Final Day of IllegalCurve.com

As odd as it feels to write the above title, today is indeed the final day of IllegalCurve.com

The website began as a fun project between a few friends and morphed into quite a time-consuming, yet highly satisfying and fun endeavor  We needed just one look at the way IllegalCurve.com looked on September 4th, 2007–the first day of the site’s existence–to realize how far the site had come.  Hundreds of thousands of hits later, we have collectively decided that the site, while we love every minute of writing and analyzing and providing hockey information to our readers, is just too time consuming a task if it is not considered a full-time job.

The opportunities the site created for us were, and still are, endless.  Through IllegalCurve.com we have met and interviewed some of the most significant players in the hockey world.  Whether it be interviewing Mike Keenan and Vincent Lecavalier in person, or interviewing Eric Duhatschek and Scott Morrison on the radio show, we have been allowed to hear the latest and most in depth hockey information from the most informed members of the hockey world.  Further, we have been able to meet many of the other bloggers and website writers and have an enjoyable and respectful hockey dialogue with them.  Without IllegalCurve.com and your support none of that would have been possible.

While we have the utmost in gratitude for other writers, our guests and interviewees, we owe our biggest thank you to you–the readers.  Without your constant support in the way of website traffic, emails, tweets, phone calls we would not have felt worthy enough to take the chances and strides that we did.  Simply, IllegalCurve.com would not have lasted for thousands of posts and for over two years if not for your support.

While I am writing this post on behalf of the entire staff, I would be remiss if I did not thank the many writers who have contributed to the website along the way.  From the beginning writers on September 4th, 2007, such as Kyle Kosior and Ezra Ginsburg to co-creator Michael Remis, everyone contributed to IllegalCurve.com along the way.  If not for the writings of Ari-Baum Cohen, Drew Mindell, Neil Rockman, Adam Gutkin, Rusty Parra and last, but certainly not least, David Minuk, IllegalCurve.com would have merely been an idea.  A special thanks also goes out to some our new recent contributors Daniel Hogan and Eric Burton.

You see, IllegalCurve.com has been the consummate team effort over the past two years.  In reality, IllegalCurve.com has been the consummate hockey team.  We worked hard together and did it for little else than the love of the game.

Luckily for us, IllegalCurve.com will live on in some form.  The IllegalCurve.com Radio Show–now the Illegal Curve Radio Show–will continue to air every Wednesday night in Winnipeg on 92.9 KICK FM, and online, from the usual 7pm to 9pm Central time.  Additionally, we hope to have our show up in ITunes in the next little while.

With the closing of the website, I wanted to provide the contact information for all of the site’s writers should anybody out there be interested in asking any of our site’s great writers to write for their websites.  I cannot guarantee they will come on board, but I can guarantee that if they do, they will provide you with some great work.

Alas, that brings us to a close.  Again, thank you to all our readers for the tremendous support along the way.  If some readers out there do indeed miss us, I can assure you we will miss writing for you just as much.

For the IC Team.

Signing off,

Richard Pollock