What happens when a player a team’s fans have spent a long time hating gets traded to that team? It’s certainly far from guaranteed that they instantly win over those fans. And the latest example of that comes from noted Florida Panthers fan Mike Ryan Ruiz of Meadowlark Media.
The Panthers acquired infamous forward Brad Marchand from the Boston Bruins at the trade deadline this year. And the “Little Ball of Hate” has generally been effective for them, including picking up two assists in their series-clinching Game 5 of the Battle of Florida against the Tampa Bay Lightning Wednesday.
But that hasn’t won over all of their fans. And that includes Ruiz, who offered an incredible rant on Marchand in an interview with Pete Blackburn and DJ Bean on the What Chaos national NHL show on the ALLCITY network Thursday:
That starts with Bean saying, “We’ve never spoken to each other before, so pardon this, which is the first thing I ever say to you, but why are you such a b**** about Brad Marchand?” Ruiz responds with, “Oh, Brad Marchand is a b****, don’t come at me like that. Don’t, don’t! That loser! Are you talking about that third-liner who shouldn’t even be dressing for this Florida Panthers team? Are you talking about Brad Marchand today, of all of the days?
“We’re about to make our third-straight Cup final, and you come to me out of the gate talking about Brad Marchand? He had a nice game! Good to go! Great, awesome! I’m glad he finally got some points in this series! Good to see our third-liner get going against like a demigod of a third line, that’s the most underrated line in hockey. Brad Marchand…”
Later, after Bean says Marchand “would f****** love you,” Ruiz responds with a middle finger and a “Do me a favor, clip this and send it to Brad Marchand.” He goes on from there to say “More of what you did the last game. You’ve been terrible since you climbed out of the womb! You’re an awful person, and even if you lift Lord Stanley over your head, I’m going to turn my back to you! I hate you!”
Blackburn then asks if there’s anything Marchand could do to win Ruiz over, which he shot down. “Everyone that knows him tries to tell me, ‘Hey, this guy’s a good guy, you’d really get along. He’d like your passion for it.’ I’d say, ‘Don’t ever make that intro. You never want to see what happens if we’re in the same room. You don’t want to see what happens. I got a lot to get off my chest for Brad Marchand.”
There are a couple of notable things there. For one, that’s a highly unusual stance for a media member. But Ruiz (a long-time key figure for Meadowlark in general and The Dan Le Batard Show in particular) is far from a conventional media member. And he’s sometimes offered fiery takes not far from what we’ve seen from other media figures with fan backgrounds, such as Bill Simmons. (It should be mentioned that both Blackburn and Bean are noted Bruins fans, too.)
Ryan’s Panthers fandom and hatred for Marchand (pre-Panthers) are both well-established, and if he doesn’t want to meet Marchand, that’s obviously his call. In the current world, where many figures in sports media are avowed fans of particular teams, that’s not that unusual.
Perhaps more amusing still is the absolute frenzy that Marchand can work people into even 19 years after he was first drafted. Marchand has been a key object of criticism from rivals countless times. He’s also had a wide series of interactions with the NHL on the TNT crew, particularly Paul Bissonnette, and he has taken shots at media and political adversaries.
And it’s pretty funny that just mentioning him sets off even a fan of his current team to a level that produces a rant like this.