It’s that time, folks. The moment we’ve all definitely, for sure been waiting for. If we’re talking rivals, real rivals, we have to talk about the Pittsburgh Penguins. As you’ll see here, and as I’m sure you all know in your hearts, there’s a lot to hate about the Penguins, even more than can be contained in one mere article. But we’re here with at least a start.
Drew: I have so many things to say about the Penguins, but I’m going to keep my words sticking to one topic: Pens fans’ obsession with us Flyers fans. I really don’t understand why they feel the need to spam “1975!” whenever any argument between the sides arrises. It doesn’t serve as an interesting rebuttal, nor does it seem worth it. Seriously, you’ve won multiple Stanley Cups in the past decade, just be happy with that! But instead, they decide to spend all of their time being mad at Flyers fans when they really don’t need to be. Remember, they booed a franchise icon in Jaromir Jagr. You simply can’t hate that man.
Kyle: There are many reasons to hate the Penguins, but honestly I don’t think they’d annoy me so much if it wasn’t for how a lot of their fanbase behaves. Keep in mind we are talking about the Penguins, a team that has almost moved TWICE in their existence as an NHL franchise. The best part is they’ve been around for exactly the same amount of time as the Flyers being part of the original expansion to 12 teams. Pens fans love to talk their smack but never forget Mario Lemieux had to pull two miracles to get them to stay in Pittsburgh, once as a player, once as the owner.
Ryan Q.: It’ll be hard for me to list all of the reasons I hate the Penguins, so I’ll just give the most important reason — Kris Letang. I cannot stand the guy. I can deal with Crosby. Malkin’s a clown, but it’s easy to make fun of him, considering his dumb face and all. But no matter how many insults I whip up for Letang, it just doesn’t seem to be enough. He’s one of the few people on the planet that I actually hate. Just seeing his face makes me want to strangle something. Kristopher, if you’re reading this, fight me.
Craig: I’ll go off Ryan’s point that we couldn’t really list every single reason why we hate the Pens, so I’ll pick one that I think some people tend to forget in James Neal. The Pens got him and Matt Niskanen in a deal for Alex Goligoski in 2011, which…what? Then he proceeded to try to take off the heads of Claude Giroux and Sean Couturier in the same shift back in the 2012 Eastern Conference Quarterfinals. Neal and Matt Cooke are cheap shot artists Pens’ fans should hear more about. Another thing is I hated seeing John LeClair end his career there. Johnny Vermont should have ended his career in the Orange and Black.
Maddie: I’m gonna go ahead and agree with, well, everything that the guys have said. So many of the players are unlikeable, there’s dirtiness and nonsense, it’s all bad. And then there’s that fact that they must have signed a pact with the devil to maintain the ability to call up randos from the AHL and have them somehow be productive. You know the vibe.
The Penguins always have like eight injuries and twelve call ups I’ve never heard of. The call is like “Malkin gains the zone with wingers Mark Donk and Buzz Flibbet” and you look and they both have 47 points
— Acting the Fulemin (@ATFulemin) November 17, 2019
Also to pile on a little bit more: their jerseys are ugly. Yellow is objectively a great color and somehow they’ve made it bad. That’s just a crime.
Ryan G.: The Penguins are just so hateable. My friends above all touched on the main points, including how horrible the fans are as well as their obsession with Flyers fans, but there is one name that I am surprised to not see yet: Evgeni Malkin. Malkin is one of the dirtiest players in the league, but he somehow flies under the radar. Hating Sidney Crosby has multiple layers, but at least one of them is simply respecting how good he is. Malkin is good too, but he is as dirty as he is good. He gets away with too much. Also, it’s infuriating how the Penguins always get good players for nothing (like Craig said about Letang). On top of that, it seems like they could put a rock on a line with Crosby and the rock would put up 70 points.
And now it’s time to switch gears and ask the panel: what do we like about the Penguins?
Ryan Q.: Lmfao we don’t.
Maddie: I guess we should give them credit for being good for as long as have been, in recent memory. Begrudgingly. I really don’t feel good about saying that. My skin’s actually crawling.
Ryan G.: No.
