There are a lot of quirks and nuances in hockey that make the sport so much fun to play beyond just the game itself. Chirping, for example, is a bit of an art-form. Not all chirps are confrontational in nature. Some are all in good fun and can be shares between teammates in the locker room, at practice and even away from the rink.
A hockey team is like a brotherhood. The 23 players in the locker room are like family and, as such, there are some fun little "sibling rivalries" that can exist between teammates. Just like any family, sometimes you want to poke at your brother or sister for one reason or another to try to get him or her going. The same thing occurs on a hockey team, and there's arguably nobody who handles it better than Minnesota's Marc-Andre Fleury.
Fleury has become known for his antics over the years, sometimes pulling pranks on teammates, but on Thursday, teammate Brandon Duhaime thought he was going to have some fun at Flower's expense. Duhaime brought a cane onto the ice for practice and placed it next to Fleury's net to poke fun at the veteran goaltender for his age. What happened next was classic Flower. Fleury discarded his goal stick, picked up the cane and actually began playing with the cane as a goal stick, getting the last laugh.
Fleury, 39, is one of the oldest players in the league and has shown some signs of slowing down late in his impressive NHL career. But one thing that will never slow down is Fleury's impeccable sense of humour. Like Roberto Luongo, Fleury likes to have fun and is often the cause of a lot of laughter both in the locker room and with the media. This whole using a cane as a goal stick at practice is just another example of Fleury's larger than life personality.
