APB on Easton Stealths

If you keep up with Capitals news, then you know about Mike Green's "stick issue." Originally hitting main stream media when Green set the consecutive games with a goal by a defenseman record earlier this season, it was revealed that Green had the last 6 Easton Stealths in existence. The story arose because the Hockey Hall of Fame came-a-calling for the stick Green used to set the record. Green did not want to part with it. A couple days later the Capitals released an announcement that Green would in fact send the stick to Toronto.

Fast forward to Game 1 of the Rangers series, Green breaks his last Easton Stealth. His replacement, an Easton S17. A stick which Green says is "heavier and thicker than the Stealth." Now the fun begins. There was actually one Easton Stealth left in existance, the one slated for the Hall of Fame. Here is an excerpt from Capitals Insider by Tarik El-Bashir today 5/12:

As you read last night, Mike Green's record-breaking stick, the one that was earmarked for the Hockey Hall of Fame, made it to Pittsburgh in time for the opening faceoff. But Green didn't use the Stealth because he said he had already decided to go with S17.

"I couldn't use it" in Game 6, Green said. "I just got used to the other one. To go back right before the game ..."

Apparently, the hall-of-fame stick wasn't the last Mike Green edition Stealth in the world, as I claimed yesterday. Green said at least a half dozen are supposed to arrive sometime today or tomorrow -- from fans and friends of friends.

"Somebody wrote something yesterday," Green said, referring to my blog post yesterday. "So [Stealths] are coming in like no tomorrow. They're coming out of everywhere. Fans and one of the reporters even had one.

"I'll use [a Stealth] in the morning and see how it feels," he added.

I don't know if anyone else is as dumbfounded as I am. If I was in charge of the Hockey division at Easton, upon hearing that Mike Green was running out of a stick that he claimed to be the best stick he's ever used, I would have called up whoever I needed to, to get that stick back in production. Slap Mike Green's name on it and advertise how it's the stick that was used to rack up 31 goals, 73 points, and set the record for consecutive games with a goal by a defenseman. Are you telling me that won't sell? Instead we are left with die hard fans running into their garage to pack up and ship out their own Easton Stealths in hopes it will turn around what has been a lack luster performance from Green in the postseason.

Can a stick make that much of a difference? It could. NHL-ers are very perticular about their equipment. Skates go on a certain way. tape is applied a certain way, sharpening is done a certain way. Everything is percison for these guys. Then top that off with some good 'ol sportsmen superstision... and you got recipe for disaster when something goes ary.

So is the stick the issue Green? We will all find out tomorrow night when the puck drops for Game 7. My guess it that it won't stop him from jumping up with the forwards for most of the game. On the other hand, it may reinstate his slapshot that has been MIA and possibly eliminate some of those ugly turnovers in the neutral zone we've seen so often this postseason.