Markus Moments from the Canucks Blogosphere

As we near the retirement of Markus Naslund's number nineteen, tributes for the former Canuck captain (like the excellent Meat Markus) are in abundance. What follows is a collection of recollections on Markus Naslund's best moments, as fondly remembered by the community of bloggers he inspired. Daniel's "Markus Moment" is below. You can read Harrison's "Markus Moment", along with the writers from Canucks Hockey Blog, Benched Whale, Nucks Misconduct and Canucks Corner, over at Canucks Hockey Blog.

Daniel "Skeeter" Wagner

My favorite Markus moment is any and every single moment he had the puck on his stick near the right face-off circle with time to shoot. In these moments, a glorious certainty would enter my mind: Markus Naslund is about to score a goal. There was always just enough time to edge forward in my seat in anticipation of jumping out of it. In a game full of weird bounces, bad breaks, and unlikely circumstances, Naslund scoring from the right faceoff circle at the height of his career was the closest a Canuck fan could get to a sure thing. These were beautiful moments of peace in the midst of stressful hockey games, and for that I am very thankful.

[Continue Reading at Canucks Hockey Blog]

5 Reasons Harrison Mooney Loves the Canucks

"Five Reasons I Love the Canucks" is a feature at Nucks Misconduct, inspired by Puck Daddy's "Five Reasons..." series. It features Canucks fans explaining, in their own words, the reasons for their passionate support of the team, and offers readers a chance to contribute their own stories to the site.

Here are five reasons I, Harrison Mooney, co-founder of Pass it to Bulis, love the Canucks.

1. The Worst Jelly Beans I've Ever Had

I have a family friend to thank for the seeds of my Canuck fandom. A huge fan who just wanted to spread the disease, he gave me a Canucks-themed gift for Christmas when I was six. The gift was a massive beer glass with the Canucks logo on it, full of jelly beans in Canucks colors. At first glance, it was a sweet gift. It would hold, like, a gallon of chocolate milk, and in order for me to drink out of it, I had to mine the metric ton of candy within it.

I later realized the gift had more to do with trying to convert me than with whether or not I would enjoy it. Consider that the Canucks colors, at the time, were yellow, orange and black, which meant that one-third of the jelly beans were black. Who gives a kid that many black jelly beans? Ask any person the worst flavour of jelly bean, and they'll tell you: black. Black jelly beans are the worst thing in the world.

The problem was that I loved candy so much that I loved the principle of candy more than I loved specific candies. Once I had worked through the scrumptiously tangy yellow and orange jelly beans, I realized I only had two options: eat, like, fifty black jelly beans, or throw perfectly good candy away. So I ate those jelly beans. I sat there for one committed afternoon, eating some awful candy, telling myself, you will eat and enjoy every last terrible one, and you'll be the better for it. I believe that some of this forced enjoyment transferred over to the team that was implicit in my self-torture, and through that afternoon of anguish, I trained myself to like the Canucks. How else to explain my love for a team that never wins anything?

You can read my other four reasons at Nucks Misconduct.