Brother Vs. Sister – EyesOnIsles Challenges BlueLineStation

Anthony Gruppuso-USA TODAY Sports

It’s never too early to talk hockey, especially in the barren desert we find ourselves in during the dog days of summer. August has entered the fray and brought with it no new news to report. That does not mean the pot cannot be stirred and the gauntlet laid down ; challenges made and challenges accepted.

This morning, while perusing the Fansided network like I always do, I did a Bing search on ‘The most overrated team in sports history’. Much to my surprise, the results led me to BlueLineStation, our ‘sister’ site here at the network run by two co-editors ; one I am getting to know (and who knows his hockey) in Shawn Taggart and the other I know more than I like to admit at times, my son Andrew Graziano.

Now they have adopted a similar business plan to Eyes and many other sites around the network in that they publish a daily piece, recapping the previous days events in the National Hockey League. And in this morning’s feature, written by Taggart, was this little diddy (not about Jack & Diane) :

Good bathroom read…

Did you catch the comment by Taggart right below the tweet?

Now there are two ways one can take the above ; One : Sean was saying that if you have time to kill and nothing else to do but play Angry Birds, you might want to read this slice of Islanders goodness from our staff writer Ashley March.

Or you could take it the way I did ; Since when is Islanders history related to feces and excrement? Yeah, I know we have had our ups and downs over the past twenty or so years but this organization is still the only American hockey dynasty.

After stewing for a good half hour over the perceived ‘dig’ at our club, I decided to look angrily at my son, who was on the computer doing some research for a piece on the top 5 Rangers of all-time (he is still at the other computer by the way. It tough to find what isn’t there son) and proclaimed ‘oh, it’s on in a big way’.

Now, me and him have been talking about some cross promotion and cross face slapping for some time now once the regular season started but I did not expect it to start so soon. Well, don’t fret Islanders fans. I have your back and the challenge was issued to these so-called Blue shirt buffoons in a big way……

Followed by…..

And finally, the challenge was issued and accepted through email. Now to be clear, I am not calling my Rangers counterparts untrustworthy but at the end of the day, you just never know when they might be suffering from not being the big story in New York going forward and having their turf invaded by the likes of John Tavares, Matt Moulson and Cal Clutterbuck (who Ranger  fans already hate).

The rules of the challenge are laid out below for all to see and now that it is documented, there shall be no running from the consequences for the loser.

• Team with the most points in the Metropolitan division at the conclusion of the 82 game regular season wins the bet.
• Loser must wear a hat of the winning team and post a picture on Facebook and Twitter.
• As a side bet between editors Taggert and myself, the loser must also change his Twitter avatar to that of the winning team for the duration of the playoffs.

So there you go Islander fans. Don’t ever fret when it comes to these inter-fan battles when I am manning the keyboard. For I will always stick up for my brethren and I hereby declare to fight these evil demon players to hell and beyond (or at least, until they move to Kansas City)

Of course, I jest through most of this piece (or do I?) – Good luck to my fellow editors and writers at BLS and may the best team win (which we know will be the Isles).

-AG (@tazman19)