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+---- Thread: Kubinec to Announce Retirement Following Rule Change (/showthread.php?tid=99284)
Kubinec to Announce Retirement Following Rule Change - Leoben - 08-25-2019
Ready for Grading. 1429 words.
Halifax Raiders’ starting left winger Josef Kubinec is not happy, and he is letting anyone who will listen (which is about three rookies in the Halifax locker room and Nick, the Zamboni driver) know about his current struggles. Kubinec has always been a little eccentric among his teammates.
One teammate, who wished to stay anonymous but still have his importance emphasized, had the following to say. “Sometimes he’s all chatty and in a great mood, hyped up for the games. Then sometimes he doesn’t say shit for weeks. He got us all coffee one morning and that was nice but then he started shouting “You’re welcome!” at everyone before we could even thank him. Then he goes out and scores a few goals so we just kind of let him be him. But he’s really lost it this time.”
Another said “I like Joe, I really do. But his demands, theories, rationale, and mood swings are downright annoying. He’s really not worth the hassle to be honest. Plus if he leaves, I can be on the first line. Wait, this on the record? Don’t tell them which line I’m on. I don’t want Joe to know it’s me who said anything. He’s spiteful.”
His latest outburst might actually cost him his career. He has refused to practice the last two weeks and has threatened immediate retirement if the league doesn’t let him use his old gloves.
Kubinec often goes off on tirades that lead nowhere but no one has seen him like this before. “Listen guys, Head Office are Nazis. Like I’ve seen them behind the scenes, they have secret offices and meetings and they say some pretty twisted shit. People talk. Loose lips sink ships, and that’s why they started flying blimps, because you can’t sink a blimp and no one can hear you up there. But people still talk. Just ask the Hindenburg. Anyway, what was I saying? Gloves!”
“He goes off on these tangents. Like he will start complaining about some league rule and before you know it he’s talking about how Detroit sacrificed four young children at the start of the season and that’s why they’re so good. He has half the rookies convinced that the population of Vancouver is just paid actors pretending to actually work and live there. Half the buildings are made of cardboard. We were walking to a club after a game and he told me not to walk down a certain street because I’d fall through the cardboard. He thinks Hillary Clinton is the GM of the St. Louis Scarecrows. When I asked him why he said “Just look at them.”
But the gloves. The gloves are the thing that has sent him over the edge. I managed to keep him on track, sort of, to let him tell his side of the story.
MB: So the gloves. What’s changed? What has you willing to call it a career?
JK: First off, thank you for having me on your podcast. I want you to know this is the first podcast I have been on and it is exciting to break this news of my retirement on your podcast.
MB: This isn’t a podcast.
JK: Then why are you recording? Are you with Head Office? Let me see your credentials.
MB: I’m a reporter. We record our conversation for our stories later.
JK: I want to keep the original tape. I have blank cassettes in my locker and I can record this conversation on one for you. Just in case you try to doctor the original.
MB: Cassette? This isn’t a tape recorder. But I will let you have the original.
JK: Can I save it to a floppy disk? I don’t use the cloud. Don’t trust it.
MB: Floppy disk? No, what about a USB drive?
JK: They bug those.
MB: DVD? CD?
JK: How do you think Michael J. Fox got Parkinson’s?
MB: Hey now. Careful.
JK: Well as long as I have the original.
MB: I’ll make it happen. So tell me. The gloves. What’s changed?
JK: About two weeks ago, they switched gloves for both leagues. They didn’t tell us until the day of. I go into the locker room before a game, I think it was Montreal, and we have these new gloves. Now they feel the same on the inside. The same fit, and it’s very hard to notice the differences.
MB: I remember that. Everyone said it wasn’t a big deal.
JK: Well for most people it isn’t. But part of the reason I can shoot the way I shoot, pass the way I pass, and skate the way I skate, is because of the way my hands are angled.
MB: Your hands are different than everyone else’s?
JK: You know the way Michael Phelps looks like an alien? Like he has a body that makes him a better swimmer? The way his back, feet, and arms are shaped? Like some higher power designed him to move through water?
MB: Sure.
JK: Well, the way my hands are angled, they make me a better skater and shooter. But these new gloves, they make my hands conform to that of the average human.
MB: And that makes you slower?
JK: I miss more of my shots, I’m a tenth of a second slower getting down the ice, and I have trouble hopping off the bench now. The data is there but everyone is too lazy to look at it.
MB: But you’re the only one this has any impact on?
JK: Others are out there but they are too afraid to speak up, so I am the voice of the voiceless. If this was one of the high profile players, this would be a big deal. Alas, this went under the radar.
MB: Why do you think that is?
JK: It’s just how they do things. They distract the league and players with some noise, and then put in some real change like this gloves ordeal.
MB: What kind of noise? What distractions?
JK: I know for a fact that PenKnight was a plant. He was a multi from HO paid to spew some sexist stuff and come across like a boomer to cause outrage across the league. This league is a microcosm of society and we live in a culture of outrage. Head Office played off that.
MB: So if that was a distraction? What were they distracting us from?
JK: That was the vote to change the gloves. The actual change was the whole Klozoff ordeal.
MB: Oh, the waiver thing?
JK: Exactly! Now you’re getting it. And remember King? Remember when he came back for a minute only to be run off again?
MB: Of course. Everyone remembers.
JK: That was the league. They paid him to come back and retire again, unretire, then retire again.
MB: Why?
JK: I can’t go into details about that one, as the change hasn’t happened yet but it’s in the works. But King is alive and well, and he’s in this league as someone else. Not a multi or anything, but he goes by a different name now. Head Office knows. They let people do that sometimes when they want a fresh start for whatever reason.
MB: So who is King now?
JK: I know. And a few other people could figure it out if they tried really hard. But I’m not going to out him. I like him. But if he gets outed, it will send ripples across the league that will be felt on Jupiter.
MB: Is it…
JK: I will tell you off the record.
MB: Fair enough. So you are willing to retire because of this glove fiasco?
JK: Yes. I will be officially announcing my retirement tomorrow. But I wanted to break it to you first.
MB: So can anything change your mind?
JK: Just let me have my old gloves. We have people in this league who have murdered people. We have legit criminals. But I can’t have my gloves because they were made in a sweatshop in Detroit? Who’s the hypocrite here?
MB: I mean sweatshops are bad.
JK: So are oligarchies but everyone’s okay with that. Let me have my gloves back! No glovie, no Kubie!
Head Office was not available for comment.
RE: Kubinec to Announce Retirement Following Rule Change - Henrik - 08-25-2019
Pure gold.
RE: Kubinec to Announce Retirement Following Rule Change - FinnRhys - 08-25-2019
Great article MB! That Kubenic guy is definitely as bad as Antonio Brown
RE: Kubinec to Announce Retirement Following Rule Change - CementHands - 08-25-2019
So the buildings in Vancouver aren't cardboard?