The Complaint Box Is Closed

That's it. No more. I read Heather's post below on the game yesterday, and went to check the comments. And for some reason that I can't even begin to fathom, the comments were about the attendance in San Antonio. And all I can wonder is: what the fuck is wrong with you people?

So that's it. No more. There are to be no more comments from anybody bitching about anything at Toyota Center or about how the poor season ticket holder feel dissed. No more unsolicited comments about the PA. No more unsolicited comments about how the crowd acts, or how you don't like the daytime kid games. No more comments about how loud the music volume is, or anything that doesn't deal with the game on the ice. I don't want to see any more comments on how great is was under Chuck Watson.

No more. The comments will not be approved. If one slips through, I will delete it.

Now one caveat: if I or Andrew of Heather should mention about the games op we didn't like, or mention something that should open the door to a comment, then it gets through. But there is to be no more of this crap like the post below where, instead of commenting on the game, you comment on how San Antonio counted attendance.

Think of it like this. Imagine you're one of the players who read the blog. After you've just won an important game, one that's put you into first place, you come over here and see that there's a post on the game. Now how would you feel if you went to the comments and there wasn't one damn comment on the actual game, but just a bunch of crap on how San Antonio didn't let you get seats in the section you wanted?

The Complaint Box Is Open

Well supposedly I'm a management shill -- though I think the person accusing me of such should actually bother reading the archives. I'm not a management shill, but frankly, I'm tired of reading complaints about the business/marketing/ticket office in post after post after post.

I can't speak for Andrew or Heather, but this blog was established to discuss the Aeros, the AHL, the Wild, and how what the Wild does affects the Aeros. It wasn't meant to be a forum for dealing with the ticketing folks or your complaints with them. It was to discuss hockey.

That said, I, and I alone, have opened up the door for that discussion time and time again as I have made my displeasure with certain things known time and time again, like the game in St. Paul, or moving the game day in St. Paul after people had made flight arrangements. I've made my displeasure with the morning kiddie games known, and I noted that I didn't like some of the season ticket plans they came up with after lots of other season ticket holders had already renewed.

But apparently I'm just a puppet for management. So, tell you what...

The complaint box is open. I want to hear your actual complaints about the ticket office/business office/marketing office. I want specifics. I don't want any of this stuff like they don't respect us, or they don't treat us like they used to. I want specifics. What is it that they used to do that they don't do now? Or what is something they're doing now they didn't do in the past? Did they screw you on a deposit? Did they make you change seats? Did they pull a bait-and-switch? Throw in the stuff about the game in St. Paul, or the kiddie games. Put all of your complaints here. Just give me some damn specifics. And yes, you can throw in the lack of Ice Girls if you want.

Let me hear them. I can't promise anything, but let me have the complaints, and I'll see if I can get some answers. But I need something specific to work with.

Word count for dummies

Saw a comment from an earlier post about the Chronicle not printing 10 words about the Aeros game in Cleveland Friday night.

To end any confusion or argument, the story was actually 360 words, which is actually much longer than some home game reports.

Here is a copy of the article:

CLEVELAND — The last time the Aeros were on the road, they scored just two goals in three straight losses to Grand Rapids (twice) and the Texas Stars.

Friday night in the first of back-to-back games against the Lake Erie Monsters, the Aeros tripled that output in a single game with a 6-0 shutout win at Quicken Loans Arena.

Six different players scored and Jon DiSalvatore recorded three assists. Anton Khudobin made 17 saves as the Aeros (9-7-0-0) won their third straight game and jumped past Peoria for sole possession of second place in the West Division standings.

The Aeros scored the first goal of the game late in the opening period when Nathan Smith took a pass from DiSalvatore and beat Monsters goalie Tyler Weiman with 1:36 left.

With three goals in the first eight minutes of the second period, the Aeros blew open the game and chased Weiman from the net.

Danny Irmen scored his team-leading sixth goal of the season 99 seconds into the period, and Clayton Stoner made it 3-0 when he scored his third goal of the season at 5:46.

Less than three minutes later, Max Noreau beat Weiman after taking a pass from Duncan Milroy at 8:10.

Noreau’s goal spelled the end of the night for Weiman, who blanked the Aeros 1-0 last month at Toyota Center.

Peter Kalus did not light the lamp in his first 14 games with the team, but he has scored goals in back-to-back games. The Aeros have scored at least four goals in a season-high three straight games.

The Aeros played the game without winger Robbie Earl, who was recalled to Minnesota on emergency conditions and played 5:21 in the Wild’s 3-1 loss at Washington Friday. Earl will likely be with the Wild and will miss tonight’s game against Lake Erie and Chicago on Sunday.

Also, Aeros goalie Barry Brust was assigned to the Florida Everblades earlier this week on a conditioning assignment. Brust made 34 saves as the ‘Blades beat the Toledo Walleye 4-3 in a shootout.

Brust will play tonight in the rematch.

Moderation Is Now On

Okay, we tried to play nice. We laid out commenting rules to be followed last week. And we think we've still had a pretty good free flow of information, comments, etc. But we've had some nasty stuff posted tonight, and every time we deleted the comment -- as we said we would -- it was reposted. And since none of us wanted to stay up all night handling this matter, we've turned on the moderation feature.

If this works properly, that means that nothing goes up in the comments until one of us approves it. Sorry, but somebody decided to abuse the commenting privilege. We're having a group meeting this weekend and we'll discuss how to handle this, but for now, it's moderation. And I apologize.

A Few Comments On The Past Few Days

We've been reading the comments to the last several posts, and we thought there were a few items that you guys have mentioned and discussed that should be addressed in a post. So I got the assignment. And note, for the most part, what you are about to get are my opinions, and my opinions only. We are in agreement on some of the things I write, and there is also much disagreement over some of what I write.

That said...

The decision to fire Jerry Meins did not come from the people in Houston. It specifically did not come from the business staff or from any of the people who were hired or used to work for Tom Garrity in Houston. This decision was made in Minnesota, and it was made by the hockey people, not the business people.

That said, I am as angry about the decision as you are. One person left a comment talking about how wrong this decision was, but how this kind of thing happens in sports all of the time. And that person was right. Still, I think Jerry Meins has done a great job with this team, and to the best of my knowledge there is nothing in regards to his work that caused this action. I am particularly angry about the way the move was made, which was Wild general manager Chuck Fletcher calling Meins, with Fletcher in Minnesota and Meins in Houston, to tell him the news. Meins' position with the team, as well as his time spent with the team, means to me that he deserved to have this action take place face-to-face.

But in the end, Fletcher has the right to have his own people here in Houston assisting with his operation. Fletcher's job is to do what he thinks is right for the Minnesota Wild, not what he thinks will keep the people in Houston happy. The Aeros are, after all, a minor league team owned by the Minnesota Wild, and the purpose of the Aeros is to make ready players to promote to the Wild. If the Aeros win, that's fine, but it's secondary to assisting the Wild -- thus despite the Aeros fighting for a playoff spot, it's more important to the Wild that Krys Kolanos and Anton Khudobin sit in the press box with the Wild because of potential injury problems.

With that in mind, I note that many of you are angry over the Wild's treatment of the Aeros roster, and many of you think that there was not effort made to retain last season's playoff club. I'm upset about some of the moves, as well, particularly Mitch Love and Nolan Schaefer. But hear this: the club did want to retain Corey Locke and Marco Rosa, and they made offers to them. It's just that those two guys received incredible offers from the New York Rangers and Manitoba Moose that the Wild were just not in a position to match. Rosa's contract in particular, from what I hear, was rather hard for the team to match as an AHL-only contract. And as Andrew has written, Kolanos had worn out his welcome with the club.

As for players like Love and Schaefer, I can't offer much beyond the fact that, with regards to the goalies, Barry Brust and Anton Khudobin are signed to contracts for this season, and both have proven that they can play goalie at this level. And as much as I want Love and Tony Hrkac and Matt Beaudoin back this season, my desires, and the desires are the fans are of secondary concern to Fletcher and his assistant, Jim Mill. Their concern should be what is best for the Minnesota Wild organization, and if they don't think those guys fit into what they have in mind for the organization, or with the type of hockey that they want to play, then they are under no obligation to sign them to a contract and bring them back to the team. They have been busy with signing guys to contracts, and we have to work under the assumption that Fletcher thinks these guys are what he has in mind for the new style of play of the Wild.

Now with that said, I'm going to address the comments about the business side of the Aeros.

Many of you were upset that we got a quote from Courtney Eidman regarding Jerry Meins. I'm sorry that you don't like that, but frankly, I don't give a damn. She was the proper person in the Aeros chain of command for this matter. In the past, we would have contacted Patrick Armstrong or Scott Henninger, but both have left the club and their replacement will not be arriving until next week. I'm sure we could have waited to talk with the new Director of Communications or Communications Manager, but then many of you would have probably been angry at us for not talking with the Aeros right away.

Some of you have also said that Eidman, the mysterious Senior V.P. -- which has me thinking of this guy -- and other people who were associated with Tom Garrity are responsible for many of the bad things that are happening with the club. And you might be right about that. I deal with the media guys, game ops people, and Joe O'Donnell. I don't deal with the people that you season ticket holders deal with, and they don't get my money -- I'm comped, sorry. So for all I know, many of you are right in some of the things that you say. But...

The lack of media attention this team gets isn't because of anything "the three blind mice on Lamar" have done. The lack of television media attention is because local sports don't get much attention on local news as they used to -- you can thank ESPN for that. It's generally the last segment of the news, right before Letterman. And local television media is always going to concentrate on the big three of the Astros, Texans, and Rockets, before any other team. Look how much attention the Cougars and Owls get, which is just barely more than the Aeros, and both of their football teams went to bowl games last season. It's just the nature of the media. And do you really want the radio talk show guys trying to talk hockey? Those guys have enough difficulty with making coherent arguments about baseball, basketball, and football. Do you really want to hear what they'll say about hockey?

That said, you are now getting much more media attention on the Aeros than you were three years ago. Andrew's in the Chron. I'm on HoustonPress.com Heather writes about the team at Pro Hockey News Daily. Then there's our group project here with Fred, that we call T3I. And I think that we're giving the Aeros better, more comprehensive, more factual, more entertaining, more objective, and more analytical coverage than any sports team in the city of Houston is getting. So in away, you guys should feel blessed. The Aeros will never return to the days of the 90s when the Aeros were treated as a major league team. First, the Aeros aren't a major league team. Second, back in those days, the Oilers had deserted the team, baseball was coming off the cancellation of a season and a World Series, and the Rockets were on their way into suckitude.

And speaking of the "three blind mice," I should also point out that virtually nobody in this position with a sports team has a background of playing the sport -- some of you have complained that they don't have any hockey background. Pam Gardner with the Astros never played baseball. Most of the business people with the Texans have never played football. Neither have most of the communications people. So I fail to see what their lack of so-called knowledge of hockey has to do with their jobs. For instance, I never played hockey, so I should probably never write about it. And I'm pretty sure that most of the major complaints that ticket holders have result from decisions made in St. Paul, not in Houston -- well, okay, I'm sure the horrible anthem decisions are made in Houston, as are the six choirs a night that all perform "God Bless America."

I've gone on way too long, and many of you are probably mad at me, but remember, this is me, not Andrew, Heather, or Fred. I hated what was done to Jerry Meins. I hated the way it was done -- I lost my job back in March and I'm still unemployed, so I'm more pissed about this than many of you know. But in the end, it's the Wild's right to do what they want. Same with player decisions. The Wild have to be more concerned with getting guys they think can play in their system than they need to be concerned with us here in Houston. I'm not saying it's right. I'm just saying that this is the way it goes when you are fans of a minor league team.

I apologize for anything that might have angered you guys. But we felt these issues should be discussed. And this is what I think. I see my job as trying to provide an objective view of what is going on with the Aeros. And I believe I have done that. And I believe that I will continue to do that. So I guess that all I can say is fire away.

New Commenting Rules (Kind of)

One of the things we try to do here it at T3I is to provide a source for not only Aeros and hockey info in general, but for all of you to express your thoughts on the various topics we discuss, or anything you want discussed. And we like a good dialogue, and we like to think that we encourage a lively exchange of ideas.

But, we would like for this expression of dialogue to be civil -- since Heather and I have both been known to use profanity in posts, I can't say no profanity. So on behalf of Heather, Fred, and Andrew, I would kindly request that everybody please watch their tone. Try to cut back on the insults. Try not to call somebody else names. If you disagree, that's fine. But we would just ask that you try to do so in a more polite manner.

Here's the thing. We have the ability to delete comments that we believe go over the top. We've never done that. We've never seen the need to do that. But after some of the stuff earlier today, we have seriously started contemplating that option. Now, I lost out on the argument about whether those comments should have been deleted -- I thought they should stay because I don't like punishing people for breaking rules they didn't know existed, but like I said, I lost.

However, starting from this post on, if we see anything we consider to be over the top, defamatory, or just plain classless and insulting, we're DELETING IT. And just as a reminder, we also have the ability to use the moderation feature, which means nothing gets posted until one of us approves it. I don't want to do that since I'm the one without a job and that means I would be the one stuck with having to approve all of the comments. But that option is still out there.

So please, comment. Have a good time. Agree. Fight. Argue. Express anguish. Let us know how you feel about what the Aeros have done, or the league, or the opposition. Just keep it civil.

After all, we don't want hurt feelings.