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Wow, what a great couple of days on the road in Nashville, didn’t see much more then the 4 of 5 square blocks around the Sommet center, but it was fun. Some quick observations about the Predators, their city, and their fans.

They don’t have a large fan base, that is evident in the paltry crowd there on Thursday night, probably less then 10,000, but the fans they have are rabid. Outside of the Flames C of Red jerseys I have never seen a fan base decked out in merchandise like Nashville’s hockey team. The odd thing was it seemed like everybody was wearing something different jerseys, jackets, t-shirts, sweat shirts, wind breakers, hoodies it was endless.

To attend a Predators game for the first they should give you a manual, they have chants and traditions for almost everything that happens in the game it is really quite amazing.

The building is odd, in the stands it is dark blue and yellow to match the home town team’s uniforms, it just seems like a little much. It is a very cavernous venue, built more for concerts then sports.

Talking to the Nashville players they all love it there, but all seem to understand that it is an uphill battle to keep the team there. Downturn in the economy, a lack of corporate sponsors, and as I said before I don’t know how it works with out a bigger fan base and I don’t what else you can do to get people to come. It is a fun time at a Predators game, but after 11 years if you haven’t gone to game you likely aren’t going to go.

They advertise very heavily in the strip area around the arena, on the walls, on the sidewalks, everywhere. Outside of that 3 or 4 block radius Nashville is Tennessee Titan territory.

Talking to head Coach Barry Trotz yesterday before the game I asked him if they would welcome Alexander Radulov back into the dressing room. Trotz didn’t rush out and say they would, he indicated it would be up to the players to allow him to come back. He felt that if the young Russian could rebuild the bridges he burnt with his Predator teammates then it would work. Barry equated it to a player in a contract hold out situation. I then asked him if he wanted Radulov back, he smiled and asked me if I thought the Flames would want Jarome Iginla back if he had done the same thing.

Barry Trotz is an interesting guy; he said he listened to the FAN960 a lot when Peter Maher and I greeted him after his team’s morning skate. The book on Trotz from the local media is that he can be moody, but when the Canadian teams show up he tends to open up.

The local hockey heroes may have taken a huge step forward last night at the Sommet center with one of their best road periods in recent memory. You would probably have to go back to Oct 13th of last year when the Flames exploded for 3 unanswered goals in the final frame in? You guessed it Nashville, winning that game 7-4. Weird stuff always seems to happen in Nashville against the Predators, not every game but at least once a year, you remember a couple of season Calgary got rolled in Nashville 9-4.
Talking to Darryl Sutter last night during the 2nd intermission and his team down by 2 goals he pretty much mapped the way back into the game for his team when he said the established veterans not the new guys had to lead his team back into this game that is exactly what happened.

Jarome Iginla was spectacular in the final half of the game scoring the hat trick to lead the Flames to the win, but it was his first goal in the 2nd that set the table for the comeback. It was vintage #12, I could almost tell when he got the pass from Conroy that he was going to bury it.

Craig Conroy was at his best early in this season, picking up a pair of helpers, but more important he had jump and he showed some versatility when Keenan shortened the bench.

Kiprusoff was sharp, particularly in the late going of period number 3, he did give up 3 goals in 2:28 in the 2nd period (a new predator record) but you couldn’t fault him for all of those goals. His poise late in the 3rd when Nashville was pressing for the tie must have been a huge boost for his teammates. I think back to a week ago after those Edmonton games and many of us were wondering if he was capable of being a top goalie, or if he had lost his game. Kiprusoff has shown me anyway that he is still very capable, now it is a matter of proving it over the entire season.

Jim Vandermeer may have played one of his best games as a Flame, took a bad penalty early in the third, but over came that with an all round performance. Big #4 played a little up front late in the 2nd and it was very apparent that he was able to gain more room for Iginla out on the ice. Most of the game saw him on the blue line where he was an effective penalty killer blocking a number of shots, and they don’t keep track of it as a stat but he had a real active stick deflecting away a number of Predator passes.

Dion Phaneuf was good, played a little more of a composed game as we saw Tuesday in the win over Washington. Statistically he had a good game with 2 helpers and being +4, it and Shea Weber were a treat to watch on the ice.

Matt Lombardi got hurt in the 2nd period when he tried to bring the puck to the front of the Nashville net, I am no doctor but if I were to bet I would say shoulder injury.

Flames penalty kill was the difference in this being an important road win and being a Predator blow out, Flames killed off 8 of 9, but more importantly then that they killed off 2 full two minute 5 on 3’s. When the Flames ran into penalty trouble early in the third it looked like their goose was cooked but a big kill seemed to turn the game around.

Flames were 56% in the face off circle (that’s off the top of my head I left my stats in my suitcase) which was very good considering the Predators were the 3rd best team in the face off dot coming in. It was very noticeable on the penalty kill and late in the 3rd when it seemed as if the Flames won every big draw.

I will say this about the Flames they like beating the Nashville Predators; it was a very excited bunch of players and Coaches in the bowels of the Sommet Center last night. I had talked to Conroy and Iginla about the rivalry before the game and both indicated to me that it really started when former Pred’s goalie Thomas Vokoun chased after Iginla wanting to fight him in 02/03 and again in 03/04. Barry Trotz had an interesting take on it when I asked him he thinks that the Predators are a lot like the Edmonton Oilers and it is easy for the Flames to get up for a team with a similar make up to their provincial rivals.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart to everyone who wished me luck before my first pay per view game last night, I really appreciated the support. Thanks to everyone who dropped me a line afterwards as well, I certainly was the beneficiary of a great hockey game to call.

I am pleased with the first game, there are area’s which I will be better at the next game just because I have the first one down and I understand the pacing better now.

TV play by play is much different then radio I didn’t know that until I started to work with Peter Maher and John Shannon from the league in preparation of my 10 games this year. There is a lot more going on from a technical point of view on television that we don’t have in radio which means more people, which means more co ordination. The biggest difference for me though was the control factor, on radio the play by play man is the quarterback he makes the decisions he dictates the flow, Peter Maher is as good as I have eve scene at doing just that. In TV you aren’t in control, almost consistently someone is talking in your ear, and the producer and director are giving the orders you have to obey their commands and describe the play at the same time it is different.

For the record 90 seconds after Prust and Tarnasky fought my director chimed into my ear “good energy Rob, tone down the fights, okay?” I was prepared for that, somehow I didn’t think my radio fight calls were going to translate very well to the world of TV, OHH Well!

How nervous was I, I am right handed I had to hold my stick mic with my left hand cause I was shaking so bad from nerves. Yup, 16 years in this business and I still get hyped up, I couldn’t sleep the night before the game and I didn’t sleep last night, too excited.

Charlie Simmer is a pro, I have worked with Charlie before and quite honestly I already knew he was a pro even before this trip, but just watching him and the way he carries himself he is a great mentor. Add to that you can’t walk 10 feet with out someone stopping to talk to him, and bar none best hair in hockey!

First time that Barry Strader (who is my cousin) and I got to work together on a game, I felt he was really strong, I am a big fan of his work since he just gets to the heart of the matter in his interviews. Barry is very matter of fact on air, and really down to earth off the air, he was really really good last night.

Thanks again to Peter Maher who took me aside at the morning skate and gave me some sound advice and got me in the right head space for the game, again he just knows when to say the right thing at the right time.

Tip of my hat to the guys from Jumbo Tron at the dome who put the game together behind the scenes Carlo, Peter, Mitch, Andy, Chris, and Jules don’t get much recognition but those guys work their bags off to make the game happen, and even more impressive is the time put into all of the features that it takes to fill the dead air in pay per view. It’s a different animal when you don’t have commercials and you have to fill each and every second, between you me and the fence post I would love to do it in radio, just go and go, but TV is a different.

To all of those who bought the Pay Per View last night, Thank you! If you enjoyed it I can only tell you that the next one in Chicago on November 9th will be even better. For those who may not have liked the broadcast please see previous sentence.

I love blogging on airplanes, no distractions, and plenty of time to get to everything. Good lord I am not sure I have written anything this long since college.

This entry was posted on Friday, October 24th, 2008 at 4:42 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.