They don't do it in football and they don't do it in basketball. The odd guy
does it in baseball, but no other sport embraces the idea of playoff beards like
hockey does. Not every player opts to grow one, but you can pretty much
guarantee that a couple players from each team will put their razors away for
the duration of the Stanley Cup playoffs, as will countless fans as they support
their teams.
Last year Mike Commodore from the Hurricanes was the unofficial champion of
playoff beard growing, and it's not hard to tell why:
The mop of hair certainly helps to accentuate what he has on his face, but
either way the an knows how to grow hair. It all begs the question- who will
have the best beard in the Thrashers locker room when it's all said and done?
I chatted with a handful of our players to see what they thought.
Being one of the youngest players on the roster Jim Slater isn't likely to
run away with it. He thinks the top facial hair award will go to Brad Larsen. As
he put it "Are we talking ugliest or best? Larsen will have the best and Mell
will have the ugliest. It'll be all grey."
He's not the only one that will be growing a grey beard. If Scott Mellanby
throws his hat in the ring Eric Boulton expects his whiskers to be grey, just
like Ray Bourque back in 2001. Boults expects that to put him over the top.
Eric Bolton got a few mentions himself as a candidate for best beard,
including one from Jon Sim, who wasn't afraid to call his own number.
"I think it will be me or Boultsy."
It must be a Nova Scotia thing.
Pascal Dupuis is known for his ability to have a five o'clock shadow by noon,
so he was expected to be a candidate, but he's backing Jon Sim as well.
But when it comes to real beard growing there are two players whose opinions
really matter. the first is Greg de Vries, who has been known to grow a think
beard and who grew a mustache for Casino Night in about half an hour.
"I think there should be some pretty good ones, but some of these guys really
needed head starts. Some of them should have started months ago," he said. "As
for the best- Brad Larsen by far. I've seen pictures of his beard from when he
was in Chicago. Hands down."
And that brings us to the front-runner in the competition- Brad "Clutch"
Larsen.
"I think Mell will have a pretty thick one, and I know Devo can pull it off.
I've seen his in Colorado. But I've got a pretty good one myself. I went
56 days without shaving during our run with the Wolves in the lockout year
(2005). It was pretty thick."
As for when it was acceptable to start the official playoff beard growing,
opinions were mixed. Pretty much everyone opted to wait until Easter was over
with to start growing their whiskers. Pascal Dupuis was of the opinion that if
you want to you can start as soon as your team clinches a playoff berth, while
Keith Tkachuk simply shot that "It's a playoff beard. you grow it in the
playoffs."
Regardless of when it's permissible to start, pretty much everyone that was
questioned said they wanted to look clean for Easter. Some of them are finished
shaving now, while others, like Greg de Vries, plan to have one good last shave
on Thursday before the official beard-growing commences.
As the playoffs continue we'll track the beard-growing exploits of the
Thrashers and post photo evidence of their progress. How many of you plan to
grow beards yourselves, and who do you think will have the most impressive beard
among the Thrashers?
For more reading on playoff beards simply head to
playoffbeard.com. Yes, it's a real site.
