Filed Under » Johan Franzen

Detroit Red Wings forward Johan Franzen had his head lopped off early in the team's Game 2 match-up against the Phoenix Coyotes. But after team physicians were not able to reattach the head in time for Franzen's next shift, the head alone was tossed out onto the ice.

Minutes later, a Henrik Zetterberg pass deflected off Franzen's still bleeding head and into the net for the game's deciding goal. Franzen's head also blocked a number of shots late in the game as the Coyotes furiously tried to even the score.

"That's just a hockey player giving everything he can for the team," said Red Wings head coach Mike Babcock. "The doctors said that they could probably put his head back on and save his life, but that procedure would have caused him to miss the rest of the game. We knew Johan wouldn't have wanted that. So we just rolled his head back out there."

The Red Wings briefly considered having Franzen's body return to the game instead of his head, but figured his body would take up too much space and be harder to move.

"Plus, we already have a torso of a minor leaguer that we called up last week getting some minutes," said Babcock. "We wanted to give the Coyotes a different look."

Brian Russell, a 41-year-old Detroit Red Wings fan, was dismayed after attending a reading/signing by novelist JonathanFranzenat the KGB Bar on Sunday night. Heads turned as Russell entered the bar twirling an octopus over his head, loudly chanting “Let’s go Wings!” among the subdued patronage.

Franzen, who was reading a passage from his forthcoming novel,Freedom, briefly paused, but continued despite the disturbance, commenting that some of his fans were “more fanatical than others.”

Russell, having never heard of the National Book Award-winning author, was at first confused, then angry, and then disappointed after realizing he wouldn’t be meeting his favorite hockey player, JohanFranzen.

“I only read two kinds of books: ones with crossword puzzles and ones I find in airplane seat pockets,” said Russell. “And apparently this impostor fruit bag writes neither. I mean, really, how many people in the world could have names that begin with Jo and end inFranzen? Six? Eight?”

Though Russell had no legitimate reason to believe JohanFranzenhad written a book, he figured it was pretty likely, as his two other favorite athletes, Gordie Howe and Muggsy Bogues, had done so in the past.

Despite the misunderstanding, Russell salvaged the evening by visiting a nearby sports bar, where he complained about the Wings’ playoff elimination and the general socioeconomic condition of Detroit to anyone who would listen.