Sabres - Crossing the Generations

The day has arrived -- another generation from our family has made it to a Sabres game.  These father-son moments will never be forgotten, on both accounts I’m sure.  Speaking from my own childhood experience, I have fond memories of parking (for free) one mile from the Aud, and then walking down dimly lit city streets with my father while he candidly (and often times offensively) spoke to complete strangers regarding his analysis of the pending game, and on the way back – provided an amplified post-game assessment of the Sabres performance as well.  Being the young kid I was at the time, I didn’t know any different – that was what I considered to be normal conversation between grown adults at a sporting event.

But the main lesson I had learned -- through obnoxious osmosis -- and not by my father explaining his seasoned hockey-watching ways to me:

If you are going to comment on an individual player’s performance during the game, you MUST yell it at a decibel level loud enough for the on-ice player to hear you – NO exceptions.

The vast majority of the time he would become a local celebrity in our section, providing hilarious entertainment for all the other fans… and the best part of it was, he wasn’t trying to be funny!  In his mind, if the players heard his opinion, he could actually impact the outcome of the game.  Hence his opinion would be heard across the entire stadium – and I’m not exaggerating, his voice would carry.  Anyone from my family will attest (and friends as well), you just had to be there to believe it.

I’m sure that Jeremy and Avery had a memorable experience too.  Jeremy sent a note saying that Avery loved it, and hung in there for two solid periods before getting wiped out… with another generation being introduced to the Sabres, we can only hope that the Lord Stanley will finally pay a visit.