NHL Talking Points: Nylander, Rask updates, Senators Twitter drama

What, or who, is behind strange accounts on Senators Twitter?

Approximately five months ago, hockey analytics specialist and TSN contributor Travis Yost published a blog wherein he claimed that a strange account had been making the rounds of Ottawa Senators Twitter. Strangely reflective of a story that had rocked the NBA back in May of 2018, but nevertheless underlined by a capacity for sensationalism, Yost’s claims were twofold:

"Anyways, let’s talk about the material on the account. The tweets follow a common theme: 1. They only tweet about the Ottawa Senators and their AHL affiliate 2. They are particularly supportive of the decision makers in the organization"

The matter — as uncanny as it may have been — was soon forgotten. Yost was quick to update readers when the user reached out to him, stating that the individual “described himself to me as a fan and resident of the city who uses Twitter to ‘disagree with the echo chamber’. He did not want to share additional information.” That the Senators were also engulfed by a whirlwind of internal controversy in the form of an off-ice dispute between Erik Karlsson and Mike Hoffman further quieted the rumblings of many a skeptic. Who, after all, had time for seemingly trivial Twitter beef?

Fast forward to November of 2018. A video of seven Senators — chief among them Matt Duchene, Dylan DeMelo, Thomas Chabot, Chris Tierney and Chris Wideman — is leaked by an Uber driver. In it, assistant coach Martin Raymond is mocked on numerous occasions and the club’s poor special teams units are relentlessly bashed. Apologies are soon issued and an extensive debate about privacy — or lack thereof — trickles into the hockey world. The implicated Duchene even goes so far as to assert that the fallout has made the team stronger, offering the instance as a teachable moment.

But to the dismay of the Ottawa faithful, the talk circuit of social media surrounding hockey in Canada’s capital is slowly but surely becoming enveloped by yet another eerie story. Still in the works, noted writers Drake Fenton and James Gordon are not hesitating to make the most of the prospect of “thinking out loud” via social media.

https://twitter.com/James_J_Gordon/status/1061048712938639360

Put simply, it’s quite possible that discussions surrounding the accounts in question are synonymous with giving the light of day to an online troll — in other words, much ado about nothing.

But if Fenton and Gordon are to be taken seriously — if, in fact, “more than 20 accounts” have been promoting similar underlying themes and are collectively waging war against a common target — then there may be cause for concern. As such, it would be unfair to undermine the efforts of each journalist to draw attention — through likes, tweets and retweets — to puzzling happenings under our noses.

Are the Senators about to have yet another fiasco on their hands? And what would the implications of a scandal of this nature look like?

The hockey world awaits the “story” that Mr. Fenton & Co. are “pulling together.”