The NHL’s Pride jersey problem slips into the comedic

The NHL got more Pride Night bullshit last night courtesy of the Staal brothers on the Panthers, Eric and Marc. I’d try and provide some commentary, but sometimes, you just can’t beat reality:

What did Staal think this was? Did he honestly think no one would remember this? I know hockey players and devout Christians are galactically stupid, and the confluence between the two would create a super-stupid creature, but this stupid? This is something out of a satire film. This is Baghdad Bob shit. This is the real-life version of all those tweets you see that use the Arrested Development “Narrator: He had worn Pride jerseys” joke you’ve seen a thousand times.

As we said yesterday, because Gary Bettman isn’t actually a leader or really anything other than a cowardly toad who just points at the bank balances he’s provided, Ivan Provorov’s original refusal to wear the Flyers’ Pride jerseys gave all the bigots a platform. Russian players, who maybe are under threat or maybe just wanted to use the guise of threat to shroud their homophobic views, were quick to rush to it. They were followed by Christians, making for odd bedfellows — but they’ll never admit to that. Hockey’s culture of TEAM OVER ALL fostered all of this even more so that more players would feel safe taking a stance knowing their teammates would likely cover for them. And if they didn’t, they would probably be provided a bullhorn to amplify out their pigheaded and wrong beliefs to get more players to go along with their bigoted siren calls for assholes.

But there’s a message for Eric Staal:

At least his own team and teammate put him and his dipshit brother on blast:

We can use this for good, so support our colleague at Kotaku, Alyssa Mercante:

Also, she’s right. Abby had better be ripped as fuck when Last of Us season 2 comes out.

You may have seen that the NWSL is now in FIFA 23. Which is a big step, because we know how much of a tangible effect video games can have on a sport’s popularity. Being able to play as the USWNT stars will mean a lot to fans all around.

At least if they felt like they were playing as the actual players. Which…they might not?

I don’t know what the feeling is of seeing yourself in a video game. I imagine there’s a pretty high level of excitement hearing that you will be, and some anxiety about the rating and then the look. It is certain this game will be played by millions…so yeah, when you come out looking like Didier Drogba and you don’t actually look like Didier Drogba (and to be clear Didier is a handsome man, but that works for him and him only), it’s probably pretty crushing.

Hopefully EA will fix this, and even without the official FIFA license, hopefully NWSL players will soon know the joy of getting the game year after year and realizing that nothing has changed about it in the fucking leas and it’s the same fucking game you were playing five years ago and is definitely not worth the $70 you paid for it. A tradition unlike any other!