s New Views Award. He wrote and co-produced the CBC TV documentary film “Sacred Ballot”, about the successor to Pope John Paul II. He then co-produced and co-wrote with David Gibson “The Mystery of Jesus,” a documentary examining the historical Jesus that aired on “CNN Presents”. CNN subsequently commissioned McKinley and Gibson to co-write and produce a sequel documentary, “The Two Marys: The Madonna and the Magdalene” which aired in December 2004, and won a Gracie Award for Best Hour-long Documentary aired in the US. McKinley and Gibson co-wrote and co-produced the two-hour CNN documentary “After Jesus: the Birth of Christianity”, which first aired in December 2006. McKinley has also written episodes for the docu-drama series “I Shouldn’t Be Alive” (Channel 4 UK and Discovery US) and “Perfect Disaster” (Channel 5 UK and Discovery US).

McKinley’s first novel, “The Penalty Killing”, a murder mystery set in the world of pro sport, will be published in March 2010.

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Website: MichaelMcKinley.net
Buy the Book: Buy on Amazon.com
Interview: Click here to listen to the MP3

Big thanks to Michael for Today’s visit…

Hockey54.com’s Launy Schwarts joins us on the interview side to talk about his project which fuses online media, hockey, social networking, and journalism, to bring you a one-stop hockey shop for the fan.  In this interview we discuss his background and experience, his journalism experience, what Hockey54.com brings to the table, and the future of hockey’s online and alternative media.

Launy Schwartz – Launy “The” Schwartz is your faithful pork pie hat wearing host and co-founder of Hockey54.com. After more than 25 years as a player, fan, coach, and now a goalie instructor, he brings to you his keen and sometimes off-centre view about the game that defines him.

Dahlia Kurtz – Dahlia Kurtz is the Hockey Girl. As co-founder of Hockey54.com, this Montrealer has many years experience as a hockey fan, personal trainer, and nutrition and wellness specialist. She is also a professional journalist, who has worked for many media outlets, including the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a reporter and producer. Since Hockey Girl is an estrogen dominant force in the hockey world, she delivers what’s missing most in it – Kahonies.

Hockey54.com: http://www.hockey54.com

MP3 Interview: Click here for the MP3 of the Interview

Big thanks to Launy for visiting on The BlueLine: Hockey Talk Radio!!

Before joining the ranks of the NHL, Dear Commissioner studied the art of leadership in the 3rd World Nation of North Korea. Here Kim-Bett-Il learned negotiations, public relations, human resources and the mastery of wide gold-rim eyeglasses, hearkening back to a time of Shaft and the 70′s. Following his failed re-election bid, Kim-Bett-Il returned to the US and began studies in the areas of law and business…

Upon graduation from Carnegie Mellonhead, Dr Bettman Hockeydew worked as an assistant to Dr Pinhead Burns, and eventually went on to found Buppet Labs. Dr H. as in “hockey” would later try to emulate the work of new Coke, and tinker with a hockey formula that was working just fine.

As it turns out the great NHL experiment, turned the game into the sports version of New Coke’s syrupy piss-water.  Fan’s backlash went unnoticed and lead to experimental plays, experimental rules, and ultimately the meltdown of the league. Despite the plug being pulled twice on his laboratory, Dr H. continued forward trying to fix things until they were broken. Current location and status unknown…

Before stealing his way into our hearts as NHL Commissioner, and before a law degree, Gary Bettman fronted a 70′s rock band known for electrifying guitars, experimental rhythms and high-pitch vocal acrobatics. Among Bett Zeppelin’s most loved hits are “When the Lockout Breaks,” “Houses of the Hockey,” “Commissioner Breakdown,” “Four Hockey Sticks,” and the timeless classic “Stairway to Sidney”

After deciding that the age of the jam band had ceased, Gary moved on to another career…stay tuned for the next installment of Bettman’s B-List: Careers before Hockey

So, after all of this wait and after an oddball pregnancy, my new young son joins the crew. I present Ian Maximillian, born 8/12/10 at 4:20PM PST. He was 8lbs even and 21 inches long.

He decided to visit in the studio and see what his daddy was doing. So, 8 days old and already rocking the mic. I recorded a segment with him shrieking and crying, because he has the cutest snort when he does so. How did I get him all wound up you ask? I told him a story about Gary Bettman and what he has done to the game of hockey. He subsequently lit up like a little 8lb Christmas Tree. After venting his frustrations, he settled down for a photo-op.

I am going to do my best to raise him up in both the hockey and radio arts. When my program finally breaks through and builds into something significant, I pray that I can pass it on to him to continue my wave of destruction. He is already a little moody and snippy, so he fits right in. I have much to teach this young man!!

I had been following the story of Mike PrimmoDano signing with the Detroit Red Wings, and pictures from the press conference kept catching my attention. For some reason, every time I saw his picture, aside from being distracted by his huge teeth, I kept trying to think exactly who it is he looked like…and then the answer came to me.

For those of you who are fans of the wonderful TV show known as King of Queens, note in the picture the resemblance to cousin Danny Heffernan.  Not that Mikey Ho looks like him full-time, but in the press conference photos, he does. Separated at birth, you ask? No, he just looks like Danny Heffernan–or as I call him Hefferdano!