When it comes to blogging about hockey there are a lot of rules many aren’t familiar with. There’s a Code. A hockey blogger Code. It’s pretty much like a Secret Society thing except we all attend the meetings from our parents basements. And we don’t drink wicked beer out of even wickeder mugs like that Simpson’s Stonecutters episode… we drink grape juice out of no-name juice boxes. Or whatever mom bought on sale this week from Costco!

Now I’m going to do something a little crazy today. I’m going to share the Code and information about the Secret hockey blogger Society. I can’t believe I’m going to reveal highly confidential information in such a public forum. Usually it would be blasphemy but I’m 92% sure I’m not even welcome in the Society. Kind of like how David Blaine isn’t welcome in the magic community. You know, because he’s all creepy and weird. Or Dominic Moore and each NHL team he joins every trade deadline.  Anyways I’ve made you wait long enough. Below is the hockey blogger Code and some background about the Secret Society. Please don’t tell anyone you read it here.

Various excerpts from the Code:

• The Code requires bloggers to be sharp and savvy when it comes to NHL trade rumours. The Code teaches us to question virtually every trade scenario and call “bullsh—” on anything that sounds remotely fake. Doing this helps lend credibility to rumours we either really want to happen or really want to believe for no apparent reason.

• It’s not enough to simply love DownGoesBrown, praise him and retweet his blogs. The Code requires you to take it to the next level by leaving strange and obscure comments on each of his articles. Some common examples include “This post was deliciously funny,” “I spat my coffee all over my computer and now you owe me a new one” or “I think you made me fart from laughing so much.”

• The Code requires you to churn out as many blogs, tweets and emails as possible during trade deadlines, UFA frenzies or other large hockey news events. Note: you’ll get all your information from Bob McKenzie and Darren Dreger but do not use their names when recycling their news. You can refer to them as “your sources.”

• A good and quick way to build credibility with your readers is to remind them what you wrote, said and predicted last week. No one’s ever going to click on your shameless self-promoted links but they might believe you. It’s basically no risk.

• Even though you don’t ever agree with anything the man says or writes, the Code requires you to follow Damian Cox on Twitter.

• Speaking of Twitter, the Code encourages “retweeting” other blogs and links regardless of its quality. It’s also cool if you retweeted the link without reading it.

• Saying “there isn’t much to write about” is generally an acceptable excuse for being lazy. Or for “having a life and leaving my basement.”

• A good way to drive traffic to your website is to trade blogroll links with other popular hockey sites. It’s a pretty honest thing sites do to grow readership and respect within the online blogger community, however, sites that follow the Code usually pull the “McGuire Maneuver” instead. Here’s what you do: First you lay the ground work by getting an agreement with another site to trade links. Next, set expectations that you are very busy for the next few days. Then you wait until the other site adds your site to their blogroll and… wait for it… you never put their site on your blogroll!!! How awesome is that??!? Why is this called the “McGuire Maneuver?” Because it’s so stupid and so annoying no one will ever admit to talking to you in the first place.

General information about the Secret Society:

• We don’t actually understand the majority of the NHL’s CBA. We just pretend to. Basically it’s such a mess that we can get away with making it up as we go. To my knowledge no one has been caught making things up. Whenever the NHL and NHLPA rewrite the next CBA, we’ll have a field day making up new crap from scratch knowing we got away with all the lies from the last CBA!

• For a little while we capped the number of bloggers who could be a part of the Secret Society. Even though we did this, bloggers from Philadelphia and Chicago kept taking up all the open and not-so-open-spots which basically screwed it up for the rest of the group.

• Hockey bloggers sometimes get a bad rap. As a Secret Society, we felt we needed to be taken more seriously. So like any organization thinking clearly, we asked George Laraque to be our official ambassador. Turns out he was too busy to accommodate our request. Something about helping the “French-Bloc’s right to a 25th Stanley Cup…”

• Those newly acquainted with The Code and it’s Secret Society are highly sought after. There’s usually lots of competition from other groups and societies which usually results in bidding wars and regrettable offers made. Our Society usually outbids the Los Angeles one because we offer 17-year commitments like the Jersey Shore girls offer “good times.” And because the LA Society can’t recruit sh—.

• In the early days of the Secret Society, Eklund was invited to join. He accepted and faced his initiation of having to push a large rock up a steep hill. After pushing the rock up a quarter of the hill, Eklund devised a short sighted scheme to avoid completing the task by forecasting unbelievable weather changes. He often claimed “calm before the storm,” followed by a “something big is about to go down” warning in an effort to avoid the daunting rock push. These quotes linked to a strange ranking system that always seemed to change. No one understood this ranking system despite hearing numerous explanations. Eklund never finished pushing the rock up the hill and is now a sworn enemy to the Society and its bloggers. As such, he is not privy to the secrets of the Code. Unless he reads this not-so-secret blog. Crap.

Stay classy, hockey blogger Code and Secret Society.