blogovich

Whew. Been a while. Commenters, your thoughts are now posted. And a promo post to Guilty Pleasures and the new Heaven and Hell album

Been a nutty time so haven't been posting to the blog but you don't want to hear my whining. Anyway, all up to date on comments now including those on the nutbar (most people think) NHL points for an overtime loss system, Chipper Jones, Chuck Berry and misuse of words.

Enjoy.

And by the way, you are welcome to visit Guilty Pleasures, a psuedo-blog the boss has me doing. It appears regularly therecord.com and is what often keeps me from posting here.

No sports column by moi in The Record this week, hence no new sports post here. Possible for next week, wait for it: women in sports and the battles they face for attention in a male-dominated sports and sports journalism world.

Oh, and Rajeev: yes, eventually I will get back to some rock and roll. Bought the new Heaven and Hell album today, you know, the Ronnie James Dio-fronted version of Black Sabbath. Only managed to listen to 3 tracks while they were playing it in my friendly neighbourhood-we-release-for-sale-CDs-before the actual-release-date store. Sounds decent on first listen, so far, but you know how first listens can be. You think, OK, it's not coalescing in my brain yet. So you are tempted to take it out of the player and put on, I dunno, Heaven and Hell the album or something.

Thanks to nonsensical points system, once again we have fraudulent Stanley Cup playoffs

What we are about to describe is the fraud perpetrated by the National Hockey League upon its many followers.

It’s due to the nonsensical, ridiculous, absurd and, fraudulent system by which the NHL awards points for victories and losses. Yes, in the NHL, you can lose a game and earn a point.

It’s all got to do with the move away from ties. It’s no move at all, of course. Ties still exist. They are merely disguised as so-called overtime or shootout losses from which teams are awarded single points -- for LOSING. It’s wrong, yet for whatever reason, accepted throughout the hockey community.

It affects the integrity of the game. It affects the playoff matchups. It means, folks, a total loss of legitimacy.

Here’s the final conference standings according to the NHL based on its points-awarding system. 

Eastern Conference:

Boston Bruins, 116 points (53 wins, 19 losses, 4 overtime losses, 6 shootout losses). In reality, Boston has lost 29 games. The Bruins are, in reality, not 53-19-4-6 (or 53-19-10 as often listed by those who simply combine overtime and shootout losses in the old xx-xx-xx won-lost-tied format). They are, for crying out loud, 53-29. They’ve lost 29 times! If they lose an overtime playoff game, it’s a loss, right? Why is it rewarded by a point during the regular season. Madness. Utter madness. 

The above is written to establish our parameters on the eve of the Cup playoffs beginning. They’re a fraud because as you will see, the matchups are not what they should be if a loss was a loss was a loss.

According to the NHL:

EAST:

Boston 116

Washington 108

New Jersey 106

Pittsburgh 99

Philadelphia 99

Carolina 97

New York Rangers 95

Montreal 93

Hence, in the East, according to the 1 vs. 8 etc. format:

Boston vs. Montreal

Washington vs. NYR

NJ vs. Carolina

Pitt vs. Phil

WEST:

San Jose 117

Detroit 112

Vancouver 100

Chicago 104 (behind Vancouver because Van is a division champ ?! divisions mean zippo in reality)

Calgary 98

St. Louis 92

Columbus 92

Anaheim 91

Hence:

SJ vs Anaheim

Det vs. Columb

Van vs. StL

Chi vs. Cal

NO!!! NOT THE WAY IT SHOULD BE!

THE REAL STANDINGS IF A LOSS WAS A LOSS WAS A LOSS:

EAST:

Boston 106 points

New Jersey 102

Washington 100

Pittsburgh 90

Carolina 90

Philadelphia 88

NYR 86

Montreal 82

(Florida and Buffalo also had 82 points in reality. Should they be in the playoffs? What is the tie-breaker with Montreal for those teams, NHL? Hmmm? I don’t know the answer, but isn’t the question worth asking?)

Hence:

Bos vs Montreal

NJ vs. NYR

Wash vs. Phil

Pitt vs. Carolina

WEST:

San Jose 106

Detroit 102

Chicago 92

Calgary 92

Vancouver 90

Anaheim 84

St. Louis 82

Columbus 82

Hence: 

SJ vs Columbus

Det vs. StL

Chi vs Anaheim

Cal vs Van

Different, huh? Matchups are everything in sports. Some teams play better against others, some not so much. It affects the subsequent matchups and thus the ultimate winner. Yet because of the faulty, fraudulent -- and blindly accepted -- NHL system, we have what we have. Ongoing, I would submit, illegitimate champions. 

It’s a complete farce and why the hockey community tolerates it is beyond me. Someone should sue. Seriously. 

See you in a few months, dear, it's super sports season

It’s mid-April, which means sports widow time.

NHL playoffs begin this week. Baseball is warming up. The NBA playoffs are on the horizon. The major golf season has begun.

See you, significant other, sometime near the end of June when things die down a bit.

Or perhaps before that. Weird thing is, particularly with the hockey playoffs and the advent of warm weather, that it’s the first round that gets everyone going. The interest level drops -- unless there’s some major incident like the 1999 Brett Hull Stanley Cup-winner from the crease controversy  -- as the importance of the games increases. You can’t have a Hull situation now, because the rules are different, thankfully, on that one. But something will come up.

The interest decline affects hockey the most because it’s a winter sport that doesn’t award its champion until practically summer, and so many  of the games get played in the afternoon thanks to the ongoing, vain pursuit of U.S. TV ratings. And, yes, we know, just a few weeks ago the suggestion was made here to hold hockey in the Summer Olympics. Different topic entirely.

Anyway, not sure what time of year is better for a sports follower. Now, or October.
Probably October, if you’re talking sheer volume. Baseball playoffs. Hockey starts. Football is in full swing, both sides of the border. The NBA begins, late in the month. And golf silly season is in full swing.

But in Canada, it’s got to be now. We are, after all, hockey-crazed.

Berkobits: We’ve mentioned this before, but there we were again on Saturday night in Ontario on Hockey Night In Canada. Toronto versus Ottawa. Two teams, both out of it. Surely, there was something better we could have been served up, CBC? Like Pittsburgh-Montreal, maybe? . . . What’s up with the Toronto Maple Leafs honouring Brad May for playing 1,000 NHL games when he’s played but 38 for the blue and white? Of course, these guys will celebrate anything, like holding a “night” for noted “Toronto superstar” Tie Domi when he hit the 1,000-game mark.

More Berkobits: Saw this in a sports column so it’s going in my sports column. Folks, there’s a difference between the words loathe and loath. You loathe, i.e. hate/despise/dislike someone (even sports columnists) or something. You are loath, i.e. reluctant, to do something. OK, carry on. . . . Terrell Owens is an amazingly self-absorbed athlete with issues -- one of which, on the field, is that he’s 50-50 to catch a pass. We all know that. But what’s the fuss about him choosing to skip a Buffalo Bills’ voluntary pre-season workout? It’s voluntary. End of story.

Still more Berkobits: Recent poll results from MovieTickets.com: Users were asked to rate the greatest baseball movies of all time from among:

•  Field of Dreams

•  Major League

•  The Natural

•  Bull Durham

•  Eight Men Out

The “gag me” Field of Dreams, one of those “baseball is life itself” and “the foul lines go on into infinity” yechh! movies, won in a landslide with 45 per cent of the vote. Major League had 23 per cent, The Natural (another hokey-fest) 16, Bull Durham (now you’re talking) 13 and Eight Men Out, three per cent. They’re all different, but of those five, put me down for Eight Men Out.

kberkovich@therecord.com

Change to Team Canada hockey logo was overdue

Say goodbye to the silhouette of a hockey player skating through the red and black Maple Leaf on Canadian Olympic hockey uniforms.

Thank you, International Olympic Committee.

We're a hockey country and we need an image of a hockey player on our uniforms to tell us what sport we're playing?

Ridiculous.

The uniform and the Maple Leaf are fine. But the hockey player and puck? It's like all those hockey expansion teams whose logos -- remember when they were called crests and yes, I'm dating myself -- incorporate sticks and pucks and so on.

Hey, we know what sport we're watching. Look at all the great team logos or crests or whatever you want to call them in sports: They are s-i-m-p-l-e.

Anyway, in case you missed it, a pitched battle over the Canadian logo -- Hockey Canada's corporate symbol -- has been burbling just under the sports radar screen. New IOC policy does not permit national federations to display their branding logos at the Games.

But on April 1, the issue was resolved. No fooling. Hockey Canada has apparently decided to simply remove the hockey player from the team jerseys (remember when they were called sweaters?).

So, when the new design comes out next month, we'll likely be left with some version of the Maple Leaf. A nice one, like the old Toronto Maple Leafs frilly look, please. No hockey players, no sticks, no pucks. We hope.

Which is as it should be.

Until, sigh, the Olympics are over. Hockey Canada plans to go back to its corporate logo for events after the Olympic Games.

Thanks, Hockey Canada. But we don't need the help.

BERKOBITS

Had to laugh when I read this week that Toronto Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke was "sour" about something. Does he have any other mood? . . . Can't help but agree with former Blue Jay Joe Carter when he suggests his World Series-winning home run in 1993 does not get the hype it deserves simply because he didn't play for the Yankees or Dodgers (or Boston Red Sox, for that matter).

. . . Bookmaker.com has issued its predicted list of the next baseball player to be caught using steroids: 1. Albert Pujols. 2. Manny Ramirez. 3. Ryan Howard. 4. Mark Teixeira. 5. David Ortiz. 6. Derrek Lee. 7. Justin Morneau. 8. Lance Berkman. 9. Carlos Delgado.

Pujols was just recently the cover boy in Sports Illustrated in which it was strongly suggested he would never, could never, ever ever, touch the stuff. Pujols came off as truly a quality, well-rounded individual in the piece, but as always, we'll see.

kberkovich@therecord.com

Stephen Harper and the "loo"

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's handlers -- and the PM himself -- got their noses out of joint when it was reported that he missed the G20 leaders' photo-op because he was in the john.

Lighten up, folks. Boy, Harper is stiff. Maybe he was in the loo, maybe he wasn't. If he was, though, he should have made light of it and said, yeah, I had to go.

Big deal. At least he'd show he's human. Might do him some good among voters.

Oh, Twitter off.

No, I don't Tweet on Twitter. I prefer to do better things with my time. And no, I don't carry about every boring detail of your life. Go get one.

Also, it's interesting that the mainstream media has just caught on to this so-called phenomenon of narcissism, which means everyone else on the web has long since moved on to something else.

Which is why, alas, the mainstream media is forever swimming upstream against the tide.

Great spoof of Twitter, by the way, on YouTube. Posted it in Guilty Pleasures, another fun vehicle I have here.