The 2019 State of Chocolate Hockey

The 2019-20 Hershey Bears season will be filled with a few milestones. The franchise will play their 6,000th regular-season game in November. The whole year marks a decade since the team’s 60-win season on the way to Calder Cup number 11. Oh, and Chocolate Hockey will be celebrating its 10th season covering the Hershey Bears.

On October 15, 2010 Sweetest Hockey on Earth launched and a new blog was born. While we have had some rebrandings, redesigns, new teams, new logos, we’ve been through a lot and seen a ton. This year is going to be super special for Chocolate Hockey for many reasons.

For this tenth season of Chocolate Hockey’s coverage of the Bears, we will be taking a look back at some of our favorite moments during the last decade of coverage. You will see guest posts from former contributors, as well as a look at where some of your favorite former Bears are now!

While this is our tenth season on the Bears beat, I’ve been calling a project I’ve been working on all summer “Chocolate Hockey 2.0.” This year will feature Chocolate Hockey’s largest contributing staff of all time.

Some of our newest contributors include photographer Tori Hartman, writer Julia Williams, photographer Carl Minieri, writer Tyler Perhac, photographer Crissy Klein, writer Emma Von Hoene, and more to be announced very soon! I cannot fully express how excited I am to see what this team produces for you to read, watch, and listen to this year.

While our staff expands, I am making a significant change of my own. Effective immediately, I am stepping down from my role as Editor-in-Chief of Chocolate Hockey to become a consultant for the site. As many of you know, I have completed my degree and currently looking for a full-time job in hockey. Rather than leave the site mid-season, I’ve decided to step down now and allow Tori Hartman and Julia Williams to take over the website as co-Editors-in-Chief at the start of this season.

This is incredibly bittersweet for me. I’ve been coming to Bears games ever since I was a kid. To be able to take my passion for journalism, photography, videography, and cover a franchise I’ve grown up around has been an absolute blessing. But there is no doubt in my mind the coverage of the Bears this season from Chocolate Hockey will be the best it ever has been.

I will still be contributing to the website, albeit much more casually than ever before. There will be a byline of “Kyle Mace” on some Chocolate Hockey posts every few weeks or months this season. For the time being, I also will be in the area as I look for a full-time job. So if you see me at a game or two, it’s not a ghost, I’m just killing time as I look for someone to hire me.

Bears training camp will open Monday morning at Giant Center, and we will have staff members there! Get ready for more great photos, new prospect updates, more feature stories, and the best coverage of the Hershey Bears you have ever seen from this website. It’s time to drop the puck!