Category Archives: Sports

Super Bowl XLVIII

When they say that everything went wrong from the first snap, it's usually not so literal as what happened to the Denver Broncos yesterday.

Congratulations to Seattle for their first championship in franchise history! Living in a city that hasn't seen a championship worth celebrating in many years, I have a pretty good idea of what that might be like. I expect it's a good time in Seattle right now.

More interesting than the game though was the bit of drama among automakers when it came to the commercials. It would appear that competition is fierce for the dollars of the rich folk out there. After talking up the fact that they were buying their first Super Bowl ad ever, Jaguar got trumped by Maserati with a surprise commercial in the first quarter.

They responded with some snarky comments on Twitter, which only made the whole thing even more amusing.

And good fun was had by all. 🙂

Go Team Canada!!!

Dammit. They're down 2 goals after the first period.

Come on, Team Canada! Pull this one out so I don't have to wake up at 4-freakin'-AM for the next game!!

I've watched all the games live so far… make it worth the effort!

GO TEAM! 🙂

What's Different About This NHL Lockout?

I was just thinking about the last time the NHL season was cancelled due to labour disputes, and for some reason it feels to me as though it were different last time.

I just can't seem to recall why that was.

I seem to recall last time thinking that the Leaf's were being put-upon by the league and that my team really just wanted to get back to playing. I feel like, during the last one, we fans were the unfortunate losers but that the people running the show actually felt bad for us or something.

That may or may not have actually been the case, but I just seem to recall feeling very differently back then than I do now.

This round feels different. This time it feels as though nobody cares about the fans while the players and owners fight it out. I feel as though we fans are just irrelevant fodder and everyone thinks our money will just flow back in when they want or need it to. I feel completely taken for granted this time, and don't remember feeling this way the last time around.

When the last lockout happened, the Leafs and Senators played up their rivalry, and gave something back to the fans, by staging AHL games between their farm teams in their NHL arenas. It was the St. John's Leafs vs. the Binghamton Senators. I went to both of them, at the ACC and travelling to the Corel Center (at the time) in Ottawa. They were some of the most exciting hockey games I've ever been to.

This time around, I haven't heard about any such events. Not that it matters. If they had them, I honestly wouldn't be the least bit interested. I just don't care anymore, and I don't expect I'm the only one that feels this way.

My X-Games Event Idea

I've come up with a new idea for the Winter X-Games.

I think they should send people down a slalom course inside a big plastic hamster ball wearing roller blades. They'll probably need some special gloves with very low-friction fingertips and a big rubber stopper in the palm.

Picture it. Awesome, right?

Everything is for sale.

The CFL has decided to sell the naming rights to the Grey Cup.

So what's next? The Home Depot Stanley Cup?? Is there no pride or sense of tradition anymore?

This trend of offering up naming rights to anything and everything has been bothering me for a while now. When MLSE immediately made a profit on the stadium we taxpayers bought for them by selling the naming rights to BMO, it was a shining example of how such a trivial thing can fetch huge money and I'm sure the politicians that brokered the deal felt at least a little stupid that they didn't just sell the naming rights themselves.

Well… I'd expect them to feel stupid if I didn't expect that they all had a big payday in kickbacks out of the whole thing.

Where do we draw the line though? If Subway sandwiches sponsors the TTC, will we get new subway stops? If I put a big logo on my garage door, will some company pay me for it?

Is there no end to what society will accept as acceptible venues for advertising?

I wonder if I'll look back on this in 10 years and long for the days when it was just the names that were for sale…

Why not show the Leafs in HD??

What's wrong with TSN and Sportsnet? Were the folks at MLSE charging too much for them to do HD? How come CBC can do it?

Even the ghetto LeafsTV broadcasts have a magic HD channel that pops up just for game time!!

Lick my balls, TSN and Sportsnet. Put up or shut up. If you can't do it right, let someone else show the games! Preferably someone who's not gonna charge us money. Yeah… I'm lookin' at you, you LeafsTV bastards!

Most minutes by a team in a season?

4 out of the Leafs first 6 games have gone into OT. This makes me wonder… is there some standing record for the most minutes played by an NHL team in a season?

Congrats to Mats on the stellar goal! I couldn't watch the game but it really doesn't get much better than that for a 500th goal… shorthanded… in OT… to complete a hat trick!

And finally… GO TIGERS!!! They took out the big guns in NY so they should be able to make short work of their slow, overshadowed cousin, the Mets.