Blog blast past: Hats off to our Ruthless capacity to live a lie

In the wake of George Steinbrenner's death, here's a piece on the closure of Yankee Stadium in from Sept. 22, 2008.

You can't talk about Yankee Stadium. There isn't any such place.

Cranky-panted Seamhead objections notwithstanding, it is impossible to not be touched on some level by the closure of the Stadium. One would have to be a sad bastard to begrudge anyone who gave in to the faux gravitas on Sunday night in the Bronx.

Look at it this way. A lot of people never visited the Montreal Forum, or maybe only got to do it once or twice. They still felt a sense of loss March 12, 1996, the day after the Canadiens played there for the final time. It's part of the understanding that pro sports would not exist without the glow you get from our shared existence as fans. I'm talking about the vibe that means two people can make plans to meet up with two other people they barely know after a game and already have the basis for a conversation.

That might be part of where the feeling of loss with the closure of the Stadium comes from, the loss of a first-hand experience. Speaking as a history buff who had the foresight not to study history in university and lose the ability to enjoy it, history is best when it's scuffed like one of Whitey Ford's pitches. Think about all the kids who'll never have the chance to be introduced to that now -- although with what the Yankees charge for tickets, plenty were denied that already.

Moving out of Yankee Stadium is another step closer to having our shared experience come even more prefab, sanitized and franchised.For instance, Maury Brown at The Biz of Baseball noted that Yankee Stadium III will have "a martini bar and a steakhouse on the inside – a ruse designed to recall the historic memory of the past while tapping into the wallets of those that come to a new stadium, not just to watch a game, but to be serviced in grand style."

In other words, you get Phil from Marketing's undercooked and watered-down notion of the 1940s and '50s passed off as historically based. Sterling Cooper would be proud; people think they are getting something, even if it's actually about as true to that bygone era as a typical Mad Men episode. Like, come on. Who has a martini and a steak at a ballgame?

So much for that famous ad that starred Humphrey Bogart: A hot dog at the ballpark beats a steak at the Ritz. And, of course, any baseball fan you'd want to watch nine innings of baseball with with drinks beers, always in the plural.

Enough about that, though. All in all, the Stadium sendoff owed more to George Orwell than to George Herman Ruth. This goes way beyond the Yankees ignoring their dismal 1986-92 era by not even having the common courtesy to bring out Steve "Bye-Bye" Balboni to wave bye-bye.

(Balboni was a laughably limited part-time DH who played two seasons in pinstripes and almost hit his weight over that time. In fairness, he weighed 225.)

Roger Clemens? To borrow Yankee TV play-by-play man Michael Kay's home run call, "See ya!" The disgraced right-hander was misremembered in the official record, even though it was just last season that the Yankees wanted him so badly that he signed a pro-rated $28-million contract for one season.

Ex-manager Joe Torre, who's now with the L.A. Dodgers, was similarly "disappeared." Never mind that Torre guided the Yankees to four World Series titles or that the image of him sitting stoically in the dugout is burned into my brain, thanks to Fox's death-by-a-million-quick-cuts style of presenting playoff baseball.

Torre won more titles than Hall of Fame Yankees manager Miller Huggins, who only had 15 other teams to contend with, and more than Ralph Houk, whose stature was such that he could only be portrayed in 61* by the guy who played D-Day in Animal House. However, he was fired and he's headed to the playoffs while the Yankees are not.

All of it rang a bit hollow, right down to the what-keeps-this-guy-alive Bob Sheppard's recorded player introductions. The Yankees ownership is likely feeling no pain over leaving. They have been trying to escape from that place since about 1981, when Snake Plisskin was appointed to the board of directors.

Remember the racially loaded innuendos George Steinbrenner perpetrated in the early '90s about the Bronx being too scary for his season ticket holders? It was all part of grand scheme:

"In truth, this was a happy occasion for everyone but the fans, who will need mortgages to afford tickets next year. The Yanks will finally own their own ballpark, the players will finally move from the utility closet in the basement into a real clubhouse, and the ownership will pocket fistfuls of cash from 60 luxury boxes.
-- Wallace Matthews, amNY.com

Translation: It mean the Yankees, whom you need to have in the playoffs so you can hate something and know that you're alive, are turning into MLSE with foul lines. (The closure occurred on the same weekend the Tampa Bay Rays, with a payroll just $5 million higher than perpetually injured Yankees pitcher Carl Pavano's contract, wrapped up their first playoff berth. By the way, Rays owner Stuart Sternberg grew up as a Mets fan.

All the "85 years" talk reveals is our admirable, Costanza-like ability to live, like, 20 lies at the same time. It neatly ignores that, as ShysterBall said, "For the record, the last home run in Yankee Stadium was hit by backup catcher Duke Sims. It happened on September 30, 1973 against the Tigers. After that game, New York played for two years in Shea Stadium and then 33 years in one of those unfortunate 1970s-era ballparks that are now finally and mercifully gone."

Then's there the reality that the Yankees' deal with New York City for public assistance for Yankee Stadium III stinks to the point that even proud Republicans are calling the baseball team "taxpayer-leeching pimps." Republicans using that language? You'd swear a Democrat was about to get elected president.

There is all of that and more. It's not a Yankee-hating thing (eh, maybe a little). Maybe all of this speaks to the general shallowness of modern life.

In the absence of clarity, the best way to deal is to give priority to the mythology of Yankee Stadium has value, too.

For pity's sake, it was the only place that could be called the Stadium without anyone asking which stadium. When Crash Davis went off on his "one more dying quail" rant in Ron Shelton's Bull Durham, he talked about how one more hit per week was the difference between being in the bush leagues and being in Yankee Stadium.

It was about as close to something anyone can understand as you're going to get in a Hollywood sports film.

Sure, as far as ballparks appearing in movies go, Kevin Costner also played a character who felt compelled to drag a famous author to Fenway Park. John Hughes knew Ferris Bueller's day off would be incomplete without a trip to Wrigley Field. That is only from a fan perspective.

What Shelton, the ballplayer turned writer meant, was that Yankee Stadium was the proving ground for a player. The media has dumbed that down over the years, but it does not make it any less true.

Yankee Stadium was Oz-like -- a fantasy world full of odd creatures with names like Billy, Mickey, Whitey, Yogi, Reggie, Jet-ah and Mariano. On one night in 1996, thanks to Jeffrey Maier and an egregious case of craven home-team officiating, it was more like the shower room in Oz for the Baltimore Orioles. (Yeah, I went there.)

Whatever you think of the Yankees, there is a sense of loss when you know that here on out, Aura and Mystique are likely just the nom de peel of A-Rod's, um, casual acquaintances.

All of that is being left behind in the greater name of greed. Sports is big business, but it still sucks.

The small world of sport

Representin' on Tabyana Beach, Roatan Island - Honduras

Yes, I'm back from my holiday...I'm sorry to say that means I'm back to posting again!

Not being much of a beach guy -- really, no one wants their holiday ruined by the sight of my fat, pasty ass rumbling up the beach --it wasn't long after this shot was taken for me to make the 500m hike inland to a clichéd "authentic" Honduran restaurant that just happened to be licensed. I swear I wasn't looking for beer. It just found me. Barena. $2 U.S. a bottle. Poured by a pretty, friendly angel who didn't speak a lick of English but knew enough to have a cold one in front of me seconds before I finished the last sip of my previous indulgence.

Not long after sitting down at the bar I was joined by my driver. Although he was likely there to protect his fare -- you don't pay 'till they drop you off at the end of the day. How novel -- he wasn't obvious about it. Instead, he tried to make small talk.

Awkward, awkward small talk that looked like it was about to fade away until he saw the shirt.

At first looking puzzled, then intrigued, he pointed and said one simple word -- "soccer." Actually, it was more like "soccer?" such was his confusion that any tourist dropped off on his island could possibly be wearing a jersey of that kind of football.

It was one of those moments that Carlsberg commercials are made of. Beautiful game, cultures connecting, it's a small world stuff. Almost a bit too perfect, but a wonderful surprise none-the-less -- especially for an anti-tourist, tourist such as myself.

"Yes," I said. "I'm Canadian - from Toronto," as if that somehow explained things. "This is my team, Toronto FC."

Smiling the driver said nothing. So, I grabbed the crest and pulled it out towards him.

"Amado Guevara," I said hopefully.

"Yes, Guevara," he said, although it was not clear if he understood or was just back to humour the tourist mode.

Not wanting my truly authentic moment to end, I continued. "What's the team on the island?" I asked. "Arsenal," he said. "But, not the big one," he added laughing.

"Is that your team, or are you an Olimpia guy?"

That's all it took. The forced smile was genuine now. The excitement legitimate. "You know Olimpia!?"

Suddenly we were going back and forth. He's telling me about his favourite team and I'm talking about mine. Both of us are pretending to know more about the other guy's team than we actually do, but both of us understanding exactly what we were talking about – the spirit of it anyway.

This wasn't two guys meeting on the streets of London to talk about the Champions League. We weren't discussing starting formations for a Chelsea - Man U match-up. Nope, we were in a remote part of Honduras and we were talking about a two year old MLS team and a club that plays in Central America. It was hardly the stuff of Setanta Sports, but that didn't make it any less a part of the wonderful kaleidoscope of the beautiful game, our game, truly the world's game.

It's all connected. From country to country, generation to generation, fan to fan. Every last bit of it. Whether we are at home in our living room, or on a remote beach in the Caribbean Sea, we're always wearing our colours.

And the world is a better place for it.

Cross-posted at The 24th Minuute

Type rest of the post here

A-twitter about getting Tavares, maybe

Sens Army Blog is having some fun with the revelation that someone has assumed the personality of Daniel Alfredsson on Twitter.

At least the imposter likes a challenge, since Swedish hockey players are not exactly known for having much in the way of identifiable personality. Twitter Alfie is apparently a caring type, writing after one loss, "Murraysburg, sorry it may have cost you your jobs."

He's also a culture vulture, who gets updates from CBC News and dishing that he relaxes with ABBA's Christmas album, which plays into any number of Swedish stereotypes. That is one giveaway that it's not Alfredsson, along with the fact "Murraysburg" is the kind of clever compound word that usually comes from some random corner of the web, not a hockey player who's got way too much time for such silliness.

You probably care more about whether the Senators will try to get into the John Tavares/Victor Hedman hunt. (James Mirtle advocated that course of action today at From The Rink.) The Senators organization loves them the Twitter, although they aren't following anyone else's tweets (0 following, 106 followers), which seems like poor form.

Anyway, it would be fun if it was really Alfredsson. The question is who has the time and the motivation and who has the know-how to ferret out the culprit? Please bear in mind this is from the same person who thought a popular Sens blog was actually an inside job. Some of us -- the same ones who wish they could say they were the last to know about THE_REAL_SHAQ -- still believe.

In praise of Whatshisname

You know you are getting older when your childhood sports heroes start to have their numbers retired. At least they aren't dying yet (a point I'm sure they would agree with).

As I've mentioned here before I grew up, oddly, as a Washington Capitals fan (I also just grew up oddly, but that's another topic). We're talking late '80s here. So, I spent many a night watching Mike Gartner on my illegal satellite dish.

It's possible that Gartner is the most underrated hockey player of all time. He was fast and he could score -- two pretty good qualities for a NHL player. And, consistent. Gartner scored as a young player and as an older one too throughout a long career.

The numbers, for those that don't remember, were 1432 games played, 708 goals,627 assists for 1335 points. Let's just reiterate that. He scored seven hundred and eight NHL goals.

Yet ask a hockey fan to list the best players of all-time and Gartner doesn't register. Sure, he's a Hall of Famer, but so is my cat Fumo (if you follow).

Again, seven hundred and eight goals.

You can criticize him for not winning a Stanley Cup (like it's his fault the Caps goalie in the late '80s was Pete Peters), or that he only had one 50 goal season (ignoring that he had five 45 goal seasons). But, that might just be a tad pedantic. That he only had 53 goals for the Leafs in two and a bit seasons likely hurts his reputation in the centre of the hockey universe, but come on.

Seven hundred and eight goals.

It's time hockey fans gave Gartner just a little more credit.

Takes one to know one: Two minutes for unoriginality!

Anyone who uses a word such as "breastophobic" shouldn't get the time of day.

One is loath to link to something which has been Deadspinned. Long story short, it's hard not to laugh like hell seeing the American reaction to some Vancouver columnist named Mark Hasiuk calling the NBA "ghetto garbage," especially after you read his eponymous website.

It all comes back to a basic principle of writing online, not to be a pedantic putz about the whole thing: Consider the source. Ten minutes of Googling reveals that Hasiuk, God love him, seems to be a big of fan of wingnut tropes. Siding with hatemongers on the principle of free speech? Check. Warning of Canada becoming a Third World country due to immigration and the erosion of a "Euro-centric" culture? Check. Invoking the slippery slope -- that's a classic -- whenever possible, such as in a column about a clothing store in Vancouver allowing customers to breastfeed on the premises:

"But what about H&M's duty to its other customers? The staunchly religious, whose particular sect forbids public nudity. The squeamish or breastophobic, who prefer a definitive line between off-the-rack retailer and nursery. What about their expectations of comfort?

"H&M also set a dangerous precedent and exposed itself to future aggrieved groups of all stripes and persuasions that may choose H&M outlets to practice their own brand of necessity. Imagine a group of Salafi Muslims kneeling before Allah in H&M's men's clothing section. Or a woebegone narcoleptic who seeks shelter at H&M for his afternoon nap."

He used the word breastophobic without even a hint of irony. Far be it to wonder why he would go from the phrase "dangerous precedent" to the image of Muslims kneeling for prayers. For Allah/Buddha/Christ's sake, even George W. Bush conceded that Islam is a religion of peace. Question: In exactly what scenario are a group of Muslims going to end up needing to pray "in a clothing store known for two-for-one T-shirts and Madonna-inspired design," in Haisuk's phrase?

Way to think it through, sir, while you were busy crawling up your own arse.

Believe it or not, this is written in sympathy. The writer in question seems to be a fairly young guy who hasn't learned two basic rules of opinion writing. One comes from Don Henley -- "the more I know, the less I understand." The other is from W.B. Yeats -- "the best lack all conviction, the worst are full of passionate intensity."

This is written with full awareness that it's hacky to fall back on someone else's pithy phrase to back up your own bias. Haisuk seems fond of it, and you have to communicate with people in language they understand.

It is amusing to see someone drag out the same tired stereotypes -- "NBA players wear saggy shorts, roll in posses and cuss on camera" -- and people become indignant. Consider the source. For pity's sake, the man called Allen Iverson the greatest basketball talent of his generation, which sort of overlooks Ray Allen, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Dwight Howard, Dwyane Wade, Brandon Roy and Dirk Nowitzki, who obviously grew up in the ghetto in Germany.

It's understandable if people in Canada turn up their noses at the NBA. The season runs concurrently with the NHL, where half the players and 20% of the teams are Canadian, as opposed to a handful of players and one team in Canada witht the NBA. That is plenty good reason to make a decision and say, hey, time is valuable, there's only enough of it to follow one league. That's acceptable, although could people please stop saying they "only like college basketball," it's annoying.

At the same time, don't hate on it and call it the "worst of America." Look at the NFL. It doesn't offer guaranteed contracts or look after players who leave the game with a permanent disability -- ask Brian DeMarco.

Boxers have nothing to fall back on once they're past their best-before dates -- no pension plan, nothing. Evander Holyfield is still fighting, that's obscene. Basketball players, starting from about age 12 or younger, get shuffled through high schools and colleges. They might end up with their degree in communications, but are on their own when it comes to how to learn (aren't we al). Michael Lewis' The Blind Side laid out the student-athlete hoax in big-time college football.

None of that is any reason to become NBA fan. The point is, get some perspective. As an entertaiment venture, the NBA is doing pretty well. It's hilarious someone would rather focus on the "thug culture" than on what Van City might have had if the Grizzlies had not left in 2001. They would have got to see Steve Nash play meaningful games in his home province. Chinese-Canadians would have had two visits a year from Yao Ming.

It's just too bad all those African-American players had to wear those saggy shorts, eh Mark?

Related:
NBA: a ghetto gutter run by money grubbers (Mark Hasiuk, Vancouver Courier)

The horror, the horror... frankly, it's beyond our Ken

The next sportswriting trope that has to go: The notion of hockey in Canada, free from skulduggery.

That thought has been rattling around for the past 24 hours, since news of a 21-year-old Ontario man named Don Sanderson (it was noted in today's Snark Break) suffering a critical injury in a senior hockey game last Friday in Brantford began making the rounds. Every sportswriter — present company very included — has written that column in the wake of some disturbing incident, calling upon people to realize there is a stain on the great game of hockey. The Hockey News' Ken Campbell, God love him, wrote a post this afternoon saying this is a reminder that it's only a matter of time until the NHL has a fatality from a fight. Someone could die from a cut from a skate blade, but they don't pad the skates with foam rubber.

It's a false sentiment based on an illusion that needs to be taken down. This idea that one day hockey in Canada will be free of all this is nothing but a cynical conjurer's canard. Well-meant sentiments aside, it won't prevent something like this from happening again to some obscure player in an obscure league.

There is a problem with unchecked aggression. The corrosive effect of the NHL and its media partners condoning violence (Colin Campbell's Wheel of Justice, Don Cherry's rhapsodizing about the swapping of knuckles and such) has probably shaped how people behave at rinks, but whether it's even the biggest influence is debatable. The loss of a sense of community, the disconnect people feel from each other, the swath that globalization has cut through rural Ontario, all of that can be seen as to contributors to how people carry on at the rink.

True there are places where the hockey culture is largely free of all this — college hockey, female hockey, the United States, Russia, Scandinavia, pretty much all of Europe, really. Football and rugby are contact sports with just as much head-knocking, but the level of respect shown toward opponents and officials is completely different.

The truth, which no one likes to confront, might be way beyond the ken of some ass-talking blog-writin' guy, but there is something so elemental about hockey that cannot be expunged. It's been there for more than a century, and there's as many explanations for it as there are poor bastards who were left with a permanent reminder of this cold, hard hockey truth. I've said it before, I'll say it again: We never learn. Sanderson's situation, while tragic, is not going to do anything to diminish any sportswriter, anywhere, from writing raptorously about the local team's enforcer, or a team's need for toughness (although holding off on it for a while would be a good idea). This is about what is, and not what should be.

This particular league had safeguards in place (as Campbell notes, the OHL senior league automatically ejects players for fighting, which is not the case in many amateur leagues). There will be more to come, including a ban on players removing their helmets before a fight (no one's said if this happened in Sanderson's case).

Point being. It still happened. Perhaps there's a counter-point that Sanderson, who previously played in a Provincial Junior A league that doesn't have fighting, was ill-equipped to be in a fight. It sounds monstrous, but so is the thought of parents losing their son.

It will happen again, and then it will happen again. The point is the notion of clean hockey in Canada is a pipe dream, unless the sports drops sharply in social import. The danger draws people in, for good and ill.

Related:
Latest fighting injury another warning for NHL (Ken Campbell, The Hockey News)
Is Don Sanderson story the wake-up call hockey needs? (LoosePucks.com)

But did they Supersize?

Although I'm not a big fan of linking Deadspin...if you haven't already read the story of the Chicago Blackhawks visit to a rural Ontario McDonalds, do so.

I'm not crazy about the self-fellating "only a hockey team would do this" bit, but it's still a nice, funny story.

The U.S. of A-Rod; or, not this again, Alex

The time is past for slinging mud at Alex Rodriguez for not being unsure what country he wants to play for in the World Baseball Classic.

Granted, as pointed out by It Is About The Money, Stupid, A-Rod did the "WBC Hokey-Pokey" before the 2006 event. He's predictable as John Gibbons was for leaving a starting pitcher in too long. One larger point, as noted about two-thirds of the way down the the Gordon Edes column linked to in the lead, is that the WBC is very much a promotional tool worldwide for Major League Baseball. Bud Selig and the boys might be crossing their fingers and toes hoping that A-Rod will play for the Dominican Republic, since it's an obvious storyline.

The U.S. team between, Evan Longoria and David Wright, also has two young, telegenic, handsome in a non-threatening way third basemen whom it can use in its would make and it might be hoping A-Rod plays for the Dominican Republic, since that would open up the third base spot for a bright, marketable young star in Evan Longoria.

The other reason not to hate on A-Rod for this is that everyone is a dual citizen nowadays. This is hardly profound. The beauty of living in this day and age (emphasized because at this writing, some jagov on The History Channel is going on about how he'd love to visit 19th-century France and hang out with with Voltaire -- that's great, hope the irony of wanting to live in the past when you're appearing on a cable TV program ain't lost on ya) is that it's particularly easy, especially if the sports is the vessel for that connection with the old country.

It's also a part a defence against that worst disease in life, nationalism. For instance, when Canada is playing in the World Junior Hockey Championship and the shinny jingoism has been put up to 11, it's an easy to cop-out to joke about being "one-quarter happy" if Sweden ends up winning.

As well, for a lot of us, that desire to connect with your roots crops up very strongly in your early 30s. There's that desire to feel a sense of the past -- especially in a world that's been redrawn more in in the past 10 years than it did in the previous 20, often seems strongest for people in their early 30s. You're no longer identifying yourself as someone's daughter and son, and are

It should be no surprise that the one pro athlete who always seems trying to please someone other than himself -- Madonna, New York sportswriters, Yankees fans, Derek Jeter, Scott Boras, not necessarily in that order -- would have the same duality of man thing happening.

That's not see A-Rod is altruistic; just think of the storyline if he ended up facing the U.S. team. It is just two-faced to judge his WBC waffling.

Who knows, maybe he just wants to avoid playing for Team USA, whose three first-round games are in Toronto. Bad things tend to happen to him -- getting caught with a mystery blonde, getting plunked in the leg by Josh Towers in '07 -- when he visits the city.

Plus he doesn't want to lose to Canada again.

(Now, it's off to Sport Chek to a buy a Swedish hockey sweater with No. 13 on the back -- for Mats Sundin, not A-Rod.)

Related:
A-Rod to play for the Dominican in WBC (Gorden Edes, Yahoo! Sports; via It Is About The Money, Stupid)

Blog blast past: Stef-fing out; a NHL prospect walks away, quite possibly for real

Columbus Blue Jackets prospect Stefan Legein, who quit hockey at age 19 three months ago, is returning to the game,
(TSN.ca (via Loose Pucks). Strangely enough, the Sean Avery-style agitator's return his hitting the same news at the same time Avery is in the headlines. Here's our post from Aug. 20, and one wishes him all the best now that he's chosen to come back.

Everyone's going to have a theory about what would possess Columbus Blue Jackets prospect Stefan Legein to apparently quit hockey at the ripe old age of 19.

Breaking out the jump-to-conclusions mat -- maybe he's going to sign in the KHL, maybe he doesn't want to play for the Blue Jackets -- is a normal reaction to news that's too much for your usually shockproof B.S. detector. There is no room, none at all, in Canada's hockey consciousness that allows one to easily digest the news that Legein might drop out of hockey. Just read the comments at TSN's website, where the player's father has denied the story).

It would not be a a shock if (emphasis on if) this was borne from Legein having some sort of personal crisis, the kind of thing that, pre-political correctness, was called a nervous breakdown. This could be 100% off-base, but since theories are like fingers (everyone's got 10 of them), what the hell. Depression is a prevalent enough illness, but the wider society, let alone the emotionally stunted sports word, has a hard enough time understanding the condition that's it worth using the Legein story as a jumping-off point. By no means is this the case here.

Speaking from experience, a common trap depressives can fall into is being unable to avoid emotional reactions to everyday situations. It's easy to see a scenario where a young person, unable to work through it, told people close to him that he was quitting the one activity that he had come to be identified through. It serves three purposes. It's a way to punish yourself through self-denial, lay a guilt trip on loved ones and put off working your way through that which you must work through.

Only a true believer would expect hockey fans to not look at Stefan Legein as someone who's throwing away a shot at every Canadian boy's dream of playing in the NHL. No one, though, has any right to ridicule or scorn. No one has to make a cause-of-the-week out of him either, but at the very least you should try to understand it from the player and human being's point of view, just this once.

The Canadian junior hockey system is not famous for being sympathetic to teenagers, let alone sensitive types who might bruise easily. Players are drafted at 16 and are forced to develop a keen survival instinct in a hurry, because they have no rights, none at all, except to ask for a trade (and then they get branded as a "brat" or a "hot dog"). There are probably a few players who develop thick skin to the exclusion of an actual maturation within.

In this context, the self-portrait Legein offered for sportsnet.ca in the lead-up to last season's World Juniors is kind of chilling:

" 'You have to hate everyone out there,' Legein confirmed. 'They hate you and they're trying to hit you and hurt you and they're trying to beat you so you have to have that same hate back.

" 'I have no friends on the ice. Once the game's over, sure everything's fine but once we're on the ice there are no friends.' " -- Dec. 7, 2007

In hindsight, you could read between the lines that Legein was trying to tell the adults who control his hockey destiny what they wanted to hear. It's ironic that he said he emulated Sean Avery, the NHL's premier agitator. Avery is at least as famous for the lengths he goes to to show the world how much he's bored by playing hockey as he is for playing hockey. (Others have pointed out this could be a prank, and considering the previously noted Avery/Andy Kaufman comparisons, it's not impossible.)

Avery's off-ice notoriety, the Vogue internship, all that, could be how Avery handles his ambivalence toward playing a game -- that's also happened to make him wealthy and a much more eligible bachelor than he would have been otherwise. (It's kind of hard to imagine Elisha Cuthbert would have ever shown up on a red carpet escorted by a guy who teaches Grade 9 math in Ajax.)

Of course, the fear when you try to act like someone else is that's what you'll end up becoming -- someone else. That's contributed to a crisis for more than one athlete in a violent collision sport such as hockey or football.

There are obviously other scenarios that could be at work.

(This might have nothing to do it, but ShysterBall has linked to a Pat Jordan Sports Illustrated profile of Bo Belinsky, who was kind of a Sean Avery of his generation. One quote from Belinsky that's kind of haunting: "I could never give up enough of myself for success." Does that not sound like, as Duane notes, clinical anxiety?)

It's bad enough to have already violated Legein's privacy by wondering if his mental state might have influenced his reported decision to walk away from hockey. It's not even out of the realm of possibility that taking time away from the sport is part of making a commitment to trying to become a NHL player. He probably never had And yes, perhaps something scandalous or prurient that will come out in a matter of days. Last, but not least, someone will connect the dots between Legein and 16-year-old Western Hockey League prospect Brandon Regier also retiring and argue that Canada's hockey system offers as quick a road to early burnout as it does to the NHL.

Sports fans don't always accept that players who have a chance to realize what you always dreamed of doing don't necessarily embrace that dream. It would be easier for us to understand if Legein had physical problems that made it too risky for him to keep playing high-level hockey, like the heart condition that forced the University of Denver hockey player David Carle to give up the game this spring. When it's something like depression, which is a very common condition, there's absolutely no understanding and that's just plain wrong.

That's not to say this is what's afoot with Stefan Legein. If not him, though, then it will be for some other promising athlete soon enough.

(Other, better hockey sites have noted that Daniel Ryder walked away from the Flames last season and he's back this season.)

'Tis the season

A caller on the FAN590 has given me an idea. He told host Mike Hogan that yesterday he and his two adult sons took part in an annual family tradition. After having a hardy breakfast, the three men plunked their butt down on the family sofa and...didn't move for the next 12-hours or so.

Chesterfield Appreciation Day, he called it. An annual day, held just before the Christmas season, where the family spends a whole day watching movies and football. It sounds a bit like heaven to me.

I'm sure the TV was beside the point. The company was what would make a day like that worthwhile. It wouldn't really matter if the common interest was football or tiddlywinks.

But, this is a sports blog, so it's worth pointing out that sports often can provide that bond that gives us the excuse that's needed to spend the time. We shouldn't need an excuse, but we do. That's just life. And, as has been written here before, the shared memory and experience of sports is probably the single biggest reason why the winners and losers in seemingly meaningless contests matter so much to us.

Chesterfield Appreciation Day. We should all pick a weekend and make it happen. 'Cause life is short.

Last weekend I lost my great uncle. I don't bring this up to bring you down -- Bruce would not be happy with me if I did that. Rather, I wish to celebrate a life that was lived with passion. In Bruce's case the passion was music. By embracing that love, Bruce lead a life that touched many and ended with his loss mourned on the front page of the local rag. We all know that we will one day die. It's up to us to make sure that we live. And, if living to you means watching the Kings play the Panthers on your 60" Plasma HDTV, then don't let anyone tell you differently!

Fronts: And we still don't know who stole the strawberries!

The really amazing part of Kingston Frontenacs owner Doug Springer's most recent TV interview is that he's not rolling a pair of ball bearings in his hand.

A lay psychiatrist could have a field day with Springer's comportment. He seems unable to look TV Cogeco interviewer Mark Potter in the eye, among other things. You really have to see it for yourself, especially the assertions that GM-for-life Larry Mavety is a "a great hockey man."



Honestly, if the clip had not made it online, this would have sufficed.



Meantime, the Springer Frontenacs got some play in the National Post: "Cynics suggest the Gilmour hiring is merely a desperate attempt to temper the city's ill-feelings toward the club, put some people into the new rink, possibly give the club a chance to still make the playoffs and give Gilmour some much-needed head coaching experience."

The only cynics here are the Frontenacs organization, for making a change but not changing not the culture. They basically confessed that they never had a coaching search last summer -- it was going to be either Gilmour, or if he couldn't commit, The Royal Mavesty.

This "sorry franchise" (thank you thank you thank you, Don Campbell) does not have a real captain to lead it on the ice, but it does have its own Captain Queeg, cutting his own towline.

(Announced attendance for the second home game of the Doug Gilmour Experiment, a 4-2 loss to Brampton: 3,100. Erik Gudbranson, good player but still a 16-year-old rookie, was wearing the captain's "C" instead of NHL-drafted Josh Brittain.)

Related:
OHL welcomes celebrity coach (Don Campbell, CanWest News Service)
Captain by committee; Coach Gilmour to designate 'C' in segments (Doug Graham, Kingston Whig-Standard)

The most inspirational thing you'll read all week...

One wonders, while reading about an Englishwoman who was basically given a choice between motherhood or being able to walk for the rest of her life, one wonders if Annabelle Baker would not have pulled through if she had not been athletically inclined.

" 'The doctor said I needed immediate brain and neck surgery," says Annabelle Baker, of Poulton-Le-Fylde, Lancashire. 'Without the operation, I could end up paralysed, in a wheelchair for life. But there was no way I could have the operation while pregnant.' "

It's a hell of a story, especially since Ms. Baker is planning to run a marathon in London next spring, three-plus years after she was at risk of becoming quadriplegic. If ever one needed motivation to get off the couch, or realize that your issues are nothing you can't handle, well, here's your example.

As the Mirror explains, Ms. Baker was active in netball, field hockey and trampolining. She believes a fall on the trampoline led to her developing the neck damage that led to "Arnold-Chiari malformation, which is when the back of the brain extends down into the upper spinal canal."

Speaking as a working journalist, someone for whom a computer crash can inspire a mini-meltdown, it is always something to come across the story of an individual who seems possessed of that Harry Truman that-which-you-must-endure. Certain people seems to have it, and can get through something that would take down a lot of us. Being an athlete alone did not help Annabelle Baker overcome (and as the article details it, she's not out of the woods), but you seldom meet someone with that kind of vitality who hasn't been an athlete.

The brutal part is that Ms. Baker has raised only 40 pounds in the name of the Brain and Spine Foundation, the charity she is planning to run for in the marathon. That's well short of her target of 1,500. Who knows whether one can donate from outside the UK, but in the age of global village, surely one of you knows someone in London, so pass along word. It's only sporting, love.

Related:
Annabelle's choice.. abort your baby or never walk again (Daily Mirror)

Rapids: Play ball! We'll have a local nine in '09

Never count out Miles Wolff.

Long story short, there will be baseball at Rapids Stadium next spring. Very shortly, it will hit the news in Ottawa that the Can-Am League commissioner has gone to bat for this city, getting the Can-Am League owners, getting them to see the value of being in Ottawa.

The team is likely to run under league control in '09 while Wolff seeks new owners. Thank you and merci beaucoup to Mr. Wolff for making this happen, for those of us who were hoping against hope that what people saw on the diamond (and off it) last summer wasn't the final curtain for pro ball in this city.

This was no fait accompli. The other owners easily could have voted their self-interest and gone with a road team, which means about six extra home dates. But Wolff got them to do the right thing. The understanding is that there will be a press conference out at Rapids Stadium next week. It will be be announced the team will play next season -- it still has a year left on its sublease from the owners of the old Ottawa Lynx -- most likely run by the league while Wolff continues to search for partners who are interest-rich and cash-rich to run the team.

This would not be happening if it was not for Mr. Wolff's belief that baseball can still work as a summertime sport in Canada, as it does with his Quebec Capitales, as well as in Winnipeg and Vancouver. The city of Ottawa has, by almost all accounts, been onside with this from the beginning, and last but least, there have been some very committed local people on the ground.

As greater minds have already said, pro baseball is the best use for the facility out on Coventry Rd. ... only six months until opening day, people. The other good news is this is getting sorted out in November, not February, which means much more time to put together a roster of players for next season.

It is a good day. Please spend some time over at Carl Kiiffner's Unofficial Ottawa Rapids Blog.)

Related:
Once more with conviction (The Unofficial Ottawa Rapids Blog)

Think this kid wants to go to Laurier?

In an effort to save my alma mater some valuable recruiting coin, I present the 2013 starting quarterback for the Golden Hawks -- Matthew Soegtrop.

(If you don't follow, check out whom the kid is related to.)

As for the story ... well, it's cute. A nice little, happy read to start off your Thursday morning (remember when Thursday was the first day of the weekend. Ahhh, university days). Who knows whether the Toronto School Board Division II Grade 8 touch football championship is newsworthy enough to take up space in the nation's largest daily newspaper. Why not? If Mats Sundin jogging on a treadmill is news, so is this.

Besides, with the Argos out The Star's got to give Zelkovich something to do.

But, seriously....Coach Jefferies...get on it. It's never too early to start planning ahead.

Bleeding Tricolour: Realignment revisited; working out anger through the majesty of Texas Tech's Michael Crabtree

One day we'll have a Canada which can have a collegiate football spectacle one-10th of the scale of Texas Tech's last-second win over No. 1 Texas on Saturday.

How would that ever happen? For starters, conference alignments and playoff formats that emphasize that every Saturday matters a hell of a lot better than the OUA, and by extension, Canadian Interuniversity Sport. It's the best against the best down there every week, produce or perish. There is no coming back from losing four games.

That is not meant to diminish the Ottawa Gee-Gees' win over the previously unbeaten Queen's Golden Gaels on Saturday. Ottawa can say it was the better team all along after its 23-13 win. Hey, it might speak well for our system that teams have more leeway if they go through an injury bug or had some close losses. To forgive is divine, eh?

Down south of the border, Texas Tech will not go back next Saturday and face a team it can beat 71-0, 71-3 or 80-0 (that is more for the first two weeks of September). The Red Raiders have No. 9 Oklahoma State, same bat time, same bat channel, since it's the national Saturday night game on ABC. They face No. 4 Oklahoma on the road the following week.

Granted, it's easier in the U.S. to line up top teams every week. They have 120 teams instead of 27, bigger budgets and don't have to pay usurious Air Canada surcharges. However, the past two years in the OUA, where three of the four teams who have earned byes have bit the dust in the semi-final, is either an anomaly or a catalyst for change.

Perhaps with a different setup would spark a different attitude about an Ottawa-Queen's playoff matchup (just look back at 2006). When one team is 8-0 and another is 4-4, there is a certain expectation for how it's going to go, even as a long-time fan. This is probably the geek lashing out, but whatever. It's not that the OUA rewards mediocrity, but it does excuse it to an unforgivably large extent.

The way it is becoming in the OUA, it's almost like you have to drop a couple games and have that feeling of no tomorrow, balls thisclose to the bandsaw, just to counter-balance the effect of cupcake opponents. I kick myself for being too stubborn to bend to this before now, but am more willing than even to accept that the regular season does not matter in the OUA.

That's fine for the teams who win. More power to them. It is completely wrongheaded when it comes to growing the game. How do you build season-long sustained interest in Canadian university football when everyone suspects the first eight weeks do not matter that much? Of course, here I am, obviously the biggest pathetic four-eyed geek who ever lived, posting about Canadian university football every week.

Competitively speaking, the bye week which can rob a team of momentum has been a mighty leveller over the past two seasons. Western got by Saturday vs. Laurier, but even the Mustangs had trouble finishing some drives.

The other part of the problem is the second tier of the OUA. As several cisfootball.org commenters have pointed out, Queen's might have been more prepared if they had interlocking games against the likes of Concordia, Saint Mary's or Sherbrooke instead of walkovers against the you-know-whos.

The result suggests the Gee-Gees, much like Western last season, had a more well-honed ability to play desperate. It's OK that Queen's lost. Life goes on. What is not OK is going through a full regular season and having no certainty how it might shake out when the team batting 1.000 faces the one hitting .500. People want to believe; some of us want to know.

The OUA, at a conference level, should do some self-examination after back-to-back years when the No. 1 seed lost in its first post-season game. Is the bye really a good idea? Look into interlocking games, look at the competitive balance of the league.

Or it could rest on the laurels of Laurier's 2005 Vanier Cup. That ought to be good until well into the next decade, barring what the Ottawa-Western winner does against Saint Mary's in the national semi-final Nov. 15.

The idea of interlocking games should be explored. Next season, have the six playoff teams play the five good Quebec teams and Saint Mary's. The four also-rans can play McGill and the other three Atlantic teams.

The second suggestion is a realignment, already suggested this summer at The CIS Blog. There could be a Big East drawn from the schools which really value football. Concordia, Laval, Montreal and Sherbrooke come to mind; Saint Mary's from down East; Queen's, Ottawa, Laurier and Western from Ontario. There would not be that big a cost increase, and teams would probably draw more fans and more advertisers.

The other schools would have their own division. They, like Davidson or Valparaiso in the NCAA basketball tournament, would still have an outside shot at a national championship. It would be for the schools such as Mount Allison or Toronto, who still retain a bit of the 1970s view that football is just a student activity. They could have their own schedule, their own championship, be akin to the Patriot League in the NCAA. Perhaps there could be a promotion-relegation system akin to professional soccer, just to keep it interesting. This might encourage other universities to form teams, if they knew they didn't have play Laval right off the hop.

Play an eight-game regular season. Have each conference's top two teams play off in a championship game akin to those in major NCAA conferences. Then have a selection committee pick an eight-team national championship.

Imagine the interest you would have two weeks ago for a Saint Mary's-Western game in Week 8, both teams 5-2 and the winner likely to get a bid for the national playoffs. That sounds a lot better than matchup of two 3-4 OUA teams playing for the final OUA playoff berth, which is what The Score aired Oct. 18. (After all that, McMaster got shut out the following week.)

Ottawa-Western in the Yates Cup will draw a decent TV audience, but why settle for that?

Every team across the country would be better off in that situation. Solid programs such as Ottawa and Western would not take a mulligan on half their season -- they would rise to the level of competition. I believe they would -- it all comes back to motivation.

Texas Tech's rise is an example of having to meet a tougher standard. It was a non-entity in the old Southwest Conference, which by the mid-1980s had ceased to be competitive nationally (for proof, check out the highlights of Miami's infamous 1991 Cotton Bowl shellacking of the aforementioned Texas Longhorns). When that league broke up in the '90s, Texas Tech joined the Big 12, and once it got Mike Leach as coach, it became a powerhouse. As for its former foes which ended up in smaller conferences, none of them will ever get close to playing in a major BCS bowl game.

It all comes back to the notion of produce or perish. In Queen's case, it has now gone 6-2 or better four times in the past seven seasons, but reached the Yates Cup only once. It is almost to the point where taking Bishop's place as a plucky underdog in the cutthroat Quebec conference would be welcomed. Sure, for any school that's not Laval, that league can be a hellhole, but like Spinal Tap sang, you know where you stand in a hellhole.

One poke over the line, Sweet Jesus ...

The blog-reading portion of Leafland has picked up their blue-and-white pitchforks.

Long story short, the FAN 590 hockey beat reporter Howard Berger from time to time taken the occasional, often well-placed poke at Toronto proper's year-in, year-out support of a team that has been left out of every Stanley Cup final across the past 40 years. It was all good. Berger does a good job, so let him have his enthusiasms. A man's got to have his enthusiasms. Then on Thursday, when he went one poke over the line by calling Toronto Maple Leafs fans "losers" in a HockeyBuzz column.

In response, the Barilkosphere has banded together, much like the '67 Leafs did (please don't point out the irony one has to go back that far to find an example of the Leafs displaying Hemingwayesque grace under pressure). Pension Plan Puppets has posted an open letter to Leafs fans asking them to turn away from the traditional media sources in favour of the blogeteriat. The full letter, after the jump.

Dear Most Valuable Losers,

Yesterday, continuing a long-standing trend, another Toronto reporter took his shot at Leaf fans. This time it was Howard Berger calling us "losers" (screenshot: one two) but we've seem the same cookie-cutter article before from virtually everyone who covers the team.

Quite frankly, we've had enough.

As fans, we believe that those most deserving of our praise and our scorn are directly involved in the game, whether it's on the ice, in the press box or in the executive corridors. Fans don't pencil in the starting five, make bad trades, or write the headlines of the day and shouldn't be blamed (or praised) for the totals in the wins and loss column.

Hockey may be just a game but it's also a passion. If you're looking for passionate hockey coverage that offers insight and humour and you're sick of being blamed for supporting a team you're passionate about, you have a better option.

It's time to leave the media superstars behind. There's compelling, timely, wide-ranging content waiting just for you online in the Barilkosphere.

Many have found this better way of following the Leafs, but not every Leafs fan has been so lucky. Please send this message to your fellow Leaf fans via e-mail or postings on message boards and let them know that they do have a choice.

We hope you'll join us here in the Barilkosphere and become regular readers, writers, and commenters.

Go forth and click through. Referrring to Leafs fans as losers, when your livelihood rests on their insatiable hunger for information, calls to mind the scene in Almost Famous when William Miller tells off the members of Stillwater: "She was your biggest fan! And you used her! You used her and you threw her away! And if you can't see that, that's your biggest problem!"

Leafs blogs:

• Battle of Ontario
• Big Smoke Sports
• Bitter Leaf Fan
• Cox Bloc
• Die Hard Blue and White
• Down Goes Brown
• He Score! He Shoot!
• Heroes in Rehab
• The Hockey News: Maple Leafs Blog
• Just Your Usual General Borschevsky
• Leafs at Hockey Analysis
• Maple Leafs Hot Stove
• The Meatriarchy
• Pension Plan Puppets
• Old Guys In Blue and White
• The Passion That Frustrates Us All
• Repressed Optimism
• Sports and the City
• Toronto Sports Media
• The Wonderful World of Loser Domi

Related:
Most Valuable Losers Once Again (Howard Berger, HockeyBuzz.com)

You think Canada has got it bad!

Although it's hard to take the FIFA rankings seriously, one does take note when the world's lowest ranked team finally gets a result.

East Timor, pointless in its six years of playing international football, managed to nick a draw yesterday against Cambodia. Make the final 2-2.

The team has one pro player (and he plays in the world renowned New South Wales Premier League), with most of its squad made up of part-time farmers. The country doesn't have any appropriate playing pitches and it's head coach fixes motorcycles for a living.

But, it's easy to make fun. The thing is, for romantics, it's East Timor out there slugging away that makes soccer the beautiful game. It's democratic. A ball, a pitch, 11 guys, go. Seemingly more than any other sport, you can draw a connection from East Timor straight through to Old Trafford. It's a long, crooked line that gets faint at times, but it's there. It's why you see som much resistance to the creation of super leagues, why Liverpool still agrees to play Doug's Auto Old Boys FC of Bristol in the third round of the FA Cup and how a fan can equally support his or her local, third tier team along with Barcelona.

Yeah, but you didn't report to the Nords

As a Belleville Bulls fan that remembers the late '80s all too well, this is not going to be easy. But, news today that Eric Lindros is donating $5 million to London Health Science Centre needs to be highlighted.

It's thought to be the biggest single donation by a Canadian athlete in history.

Lindros was an amazing talent (so was his brother) that has never been given the credit that he deserves. He's likely a Hall of Famer. He was on the Canada Cup team at 18 and he was the most dominating junior player I've ever seen play live (usually while screaming obscenities at him, it must be said). Yet, we (mostly) still view him as a spoiled brat that first refused to go to Sault Ste Marie, then held the Quebec Nordiques hostage.

Lindros was a teenager when those things happened. He grew up. It's time his critics did too and celebrated him for what he was--a incredibly talented player that was hard hit by injuries throughout his career--and for what he is now--a guy that gives $5 million to charity.

How far were the Tigers back with 16 to play in '87?

In other AL East news, the smokin' hot Blue Jays won again last night. That makes 12 of 13 for them. They're now 6.5 games back in the wild card, meaning if they win three of four or sweep the four-game series at Fenway Park this weekend, we've got a race.
--Adam Kilgor

What's above is a pretty benign quote to highlight, it's understood, but what makes it noteworthy is this:

It was published by the Boston Globe's blogger. It's not the words of some delusional Blue Jays fanboy blogger, or even a segue into a hilarious story by Mike Toth about his grandfather and the Calgary Cowboys of the WHA. No, it's an honest to goodness observation from a completely neutral chroniciler of the game.

We've got a race. (I'm choosing to ignore the "if" for a moment).

So, then, if what Mr. Globe blogger says is true (and he's from Boston so it must be) then does that mean that tonight--dare I say it--is...wait for it...

A Meaningful Baseball Game In September! (tm)

Somewhere Bob McCown's head just exploded.

Yeah, but have you re-signed Sundin yet?

MLSE is an easy target--they are rich, only interested in the bottom line, evil, whatever. Even here we have been known to do a little MLSE bashing from time to time.

So, I think, it's only fair that the critics take the time to point out when the company does something worthwhile.

It's easy to be cynical about the motivations of MLSE and Home Depot. However you have to be careful not to cross the line from cynical to bitter. Cynicism can be confused with wisdom, whereas bitterness is just kinda ugly.

Ultimately I doubt the kids that are playing hockey on the refurbished rinks next winter are going to care one bit that the two companies want to sell their mom a 10-game Raptors flex pack and their dad some new kitchen cabinets.

There is little doubt that MLSE understands how to make money and enjoys doing just that. So what? They aren't any different than any other big company and, the last I checked, we are still living in a capitalist society.

As a sports fan all you should care about is whether the suits are trying to put a winning product on the pitch/court/ice. There is no evidence MLSE isn't doing that.

Let me just repeat that:
There is no evidence that MLSE isn't trying to put a winning product on the pitch/court/ice.

Note that the suggestion here isn't that MLSE is any good at putting a winning product on the field. No, no one could possibly make that argument. But, they are trying. The Leafs have always spent a ton of money. The Raptors are $1,500 below the cap (I suppose you could argue that they should move into luxury tax zone, but we don't know that they won't if the Raps ever get close enough to make it worth their while). TFC, for all its faults, spends.

MLSE is not cheap. It's incompetent, but not particularly cheap.

But, none of that takes away from the fact that fixing up hockey rinks for kids is a nice thing to do. So, good on MLSE and Home Depot.