The Swedes never hug Ozzie
Helene St. James of the Detroit Free Press recently wrote her best, and certainly most entertaining, article this year in regards to the results of a Swedish study. The study reports that 9 out of 10 Swedes hug someone at least once a week. She took this information and confronted the Swedes on the Detroit Red Wings squad and got some great quotes out of it.
“In here, not a lot of hugging, but a lot of harmony, a lot of loving,” Niklas Kronwall said. Asked if he would hug somebody regularly, Kronwall replied: “Probably somebody who needs a hug. … Probably Malts right now. Sometimes when he gets in here in the morning he’s a little short, a little bitter. So sometimes I do think he needs a hug.”
Johan Franzen said: “I’m the 10th guy.”
Nicklas Lidstrom had heard about the study, and suddenly something clicked about Tomas Holmstrom. “I know Homer’s been trying to hug me for quite some time,” Lidstrom said, “and I didn’t know why, but finally I figured it out.”
Henrik Zetterberg allowed, “Well, we are a very friendly people.” But he said he is a non-hugger, something to which non-Swede Chris Osgood can attest. “The Swedes never hug me,” he said. “I get none. Zero. I feel like I should get more. I’m getting lonely. They should hug more.”
During home games in the second intermission, the Wings have been showing clips of the “Chris Osgood Show.” It’s definitely the best thing I’ve ever seen on that jumbotron aside from the team winning the Cup. The show features Ozzie going around the locker room and asking a handful of players a specific question. On Saturday, he asked the likes of Dallas Drake, Johan Franzen, and Jiri Hudler who the worst dressed teammate was. Without explicitly saying so, Franzen implied it was goaltender Dominik Hasek (a player who has a 2-digit jersey number that begins with 3 and it wasn’t Draper or a Swede). Hudler said he wouldn’t give an answer because he essentially didn’t want to bad talk a veteran on the team. Anyways, I don’t believe they have been doing the show every game, but it’s definitely entertaining if you do catch it!
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One Response to “The Swedes never hug Ozzie”
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December 7th, 2007 at 4:38 am
I was also told that us Scandinavians (I’m 1/4 Swedish and 1/4 Finnish) are very reserved and that we need to hug more. Granted this was by a bunch of West Coast people who definitely need to hug less.