blogovich

NHL's all-star breakaway challenge an embarrassment

Well, at least Hockey Night In Canada's Ron MacLean did what he normally doesn't and told it like it is: He said NHLers aren't "trained seals" and the breakaway challenge during the NHL's all-star skills competition "should go back to New York", i.e. head office and the dustbin.

What an embarrassment.

An absurd, ridiculous, not remotely part of the game display. Players stickhandling with the butt-ends of their sticks. Trying to bounce the puck off their heads. Trying to juggle the puck on their stick blades. Sliding -- yes, literally -- in on goal, on some sort of purpose. But you can't fault the players, really, other than being fools for agreeing to participate. They're trying to provide some sort of show, though they look amazingly ill-at-ease in doing so. 

Why not just have them do a normal shootout? You see more truly fancy moves during the shootout in regular NHL games than you'll ever see in this embarrassing farce.

And the commentators -- at least until MacLean spoke up -- were just as bad. Instead of telling people the truth -- that the event is crap -- they were actually trying to analyze it.

The fans vote on the winner. Here's hoping they vote this nonsense out of existence.

Hockey fighting: Inmates run the asylum

Yeah, I know, that headline -- inmates running the asylum -- isn't exactly a revelation to anyone when it comes to hockey. Makes you think that all the trees that have been felled and air expelled in recent days on the subject is truly a waste of time. If these guys want to kill each other -- and evidence and internal polls suggest they do...well, let 'em and let's move on.

Fighting is back in the news in hockey due to what hockey folks will tell you is the "unfortunate" death of Don Sanderson, a senior hockey player with the Whitby Dunlops, who died as a result of injuries sustained when his unhelmeted head hit the ice during a fight.

It wasn't an "unfortunate" incident. It was preventable if fighting weren't allowed in hockey.

Which brings up another thought: when people say fighting should be "banned", well, technically, it already is. In many leagues outside of major junior hockey and the NHL, game ejection results, which effectively means fighting is banned.

But just think if linesmen immediately stepped in between potential fighters and didn't allow them to even get at each other -- or stepped in immediately if they did manage to get at each other. Then, chances are, you'd never actually have a fight and nobody would be talking about whether helmets should remain on or off or whatever.

Of course, nobody in hockey ever thinks of that, i.e. stopping the fight before it even gets started -- which would be pretty easy for the majority of potential fights since the prospective combatants usually discuss it in the faceoff circle before the puck is dropped, or dance around discussing it before they actually come together and exchange blows or sweater tugs.

Yeah, yeah, media folks know nothing about hockey, about the code and honour of the game, as Don Cherry ranted on about on Hockey Night In Canada the other week. You have to have played the game -- which lots of media guys do, actually -- but beyond that, what Cherry and his ilk never mention is the fact many NHLers (try Hockey Hall of Famers Mike Bossy and Ken Dryden to name two) have publicly stated on many occasions that fighting is not necessary.

Beyond all of that, does anyone else find this whole discussion as a result of the Sanderson tragedy (which is not funny) unintentionally hilarious?

Here's what I mean.

• David Branch, commissioner of the Ontario Hockey League, is getting all kinds of media praise because he's now established a rule saying OHL players are forbidden to take off their helmets in a fight.
• Saturday night on Hockey Night In Canada, NHL Players' Association executive director Paul Kelly said that while a helmet rule wouldn't work in the NHL (these guys are PROS, you see, more mature, more responsible for their own actions), it is imperative that players must be protected from hits to the head. 
• Meanwhile, Kitchener Rangers player Mike Mascioli told our paper, The Waterloo Region Record, for Saturday's edition that he thinks the OHL's new helmet rule will eliminate fighting, and fighters, because they won't want to hurt their hands on other people's helmets. "I'm not happy about it because it takes a lot of jobs away," Mascioli said. Hmm. His job, maybe?

OK, let's review the above points. If you listen to Mascioli, Branch should indeed be hailed as a genius for those who see no need for fighting in hockey because his new rule is going to eliminate it. Of course, you could also read it another way -- that Branch is perfectly fine with fighting; he just wants fighters to keep their helmets on, not only to avoid injury but, c'mon, so one day, when a Sanderson incident happens in the OHL, the league can avoid a lawsuit.

As for Kelly, he's hilarious. It's imperative that players must be protected from hits to the head. He's talking cheap shots, elbows to the chops (which the sainted best leader in the history of the known cosmos, Mark Messier, is always praised for). Those are no-no's. Hits to the head via a punch in a fight? Hey, by all means, boys, feel free. And take off your helmets while you're at it.

Back to Mascioli. His quote about not being happy about it because jobs will be lost is also unintentionally a scream. How about he look at it another way: learn to play properly and you'll have no worries.

Not that any of this will convince any of the lunatics who continue to run the asylum, though. So to come full circle, let 'em. It could be -- as we've now, unfortunately, experienced -- their funeral.

Memo to NHL: The Russians do it right for hockey all-star game -- it's outdoors

The Russian league all-star game was today, Saturday, in Moscow. Great setting in Red Square.

One wonders why the NHL doesn't do the same. The current NHL all-star game is pretty much useless, noboby cares because it's a no-hitting, usually ridiculously high scoring affair that does not resemble true NHL hockey in any way, shape or form.

So why not add some lustre to it by going outdoors? It certainly would be more fair in the long run than playing regular-season games outdoors. The outdoor classic is wonderful, but it really should be an exhibition game, not a regular-season matchup where a result from a game played in possibly adverse conditions could have an impact on the playoff race and, thus, the outcome of the playoffs.

Zeppelin's Page should admit defeat and hire Coverdale to sing, write

Jimmy Page wants to take a version of Led Zeppelin on the road and/or record. Without Robert Plant, who isn't interested. It would be Page on guitar of course, Jason Bonham on drums and John Paul Jones on bass. With a new singer.

I wouldn’t be calling it Led Zeppelin, Jimmy.

Page’s problem is he has not been successful outside of Zep because the former session man cannot write songs. If he could, he’d never have had to rip off old blues artists while in Led Zeppelin.

What he might consider is recruiting David Coverdale again. Like him (in Deep Purple, Whitesnake or solo) or not, Coverdale can write listenable tunes. And the Coverdale-Page project from 1993 is the only worthwhile music -- aside from a couple tunes with the otherwise surprisingly forgettable Firm considering Paul Rodgers was involved -- Page has produced outside Zep.

Don Cherry, hockey fights, and other Berkobits

One, two or three-or-so-liners about various things: What was Don Cherry, hockey fight promoter, doing at the funeral of Don Sanderson, who died as a result of falling and hitting his head during a hockey fight? What a shameless hypocrite . . . Word is that Craig Hartsburg, who just got the job as Ottawa Senators coach this season, might be out soon in favour of freshly-sainted Team Canada junior coach Pat Quinn. Hartsburg was a great NHL defenceman but has a mixed record as an NHL head coach (Chicago), having been a fine assistant with Philadelphia, to name one team. He’s been a terrific junior coach with Team Canada, the Soo Greyhounds and the Guelph Storm, where I found him during my junior hockey reporting days to be not just a good coach but a class act. But one wonders whether he might be one of those guys who is better suited to either being an NHL assistant or a major junior head man. . . The Dallas Cowboys just got rid of Pacman Jones. Their next act should be to dispense with Terrell Owens, a me-first team cancer if ever there was one. . . . Jennifer Anniston: one of those celebrities who is famous for being famous.

Mixed feelings about the world junior hockey championship

Reasons to wonder about the worth of the world junior hockey championship, won again on Monday by Canada for a fifth straight year.

• Nobody else but Canada cares. So it’s usually played in Canada -- two of the last five tournaments, in fact, and three of six by the time next year’s event faces off in Saskatchewan. This is so the International Ice Hockey Federation (and why wouldn’t it) can make money instead of drawing flies in Europe or, worse, the United States, where the word “junior” in sports is the equivalent to what we in Canada term “minor” sports.

• So Canada usually has home-ice advantage for the reasons stated above. This regular home-ice advantage renders the event somewhat akin to the old Canada Cup or World Cup. Those events (the vast majority of times) were played almost exclusively in Canada and were initiated by the disgraced Alan Eagleson in part as a means of getting back at the Commies for alleged lousy refereeing, food, lodging, etc. at the annual world hockey championships and Evil Empire skullduggery during the 1972 Canada-Soviet series. When I was covering Canada Cup '87 for The Hockey News, Swedish coach Tommy Sandlin -- miffed because his team had to travel from coast to coast for its games while Canada's travel schedule was confined to the Montreal-Toronto corridor -- told me the Canada Cup was “a summer tournament for the Canadians” and he was right.

• What kind of tournament worth its salt essentially depends on Canada getting to the final to achieve success? Wonder what those TV ratings would have been, and how many tickets would have gone unused, had Sweden played Russia in the final? Speaking of Sweden, had the Swedes won the WJC, do you think the winning goal-scorer’s stick would be going to the Hockey Hall of Fame, as is the case with Angelo Esposito’s stick from Team Canada? Somehow, I doubt it.

• Speaking of the WJC, it’s actually called the world under-20 championship, is known by that moniker everywhere else, is described as such right on the trophy and the IIHF web site. But for Canadians to call it that would render it just another age-group tournament. Who, for instance, except fanatics ever follows, say, the under-18 worlds -- except of course the year TV, thanks to the NHL lockout and starved for content to fill the 24-hour cycle, broadcast it. Seen much of it since, folks?

• The field is weak. After Canada, the U.S., Sweden and Russia, there’s a marked dropoff in the quality of the competiton. Sure, you’ll always get the occasional upset, but this tournament isn’t that far ahead of women’s hockey’s exclusive Canada-USA scenario.

• It’s a little TSN cottage industry event. That’s fine, I guess, but TSN essentially created this event, much as it saved the CFL with Friday Night Football. And speaking of TSN, the network and the Canadian Football League took criticism for -- TSN being a specialty network -- denying Canadians who don’t subscribe to the network access to the Grey Cup and resulting lower ratings. Nobody says anything about the exact same thing in terms of the world juniors. Instead, record ratings are trumpeted.

• It’s become a cliche. Every year, we read and view the same sorts of stories. First come the selections for the tryout camp. Then the “dreaded 6 a.m. hotel room call” that signifies who’s been cut. Then, immediately after that, the requisite ostracizing of the cuttees and the “team building exercise” for those who made the grade. Then the team picture. Then the tournament victory. Then the team singalong of the national anthem at the blueline. Then the player arrivals at the airport on the return home to their respective teams, complete with media frenzy (often featuring media members who wouldn’t know junior hockey from a hole in the ground the rest of the year) that usually outnumbers the fans. It’s like watching the same movie over and over again.

• Did I mention that nobody else but Canada cares?

Now, to prove I’m not just a contrarian party-pooper, some reasons to like the under-20 world championship.

• It’s a little TSN cottage industry event. Yes, this point works both ways. TSN essentially created this event, and that’s good exposure for junior hockey.

• The event is essentially the equivalent of U.S. college football bowl games. Same time of year, many of the players wind up in the professional ranks, etc. But the hockey tournament is better because it’s much more meaningful -- a true championship, not come idiotic computerized election that shuts out some schools (hello, Utah) from proper Bowl Championship Series consideration. Of course, this is a system devised by a country, the U.S., which has a sorry record of running its own political elections, so what do you expect? Bottom line: There has never been a U.S. college football Division I-A champion and never will be until a proper, workable playoff system is implemented. They do it in Divisions II on down, so why not in Division I-A? President-elect Barack Obama believes a playoff system should be implemented so if he does only one thing during his time in office, here’s hoping.

• Who cares if nobody else cares? Canada loves hockey. It’s a national rallying point, at least for sports fans. So be it.