Monday, March 3, 2008

Geno's Press Conference

The NHL occasionally does phone press conferences and usually they're transcribed up to the internets and linked up by Kukla's Korner. Today's subject was Evgeni Malkin. If you put up 26 points in a month of 14 games, folks want to talk to you.

Malkin is learning the language and starting to feel more comfortable, but often times he defers to a translator the Pens have assigned to him or his friend/teammate/landlord Sergei Gonchar to talk so he can convey exactly what he wants to say. Hey, how well do you could speak in Russian after being their for about a year (since you summer in North America).

Mostly the press conferences are fairly boring and routine; most players give the bland, cliched answers to questions that a close observer to hockey already knows what they're gonna say. But after responding to 7 questions through Gonchar, the following happened:

Q. Sergei, do you notice his English improving? A lot of people are saying he understands more than he can speak. Is that fair to say?

EVGENI MALKIN: (In English.) Yes (laughter).


Made us smile, at least.

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