Weekly Musings: NHL Concussion Suit a Joke & Rogers Pulls a Fast one on Bell

Let the Shopping Season Begin!

US Thanksgiving is upon us and the manufactured "Black Friday" is only hours away from making shoppers look like idiots yet again, truly showing us all what many people see as the real reason for the season: Shopping and keeping our economy moving along. As much as we all hate the consumerism that our society nurtures each and every Christmas season, without it we would be living in 3rd world conditions because after all, it is the flowing of money from consumers to businesses back to consumers in an endless cycle that keeps our economy humming along.
 

As good as that is for all of us, there is an inherent evil that has worked it's way into our society through some horrendous corporate values started in the 1980's. Too many corporations are committing 2 hugely immoral acts that are forcing our society to deteriorate at a rapid rate; Underpaying its workforce and overworking at the same time and secondly not paying their fair share of corporate taxes placing an even larger burden on the taxes paid out by the everyday citizen.

Enough of that anti-corporate tirade for now, let's focus on a couple of sporting world issues to throw our minds off the problems of the world.

There was a lawsuit filed on Monday in Washington, DC by former NHL players similar to the one filed by former NFL players claiming that their concussion issues and other life after the sport issues are a direct result of the head injuries they sustained while playing in the league and that the league failed to adequately protect them (in essence, lied to them when they had head injuries during their careers).  I have several issues with this suit which I will explain shortly. The lawyer heading up this suit is a guy names Steve Silverman. I listened to him on TSN Radio 1050 a couple of nights ago as I drove home and wanted to punch him in the face for the smug attitude he was displaying and ludicrous arguments he seems to basing this lawsuit upon.

Rumour has it Eric Lindros is one of the Claimants in this concussion lawsuit

First, let me just say that as of about an hour ago, one of the 10 named claimants in the suit, former Leaf captain Rick Vaive, pulled himself from the suit saying that he had no intention of suing the league and mistakenly thought it was a workman compensation suit filed in California. Not sure what that one is about, but if the most notable name of the 10 claimants pulls his name off your suit, you are already in trouble.

Secondly, Silverman stated bluntly that this suit was only against the league and not at all against the players association. This is so incredibly illogical that it makes my head spin. If there are players suffering from injuries incurred while playing in a sports league that HAS a players union, it is incumbent for those said players to first go after their union to assist them. I mean what else is the point of a union if not to help protect the health and safety of its members, right? How then is it logical to not go after your union if they refuse to cover your medical bills?

Bob Bourne said in an interview yesterday that he is part of the suit and he blames his hockey injuries for going through 5 jobs since he retired. Hardly scientific proof mind you, I've gone through 5 too so who can I sue?

 That right there should be grounds enough for any judge to tell this moron to take a hike. But wait, there is more! Unlike the NFL, the NHL never once took a stand publicly with regards to the effects of head injuries until the mid to late 1990's when the effects of head injuries started to shorten the careers of players like Pat LaFontaine, Paul Kariya and Eric and Brett Lindros.The only team to even question head injuries publicly was the Flyers and that was more of a personal feud between Bobby Clarke, then GM of the Flyers, and Eric Lindros and his family (which, in hindsight, appears the family was correct all along in terms of the poor medical care their son was receiving). So without any direct quotes (which the NFL players had tons to use of former NFL commish Paul Tagliabue saying that anyone could play through a concussion), there is even less evidence they have to support their claims.

Lastly, some of the players in question in this suit played in the late 1970's all the way through to the mid-1990's at a time when even wearing a helmet as a player was not mandatory. The league tried on several occasions to make helmets mandatory but there was constant push back from, <Cue the shocking music>, the players union itself. Unlike other sports, the players have always had a large role in determining their own safety standards as can be seen with how long it took before they grandfathered in helmets as well as visors and their demand to leave the rules around fighting alone.

Saying the league is at fault for "allowing" fighting and body checking clearly tells me this lawyer does not understand how the league and the Players Association actually works

Which brings me to the last part of this suit that should get Silverman laughed out of the courtroom. Part of the suit claims that the league is at fault because the allow bare-knuckle fighting and body checking in the sport which causes these types of injuries. I would have to say on some level the answer is both yes and no to these claims. Yes body checking is allowed but the way he made it sound on the radio, the league is openly demanding that it's players hit fellow players in the head directly when they are close to the boards, almost as if they are the evil coach in the movie "Youngblood" demanding that his tough guy names "Rackie" go out and nail the Captain of the Hamilton Wings, Don Sutton (Patrick Swayze) to take him out and then go after Dean Youngblood (Rob Lowe) as well.

Body checking is shoulder to shoulder and is legal. When a body check is done correctly, there should be not be any involvement of a players head in a hit and the league has slowly started to take steps towards that as more and more knowledge of head injuries becomes known. A hockey fight is neither legal nor encouraged as he claims as combatants are penalized in increasing severity depending on the situation in which a fight happens, time of the game, etc.

With the rash of head injuries to the games biggest stars over the last 10 years, the NHL has been doing everything it can to try to make the game safer. Given how little we know about head injuries, having this accusatory lawsuit come out is not only wrong but clearly demonstrates how little the lawyer knows about the sport and its inner workings 

Yes the referee and linesman essentially stay away until the 2 willing fighters are too tired to keep fighting or if one of the players cannot continue to defend himself (similar to UFC rules really), but not getting between 2 men willing to fight each other does not imply acceptance. Plus, on multiple occasions the league has tried to increase penalties to the players who decide to fight and they have been met with intense push back from the same players union who was supposed to be there to promote a healthy and safe workplace environment.

All of this leads me to conclude several things about this suit that everyone else should realize right now. The lawyer is an ambulance chaser who saw an opportunity to try to both make a name for himself and a buck, the suit will be thrown out so fast that it will result in a new one being filed shortly thereafter which will include the Players Association and an eventual change to the PA's constitution will result in more money going to help players who are down on their luck resulting from injuries they got when they played. At least something good will come out of this frivolous and misdirected lawsuit.

Bettman with retiring Rogers CEO Nazir Mohammed all smiles. My Cable and Cell bill better not increase

So Rogers communications (owners of numerous TV stations including Sportsnet) was able to sneak their way in and steal the national TV and multimedia rights out from under Bell (owners of TSN) for a staggering 12 years and $5.23 BILLION, essentially changing the landscape of hockey viewing in this country. The only good thing about this deal is that we will now have more options to watch games on Saturday nights what with the fact that although CBC was able to keep leasing games off of Rogers moving forward but Rogers will be able to post up to 9 additional games on their multitude of channels on both basic and cable TV as well as online and through their apps.

As good as it will be to have so many options on Saturday night, it sucks that the lead host on national broadcasts will be Daren Milard, the same guy who seems out of his element hosting Hockey Central at Noon will now take over for James Duthie who is the multi-award winning host of TSN's panel. We will be inundated by Nick Kypreos and Paul McClean for the next 12 years unless a mass exodus starts and some of the most talented and available people who work for TSN now will most definitely move over to Rogers over the next few years.

Yes the "Count" will be counting money for years after this crazy deal he and Rogers signed

 
The fact that Rogers and Bell could forge an alliance on one hand to purchase MLSE and then be back to their old selves in terms of fighting it out at the corporate level is good in the sense that it still shows that they are willing to compete. But this deal is bad in another way. The sheer length of this deal makes it bad. 12 years in the control of a communication giant that SHOULD have better production values then it currently has does not bode well for the future of hockey on Rogers. Again, the talent drain from TSN may help to fix that but still. The last part of this deal I think will be bad is the fact that Rogers now has creative control over Hockey Night in Canada as well which means that a now faceless corporate giant like them will be doing their best to keep Don Cherry on a leesh (if they even keep him at all). Times they are a changing.

I have a suggestion for Bell that might help them ease into the transition into other sports as their main bread and butter; Take a good $2 billion of the $4 billion you were looking at spending on the NHL rights, buy the Tampa Bay Rays, some land in Montreal and build a new baseball stadium there then move the Rays to that city. You could probably even do it for a lot less then $2 billion but I think you get my point.

If you had $2 billion lying around, what would you do with it?

Why do you ask would I suggest such a thing? Well, Rogers has turned their investment in the Blue Jays into a major cash cow as they have been able to milk Jays fans out of just about every dollar they possibly can. Since they own the Skydome and broadcast every game on almost every channel they have in the summer, they dominate baseball coverage in this country. Attendance has increased so much that Rogers invested last winter in a big way and major talent came into the fold. Yes, the Jays had a bad year but not because of a lack of effort.

Far too often, this is the case in the summer at Rays games. What Montrealers wouldn't give to have a 2nd chance...

Bell could do the same thing with a young, up and coming team like the Rays who draw flies in the St. Pete's Times Forum (which used to be where the Lightning played their home games) by moving them to a city that did not deserve to have it's team slowly destroyed from the inside by bad ownership and a piss poor stadium that kept fans away more then anything else.

With a 12 year programing gap looming large starting next year, Bell should seriously consider going after the Rays and moving them to "La Belle Province". Maybe then that nomad known as Youppi! can return home

With a 12 year gap looming large on it's TV schedule, why not buy a baseball team and move it to a market that deserves a 2nd chance. Why not bring back "Les Expos"?

Christmas is just around the corner but the sporting world keeps on turning so stay tuned for more entries over the next few weeks.

Until next time...

Weekly Musings: Fielder for Kinsler Explained, A-Rod and More...

A few random thoughts from the week that was....

3 years in Detroit was all the Tigerscould take before the shipped Cecil's son to Texas

Word came down yesterday that the Detroit Tigers had traded away Prince Fielder and $30 million (to help offset his salary) to the Texas Rangers, for 2B Ian Kinsler. At first glance, you wonder what on earth the Tigers are doing. They just dealt away one of their dynamic duo, a guy who hit 25 homers and had 103 RBI's last year while hitting ahead of possibly the best hitter to come around in the last 20 years in Miguel Cabrera.

Essentially, one protected the other in the batting order but in reality, upon 2nd glance, bringing in Fielder may have taken years off of Cabrera's career had it not been for this trade. If we go back to when the Tigers were about to sign Fielder in the first place, the move seemed odd as the Tigers already had a slugging firstbasemen in Cabrera and a hard hitting DH in Victor Martinez so to make the move make sense, Cabrera moved over to play 3rd base. While he did an admiral job there over the last 3 years, his body was starting to break down more then it had before. Blame age, blame the fact they have been in quite a few playoff games, blame whatever you want but there is a HUGE difference in playing 3rd base and playing 1st and it was starting to take it's toll on Cabrera.

Dealing Fielder was mostly an attempt to keep Cabrera healthy

Add to the fact that despite making a ton of money and having very successful regular seasons, Fielder would disappear over the last 3 playoffs and you can see why the Tigers were willing to sacrifice his big bat for a guy they can slot in the #2 hole in the batting order (or leadoff for that matter) and keep Cabrera healthier at 1st base and hopefully, as scary as it may sound, even more productive as a direct result of his improved health and a higher on-base guy ahead of him, breaking up double plays and scoring from 1st on doubles down the line.

The added bonus is that this move will improve them defensively at 3 positions. Cabrera has better range at first then Fielder ever had so this allows the team to improve by subtracting their worst infielder from the equation. At the same time, they now have a bonafide defensive stalworth at 2nd base who can hit for power as well. This leaves 3rd base now vacant along with a substantial amount of money. This does leave open a very real possibility of a significant move being made by the Tigers that is not entirely obvious right now to the entire baseball world.

Ian Kinsler can also play 3rd base as he is a versatile infielder with a strong arm and great bat. If the Tigers were to try to jump in on signing a player like a Robinson Cano to play 2nd base (they DID just free up $130 million that they now will not have to pay to Fielder, why not offer all of it to Cano and watch the money flow back in jersey sales alone), have Kinsler at 3rd with Iglesias at short, Cano at 2nd and Cabrera at 1st and you have the makings of a star studded infield that would be both incredible defensively and offensively 2nd to none. Something tells me that there are many more moves upcoming and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

With over $130 million freed up, something tells me 8 mill will have a new power hitting 2B

To be blunt, Alex Anthopolous kind of gave it away that big moves were about to happen when he was on TSN drive a couple of days ago. He basically admitted that until some of the bigger moves were completed by other teams, he and the Blue Jays were stuck in a holding pattern with several moves they would like to make themselves through trade. Now that the first domino has fallen, watch for a string of deals and signings to come in the next couple of weeks. You have to realize that we are only 7 weeks away from pitchers and catchers reporting for Spring Training so it's got to start happening some time soon, right?

Well no sooner do i start saying it then the Cardinals and Angels swung a 4 player deal. The dominoes are about to start falling and there will be several shocking moves in the coming weeks. I will predict now that the Jays will get not 1 but 2 new starters (Matt Garza will be one of them) and a new 2nd baseman through trade. Ricky Romero will be dealt away and we may even see the Jays give Roy Halladay a shot to make the team in the spring as he tries so hard to get back to where he once was after shoulder surgery. 

A-Fraud is back in the news again as he is now in a spat with MLB over his demand to have Commish Bud Selig testify and be cross examined by his lawyers during the legal battle he is waging to make sure he doesn't lose the $100 million that the Yankees owe him over the next 4 years of his deal that they are trying to void. As much as I hat Alex Rodriguez for the man he is, the person and the things he has done, this is one time when I actually agree with him. He has every right to demand to know the reasoning behind the unprecedented 211 game suspension he was handed by Selig once the Bio-Genesis truth started to come out.

As much as you can hate the man for a whole so many reasons, he has the right to hear Selig explain the suspension

While I personally believe that A-Fraud should have been banned for life and barred from being a member of the Hall of Fame for life given his frequent cheating (and I'm not just talking about using steroids to get an edge in the game either), Selig should have the balls to take the stand and explain exactly why A-Fraud deserves the suspension. The truth is Selig is just as big of a tool as A-Fraud because he remained silent throughout the mid 1990's until Jose Canseco became the face of admitted steroid users in the game and allegations started flying at just about every home run hitter in the game. Teams made millions and no one cared that the players were juicing like pigs. It wasn't until it became clear to Selig that this would effect his legacy as the Commish that he finally started to take this situation seriously and tried to stem the use of PED's.

Selig needs to grow a set and be a man and tell A-Roid to his face that he is out of the game because of all his indiscreations and he is using his power as commish to do it in the best interest of the game. He won't of course so instead he is allowing A-Fraud to be made to look like a sympathetic figure. Wow is Selig ever stupid.

The Buffalo Sabres fired their joke of a coach Ron Rolston and long time GM Darcy Regier last week and in their places brought back 2 incredibly popular former members of the team in Ted Nolan as Interim coach and Patty Lafontaine as President of Hockey Operations with an eye towards hiring a GM down the road. When your team wins 4 of their first 20 games and their are questions being raised about the class of your team given some of the decisions your coach is making as well as how he is rumoured to have been screaming non-stop at his players behind closed doors, its clear Rolston was in over his head and needed to be fired and sent back down to the minors to learn what it takes to coach professionals. His antics may have worked in College, where he got the vast majority of his experience, but that crap doesn't work in the pros and he learned that quickly.

The Sabres made the right moves in bringing back Nolan and Lafontaine, 2 men who should never have left

Bringing back Nolan and Lafontaine was the right move on so many levels not the least of which was to generate some positive PR for the team when the fans were already starting to consider turning away from them. The fans could see that this team was playing with no heart and under a coach who had no clue what he was doing and despite their cries for change, especially when it came to getting rid of Regier who had been under constant scrutiny for over a year about his job security, it wasn't a shock to the fans when they were both fired. It was more relief that their cries for change had finally been heard by owner Terry Pegulia.

It will take time and, if the right GM can be found to help uncover those draft gems, add in the grace period that the fans will now give the new regime sprinkeled with some patience, the Sabres could be well positioned to have a turn around back to serious contenders in 2 years.

That's it for tonight. There will be more to come next week.

Until next time...

Weekly Musings Returns: Dolphins, Ford and Strange Refs

Very busy couple of weeks forced me to push back some things but I finally have some time to go over some of the craziness that has been happening all around us. Let's dive right in.

Underneath this seemingly calm moment, lay a hostile and abusive work environment

-The Miami Dolphins are a mess and deserve everything they get for essentially encouraging veteran Offensive Lineman Richie Incognito to "attempt to toughen up" one of his younger teammates, another Offensive lineman named Jonathan Martin. If you heard the vile and disgusting things that Incognito left on Martin's voicemail back in April (something that says a lot about this entire situation to be honest), you would have no problem with the fact that the Dolphins suspended Incognito indefintely (they SHOULD just cut the guy).

What gets me about this situation is the fact that the next day, despite the fact the voicemail was made public, the next day after this was uncovered, to a man the Dolphins team players came out defending their teammate except it was Incognito that they defended. WTF?! I know some are saying this is a "he said, he said" situation but given the recorded evidence, I honestly don't know how anyone can honestly believe that. The only good thing to come out of this is that it actually happened to a football player who is intelligent enough to know when to say "screw this, I am not taking this from you" and walked away from the team in order to bring attention to his situation.

Martin comes from a family of well educated people who brought him up to get his education first (Ivy league school product who has a degree) and isn't completely 100% reliant on the NFL to get him out of a bad living situation. To him, being in the NFL is exactly what it should be to most athletes; a temporary moment in their lives. For most NFL players however, not only does being in the League become the most important part of their lives, it becomes the only part that matters. Making it to the NFL is an escape for so many inner city kids in the US that it almost seems as if the league banks on this fact with some of the things that they have enforced through their negotiations with the Players association.

I will explain that in a moment. Back to Martin. He clearly was able to recognize just how fickle a career in the meat grinder that is the NFL was and decided if he was going to be subjected to the abusive situation that he was in with the Dolphins then he would rather just leave the team entirely. There are probably not a lot of players who could have done what he did.

Not sure why but I see a definite connection between Di Caprio's Character and many an NFL Owner...

Back to the NFL itself, having just watched Django Unchained, I may well be making a wild connection here that isn't really there but I see paralels between the type of character that Di Caprio played in that movie (A vicious slave owner who in one scene basically motivated one of his own slaves to essentially do anything to kill his opponent in a version of an MMA no-hold-barred 1 on 1 fight). The fact that the league has no guaranteed contracts makes it very much a free for all for many players in the league. add the fact that about 70% of the league is made up of black players and you can see where the comparison comes from. You have owners who have tried to take as much away from the players as possible and to this day are constantly dangling the carrot of financial freedom and stardom but always have the sword of Damocles hanging perilously over any and all players who don't do what their owner expects of them. Very interesting.

-I don't want to get into Rob Ford too much as he continues to find ways of shocking and amazing the entire world now as his plight seems to be on every news station across the globe but I want to make one point about a comparison I was going to make about his treatment by the local media. The angry drunk video is total piling on by the media who seems to have had it in for Ford from the start. My point about the angry video has more to do with the fact that it is so random, has no context to it and yet was released solely to make Ford look even worse (not that he isn't doing a fine job of that himself but still) and yet instead of anyone calling out the media for this clear case of simply piling on, we just sit back and continue to attack a man who clearly needs help.  

I admit it is entierly possible we all know someone who has been drunk on video saying or doing something that they would not be proud of or want anyone to see. This video to me shows just how uninformed the media now is as instead of giving us a date it was filmed, the location, the person's name who recorded it, they just play it and leave out all the details that would help us make a more informed decision about it. They clearly had a story on their hands from the start with Mayor Ford and were relentless in their pursuit of it, even if their own journalistic integrity be damned in the process. I guess the fact that we are now the laughing stock of the planet for having a crack-head mayor doesn't matter as long as they get their own names out there as the people who tracked down this story from start to finish.

One last note here on Mayor Ford. To Mayor Ford; Take a leave of absence already and get yourself out of the spotlight already.

It's time he took some time away from the job

-This has been one strange NHL season so far. The Flyers were supposed to be a good team and they fire their coach after starting 0-3. The young Oilers who many thought would be the breakout team this season, have faltered so badly, they are 2nd last in the entire league. The Colorado Avalanche, and their legendary former player/new coach Patrick Roy were expected to be seller dwellers started off with 10 wins in 12 games and then their Russian starting goalie is accused of beating and holding his Russian model girlfriend prisoner in their condo resulting in an official from the Russian Government to accuse the Colorado police of a conspiracy against Varlamov as he is slated to be the Russian starting goalie in the up coming Sochi Olympics. Oh and did I mention that the current edition of the Maple Leafs is starting to look eerily similar to the 1992-93 Leaf team (before all the injuries to their top 2 centers).

This was his mugshot. Like his Coach in the past, Varlamov could well be facing potential domestic legal issues

Looking at the Leafs, when they were healthy, they were rolling and were off to a great start. they were 10-4 only a short time ago (now 11-7-1). They had balance among their top 3 lines and had all their "D" playing well. Injuries and a questionable suspension (1 game sure, 3? No. Bad call Shanahan....Congrats on the Hall of Fame by the way!). Here are the comparisons I see;

2 Solid Goalies in Bernier and Reimer similar to how the Leafs had Fuhr and Potvin to start that season. There are 2 wingers on the current Leafs that could hit 40 goals, maybe even 3 had injuries not taken Bozak away from Kessel and vanRiemsdyk, with Lupol being the 3rd one. That '92 Leaf team had Wendel Clark and (eventually) Dave Andreychuk, whom they acquired when they dealt Fuhr to the Sabres.Coincidentally, that team dealt away Fuhr once they saw who their true #1 goalie was in Potvin, which is bound to happen shortly when this Leafs team chooses Bernier over Reimer and then deals Reimer over to the Oilers in a 3 team deal that will land them Matt Moulson, Sam Gagner and some picks and cap space (this will be explained later on).

Whether it's by trade or in the summer as a free agent, Matt Moulson will be a Leaf. Write that down...

The Leafs current 7 Defenceman are at least on par if not on pace to be a better group then the 7 that were on the 1992 team. Those 7 guys were Dave Ellett. Jaime Macoun, Bob Rouse, Todd Gill, Sylvain Lefevbre, Dmitri Mironov and Drake Berehowsky. Compared to Dion Phaneuf, Carl Gunnarsson, Cody Franson, Mark Fraser, Paul Ranger, Jake Gardiner and Morgan Reilly.

Both teams had/have depth at forward, with the current team having theirs severely tested at the moment but the one difference in the 2 will be how GM Dave Nonis decides to handle his wealth of NHL caliber defenceman (John Michael Liles is languishing in the AHL and could be helping another NHL team right now instead) and his goaltending situation. If Leafs management really thinks they have as shot at doing something special this year, they need to make some moves now to stem the tide of problems that may well conitnue to push this team down the standings with their top 3 centers out of the lineup.

If it were up to me, I would use both of those to my advantage and make some changes given the injuries to both Dave Bolland and Tyler Bozak. This is what I would do. Edmonton is in desperate need of defenders and the Leafs have Liles in the minors along with Gardiner seemingly a valuable asset they can afford to deal given their own needs at other positions and the fact Reilly looks NHL ready. I would offer the Oilers the following;

From Toronto:
Jake Gardiner - Salary $875K  Term remaining - Restricted FA after this year
John Michael Liles - Salary $3.875 million  Term remaining - Expires after 2016-17
James Reimer - Salary $1.8 million   Term Remaining - Restricted FA after this year
Tyler Bozak - Salary $4.2 million  Term remaining - Expires after 2017-18
1st round pick this summer

 Total Salary - $10.75 Million
Salary Cap Space
Before Trade - Over by $1.65 Million
After Trade - Over by $5.4 Million

For

To Toronto:
Sam Gagner - Salary $4.8 million  Term remaining - Expires after 2016-17
Nail Yakopov - Salary $925K  Term remaining - Expires after 2015-16
Ales Hemsky - Salary $5 million - Term
Devan Dubnyk - Salary $3.5 million  Term remaining - Unrestricted FA after this year
2 2nd round picks (2014 and 2015)

Total Salary - $14.225
Salary Cap Space
Before Trade - $58.8
After Trade - $55.05

This would require a follow up trade by the team which would be with the Sabres and go as follows;

To Toronto:

Matt Moulson - Salary $3.133 million  Term remaining - Unrestricted FA after this year
2 2nd round picks (Theirs from 2015 and the Islanders from this year)

 Total Salary - $3.133 Million (3 million retained)
Salary Cap Space
Before Trade - Over by $5.4 Million
After Trade - Over by $533K
To Buffalo:

Nail Yakopov - Salary $925K  Term remaining - Expires after 2015-16
Ales Hemsky - Salary $5 million - Term

 Total Salary - $5.925 Million (plus $3 million retained)
Salary Cap Space
Before Trade - $12.9 Million
After Trade - $3.975 Million
After these 2 trades, the Leafs would have the following line-up;

Forwards:
Kessel-Kadri-vanReimsdyk
Lupul-Gagner-Raymond
Clarkson-Bolland-Kulemin
Orr-McClement-Ashton

Extra forwards: Bodie and McClaren

Defence
Phaneuf-Gunnarsson
Franson-Fraser
Reilly-Ranger

Extra Defenceman
TJ Brennan

Bernier would be the starter, Dubnyk the back up.

These 2 deals would be ideal for all 3 teams involved. The Oilers would get the solid goaltending and a couple of NHL Defenders to help them rebound. The Sabres would get Yakupov and the salary relief that would come when Hemsky's deal expires at the end of the year and the Leafs would have a solid 1-2 punch down the middle in Kadri and Gagner that would essentially be interchangeable and both being local kids is always a positive.

One last thing that I wanted to focus on. Nazem Kadri was suspended 3 games for a hit to the head of Wild goalie Nicolas Backstrom. A 2 minute penalty was given to him on the play which was fair but 3 games was excessive. 2 games would have been fine but 3 isn't logical. What really bothers me is the fact that later in the same game, Kadri nailed Brodin, a young player for the Wild who was standing still by the boards with his head down, shoulder to chest, and was given a 5 minute major and kicked out of the game. Horrible call on the play by the officials that very possibly cost the team a chance to win the shoot out had Kadri been around to take a shot.

Kadri is out 3 games for this hit on Backstrom. I think it should have been 2

Kadri admitted today to the press that even Brendan Shanahan told him that he found that to be the wrong call and his hit legal and within the rules of the game. This leads to me tonights game between the Leafs and Sabres. On at least 3 occasions where a Sabres player tripped (Gunnarsson behind the net), cross-checked a  player (Myers on Lupol into the boards) or high sticked (Hodgson's stick being almost in Kulemin's helmet) without a call being made yet almost immediately after each of these incidents, a much lessor foul (Fraser's 2 handed push deemed to be a cross check and Kessel inadvertently knocking the puck out of mid-air out of play come immediately to mind) were called instead. It makes you wonder what game these guys are watching and what they actually see as penalties on the ice.

Those are my thoughts for the week.

Until next time....

Quick Thoughts - Start of MO-Vember & More

Some random thoughts that have come to me in the last few days as we head into MO-Vember;

He is Rich and will not listen to anyone but himself, despite the fact he could probably become even richer

 

- While I agree the name "Redskins" sounds inflammatory and can be very offensive to natives, Dan Snyder (owner of the team) and the front office staff of the team have taken the entirely wrong tact in dealing with this situation. In case you have missed it, over the last few years, many college teams have changed their names from Braves, Indians, Fighting Sioux and the like, to be more PC Friendly and because some of the more powerful Native groups (the bands who essentially did what they had to in order to survive, selling out in part and owning multi-billion dollar generating casinos since the US Government has never done anything to help them) have waged expensive campaigns through the media to demonize anyone who still holds onto these sports nicknames. Dan Snyder has been openly attacking the very notion of ever changing the team name. 

Instead of being defiant like he is saying he will not “bow down” to pressure to change it, using skewed stats of his own season ticket holders (68% said they do not want a name change), he should instead be attempting to bring in native representatives and offering to fund some native charities an attempting to turn the name into a rallying cry by honouring all natives across the country in a ceremony at half time of one of their home games (just one of many things he could do or say). Maybe even keep the name but try to honour the people upon which the name was initially a mocking gesture by its initial former owner (who was known to be a racist) way back in the 1930’s.

There may be some other inner workings here as the team may just be posturing for an eventual name change but this has been handled so poorly by the team that the league may well have to step in just to try and save face. And guess what Snyder, you would make a TON of money on re-branding the Redskins too if you decided to “cave” to the pressure. Some guys have it made regardless of what they do.

I'm happy for Big Papi, who had an absolutely phenomenal World Series and is now a 3 time Champ

 

- The Red Sox won the World Series and as much as I would love to be happy for them (I am for the players mostly), I just can’t help but feel like John “Benedict Arnold” Farrell did not deserve this at least not this soon after he weaseled his way out of Toronto. What he did was despicable and he and everyone in the game knows it. He tarnished the image of the Blue Jays and the perception of the team around baseball and then he gets rewarded by the baseball gods with a Championship? David Ortiz I am happy about, he is a true giant of the game and deserved to be the World Series MVP. Farrell is a bum and it’s not right that he did this and then wins the World Series so soon afterward..

-Still talking about sports, I thought about what would happen if projected #1 overall NBA prospect Andrew Wiggins let it slip somewhere that he would refuse to sign or play for any other team other than the Toronto Raptors. That would be the best way for the sporting world to correct the image of the city tarnished by Farrell; to have a high profile athlete basically come out and say “Screw all of you, I want to play for my home town team”. Couple that with someone like Kevin Durant (free agent after next year) saying he too, wants to play for the team that was his favorite growing up, and then you would REALLY have something in Toronto with regards to the Raptors. 

Leiweki with Drake and new Raptors GM Masi Ujiri. All 3 men should be hoping for a horrible Raptor season

 

The new CEO of MLSE, Tim Leiweke, has let it be known that he wants to turn the team into a perrenial contender and the first step towards that might well be changing the team name. Raptors was clearly choosen at a time when Jurassic Park was still fresh in the minds of everyone. The purple dinosaur has had its day and its time for a new nickname. Huskies would have been a great name but if not that then I am sure they will come up with something that makes a lot more sense then a dinosaur. 

On a sad note, the guy who plays the Raptors mascot at games tore his achilles while performing at a school in Saint John, New Brunswick and will be out the entire year. He will not be replaced as the team has decided not to have someone else try to fill his shoes while he recovers. Classy move by the team. Now if only the team could find a way to transfer that class to how they are portrayed on TV as the ratings locally for their first home game were pathetic (only 54,000 people). They are 2-1 on the season now only z week into the year but they would be better served by tanking. 

Stripes will be filling in for this year as the Raptor heals from a torn Achilles. Odd but a classy move

They did open their season with a win over the re-building and hapless Celtics. In a lot of ways, the Raptors would probably be better off being in the shoes of the Celtics in their pursuit of Andrew Wiggins and the #1 pick in the upcoming NBA Draft. Many analysts are saying that the league will reach epic losing this year as teams will know by the 40 game mark if they are good or bad and if they are bad, look for massive tanking to take place (playing really young players and trading away ALL your veterans in the hopes of winning the draft lottery). It could get so bad that the league may have to re-visit the idea of how they conduct their draft lotteries entirely.

-Changing gears for a moment, with the recent statement released by US NSA officials saying that in their defense, the information they collected was actually given TO them by their allies, one would think that would, if true, at least start to get some of the heat off of them, if even for a moment. I'm not trying to take then off the hook for what they did but if the Italians were already looking into German politicians and passed the info to the NSA, then simply because the NSA had that info does not mean that they are the only ones guilty of something.

I'm not sure what is scarier; that he didn't know about the NSA doing what they did or if he did...

 There is another aspect of this entire story which no one is really talking about and that is the truly scary part about this entire situation being the very real possibility that the President had no knowledge of these covert actions. If that is true, then who really is in charge in the US?

The Tea Party is doing its best to throw several wrenches into the gears of government (on more than one occasion) claiming it is in the best interest of the country (and not what it truly appears to be, overt racism against a black man who happens to be the President as well). There are the Republicans in the Senate and in Congress, trying to make sure they stay in office, who are being warped along with all their morals and values as they alter their positions on just about anything so that their extreme constituents will keep voting for them. These same morons then sit back and wonder why the US Government is mocked and laughed at by the rest of the country and the world when they are barely able to function with their Democratic colleagues.

If the NSA was not reporting their actions to the President, who is supposed to be the most powerful man on earth, then who do they answer to? Is there some other shadowy figure out there that has even more power than the President that we should actually be fearing even more then these radical Tea Party idiots?

The whole situation reminds me of the Wizard of Oz. The “GREAT AND POWERFUL OZ” had no real power, despite all the appearances in the world to the contrary. As much as we would love to have thought that President Obama was going to change the world, clearly he never has been given a fair and viable situation in so many different levels as he was brought into power with so much of the nation falling apart. Just a few of the issues that began to hit hardest just as he came into power include; the financial meltdown, civil unrest in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, The US middle class being destroyed and corporations eating up all the money they possibly can while exploiting as many as possible, Guantanamo Bay Prison Camp, fighting 2 unjust and unwarranted wars, US soldiers desecrating prisoners, killing indescrinmately as if they are playing Call of Duty, Wikileaks exposing thousands of military secrets, and last but not least being the President who had to try and clean up the pile of crap that his predecessor left on the desk of the White House before he left.

Add to the fact that the NSA has basically put him in a situation where either he is made to look like a liar to other world leaders or as if he is so weak that he has no control over his own covert agencies. He is in a no-win situation. How nice.

-Finally, as we are now in November, correction, MO-Vember, it is time to turn my attention to the fact that I am now 3 days into "growing it out" and so far I only have 1 person who has pledged to support me in my month long growing. For each day that I let it grow out, Mike will donate $5. If I last the whole month, he will double the total (for a donation of $300). For me, it will be a piece of cake to keep a long goatee going. I would like to invite anyone else who has known or knows someone who lost their fight with Cancer to pledge support for me as I do this in memory of my 3 uncles and my aunt who all lost their fights with this killer disease.