For I am Costanza, lord of the idiots

It's a somewhat busy day with another writing gig, so posting might be light.

Anyway, this must be shared. A couple years ago, in the wake of the World Cup, I set himself to finding an English Premier League team. Aston Villa seemed like a good prospect, but it never took.

Creating a rooting interest out of whole cloth might appeal on some contrarian level, but people's sports-viewing habits tend to become entrenched after 20-plus years of wasting your life watching games. Footy fans also have to get up at ungodly hours, like before noon on Saturdays and Sundays. A Minnesota Vikings, Toronto Raptors and Kingston Frontenacs fan can only belong to so many championship-starved fanbases, ultimately.

Well, that was mid to late 2006. In between, good friend Neil Acharya, over a few Innis & Gunns, welcomed yours truly into the fold of Liverpool fans. Liverpool is neck-and-neck with Manchester United for the EPL title, which is awesome.

Meantime, Villa under Martin O'Neill is rocking the claret and blue all the way to a Champions League bid. Thing is, they're something of an underdog team, while Liverpool is "famous for being good," to quote the Colin Firth version of Fever Pitch, which when combined with the Nick Hornby book furnished 75% of my understanding of how to be a footy fan.

Liverpool winning would be good, but it's so mainstream. Then again, so is Hornby. Ultimately, maybe it was good to ignore the inital appeal to cheer for Villa and go with The Opposite, knowing you'll never walk alone.

Related:
Champions League football is Aston Villa's to lose (Stuart James, The Sport Blog)

The Trippers...

Remember, "It just doesn't matter! It just doesn't matter." ... items of a sporting interest you should not get bent out of shape over...

... the Senators possibly waiving Martin Gerber. It's not the goaltending. Sens GM Bryan Murray has reiterated the need for a "puck-moving defenceman" so often the hockey writers in Ottawa could get away with just typing PMD. The Sens will find a PMD right around the time Bush and Cheney find the WMDs.

... all-star shortstop Michael Young asking for a trade at a time when his first organization, the Toronto Blue Jays, are in austerity mode.

... The Atlanta Thrashers putting the "C" on Ilya Kovalchuk. It's not like it stands for "checking."

... Vancouver being up a creek over paying for the 2010 Olympics. It will fit right in with their new tourist slogan: "Vancouver: Montreal with milder weather."

... college football not having a playoff. The NFL has it all wrong by taking the chance of ending up with the No. 4 and No. 6 seeds in a championship game. It's better to pick two teams at random and say "Screw you, Utah."

.... Tim Tebow returning to Florida for his senior season. He probably won't play quarterback in the NFL and it's much more interesting to keep an eye on Ball State's Nate Davis.

... Dolphins quarterback Chad Pennington being named NFL Comeback Player of the Year for the second time in three seasons. Chris Rock hasn't had as many good comebacks.

... Liverpool tying Stoke 0-0 on the Premiership (yes, if forced to swear soccer loyalty, it's the Reds).

This post is worth nothing, but this is worth noting

• The AHL's Rochester Americans want to host an outdoor game next season. Good luck to them, although a Rochester Americans-Lake Erie Monsters game would strain the definition of "Winter Classic."
  
• That picture of our favourite funny bastard is not original, but no one ever said it was. That's the difference, WTVH Syracuse.

Bad news for nocturnal rounders fans

Hearing of earlier starts for baseball playoff games would not mark the first time someone though, "Hey, one positive sports development to come out of the recession." Hey, at least one bloke believes it could be be great for the English Premier League, which is capitalistic excess straight out of Hank and Hal Steinbrenner's most fevered dreams.

Monday's Sports Business Journal predicted that it's likely that baseball will not be so much of the national past bed time this October.

First Fox announced that it is canceling its pregame show during baseball’s regular season. Now look for the broadcaster to start World Series games a half-hour earlier, closer to 8 p.m. ET. Fox has always maintained that later starting times helped ratings, which meant more people were watching. But this year, the World Series games went so much longer (average length for the three non-rain-delayed games was 3 hours, 15 minutes) and ended so late (average ending time was 11:43 p.m. ET) that ratings couldn’t keep up.

It is a small win for fans in the Eastern Time Zone. Too many baseball nuts, on the morning after a heart-pounding extra-inning post-season game, have been confronted with that empty feeling. It comes with realizing that you were the one twitburger in the entire company who stayed up until 1:15 to see who won and have no one to talk about with, let alone someone of the desired gender. C'est la vie.

There are some other intiguing predictions in that article, such as the NCAA basketball tournament being expanded to 96 teams. That one is for another time.

Related:
The year ahead in sports media, through a digital crystal ball (John Ourand, Sports Business Journal)

The year that was -- 11 things that made me smile in 2008

In honour of Listmas (what, that’s not what it’s called. With all the top 10 lists out there I could have sworn…), my own, personal, self-indulgent top 11 (cause we take things that extra step here at OOLF) sports moments of 2008.

You know, dear readers, we do have a comments section! Perhaps you could add a list of your own. Come on, it’s fun!

11 - Laval’s dominance
Sometimes it’s hard to appreciate the favourite. Cheering for an upset is always just a little more fun. But, if you can’t appreciate just how good the Laval Rouge et Or football program is, I’m not sure you are a fan of sport. No, the Rouge et Or didn’t provide fans with much drama in ’08 – they were too good – but standing on the field watching the players hold up yet another Vanier Cup, you knew you were surrounded by excellence. And, that’s what sports is about.

10 - Champions League final
And, this is coming from a Manchester City fan. I can’t think of a worse match-up than the all British Man U/Chelsea. But, the game made up for it -- a tale of two halves with United coming out strong and Chelsea storming back in the second. Chelsea was unlucky not to win it outright on the pitch, but United proved just resourceful enough to claim it on the penalties (with a little help from the pitch and a slip by John Terry). Often the big games fail to live up to the hype, but this was not a case of that.

9 - Carol Huynh wins gold for Canada
It was a looooong time coming with every half-wit humour columnist in the land cracking out the atlas to find Third World countries that had more medals than us Canucks. One of the great things about Olympics is there is always a where-did-that-one-come from medal. This was it for 2008 and it kicked of a second half of the Games that was as good for Canada as any other Olympics. When the lights went out, we had actually exceeded pre-game expectations and it was Huynh that got things going.

8- Belleville forcing game 7 in the OHL Final
Ultimately my Bulls – my hometown, childhood team, Bulls – came one game too short twice. But it was a nice little ride for this junior hockey fan. By storming back from 0-3 in the OHL final, Belleville briefly put itself in the national spotlight and, as anyone that cheers for small town teams will tell you, that doesn’t happen every day and you soak it all up when it does.

7 – The Pats lose!
If Laval taught me how to appreciate a favouritre, the Super Bowl reminded me of how good it feels to watch arrogance fall. It was a good game, but all history will remember is that the Pats got what was coming to them. And my inner, immature child loved every minute of it.

6 - The Men’s 8s do what is expected
Canada’s biggest favourite of the Beijing Games simply went out, pushed the pressure aside, and got the job done. And, in doing so cast off the personal demons from losing in 2004. There is something about the men’s 8s that is compelling. Maybe it’s the speed, or the power or maybe the tradition. But at the start of any Olympics this is one of the top three or four events I’d really like Canada to win.

5 – The Voyageurs Cup
But, mostly the way soccer fans in this country took to it. It had been 16-years since Canada had crowned a pro soccer champion in a legitimate competition. And, it had been far longer than that before anyone cared about who won. That changed in 2008, when the Voyageur’s Cup – paid for and donated to the CSA by the fans of the game – was awarded in front of 20,000 mostly disappointed fans in Toronto. Speaking personally, the day of the final game was the most intense I’ve ever experienced as a sports fan and the feeling at the final whistle was as awful as I can imagine. But, time gives me perspective and I still look back on the day and shake my head at just how far the game has come in such a short time.

4 – DeRo comes home
On the pitch 2008 was mostly a forgettable year for TFC fans, but an early Christmas present – the acquiring of Dwayne DeRosario—restored hope in the masses. DeRo (with apologizes to Jimmy Brennan) is the first Canadian star to come home to play and that matters a great deal to the supporters. Suddenly we feel even more connected to our little soccer club.

3 - Simon Whitfield’s silver
The man was out of this race about 10 times. He never looked comfortable. He often looked old and worn out. But, Simon Whitfield has a killer instinct that is sadly missing in most Canuck athletes. His final kick came up just short of gold, but his silver was, without a doubt, the Canadian performance of the Games.

2 - Usain Bolt goes really, really fast
It took 20-years, but I finally saw something more impressive than what Ben Johnson did in 1988. Officially he stopped the clock at 9.69 seconds, but he had more speed in him. It was scary and awe inspiring. And that was before he went 19.30 in the 200m.

1 - Barnsley!
I was sick the day that Barnsley played Liverpool in the FA Cup, which is how I improbably found myself in front of the tube in the middle of the day watching a soccer game that seemingly was a blowout waiting to happen. It was already 1-0 ‘Pool when I turned it on. But then Luke Steele started to make save after save. And then Stephen Foster got an out-of-the-blue equalizer. Suddenly I was sitting up, on the edge of the couch willing this little Championship team on. If only they could hold on to the draw and force a re-match in Barnsley, I thought. That would be something to see. But then Brian Howard scored in injury time causing me to literally start jumping up and down, giggling at the absurdity of it. Liverpool was out; Barnsley was through….

To play Chelsea. Surely they couldn’t pull another upset, could they?

Really, just watch this. If it doesn’t put a smile on your face you are likely dead and most certainly not a sports fan:


The next time a Big Four fan tries to tell you that no one cares about the FA Cup anymore, kindly tell them to stuff it.

Battling for Airtime: oh, what a weekend!

This weekend was made of the stuff that sports fans dream of, the entire weekend was a case study in why sports compels so many!

In Junior Hockey the Canadian squad started off strong in exhibition play all weekend long, providing excitement to the masses eagerly anticipating the start up of the tournament in just a matter of days.

This weekend's Football ticket was nothing short of intriguing, confusing and exciting all at the same time as the playoff picture become nothing short of muddier - the perfect compliment for the action that began the night before. Saturday night, the historic last game played at Texas Stadium, provided both a defensive showdown early with an offensive explosion in the final quarter, coming virtually right down to the wire to decide the outcome and close down the hallowed field.

While on the ice the professional ranks shone on Saturday night with two Canadian teams winning in dramatic fashion in OT, while another played the uncommon role this season of a dominant winning side for a change! There was also some Curling thrown into the mix as well as North America squared off against a World team, which was broadcast throughout the weekend (for those interested, I came back to it from time to time).

And in the world of Footy the FIFA World Club Championship (for those following) came to a close with Manchester United on top while an undermanned Arsenal drew Liverpool, once again giving Chelsea a chance to move atop the EPL - whether they take the bait or not is another issue altogether...

Suffice it to say, it isn't hard to assume that basketball was pushed to the side this weekend by many, even before Friday night's rather embarrassing Raptors loss to the worst team in the Association (well, those with TSN2 had that choice on Friday night anyways).

The Toronto Raptors may not have been the sports fan subject of choice on Saturday night, but if that is the case it's rather unfortunate because if one had been flipping back and forth they would've seen a flawed (yes) but spirited effort on the part of Toronto facing off against perennial giants the San Antonio Spurs. Yes, the holes were still apparent, but the desire was also apparent too - something missing the night before. An effort like that would have earned them a win on Friday night in Oklahoma City. Once again the team continues along on its common theme of the season thus far: hope is rekindled that the team can put it together after a more inspired effort against a top flight team, but then of course that one last point still lingers on - the game was still another loss.

Overall, a sports fan couldn't have asked for a better weekend - well for the most part, of course for the Raptors fans out there things could have been better! As football winds down and hockey picks up twofold it's likely basketball will take a seat over the next little while for many Canadian sports fans. Every once and a while though try and throw some hoops into the mix, you never know you may actually get a good game out of it!

Scary times, indeed

Another canary in the economic mineshaft: The Oakland Athletics, having dropped their grandiose plan of a ballpark village, are talking about a smaller stadium, right on a transit line.

Even Fremont Mayor and ballpark booster Bob Wasserman says he and his City Council colleagues "definitely" have to look at the idea, now that the tanking economy has forced the A's to put the rest of their "ballpark village" plan for 3,000 apartment and townhouses on ice.

Speaking as a layperson (oh, grow up), it seems like this is going to become more and more of a common thing, although it's hardly a ripple of evil since new stadiums don't necessarily enhance the fan experience, except for separating her or him from his money.

Over in England, Everton is going through a huge public inquiry over a stadium and retail project. This morning's Globe & Mail details how Montreal Canadiens owner George Gillett just took out a huge personal loan, because he's hip-deep in red ink between owning Liverpool (Everton's rival), a string of auto dealerships and "up-market ski resorts."

Gillett evidently can do the debtor's dance better than a lot of businesspeople. It's going to make for a different sports landscape in a few years, but those who are thinking that pro sports are getting too big might not mind too much.

Related:
Oakland A's talk of new stadium closer to BART (San Francisco Chronicle)

The dominoes fall in TFC land

No more TFC today, I promise. But, this has a few things that will be of interest...

Soccer by Ives (a place you might just see some of my writing next spring) is reporting that Joe Kinnear is staying put in Newcastle (well, SBI isn't breaking that, it's just putting the MLS spin on it).

That spin is that it means that it's almost 100 per cent certain that John Carver will be back as the Reds head coach in 2009. He was under contract, but widely linked with Newcastle. You see, he's buddies with Alan Shearer (a man that should talk to DOUGIE! about the value of going to a lower league to learn how to coach before shooting for the big time) and Shearer told some British media types that he planned to hire Carver as an assist when he was anointed at Newcastle (which seems a bit like tampering, but maybe they do things differently over there).

At any rate, it looks like Shearer isn't going to need to hire any assistants now.

Carver will probably head back to England in the next year or two. It's pretty clear that he views this as a stepping stone, rather than a long-term move. And, he has stuff to learn. Toronto fans love his passion, but his tactics occasionally left a little to be desired (to say nothing of his squad selection). But, it would have been a loss if he had gone back. Three coaches in three years doesn't inspire confidence.

Notes: Also of interest in the Ives article is that Toronto has $1 million in allocation for 2009. That's the number that had been rumoured, but the article was the first I've seem that spells it out.

That's a whole lot by MLS standards, by the way. It's almost 1/3 of the whole cap.

Cooking the Books: Jack Falla dead at 62

The second edition of Cooking the Books is in the hoppers. Meantime, it has to be noted that there's an eerie quality to the news that Jack Falla died over the weekend, right in the wake of his essay collection Open Ice: Reflections and Confession of a Hockey Lifer.
It's certainly not the first time someone has left us right after completing a major work. Warren Zevon just hung enough to see The Wind released; everyone knows how Charles Schulz died the day after the last Peanuts strip ran.

It just so happens that yours truly has a copy of Open Ice, so it will be in the next set of book reviews. It sounds as if Jack Falla's life and work, to use the epigram he quoted in his opening chapter, offered a number of "lenses through which we read our own minds."

"The word passion is so overused now, but there was no question about his love of being out on skates and playing it, watching it, reporting it, writing it (and) teaching how to write it." — Kevin Dupont, Boston Globe

There's also on Ottawa connection to the Falla story — in the preface, he talked hopefully of being able to skate on the Rideau Canal in his 80s in the manner of Aurele Joliat, the great Montréal Canadiens forward of the 1920s and '30s. It also captured the spirit of thing about what it means to hold a game sacred.

"Writing Open Ice helped me see what I've long felt: that the game is important to me for reasons that transcend standings, statistics in score. I remember a day years ago when I had finished giving a guest lecture in a friend's summer term class at Boston University. As we talked briefly in the corridor after my presentation, I told my professor friend that I was headed to Buffalo to attend the NHL Entry Draft. 'Why do you go to the draft? They don't play hockey there,' he said.

" 'I go to see my friends,' I said, explaing that the NHL is like a tribal gathering. I'd walked a few steps down the corridor and my friend was just closing the door to his classroom when I called back, 'Hockey is the only tribe I belong to.' "

Related;
Veteran sports reporter Jack Falla is dead at 62 (Vivian Ho, BU Daily Free Press)

A couple of other titles have been tossed in the hopper:

• Declan Hill's The Fix could be milked for several posts. It's a tough slog, 350-plus pages, but I'll try to get through it soon.
• Jeff Pearlman's Boys Will Be Boys: The Glory Days and Party Nights of the Dallas Cowboys Dynasty is being published today. Kissing Suzy Kolber has bullet-pointed the most scandalous bits. It's go
• The Times has a profile of the Gary Smith, who's got a new collection of Sports Illustrated pieces in stores.
• Hockey Book Reviews notes that Wayne Scanlan's excellent 2004 bio of Roger Neilson, Roger's World, is now retailing for $4.99 at Chapters. (Man, it must suck to have something you created be selling for five bucks. It's a good book.)

He could be referring to either kind of football

Great article in The Guardian on Sunday that brings home the malaise of modernity that kind of hands over the world of fun and games, where the players "are richer, but not necessarily enriched."

While football has an end-of-empire feel, it will limp on gloriously, because millions are as addicted to the glamour of the Premier League as they are to the football itself. A friend who supports Manchester United hasn't been to a game in years and has no intention of doing so - but he constantly goes on about the money the club spend in the transfer market. I got the impression he was mildly disappointed they paid Spurs only £30 million for (Dimitar) Berbatov, and envious of the £32 million City could afford for Robinho.

Addicted to the glamour... doesn't that beat all.Can football get itself out of jail? (Kevin Mitchell, The Guardian)

Blattering on about domestics

The Globe’s Ben Knight goes after an easy target today in challenging FIFA president’s Sepp Blatter’s argument for forcing club teams to start six domestic players each game. Currently, foreign talent, especially among the so-called big four clubs (Chelsea, Manchester United, Arsenal and Liverpool) dominates the EPL. It’s suggested that that reliance has been a major reason for the downfall of England as an international power in the game.

As Knight points out, it’s a stretch to blame United’s success in the Champions League with England’s failure to beat Craotia when it mattered last year. England hasn’t fallen so much as it has stood still while many nations pass it (but let’s keep it in perspective—England is still one of the top 10 or so countries and on a good day it can beat anyone. It just doesn’t do it consistently and it’s not a tier one favourite like Brazil, Germany, Italy, et al.).

Blatter’s plan is a non-starter of course. EU employment laws make it next to impossible to enforce. But, that doesn’t mean that the spirit of what Blatter is talking about doesn’t have some relevance.

Football culture is tribal by nature. Fans, especially hardcore fans like you see in the cheap seats the world over, have a symbiotic relationship with the club. They want the club to represent them in ways that go beyond the strip they wear.

It's why many in Canada would raise hell if MLS eliminated TFC's need to carry Canadians and it's why Jim Brennan is so beloved in that city (and it's why Dwayne DeRosario needs to get his butt to T.O. yesterday). It's also likely why you would find more Manchester City fans in Manchester than you would find fans of United--The Evil Empire may win, but it hardly represents the typical working class bloke from the city.

In many ways the world’s game is moving away from its tribal roots. Although many will view that as a good thing—less chance of hooliganism—you must be careful not to lose sight of the reasons why the game is as popular as it is—the passion of its fans. The more soccer’s ruling class pushes away from the smelly underclass the more it runs the risk of alienating those fans. History tells us that professional sports can insult and ignore its fan base almost at will (see: Maple Leafs, Toronto – post expansion years), but soccer could be different (see: FC United of Manchester).

Blatter’s rules won’t fly, but that doesn’t mean that Europe’s top teams should ignore local talent. You gotta take care of the one that brought you to the dance after all...

Forget who's on top. It's all about who goes down.

Although much of the football* world’s attention will be focused on a rugby pitch in northwest England this weekend, that’s not where you will find the real soccer** drama.

Yes, yes, I know that the Evil Empire is poised to repeat as Premiership champions. All it will take is a win over Wigan, a team 44 points arrears of them, to get the job done and render Chelsea’s game with Bolton meaningless.

All EPL fixtures this week go at 3 p.m. GMT Sunday. The idea behind the uniform start is to ensure that all games are played fairly—it’s thought that if two teams go into a game knowing that they need only a tie (after seeing another final week game played) that they will dress the team janitor and have a tea party in the middle of the pitch, looking for the thrilling 0-0 draw. It isn’t that farfetched of a concept.

But, really there isn’t that much drama at the top. As much as I, and millions of other soccer fans around the world, badly want the Red Devils to slip up and drop points to their plucky underdog opponents this week, the chances of that happening are slim. And, even if it does, all it will mean is that the second least likable team in England will capture the title.

It’s hard to get too pumped up about it. What isn’t hard to get interested in, however, is the battle at the bottom of the table and the playoffs in the Championship to get into the EPL. That’s where the previously mentioned drama is.

With four teams still in the hunt for the final two spots in the 2008-09 EPL there is a lot to play for this weekend. Bolton, currently in 16th, is in the best position. If they can steal a point off Chelsea they will ensure their safety for next year. Even if they, as expected, lose to Chelsea it would take a series of bizarre circumstances for the Wanderers to drop as their goal differential is vastly superior to those chasing.

So, that leaves Fulham, Birmingham and Reading to hash it out for one spot. Reading has a near guaranteed three points in its pocket having drawn hapless Derby, while Fulham gets FA Cup finalist Portsmouth and Birmingham hosts Blackburn.

Shockingly, considering where the Cottagers were six-weeks ago, Fulham—which has a bit of Canadian content—controls its own destiny. Well, almost. With a six-goal differential advantage over Reading, a Fulham win would mean that Reading would have to beat Derby by a minimum of seven goals. It seems unlikely, but then again Derby has probably had the worse season in the history of the Premiership…

So, Reading has to hope that the Cottagers drop points (assuming it wins against Derby).

Birmingham is pretty much screwed in it must rely on Derby getting its 12th point of the season to have a chance. Even if that were to happen, a Fulham win would knock them down to the Championship.

But, maybe that isn’t such a bad thing as the Soft Drink Championship is where all the fun is anyway! Something I will expand upon in my next post.

* I’m not getting into the whole “do I call it football, or do I call it soccer debate.” As you will find out, I use the terms interchangeably. I’m not sure why people get so worked up about this little semantic issue.

** See, I told you so.