-M. Tkackuk (hyphen edits)

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↳ LUKE HUGHES  | calgary flames @ new jersey devils, february 8th 2024

so there’s a new interview with the panthers’ play-by-play guy where he says keith told matthew to ask for a personalized goal call when he came to florida: thehockeynews.com/nhl/florida-panthers/latest-news/getting-to-know-goldie-q-a-with-florida-panthers-play-by-play-voice-steve-goldstein

this fits into my theory that matthew is a very media savvy person and super aware of his public personal narrative and branding because keith kind of trained him to be that way.

oh that's fun to know! i DO think matthew is very aware of his public persona, because keith has definitely said things about how it's different for matthew and brady than it was for him with social media and stuff, and how matthew was obviously a little peeved that videos of brady's wedding got out because he's very intentional with what he puts out of himself, and is very good at not getting photographed

but i would also say matthew said this to goldie in a joking manner too, because that's another neat thing about matthew, he's very charming and undemanding

november 19, 2022: cgy @ fla 

here have these random screenshots because i'm in a hanny and tanny mood

YAAAAAAASSSSS MOZZY STICKS!!!!!

This anthem singer practically making a theatre show out of this anthem and the americans are crying heaving throwing up. Using the flag hanging from the rafters as a prop n errythin. Honestly their faces. this is Hamilton 2 for this audience

Cliffy hockey, McAvoy’s a stallion and Ullmark is a brick wall!! ⭐️🧱🐎

What do you enjoy about Calgary?

Ok I have multiple.

I live in the NE area btw.

CrossIron Mills - I'm surprised I'm writing this but yes, its one of my favourite things about this city.

Downtown - love it, go a lot now for work.

Bowness Park - I love bowness more than anything, especially during the winter when I can skate.

03.04.24 (SEA @ CGY): the seattle kraken win their 100th game against the calgary flames

pre-game: kadri

I was looking at some hockey wags instagram accounts and it's so funny how a lot of them have private accounts because they're "private" and yet most of them and their families (like mtkachuk gf family) accepted follower requests from wags accounts and let them post private pics (mtkachuk gf did this with the flames wags page when he left cgy) like what's the goal here I don't get it. I wonder if most of them really think the media will care enough about them when they barely care about crosby's "girlfriend" and he's the most famous one lmao

The media don't worry about the Crosby gf because they've been strongly advised not to worry about her. This is not a personal initiative

Chris McLeod: You see your captain [Matt Maggio] drop the gloves there at the end, is frustration starting to boil over for the Spitfires?

Shane Wright: Yeah. I mean, it's pretty em-- pretty f-- pretty embarrassing out there. Just no effort, no compete from anyone, and it's... just really embarrassing out there from us.

[Video: A white-haired white man in a headset and a suit interviewing a brown-haired young white man in a headset and a red hockey jersey. The jersey has a letter A on it. The hockey player does not look into the camera.]

Oh, man. Context: This was a struggle bus of a game after the previous game was also a struggle bus of a game. The Spitfires had been playing well before they got Shane, and they did even better after. Shane is averaging about 2 points per game and has been getting increasingly aggressive shooting and more comfortable coming in as a dominant forward as opposed to just ("just!") a strong defensive playmaking center.

AND THEN.

The Spitfires' forward group went down to injury after injury, including Shane, who was out for several games with a hurt ankle. By the end of the season, they were playing with seven forwards (a healthy crew is twelve) and one of their D-men was occasionally playing forward. Matt Maggio, team captain, became the first player in the OHL to score 50 goals and 100 points, but Matt and Shane were two of the few healthy guys through the end of the season. Oof.

The intermission interview was painful to watch and included a Shane who did not make eye contact with the camera even once. (He normally does. He also normally smiles. 🥺) This was a moment he really didn't want to have - an arena camera showed him trying to ask to go to the dressing room so he could talk to his team instead of having to go up for an interview when his team needed his support and, um, motivation - but he's also a public face of the team and he did his job as respectfully as he could.

Honestly, what stands out to me here is how much he sounds like Yanni Gourde does when the Kraken are having a bad night due to lack of compete. Shane is a guy who wants to be winning very badly and isn't happy when his team isn't playing up to their potential. (I find myself wondering if this Ontario kid might just have been watching the Leafs all these years and thinking They don't want it enough. When I'm in the NHL, I'll never have that problem. I'm always going to want it more than anybody else.)

Shane can play one more game in the NHL this season and still be eligible for an entry-level slide (meaning the clock doesn't start ticking on the 3 years of his entry-level contract until next season, giving the Kraken another year before he becomes a restricted free agent and they have to extend his contract. This includes the playoffs. Is he NHL-ready? Unclear. But if the Spits exit early, it's not out of the question that the Kraken could call him up for one last game in the regular season, especially if we've clinched a playoff spot by then (we need 9 points, or 2 of the 3 teams still in wild card contention - WPG, CGY, and NSH - to miss out on 9 points, or any combination of us getting AND 2 of 3 missing 9 points, to clinch, so it could happen around the time the first round of the OHL playoffs are over).

This kid is going to be a flaming ball of compete and need to prove himself in training camp next year. Watch out.

oh that little sibling take is so intriguing because i feel like matthew DOES come off as a little bit of a tryhard with how he tries to be on good terms with everyone “off the ice” or w/e (ie being a pest on the ice but off the ice he spits out this bs about how it’s just a game etc…). It’s like one of the more … intruding things about him to me because i’m like does he lack that much self awareness. Does he really not know WHY he wasn’t made captain in cgy etc???Although I also think he also may not be as socially inclined as other guys but tries sometimes to not shake the table?? When he was with the flames there was frequent gossip that he wouldn’t accompany the team on nights out to bars or whatever and if he did, he’d leave early lol

i super agree with you about the tryhard please-like-me that matthew gives off but i don't know if i agree that it's due to a lack of self-awareness? at least to me it feels like more of an excess of self-awareness, like he knows exactly why people might not like him (being a pest, not being friendly in the right ways, being the most annoying person on the planet) and is overcompensating in places

but also more broadly one of the things i really enjoy about writing rpf and being in rpf fandoms is poking at things like this, because real people are full of contradictions and things that just make no sense! we're our own worst enemies and we all do things like wishing everyone would like us while not bothering to do the things that would make people like us, and there's a really fun challenge in turning those messes of character traits into something that makes narrative sense for a story

Calgary vs. Columbus end of game line brawl October 20, 2023.