ottawasportsblog

It's the most wonderful time of the year...

Bah humbug, forget Christmas, the fall is the most wonderful time of the year. Baseball pennant races and playoffs, football in full swing, hockey getting started. Hey, there was even a great golf tournament last weekend.

While the spring with the Stanley Cup, Memorial Cup, and spring training baseball definitely has its moments, there's still nothing like the autumn.

In the final week of the season, the Yankees are fighting with the Sox and Indians for the division and wild card. After 10 years of watching the Yankees suck mightily, I've spent the last 10 falls watching them in the playoffs annually. Knowing that they may be on the verge of sucking again with most of their roster now on the decline (we saw a glimpse with the 11-19 start), a last hurrah in the playoffs this year woud be sweet.

NFL football is in full swing, and along with the games come 2 fantasy leagues and a pick 'em pool.

Today is Gades game day. While things have been dire lately, with they're still well within striking distance of the playoffs.

Today is also Sens game day. Hasek plays his first full game in a Sens uniform and only three days to go until my first visit to the Corel Centre.

Fun times.

Not much time, but just had to sqeeze in a quick post, post-Sens game. It's the first televised one of the year, and my first glimpse at nearly the complete lineup of the new look Sens. I'm not going to read too much into a pre-season game, but they looked great. Brandon Bochenski continued to cement his spot on the team, and on Spezzas wing, with a hattrick. Volchenkov also left his mark, laying out a handful of Leafs with solid hits.

Mostly though, tonight isn't about the analysis, but more about just how odd, but great, it felt to be watching a real, live, Sens game (athough on TV for now). It was almost enough to take the edge off the Gades' latest train wreck of a game.

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Spent part of the weekend blowing through Dave Bidini's latest book The Best Game You Can Name. Like his other books, it's a quick and funny read, and ranks right up there with the best hockey books (thin as those ranks may be). He intermixes a narrative of his own musician league rec hockey tournament with relevant interviews and commentary from former players, coaches and writers. Like his other books, it's well worth a read.

Some random sports links from the last couple of weeks:

- like something out of the Onion - Lenny Dykstra, financial consultant
- courtesy of Jes Gobez: Gary Coleman, hockey groupie
- For the love of God won't you think of the children - An Open Letter to T.O. (thanks to Eric at OffWing Opinion for the pointer)
- Heather at so.very.obsessed is hosting the Carnival of the NHL #8
- Hockeybird has a nice Messier tribute podcast
- the vintage hockey masks page

Thankfully, it looks like the Gades have been saved from themselves for now.

Trade talks have broken down since publicly begging for a player like a kid in the cereal aisle will tend to drive up the price a bit. Palmer could be ok at the right price, given the right protection, and eased in as just another QB. He should not be the square marketing prop peg, in the round football operations hole.

Perhaps, the Gades can take the rumoured 5-600K salary and invest in upgrading the porous O-line to give KJ more than a nanosecond after the snap.

I won't even start on today's revelation that the Gades have added Ryan Leaf to their Neg List

The circus is ramping up.

Ugh.

Somehow, I always seem to inadvertently schedule my vacation for when the B.C. Lions are in town. Invariably, I never regret missing the game. Last night was no exception.

Although I couldn't be at the game, I managed to force myself to watch most of it on TSN. Thank you sir, may I have another!

I'm a postitive guy, but there's not much I can point to last night. The offence was bad. The defence was bad. The special teams were atrocious. There's nothing positive to be taken from 61-27. They're still ahead of the Ti-Cats... for now anyway.

Ugh.