Oilers and Fans Bound to Spring a Leak or Two with Addition of New Cheer Team

"If only we had a cheerleading team to make this moment that much better!"

Apparently a youth movement on the ice leads to immaturity off it.

The Edmonton Oilers, a team that has earned high marks so far this season for being entertaining to watch despite low overall expectations, are set to become the first Canadian team to boast a cheerleading squad. No date for their debut has been specified, but it will reportedly come at a home game later this year.

As per TSN, 23 NHL teams already have one, which, I suppose the Oilers are taking as a sign to jump off a bridge because everyone else is doing it. Gotta love that mob mentality. Call me and most other Canadian fans purists, but, while undeniably a step towards the mainstream, it’s a step the Oilers don’t need to make. The team has sold out every one of its home games in each of the past five seasons. The last time the team didn’t average Rexall Place’s capacity of 16,839 was ironically in 2005-2006, the season in which the team reached the Stanley Cup Final.

Now the implications of such a fact aside (that Oilers fans apparently love watching their team lose), it in all honesty seems at the very least somewhat odd that the team is just now deciding to improve their “in-game experience” for fans. Oilers President Patrick LaForge says that fans have been asking, but I want names, because it seems a little outlandish that anyone would willingly find a way to fit such a request into what could only have been an awkwardly worded email.

“Dear Mr. LaForge,

I love the team’s chances this year, but I think scantily clad women in the stands would really add to the game. God knows making the playoffs is a struggle each and every year for this franchise, but it can never be too hard enough, if you catch my drift... therein lies the true entertainment value of a family outing to an Oilers hockey game.

Signed,

An Anonymous Oilers Fan”

I will not get into the undeniable merits of employing a cheerleading squad, because, frankly, this is a hockey site and not an ogling-at-beautiful-women site, which admittedly can be construed as a sport in its own right. Still, Canadian hockey fans clearly do not need added incentive to attend a hockey game. Cheerleading cheapens it all, especially when the fans actually understand and want to watch what’s going on in the game and don’t need an attractive distraction to take their minds off the mediocrity of it all.

To add insult to injury to fans looking to hold onto the last bit of Canadiana left in a quickly-becoming-Americanized sport (remember that glowing puck on FOX?!), a cheerleaders’ calendar is set to be released near Christmastime, apparently made to be the perfect gift for that special perverted someone in everyone’s life.

While some Canadian teams already have girls equipped with shovels to clean up on-ice snow, this latest bit of news is taking the trend too far, like the aforementioned long walk off a short pier. Maybe LaForge, himself, could use the trip to cool off a bit.