Used gear, ownership grilling, Rick Tocchet's new contract and the mighty Thunderbug off unemployment are expected to highlight tonight's festivities at the Forum

By AMANDA HARRIS

The Plan Is In Place. The Lightning Will Win Again. Let Us Show You How.

Ah yes, the groveling has reached fever pitch over on Channelside Drive with OK Hockey hosting yet another “Town Hall Meeting” this evening in an effort to boost their bottom line drum up interest for the coming season.

And if the image of a battered Marty St. Louis that has taken center stage on the Lightning website for the last month isn’t enough to draw you in, the Bolts recently have unveiled a host of incentives that will no doubt have you willingly sitting through the gridlock on I-275 just to say you were there.

The shindig begins at 6pm with a used equipment sale inside the St. Pete Time Forum featuring “items formerly used by Lightning players.” Given the unpredictable nature of this ownership group and the brashness with which they make personnel changes however, I’m thinking “items used by former Lightning players” may be more accurate.

After snapping up game-used sticks that shoot nothing but disallowed goals and blockers as penetrable as Swiss cheese, fans are encouraged to stick around and bear witness to the melee as season ticket holders harangue Oren Koules and Brian Lawton during the question & answer portion of the evening. 

It is during this town hall style Q & A that the unveiling of Rick Tocchet’s three-year contract is expected to occur and the man himself will also be on hand to field inquiries from those in attendance. Perhaps, on my behalf, Joe could ask the big cheese if his signing and Phoenix’s filing for Chapter 11 within 24 hours of each other was purely coincidence?

Following the town hall meeting, the equipment sale will resume and the Lightning locker room will open for tours. Various staff members will circulate the crowd to answer questions throughout the event and all fans in attendance will receive a mini-bobble head and be eligible to win game-worn jerseys from Evgeny Artyukhin, Ryan Craig, and Ryan Malone (uh oh, could this be a foreshadowing of trades/salary dumps to come?).

Additionally, Paul Ranger and Andrej Meszaros (a.k.a. the only two Bolts who couldn’t skip town April 13) will join Tocchet in hour-long autograph sessions while ThunderBug will be resurrected for photographs.

Given the bevy of information unleashed at last summer’s forum when Vinny Lecavalier’s new contract and the financial context for a new ownership group shared the spotlight, I wouldn’t miss this one for the world.

Hard to believe it was less than one year ago Mr. Koules stepped up to the mic and impressed upon his audience what he considered the Lightning’s bigger picture: “asset appreciation”. 

Wonder what the spin will be this time around.

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