as a female fan of hockey, icegirls do nothing for me. I could get all feminist and offended, but what’s the point? The arena is going to do whatever it takes to draw a crowd and make money. It is that simple. Men like looking at hot women, women like looking at hot men. I would prefer to see hot guys half naked on the ice if there was a choice, but I believe that would empty the majority of the seats.

The chick they did feature was about a 7 on the Skank-O-Meter, with 1 being Judy Garland in “The Wizard of Oz” and 10 being any one of the Desperate Housewives.

B.

… here in Atlanta. It was training for the Blue Crew (our girls down here) – they were learning how fast to shovel snow, etc. Now, I’m usually not hyper overreactive towards them since a sorority sister is one of them (the first one on the website), but I thought Mom was going to have a heart attack and DIE right there. Lots of screams of “What the hell is this? We didn’t have this when I was younger – WE HAD THE PLAGERS AND THEY SCRAPED THE ICE WITH THE OTHER TEAM” commenced.

I usually ignore them, but their new Code Red uniforms to match the teams fugly ones are way too much:

Add in the cleavage with the “Thanks for becoming one with me!” tag-line at the end of their in-arena “getting to know you” things," and they take arena upkeep to a new level of hussy.

I have 2 thoughts on this, and both are anti-ice girls:

1. I’m sure that most of the other visitors and people who comment on this site are hockey fans. I go to games to see the Blues play, and hopefully see the Blues win. Any of the fringe things, from the organ player, to Louie, to Angella, or any of the gimmicks that run during stoppages in play or intermissions don’t really mean much to me. The Blues could have had supermodels cleaning the ice the year they finished last overall and the building still would have been 40% empty on good nights. Winning hockey equals a full building. Losing hockey equals an empty building. How often will someones inner monologue be…“I really don’t feel like going to the game tonight. They’re playing Columbus for the 27th time this year, and the weather is crappy…but the Ice Girls are going to be there so I can gawk at them from my seat four rows from the top of the place?”

2. I assume that the main thing these girls would be doing is shoveling snow from the boards and the crease during play stoppages. I also assume that the kids that do this job now are volunteering to do it. They get their name and their team’s name said on the PA, they get to be on the ice during a game, and if I was that age, I’d think it was a pretty cool thing to do. While not breaking the bank, the Ice Girls would probably require some type of paycheck. I’m guessing that the current system of doing it is cheaper. Spending money on this means money isn’t spent on something else such as ushers, vendors, bartenders, you name it.

I’m all for scantily-claddedness, don’t get me wrong, but sometimes more clothing is hotter (Fredrick’s of Hollywood knows this). Give me an attractive hometown girl in a jersey and jeans over a overly make-uped, stripper lite for my ice-scraping viewing pleasure.

One thing I can say, I guess, is that I’d be a lot more inclined to get some poor-angle ice level tickets if hot, barely-clothed women were skating past me every commercial break. Also, I have to give credit to the Blackhawks TV marketing/advertising department because they tend to bookend their commercial breaks with the ice girls. I can imagine the prospect of seeing them makes viewers less inclined to flip channels on the breaks…which makes the advertisers happy, I bet.

And if you’re wondering, Sean, I can now contest that this site (except for videos) does in fact work on the Nintendo Wii internet channel, as I’m currently reading/responding from one of the aforementioned Wiis. Not that I’ll continue to do so though…because typing via pointer is a frustrating bitch. And now back to Super Smash Bros. Brawl…or Mario Bros. Lost Levels. To be determined…

that sporting events of today are not geared toward my demographic group…when I started going to Blues games in the early 70’s, it was just hockey with a little organ music on the side…no rock music turned up to eleven, no jumbotron, no instructions from the scoreboard telling you when to cheer or boo or kiss your date/wife, no dancing girls, no dot races, no contests…just hockey.

I also realized somewhere along the line, that being a cranky dick about the whole thing does no good whatsoever…I have learned to tune out all the bullshit I don’t enjoy and to concentrate on the game that I came to see…that way, everybody wins…now if the Blues wanted to send these women on the ice stark naked, well, I guess that’d be interesting to see…but none of this should ever take away from the beauty of this game we love…and if our team can ever win a Cup, I assure you nobody will care about the girls or the music or anything like that.

….God help me, but I’m still having trouble seeing the down-side to that concept.

We need to bring out the skanks, use the same marketing strategy like them fat bellied men who dance in basketball. Go down the the local bowling alley and pick out a dozen well coiffed Pall Mall smokers and let er rip, tater chip.

There is no place for them and it is a complete waste. Let the little league kids do the shoveling. Skanks have no business on the ice. They should know their role. That is orally satisfying players in the locker room after a win. I would even accept a shootout win.

Also ditch the on ice bullshit Blue Crew crap in between periods. What do I like in between periods? Layin’ pipe. Giggity goo!