untitled (Formerly Coooper's Corner)

I was going to do my blurb this week on some hot info that I had discovered - the reason why wrestling is not as watchable as it was when we were kids. It has to do with Mean Gene Okerlund, however that will have to wait because of the breaking news regarding the Calgary Flames and a possible coaching change. I just have to air my two cents on the matter.

If you have not heard the Flames supposedly have hired “Iron” Mike Keenan as their new head coach. I must have missed it when they fired Jim Playfair. Did that actually happen? Now I do dislike, and am in no way defending Jim Playfair’s punch card coaching system* but the move to Keenan seems to be a drastic measure. I am already fearing for Miikka Kiprusoff’s mental state, with him knowing that now he will get the hook after 2 or 3 goals on no matter how many shots.

Remember the Greg Millen / Jacques Cloutier / Ed Belfour saga of the 1990 – 91 season? I distinctly remember Keenan pulling Belfour after 2 goals, putting in Millen, and then after 1 goal putting in Belfour again only to pull him shortly later for Cloutier. No joke! Then there was the saga in the 1992 finals between Belfour and Hasek. I am sure we all remember Belfour getting the hook in game 3 for Hasek and as well in game 4. I have searched youtube.com for some evidence of this but with no success.

Keenan has also done the same in his other coaching stops which include Philadelphia (where he went to the Finals twice and lost), NY Rangers (where he won 1 cup), St. Louis, Vancouver, Boston, and Florida. Granted Keenan has had some success. However, the majority of that was in the late 80’s and early 90’s. And as for his Stanley Cup win with the Rangers, I think that the leadership of Messier and the rest of the former Oilers on that team had more to do with the win than Keenan’s coaching.

Wherever Keenan has coached his players have grown to loath him. I can see Iggy asking for a trade before X-mas.

I can sum up my feelings on this whole situation with a classic quote from Slapshot.... "They're f#*&ing horrible looking! What did the old man trade for these a%$holes? A used puck bag?"

On a somewhat unrelated topic... Remember after the lockout and the Flames were in the process of trying to sign Tony Amonte, Darren McCarty and Scott Neidermeyer? Hmmmm I wonder whom the Flames should have put more effort and dollars into trying to sign. (Editor's Note: Here's a hint, it's the one who just won the Stanley Cup and Conn Smythe Trophy - and not the two plumbers the Flames eventually ended up with) I can sum up my feelings on this debacle with another classic Slapshot quote.... "Boy every piece of garbage that comes on the market and you gotta buy it."


*Jim Playfair’s coaching system is something Luke and I came up with, if you were unaware of the reference. In our opinion Playfair is an emotionless cyborg (but not the super-intelligent kind) that accepts those old style punch cards which contain coaching information. They are fed to him through a slot in his neck by assistant coach Rich Preston. These punch cards then tell Playfair what coaching strategies to employ.

We Were Legion

As I was sitting in the stands at last year's Saskatchewan Roughrider home opener, I started to notice that something was wrong. At first it wasn't anything tangible. But as the game went on that feeling of something being out of place grew stronger, until I finally figured out what the problem was - those damn Korean dry cleaners had switched my pants with someone else's - no, no wait, that wasn't it - it was too quiet in the stadium.

Taylor Field has long been known as the toughest stadium to play at in the CFL. The concrete-esqe turf aside, it was always the crowd that made the experience unenjoyable for the visiting team. But that night in June last year there was almost no crowd noise at all. It was eerily quiet, so much so that you would turn to the person next to you saying, "What the hell is going on in here?" And I wasn't alone in thinking it was quiet in the stadium, more than one person who attended the game had mentioned the lack of crowd noise. It was like a mausoleum in there.

This got me thinking about what had changed, what was different. Why was the crowed at the home opener so mellow? After I had attended a few more games with similar decibel levels it finally hit me, the University Section was gone.

The southern-most section of the East grandstand in Taylor Field was officially labelled Section 28 by the Saskatchewan Roughrider football club, but it was unofficially and affectionately known as the University Section. If you were a university student, looked like a university student, had a student ID, didn't have a student ID or were simply between the ages of 15 and 45 and wanted a cheaper football ticket, this was the section for you. It was consistently the loudest and most vocal section in the stadium and its volume was what I was missing on that opening day game.

Where do I even begin to tell you what it was like to sit there? First of all I should say that this section was not for everybody and those who purchased tickets in Section 28 unknowingly were seldom happy with the results. It took a special kind of person to sit there and enjoy it. There was a high probability that something was going to be spilled on you during the game - most likely an alcoholic beverage of some sort, beer or Rider rye. In rare cases it was vomit. It was drunk and it was loud and it was rowdy - but it was very, very rarely mean or nasty or confrontational, at least within the section. Those types of behaviours were directed towards the opposing players.

Maybe the best way to describe it is, it felt like being at a football game with 500 close friends. When the University Section spoke, it spoke with one voice. Everybody sang the national anthem together, loudly - and usually at least one or two lines ahead of whoever was singing it on the field. Everybody yelled and screamed together, unlike quite a few other sections of the stadium where it seems like people are obligated to sit on their hands and enjoy the game in quiet reflection. There were times when I was sitting there that I felt that we were affecting the game, that if we made enough noise we could will something to happen. I couldn't speak after the games sitting in the University Section, not because I didn't want to, but because I physically couldn't, my throat was raw and exhausted.

It was a section where you could stand and lean against the metal retaining wall on the end of the stadium and no one would hassle you (this is a surprisingly enjoyable way to watch a game). It was a section where you could scream things at opposing players like, "Hey number 20, tell your mother I love her!" and instead of being told to sit down, you were encouraged on. It was a section where you could lean over the side and leer at the females in the hot tub, or yell at a hot tub full of guys and question their sexuality (not that there's anything wrong with that). It was a section where you could heap abuse on a local radio personality for no other reason than he stood in front of you for some ill-advised reason. It was a section that when at its best, it felt like you were in a snake pit. It was a section that made you feel like you were a part of something bigger than yourself and part of something special. But it was also a section that was prone to the occasional scuffle and fight, and this was its downfall.

I was there the night the University Section died.

I wasn't sitting there that night, late in September 2005, I was in Section 2 - directly across the field from the University Section. You could tell something was happening before you could really see what it was. But soon you could tell - it was a fight. But it wasn't just a little scuffle, from across the field it looked like a full-fledged brawl. You could see the fight moving from all the way across the field, it looked like a wave rolling into the shore and breaking back. After everything was calmed down and one person was hauled away in handcuffs it was all over for the University Section.

Two months later, after the season ended, citing concerns over safety and creating a friendly environment, the team announced that the University Section would be moved from Section 28 to Section 20 - in the north end zone, as far from the field as was possible, and basically away from everyone else. I am suspicious of these motives however, as Section 28 immediately went from a $25 ticket to a $40 ticket after the move. But be that as it may, the move cut the heart right out of University Section, like Carl Spackler threatening to cut Judge Smails' hamstrings.

Now the "new University section" sits mainly empty for most games, which is a real shame. It was never just about getting a cheap ticket. There an experience that went with sitting in the old University Section that just cannot be duplicated in its current incarnation. I sat in the "new University Section" with some friends last season and we were almost the only ones there. It may end up being the same thing again this year when we sit there on opening day.

Sure it used to be a little rowdy and volatile, but it was also loud and it was infectious. The noise from Section 28 used to make everyone else in the stadium start to cheer or cheer louder. Whether it was cheers, boos or the national anthem, that sound almost always originated from the University Section and spread like wildfire around Taylor Field. And it was this noise that was missing last year on opening day - and to be honest, I'm not sure that the stadium was the same at all last year. And who knows, it may never be again. But I do know that for a few short years those of us that ventured in Section 28 were the driving force behind the mystique of Taylor Field - we were a part of the game. We were loud and we loved football in Saskatchewan.

We were legion.

Artist of the Week

What started as a blurb on Monday Headlines is now it's own weekly feature (and now called Artist of the Week), due mostly to the fact that I did in Monday Headlines Phil Leotardo-style.

So this week's artist is Wayne Petti. You can check him out at www.myspace.com/waynepetti. He's the lead singer of Cuff the Duke, as well as the keyboard player for Hylozoists. In one of those serendipitous moments that only music can provide, I happened to hear him randomly on the in-flight music station on an Air Canada flight from Regina to Toronto. And he'll be in the Queen City this summer at the Regina Folk Fest.

Enjoy!

Requiem For a Hockey League

The NHL is dead... at least to me.

There I said it. I refuse to be another hockey apologist, who claims that everything is fine with the game, that the product has never been better. I have gone the other way completely. I'm afraid that I may have given up on professional hockey. I am deliberately hard on the NHL, I openly admit that and make no apologies for it. But my stance on the NHL is not arbitrary and without reason. And my reason is this - I used to love this game. Hockey defined my life as a young boy. But now I look at this game that I used to love and it makes me sick to my stomach at how the NHL continually embarrasses itself and drags the game of hockey through the mud. There, now at least my bias and agenda are out in the open and I can carry on with the NHL season wrap-up.

Did you ever hear the one about the U.S president who started a war that was so unpopular and who was so universally reviled, that he tried to distract his people anyway he could, even going as far as suggesting going to Mars? In a magic act this is what they call misdirection. The magician distracts the crowd's eye so they don't see him stuffing a rabbit down his pants. And I admit that sometimes it easy to fall for. But don't. You will never find any truth or substance with the misdirection. Always be wary of grand plans and out of this world goals, they are probably meant to distract you from the ugly truth.

Keeping that in mind, did you happen to catch NHL deputy-commissioner Bill Daly's comments last week and the following puff-piece from the CanWest News Service? The long and the short of it is that the NHL now apparently has strong interest in getting teams in Las Vegas and Kansas City, with Hollywood 'big deal' Jerry Bruckheimer apparently interested in owning a team. The article also mentioned the NHL's proposed expansion into Europe (thankfully, they are not seriously considering this, just theorizing about it).

Now haven't we all been taken on this ride before? As far as I can tell there was once strong interest in hockey in Carolina, Tampa Bay, Florida, Atlanta and Nashville. Anyone know how those franchises are currently doing? I'll tell you - they can barely give tickets away. And now the NHL is considering expansion into another two non-traditional hockey markets. Even if I weren't a hockey fan, I don't think I'd be able to see how this makes any sense, especially from a business perspective. Apparently the NHL owners have no problem with bailing out another failed franchise 5 years down the road, as long as they get their money right now.

And the whole Europe thing... well you can just insert your own punch line here _________.

Don't ever let anyone tell you that the game is fine, the game is not fine. Let's go through it, shall we:

- The on-ice product has regressed greatly over the last 2 post-lockout years. The obstruction is being taken out of the game but this means an endless parade to the penalty box, which kills any flow a game might have. The solution to this? I don't know, I think an increase in the size of the ice surface needs to be looked at. The players are simply too big, too strong, too fast and wear too much equipment today for the size of the ice. Have you ever watched old NHL games on TV? I have and the one thing I notice more than anything is how small the players look compared to today. I think the key to the game is in the size of the ice. I know owners will complain about losing revenue from having to take out seats to accommodate the bigger surface, but come on, it's not like there selling all their tickets anyway.

- Scoring is way down from a year ago as well, which is hard to explain given all the penalties that are being called. Obviously more powerplays does not equal more scoring, much to the chagrin of the NHL.

- This years playoffs were uneventful at best and downright unwatchable at worst. Of everyone I talked to about the playoffs, almost everybody had lost interest and stopped watching after the first round. Not a good sign when even Canadians have stopped paying attention. The reason I think is that the season is at least 10 games too long, maybe even a month too long. Why on earth would I still want to be watching hockey in June?

- The TV ratings are so bad in the U.S it's just too easy to make a joke about it. I'll just tell you the facts - Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final received NBC's lowest rating ever for a Saturday night, beating out the previous champ, a 2 year old re-run of the West Wing. It's enough already, these rating are an embarrassment to the league. Some say that any press is good press but having your league mocked on a nation-wide scale does nothing to grow the game. The simple fact of the matter is that nobody is watching the games.

- The salary-cap that was supposed to save the NHL and give everyone an equal playing field has gone up for the second straight year. In less that 5 years the league is going to be in the same position it was before the lockout. Even though there is going to be a cap on what teams can spend, pretty soon teams won't be able to spend up to that cap. Montreal has already announced that they're raising ticket prices to deal with the cap increase. I thought that the cap supposed to stop things like that from happening.

- Attendance is very, very sad in a lot of cities. Sure places like Calgary, Toronto and Buffalo sell out all the time but for every Calgary there seems to be 2 Nashville's. The NHL's official attendance number's are lies, that's all they are. There may be 11,000 people at a game in Carolina on occasion but you can bet that 11,000 people didn't pay for tickets. The NHL's numbers are padded by corporate giveaway tickets and other giveaways of that nature. Sure it might be nice to have that many people in the seats, but giving tickets away doesn't do much for a teams bottom line. Even traditional hockey cities like Chicago and Detroit are struggling to sell tickets. Chicago because they are terrible and have been for over a decade, which is very sad and a whole other story, and Detroit because the economy there is so bad that there is not a lot of money left over for hockey tickets. Did you know that Detroit made it to the Conference Finals and didn't sell out one playoff game?

- The Stanley Cup Champion is Anaheim. Just let that sink in for second. Anaheim. I don't really have a problem with the team, they had more Canadians than Ottawa, although I do think that Brian Burke needs to shut his mouth for the good of the game (nobody embarrasses himself more with old fashioned thinking, except maybe Don Cherry). But I don't think it's a good sign that a city where only about 12,ooo people show up to the victory celebration is the league champion. (How many would have shown up last year if Edmonton had won, or two years ago if Calgary had won?) Is the league going to benefit at all by having its champion in a city where nobody really cares about hockey? How do I know that nobody cares you may ask? Well I have a source in Irvine, California (which is about 10 minutes from Anaheim) and this person said that the day after the Ducks won the cup, nobody, absolutely nobody was talking about hockey. The only thing that people in the office where this source works were talking about was Paris Hilton. That is the sad reality of the situation.

What does all this add up to? I'm not really sure. All I know for sure is that I have never been less interested in hockey than I was this year. The NHL is sick and it seems like it's on the brink of being broken beyond repair. This game used to mean too much for me to watch it go further and further down the drain. And that is why I'm so hard on it.

The Links

Since I'm not going to be at work tomorrow again (ain't life grand?), I'm gonna throw The Links at you a day early again. This week I'm working with the theme of unforgettable sports moments (since I didn't come across any grisly videos of people getting injured this week). All of these videos are guaranteed to give you goose-bumps.

...if this doesn't give you chills, you're not a football fan - the highlights of possibly the greatest college football bowl game ever played (at least the greatest ending). In it you get to see: an interception returned for a touchdown, a hook-and-ladder play for a touchdown, a half-back option for a touchdown, and a Statue of Liberty play for a game winning two-point conversion. And as an added bonus, you get to see Chris Meyers of Fox Sports just absolutely ruin a post-game marriage proposal.

...do you remember where you were when this happened? I almost lost my job over that game.

...this defined an entire generation of Canadian hockey fans.

...and I just threw this clip in because I have to be a little bit of a homer every now and again.

...I wasn't going to put this in because it has nothing to do with sports, but it's just too cool not to get out there for people to see. Although Bill Simmons had a link to it in one of his columns this week, so a lot more people saw it there than will see it here.

untitled (Formerly Coooper's Corner)

First off, the blog piece formally known as “Cooper’s Corner” would like to congratulate the Anaheim Ducks on their first Stanley Cup victory. It was very nice to see Teemu Selanne and Randy Carlyle finally get to hoist the cup. It is great to see some former Jets win the cup, especially Carlyle who spent many a year on some brutal teams. I am also happy to announce that the Ducks win also propelled me into 2nd place in the North East EMS office pool, thus getting me a handsome prize; I believe it is $50.00. Thanks to Luke for the many nights helping strategize a team. (Editor's Note: I am so glad that I was able to help Cooper win money, when my own pool picks were so woefully bad that I still haven't come to grips with them)

Now on to the topic at hand, wrestling.

Yes wrestling.

This is the part where most of you are probably clicking 'Back' on your browsers, or just closing your browser all together, never again to visit the page. Wrestling is a virgin topic so far on Sports As Life, so bear with me. Anyway this past Saturday night I was astonished to see NBC broadcasting “Saturday Night's Main Event”. (Probably had better ratings than the NHL)

For those of you unfamiliar with Saturday Night's Main Event I will give you a brief history. Saturday Night's Main Event was a late night, (Saturday night, as you might have guessed already) WWF program that was on occasionally from 1985 to 1991. This was not your ordinary hour long show like the ones WWF would show Saturday mornings where the biggest match was getting to see The Brooklyn Brawler lose for the 300th consecutive time to some bigger name like Mr. Perfect or the Million Dollar Man Ted Dibiasse.

No, Saturday Night's Main Event was packed with the biggest matches, pay per view-esque matches. Matches like Hulk Hogan vs the Ultimate Warrior, or The Macho Man Randy Savage vs Jake the Snake Roberts. I mean BIG!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qz_dBrvGSxw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoRV5X__o3Q&mode=related&search=

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rC5V44AT8JY&mode=related&search=

Now I imagine that most of you who frequent Sports As Life, if not all of you, have outgrown wrestling by some 15 years. I myself have not watched wrestling since The Rock was champ and Stone Cold Steve Austin was feuding with Vince McMahon, which was in early 2001. A lot has changed since I last watched regularly, a lot! For example.

1) The WWF is no longer known as the WWF but as WWE or World Wrestling Entertainment. Apparently the World Wild Life Fund had a beef with the later and sued for the name I believe and won. I will have to check my facts on that one.

2) The WWE now consists of the old WCW, ECW, and whatever else Vince McMahon has managed to buy out. I don’t think there is any competition for Vince anymore.

3) Vince McMahon is absolutely huge. I mean HUGE! As big, if not bigger than some of the wrestlers. I am talking about a Bonds-like physique change. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was taking some stanazolol or other similar product. But still he looks great for his age.

4) Vince McMahon is the ECW hardcore champ. I believe that is the world championship of the old ECW. From what I understand, is that there are now 3 major title belts, the old WWF heavyweight belt, the WCW world title belt and the ECW belt. As well as all the other belts such as the tag team belts, intercontinental championship belt, television title belt, etc, etc, etc. Too many to count. I believe that the ratio of wrestlers to belts is 3:1.

5) Everyone we grew up watching is no longer wrestling (go figure). They are all either retired or dead. However the Undertaker is still a mainstay of the show. Some dead figures we grew up with include Brian Pillman, Mr. Perfect, Gorilla Monsoon (I always envision a giant wave of apes coming towards me when I hear that name, terrifying), The British Bulldog, Miss Elizabeth etc, etc, etc.

6) Diamond Dallas Page is nowhere to be seen. I miss the “Diamond Cutter”.

Even though I watched the entire programme, I must admit I did not enjoy it. Wrestling today just doesn’t cut it for me. I did thoroughly enjoy watching a midget dressed as a leprechaun brandishing a shillelagh beat the hell out of another midget however. Other than that it wasn’t what I remember wrestling to be. No great characters to hook on too I guess. After watching the You Tube clips though I am seriously considering doing a regular wrestling column. We will see I guess.

And You Thought I Didn't Like This Trade Before...

Now, I'm not saying it's easy to be the General Manager of a professional sports team. I'm certain that it is not. That being said however, I feel I have to take issue with something that has just happened with the Roughriders.

Last week the Roughriders traded running back Dominique Dorsey and defensive lineman Dwan Epps to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers for defensive lineman Eric Wilson. When this trade happened I admit that I was a little surprised and I didn't like the trade. But really what do I know right, I assume that Eric Tillman has a little bit more information about the trade than I do. So fine.

But today I'm scanning the Leader Post for the latest Rider gossip as I always do and I see that Eric Wilson has been released because, and I quote, "The Roughriders wanted to re-work his contract..."

So to me, what this means now is that we traded Dominique Dorsey and Dwan Epps for...nothing??

Now maybe I don't have all the facts. Perhaps Wilson got released and they are going to try and work out a new deal or something. But as it stands now, the Riders gave up two players (one of whom was their all-purpose yardage last year) and got absolutely nothing in return.

I have two issues with this. First of all, am I the only one confused/upset/baffled by this decision. As a GM you would know what the contract status is of the person you are trading for. And if you had even the slightest inkling that he wasn't going to re-work it and take less money, why would you bother trading for him in the first place? And why would you expect someone whom you had just traded for to re-work his contract. I really fail to see the logic behind this. If I'm the only one, I'll shut up. But can someone explain this one to me please?

My second issue is that I'm not sure why the media has given Eric Tillman a pass on this one. You've just traded away two players, one of whom was a large contributor last year, and gotten nothing in return. And no one in the media bothers to question that? The info about Wilson being released was written in the fine print of Darrell Davis' daily training camp coverage. Obviously this is not earth-shattering news, but does Tillman not have to at least explain what went on here? Doesn't the media have a responsibility to find things like this out?

In every other major sporting league coaches and GMs have to face the media regularly. And they may have to do it in other cities in the CFL too, I don't know. But here it seems, especially since the regime change, that no personnel decision is ever questioned. I'm not suggesting that people in the media nit pick over every little detail but come on - ask a tough question every once and awhile, hold people accountable for their decisions - isn't that what being a journalist is about?

The one explanation I can come up with is that members of the local media don't want to lose their access to the team. I suppose it's tough to be a working journalist in a town with only one pro sports team if you're banned from that team. But the flip-side of the that is almost equally as bad. If a journalist is too buddy-buddy with the team then everything gets reported through rose-coloured glasses. The media here has to be unafraid to tell it like it is, not hyper-critical but not sugar-coating everything either.

One thing that people shouldn't lose sight of is that the Riders are a community-owned team. If anyone deserves information about the team it is the community that supports it and keeps it afloat. The people who support the Roughriders deserve to be kept in the loop about the decisions the team makes. If anyone says that the public doesn't have the right to know every little thing about this team, they're dead wrong. This is a community-owned team and the community has the right to be kept up to date on what is going on with the team. (Don't even get me started about the exclusive, for paying members only section on Riderville.com, what an embarrassment that is)

I don't mean to be negative for no reason, I just think there are issues here that nobody is willing to discuss.

Take heart though, we here at Sports As Life have no official access to the Roughrider organization, so we do not have to be worries about losing it. And quite honestly I think that puts us in a pretty enviable position - we don't have to be worried about biting the hand that feeds us, and other cliches of that nature.