The 2008 Sporting Madness Christmas Gifts, Part I

Continuing in our proud 1-year tradition, and in step with everyone else who uses the meme, here's the Sporting Madness Christmas gifts for the world of sports:

Soccer:

- To the Vancouver Whitecaps and Bob Lenarduzzi: a nice, gift-wrapped MLS franchise. That could make the entire city happy. I'll have more on their chances soon.

- To the Montreal Impact: good luck for their forthcoming CONCACAF Champions League quarterfinal matchup against Mexico's Club Santos Laguna. Montreal's unexpected run has been tremendous to watch, and it would be great to see a Canadian team keep going.

- To Toronto FC: Well, they did already get one very nice Christmas present, but we'll send them a quality designated player as well and a playoff berth. This franchise has been great for Canadian soccer and the city of Toronto. They have so much support and so many tickets sold in advance that they really could just go through the motions, so it's refreshing to see them continue their involvement with the community.

- To Dwayne De Rosario: A happy homecoming and a tremendous time with TFC.

- To Manchester United: Some polish for that World Club Championship trophy [The Times] and good luck for their match against Stoke tomorrow.

- To Cristiano Ronaldo: Some better cleats so he doesn't fall down so frequently.

- To the Seattle Sounders of MLS: solid support from the local fans and media. After all, they're one of the only bright spots on the Seattle scene in what was possibly the worst sports year ever for a city [Jim Caple, ESPN].

CFL:

- To the B.C. Lions: An increase in the salary cap. That way, they wouldn't have had to part ways with the likes of Jason Clermont [Tim Switzer, Regina Leader-Post] and Tyrone Williams [Lowell Ullrich, The Vancouver Province] (no, not that one) for reasons that were probably more financial than football. The current cap is far too restrictive.

- To Lions' head coach/GM Wally Buono: Some good binoculars. He'll need them to find replacements for all those who have left or may be leaving, including Clermont, defensive player of the year Cameron Wake, defensive coordinator Mike Benevides [Ullrich, The Province] and Otis Floyd [The Province]. Fortunately, Buono is a personnel mastermind and there's a great supply of players out there now, thanks to the recent demise of the Arena Football League [myself, Out of Left Field].

- To the Calgary Stampeders: Congratulations on that Grey Cup and an increase on the scouting budget, so they can replace the likes of Brandon Browner and Sandro DeAngelis if they jump to the NFL [David Naylor, The Globe and Mail].

- To the Edmonton Eskimos: Relocation to the East Division, as well as a nice mention in TMQ. It's too bad they lost the East final: I would have loved a Battle of Alberta Grey Cup.

- To the Saskatchewan Roughriders fans: A sense of decorum, and some new gloves to give them a better grip on their cans of beer [Greg Harder, Regina Leader-Post].

- To the Winnipeg Blue Bombers: A diminished sense of propriety. Having cheerleader photos show up on The Big Lead is not really a scandal. Hey, at least you got the American press talking about the CFL! [A.J. Daulerio, Deadspin]. (By the way, can we please bring back Gourmet Spud's CFL D###-Joke Free Jambor-eh? It was my favourite Deadspin feature.)

- To the Toronto Argonauts: A good new head coach. I think Benevides would be perfect for the job, as much as it would suck for the Lions to lose him. The CFL needs a strong Toronto franchise to stay healthy, especially with the cross-border incursions from the Buffalo Bills.

- To the Montreal Alouettes: One healthy Mike Giffin [Neate Sager, Out of Left Field]. Insert at tailback for best results. Caution: Not intended for use as a fullback.

- Also to the Alouettes: Thanks for putting on a great Grey Cup weekend and delivering stellar TV results, even if certain anglophiles didn't like them.

- To the Hamilton Tiger-Cats: A winning season. We all know they need one.

NFL:

- To Plaxico Burress: A new suit, with a built-in holster. That way, he wouldn't have to go clubbing in his sweatpants [Rick Chandler, Deadspin].

- To the Dallas Cowboys: Some nice team-building activities! That way, you wouldn't wind up with crap like this [Dashiell Bennett, Deadspin] happening.

- To Terrell Owens: A little bit of maturity.

- To Bill Cowher: A nice new head coaching job (but not the Browns: he deserves better!).

- To the Buffalo Bills: A wealthy local investor who can buy the team and keep them out of Toronto.

- To the Arizona Cardinals: A playoff berth. It's been a long, long time coming.

- To the Pittsburgh Steelers: Another Super Bowl title. I'd love to see this one, especially considering that they barely have any offence; it would vindicate my love of hard-hitting defence.

- To Ben Roethlisberger: A new offensive lineman or two to give him some more protection in the pocket. Failing that, some extra padding to make all those sacks hurt a little less.

- To the New England Patriots: A quick playoff exit (or a failure to get in at all). I'm really sick of this team. Weren't they supposed to be toast already with Brady gone?

- To the New York Giants: My undying gratitude for ruining 19-0, making one of my predictions work and giving us possibly one of the best football games ever (and my vote for the greatest play ever, attached below).



Hockey:

- To the Vancouver Canucks: A nice, gift-wrapped Swedish star [Jeff Paterson, The Georgia Straight]. More on this later.

- To Roberto Luongo: A magical healing chamber. His team needs him back [Iain MacIntyre, The Vancouver Sun], and fast.

- To Trevor Linden: The best wishes of all Canucks fans. It was great having you here, Trevor, and you'll be sorely missed.

- To Mike Gillis: A mild raspberry for canceling my interview earlier this year, but congratulations for creating a solid Canucks team out of other people's castoffs.

- To Kyle Wellwood: A Stairmaster, so he can stay in shape and keep this great run of form going.

- To the Phoenix Coyotes: Some money to delay their inevitable failure. Oh wait, the league already gave them that [David Shoalts, The Globe and Mail]. How about an even more favourable arena deal? [Scott Burnside, ESPN].

- To the Fresno Falcons' players: New contracts somewhere else. A franchise folding in mid-season [James Mirtle, From the Rink] is bad enough: it's worse when it comes right before Christmas. They were leading their ECHL division, but they couldn't overcome their franchise's off-ice incompetence.

- To Washington Capitals' web producer Brett Leonhardt: A very merry Christmas, and a new lifelong dream (as he got to achieve his old one this year) [Lindsay Applebaum, D.C. Sports Bog].

- To Kirk Muller: A nice Golden Gaels tie so he can remember his time at Queen's [former sports editor extraordinaire James Bradshaw, Queen's Journal]. Hey, it might bring good luck as well: the McGill tie worked for Mike Babcock [Earl Zukerman, McGill Athletics]!

- To Brian Burke: An extra layer of thick skin: he's going to need it in Toronto.

- To Dave Nonis: Some new Leafs clothing. Great to see him get another important job. I thought both him and Burke weren't treated terribly well in Vancouver. Both are great hockey guys and will do well with the Leafs.

- To George Parros: A mustache-grooming kit, so he can maintain his excellence in facial hair.



[Photo from SI.com]

CIS:

- To Laval: Some champagne to sip from the Vanier Cup. They had a great year, and they fully deserved the trophy.

- To Benoit Groulx: A fair tryout for quarterback at the CFL level. He won't get it because he's Canadian, and that's a shame; his play in this year's Vanier Cup was better than several quarterbacks currently in the CFL.

- To the CIS organizers: Inspiration to put the Vanier Cup back with the Grey Cup. That worked brilliantly last year, but this year showed that having the games back-to-back in separate cities isn't the best for the university game from any point of view. With the games together, that's plenty of free promotion for the university game, and you'd also get much more media interest. There aren't a lot of football-savvy media types in Canada, and splitting them between the two events means that many organizations will opt to only cover the Grey Cup in person. Laval will do an okay job of hosting, but I would have much rather seen the Vanier again linked with the Grey Cup.

- Also on that front, it would be great to get some clarification about the amateur/pro rules in CIS sports, especially soccer. As Srdjan Djekanovic himself informed me in a comment (which he then removed), basically the only thing that made his participation in CIS championships after playing professionally legal and Andrea Lombardo's illegal was a couple of pieces of paper that allowed him to retain his amateur status. There's nothing wrong with that if everyone's on the same page. However, the press release about Lombardo only mentioned him playing professionally and didn't discuss the distinction at all; that leads to unnecessary speculation and controversy. The Byzantine nature of the eligibility rules and the differences for each sport make it way too hard to understand who can play and who can't, and that's probably why we keep seeing these violations in different CIS sports; most of them are honest mistakes or misinterpretations of the rules rather than attempts to cheat. Let's make it simple and easy for everyone to understand.

- To the sports information directors across the CIS schools: A sincere thanks for all that you do. Your work makes things a lot easier for all of us who cover the league. Special thanks to Mike Grobe of Queen's, Dan Carle of Ottawa, Ari Grossman of Laurier, Earl Zukerman of McGill and Mary Beth Challoner of the University of Toronto. One thing that would be nice would be to see consistency in statistics, though; some schools do a great job, but there's far too many mistakes in other cases.

- To the University of Toronto football team: Hearty congratulations for snapping the losing streak. It's great to see the Blues back on the road to success. Also, congratulations to Greg DeLaval on the removal of his interim tag [Neate Sager, cisblog.ca].

- To the Gaels' men's soccer team: some coaching continuity. They could use it.

- To the Queen's bean-counters: Some extra alumni donations to dissaude them from moving the new hockey rink to West Campus [myself, Queen's Journal]. This is an incredibly bad idea. The hockey rink was going to be a focal part of the new building, and that's why our teams have had to put up with the constant travel last year and the antiquated Memorial Centre this year. You owe it to them to give them the promised new state-of-the-art rink in a central location where they can draw fans, not a prefabricated building out in the boondocks of West Campus.

- To the Gaels' rowing teams: Some craft beers to celebrate their excellent season. Year in and year out, they are probably the most successful teams at our university despite little publicity or funding. Keep up the great work.

- And finally, to Queen's football: Framed copies of all the records shattered this year. It didn't turn out the way many had hoped, but it was one hell of a ride. Best of luck to you all.

That concludes the gifts for the sporting world. Part two, featuring gifts for those who cover it, should appear tonight or tomorrow.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all those of you who celebrate it, and a happy holiday of your choice to everyone else! First, I want to say thanks to all of those who take the time to read my musings and pontifications; it's greatly appreciated. Apologies for the lack of writing around here lately; I figured the holidays would give me more time, but they actually haven't to a large extent. In any case, my Christmas present to those of you who still bother to check this site comes in the form of a return to writing. I've been working on a couple of long posts for the last week and a bit and should have them ready to go within the next couple of days. Anyways, thanks again for reading and have a great holiday season!
- Andrew

A sporting Christmas wish list

Apologies for the lack of updates over the last few days: a combination of my computer dying (or at least suffering serious injury) and the craziness associated with Christmas meant that I wasn't able to find the time to sit down and hammer out a post. Anyways, in step with the many pundits who have traversed the road before me(such as Ben Knight and my own father), here's my shot at offering symbolic Christmas presents to those I write about.

Hockey:

-To Roberto Luongo: A trophy case for those he should collect later this year. Luongo narrowly lost out to Sidney Crosby and Martin Brodeur in the Hart and Vezina Trophy races last year, but is having a better season than either to this point. He also dominated their head-to-head battles, stopping Crosby twice on late breakaways and shutting out Brodeur's New Jersey Devils in a 5-0 rout. As the Vancouver Province's Ed Willes pointed out in an insightful column yesterday, "Luongo, at this moment, is the best player in the NHL." His numbers (2.03 GAA, second only to Detroit's Chris Osgood, and .929 save percentage, second only to Boston's Tim Thomas) are impressive on their own, but look even better when you look at the shot-difficulty data Gabe Desjardins has compiled (thanks to James for the link). Luongo is sixth on his list of those who have a better GAA than expected from the difficulty of shots that they make, with a delta GAA of -0.65. Brodeur is way down the list with a delta GAA of -0.11, suggesting that many of the saves he makes are on easier shots (not surprising, when you consider that the defensive system New Jersey plays with is even more pronounced than Vancouver's). Hopefully a strong continued performance from Luongo will be enough to sway the necessary voters come June.

- To Joe Sakic and Ryan Smyth: get-well soon cards. The league is a better place with players of their quality.

- To Mike Weaver: Some toys for his new son. He's been a solid team player thus far for the Canucks, effective in his role and capable of stepping up to fill in defensive holes in the roster.

- To Buffalo Sabres and Pittsburgh Penguins players: some toques. They'll need them.

- To Colin Campbell: a clue. The NHL's discipline czar uttered some great lines to Toronto Star writer Randy Starkman on the legitimacy of concussions in hockey. "Some are legitimate," said Campbell. "I think some you might find aren't legitimate. ... I think there's a small percentage, not a great percentage, of players who use it as an excuse, `Oh yeah, I've got a concussion.' They can milk it. It's a hard thing to really say that you haven't, you know, if you're trying to get some extra insurance money out of it to get paid an extra year or something." I think Campbell is out of his mind here, especially given the hockey culture of not reporting injuries and returning far too soon. As Keith Primeau, who was knocked out of the game by concussions, said in Part Two of Starkman's series, hockey players aren't going to take themselves out of a crucial game due to concussion symptoms. "They're not going to do it," Primeau said. "Guys aren't going to think long-term. We never do." It's a little worrying to hear that the head of NHL discipline thinks players are faking concussions. I'll have more on this in a later post or column. By the way, kudos again to James for highlighting these articles in an insightful post.

- To Starkman himself: sincere commendations for the work he did on his features on concussions in hockey. Concussions in sport are a tough, often touchy topic to address, as I found out earlier this year when writing my original piece on them. Players and coaches are frequently reluctant to give out too much information on concussions for fear that it might be used against them by opponents. Yet, it can be rewarding: there's a deep issue here, as concussions bring up the tension between the manly image of playing through pain and the concern about what's best for an athlete long-term. They make us ask the question of "at what price do we value sporting triumphs?" Starkman did a fantastic job on this article, and deserves a hearty round of applause. Hopefully, more work will be done on concussions in different sports in the future: I still think that this is perhaps the most important, if rarely talked about, issue facing sports today.

- To all NHLPA members: reading lamps for them to enjoy their new gifts from Chris Chelios and Eric Lindros, Susan Foster's The Power Of Two. This fantastic book, on the work that Foster and ex-NHL star Carl Brewer did to expose Alan Eagleson's shameful activities as head of the Players' Association, should be required reading for every hockey player, particularly in light of the recent troubles the PA underwent with Ted Saskin. Kudos to Chelios and Lindros for springing for these. I'll also send the PA members Russ Conway's great book Cracking the Ice, based on the investigative articles he wrote for the Lawrence Eagle-Tribune, to give a journalist's perspective on Eagleson's downfall. Both books are terrific, and should be read by anyone interested in the history of hockey.


Soccer

- To Jonny Evans: a good lawyer. He'll certainly need one.

- To Manchester United: Blinders to ignore the fallout from the Evans case. Regardless of how this turns out, it's going to be a public black eye and a distraction for the club at a very inopportune time. Hopefully, they'll be able to keep their focus on the pitch.

- To Luca Toni and Franck Ribery: some choice German sausages, beer, and Black Forest cake to make them feel at home at Bayern Munich despite Oliver Kahn's recent comments. I'm pretty sure Toni at least feels somewhat comfortable, judging by his recent four-goal performance against Aris.

- To the Vancouver city council: a desperately needed kick in the pants to get going on the new soccer stadium. Unlike every other arena deal in recent history, Greg Kerfoot is proposing this one with very little cost to taxpayers at any level. Council should stop moaning and listening to the constant grumblers, and get on board with this before Kerfoot realizes just how much better his offer is than any proposed by a sports franchise in any other city. It's a wonder that this man puts up with this city.

- To Toronto F.C.: a playoff berth next year, and an injury-prevention device. They made some great strides this year, and could have done much better if not crippled by a string of bad luck. Hopefully the support will stay strong in Year Two and the on-field success will follow.

- To the UBC Thunderbirds and the Cape Breton Capers: a belated bottle of champagne for their CIS championship wins.

- To the men and women of the Queen's Golden Gaels soccer teams: a round of drinks in celebration of a successful season, and best wishes for next year's campaigns.

- To George Gillett: success in his new stadium endeavour for Liverpool. He comes across as a guy who genuinely cares about his franchises, and the tremendous level of access he gave to the Globe and Mail's Stephen Brunt recently certainly speaks well for him.

- To the aforementioned Mr. Brunt: congratulations for a solid year's worth of work. He's written many terrific soccer columns this year, including the aforementioned one on Gillett and Liverpool and his earlier call for replacement of the Canadian Soccer Association around the Black Wednesday protest. It's great to see a columnist of such stature not only talking about soccer, but writing insightful pieces on it. He's also written some other great columns this year, including those on the imminent invasion of the NFL, Bret Hart
, and the backroom maneuverings between the NHL and NHLPA. Keep up the good work.

- To another great Globe columnist, Ben Knight: kudos for a fantastic first few months in his new digs at the Globe on Soccer blog. He consistently provides great insight into and fascinating takes on the beautiful game.


Other Sports

- To the New York Giants: superhuman strength to knock off the insufferable Patriots against all odds (and not the steroid variety: it's not worth becoming cheaters to beat cheaters).
- To Madison Square Garden head honcho Jimmy Dolan: a hint that it might be time to Fire Isiah?
- To those named in the Mitchell Report: a old-fashioned Bronx cheer