Let's Talk New Jersey Devils Bloopers

We as fans glorify accomplishments, wax poetic about great goals and saves, and rue disappointments and failures by our favorite team. We also chuckle, chortle, giggle, snicker, guffaw, and laugh at when things go right or wrong in an amusing fashion. We call those moments bloopers. That's not alliterative with hockey, but calling them hockey ha-ha seems lame. Bloopers it is, then.

Bloopers in general are a little tricky to define. Sure, they have to be funny; but it goes a little deeper than just being funny. There is a line between someone just making a mistake and someone who just had something silly happen to them. There is a line between someone getting victimized by a bad break and someone who was the subject of something strange happening. A good litmus test would be David Clarkson's goal in Game 5 of the 2012 playoffs. Ilya Bryzgalov's mistake was hilariously costly. Was that a blooper? To Devils fans and maybe neutrals, possibly. To Flyers fans, probably not. I'm not so certain since it was really Bryzgalov botching a play instead of something odd happening. I'll admit to cackling with glee seeing it over and over, though. I suggest you should watch it over and over and come to your own possibly humongous conclusions.

Anyway, let's get to the Devils. With two seasons in Kansas City, six in Colorado, and thirty in New Jersey, there has to be a good amount of laughable moments here and there with the New Jersey Devils organization. I decided to ask my fellow fans on Twitter through the @InLouWeTrust account about their favorite non-Bryzgalovian bloopers. The quick results are after the jump

Sachin Dave Chandan immediately asked whether a door malfunction during the 2012 NHL Eastern Conference Finals would count. After linking to a video, it definitely does!

Poor Travis Zajac! He was forced to wait, see a guy fail to kick and slam the door open, then get moved to the other box, and then put back in the original box. All because The World's Greatest Arena didn't have a working door. No word on whether James Dolan added new rink doors for the renovation. Sachin's video was the short version. I'm not going to subject you to the long, original broadcast version. (Poor us!) I will subject you to Fred Murtz giving it the Benny Hill treatment:

Another quick response came from a person with the handle @MartysFault: the non-hug between Patrik Elias and Petr Sykora. Two others, Vasilii Zaytsev and Talking Red host David Sarch, each found a GIF of the whiff. This is Vasilli's, via 27.media.tumblr.com - click on it to make it work:

That's another classic blooper from this past season. The third immediate response goes back a few years, as first suggested by Pete Bartello. It happened back in the 2003 Stanley Cup Finals and if you remember that series, I think you know what you're about to see next:

Yeah, this definitely wasn't a positive blooper. The dump-in went off Martin Brodeur's stick and deflected past him. Yes, Brodeur technically scored on himself in a 1-1 game in Anaheim. It certainly wasn't funny then. Now, we all can laugh about it since the Devils won the Cup and the right to laugh last. Ha-ha!

I will admit my own thoughts and others' immediate memories are towards recent memories. Let's remember that the Devils were pretty much bad until 1988 when they started doing things like "making the playoffs" and "winning at least 30 games in a season" on a regular basis. With poor play and things just coming up against NJ, some had to have been farcical. However, I can't for the life of me remember a blooper that has stood the test of time. I defer to our older and possibly wiser readers to chime in about those days.

In fact, I defer to all of you now. What are your favorite Devils bloopers? Which ones do you remember and regret remembering? Please share them in the comments. Thanks to everyone who suggested bloopers on Twitter and thank you for reading.