Scoreboard!

If you were to mosey on over to the Express' 'Free Ride', you might notice that they are reporting that work has begun on dismantling the Phone Booth's existing scoreboard. The new scoreboard will be a huge improvement, apparently:

Over a 1,000 feet of linear [light-emitting diode] fascia will bring to life the entire upper level of the arena bowl, while 400 feet of full motion signage will continue to animate the lower level of the arena bowl. Four additional LED displays will also light the top corners of the arena bowl with statistics, 3D graphics and advertisements, thus completing the entire digital display system.

Woo-hoo! Finally, the upper bowl will finally be brought to life! As opposed to... I don't know, I guess the only seats that most fans can afford must be the ones that attract the lifeless corporate drones. As opposed to the lower bowl, which was apparently already "animated". Thank goodness Abe was able to push through an entirely pointless tax increase on Verizon Center tickets to pay for all this. It's nice to know that the increased price I'll be paying for Caps tickets means that we'll be getting "a new state-of-the-art high-definition one hanging high above center court, just in time for the start of the Wizards' season this fall".

Wait... the Wizards?! You mean the team whose season doesn't start until October 31st? Three and a half weeks after the Capitals' home opener? Fascinating.

Online Voting May Produce Skewed Results? I'm Shocked, Just Shocked!

As everyone's favorite beat writer pointed out yesterday on Capitals Insider, Alex Ovechkin has dropped to third among forwards in the Eastern Conference All-Star voting. (Even more disturbing? Marc-Andre Fleury is the leading vote getter among Eastern Conference goaltenders. When did Penguins fans learn how to use computers?) Obviously, I probably don't need to expend any energy exhorting you to stop wasting time reading this and go vote. I don't know about you, but, living in DC, this is my only chance to vote for something that actually matters.

While I'm on the subject of All-Star voting, what, exactly, does the voting all mean? I'm not entirely clear on the rules here, nor am I clear on how the votes are factored in when deciding who gets to actually play in the All-Star game. Is it just the starters who are decided by the fan vote, a la MLB? Or is it some combination of the fan vote and other factors, a la the NFL? Anyone who can refresh my memory on this one wins a gold star.

Speaking of Stars, Jeff Halpern will be wearing one when he steps on the ice at Verizon Center tomorrow night. I was never as impressed with Halpy as everyone else. I felt that the old 10-11-22 line was more than the sum of its parts and once he was seperated from Dahlen and Konowalchuk he wasn't too much more than an average NHLer who happened to be from the DC-area. Frankly, his departure left the captaincy open for Chris Clark, who has been one of my favorite things about this year's team. So I'm having a hard time getting paricularly worked up about his return one way or the other. Which is probably a good thing, since I'll be missing the game anyway.

Apropos of nothing, I was walking down 7th St tonight and the big screen on the side of the Phone Booth was airing the Flyers-Predators game. Was this game showing on Comcast down here and I didn't know about it? Or was it just on the big screen?