Friday, October 30, 2009

The Habs Don't Need A Big Scoring Forward, They Need Another Team in Quebec City

I like to think that what the Habs really need is another team in Quebec City again, that way all the "journalists/fans" who have popped up since the mid 90's can go back to making life difficult for another Nordiques club.

After thinking it over for the last few months, I have come to the conclusion that the second worst thing to happen to hockey in Montreal in the last 20 years was the loss of the Nordiques, the worst thing being Ronald Corey's bumbling incompetence in the way he mismanaged the club. That day Corey cleaned house and brought in Tremblay and Houle, is a day the Habs are still trying to recover from, and his inability to get a written agreement on how the new building would be taxed was another killer.

I'm sure if you go into the home of any reporter/fan who crapped all over Koivu for not being french, yet thought Kovalev was the greatest player in Montreal since the rocket you will find either one of two things:

1. no hockey memorabilia/playing equipment or anything whatsoever to indicate that they know a thing about the game, they just think that they know the team is failing due to a lack of francophones

or

2. a startling amount of Nordiques memorabilia that would creep out a normal person (I'm thinking it would resemble something like a scene in one of those Hannibal Lecter movies, but instead of a below ground pit full of rotting flesh it would be piles and piles of clothing, cards and toys with that red igloo shaped N on it.)

these people are so bitter that their "Dekes" are gone and they won't be happy until they have ruined the hated "Habs" and they are doing it by presenting themselves as reporters, pundits and blog writing fans.

Friday, September 25, 2009

Random Ramblings

Australia is: The Land That Time Forgot - think about it for a few moments.  One of the most popular bands in the world right now is AC/DC, perpetually stuck in the 70's these lads aren't in to the latest fads.  Other recent bands to make it big from the land down under Jet, a bit more glam. Airbourne, these guys may as well be the bastard children of Angus et all.  Wolfmother, the look and sound like they shop at the the Jimmy Page boutique and are styled at the Robert Plant salon.  Don't get me wrong, I love AC/DC and Airbourne and I love that their style and sound is a little bit "back in time." Not too mention everyone there seems to have a tan despite the fact the rest of the world has learned about this thing called "skin cancer" in the last 20-30 years.

Not Convinced, just look at their cars, big rear wheeled drive v8 beasts, and they still make the el camino and ranchero down there, but of course they call em "utes".  It's entirely possible that they still have dinosaurs hidden down there somewhere, which would explain why they still drive big v8's, they will always have a supply of fuel as the dino's keep dying and turn into crude as part of the "Aussie circle of life".

J.P. Ricciardi - If I were picking a fanatasy league team I would follow his advice, but the catch here is that fantasy leagues are not real.  This guy probably spent a lot of time in high school playing strat o matic baseball along with being stuck in the locker by the jocks.

Strat o matic explains why he thinks players who hit 20 homeruns in 80 games and have never played a full season are better than players who have never been hurt but only hit 39 home runs in a full season.  He looks at the 80 game guy and figures he's worth more because in a full season he would hit 40 homeruns, which is 1 more than the proven player who never misses a game.

Being stuck in a locker often probably explains why he doesn't really like "star" athletes, what did he have against Delgado who was a proven performer, and would rather have the unproven players that have never played a full season, but have the "potential" to light it up.

Wayne Gretzky - Everyone should just lay off the poor guy, for quitting as coach.  Wayne has been used by people of questionable character since he left "the soo".  First is was Peter Pocklington (look up douchebag and you'll see his picture), then Bruce McNall (con artist and thief) and now Gary Bettman (who is just a dirt bag lawyer who excels at nothing but lying).

I think it would be safe to bet that buttman forced Wayne into the Phoenix situation the same way he made the NHL owners believe that southern expansion was too good to miss, by outright lying. "Don't worry Wayne, with you in Phoenix there is no way hockey can fail and you'll make millions of dollars" or something similar is what buttman probably told him.

Now that it is clear that whoever owns the Phoenix team has no plans for him, one of the parties being the same group that put him in Phoenix to begin with, can you blame the guy for not wanting to be where he's not wanted? Never mind the fact that he is probably tired of being used by these douches for the last 30 years or so.

Thursday, September 3, 2009

Motorf**kinhead

I had the chance to see Motorhead at the Sound Academy last night, and I was glad that I took the time to go see Lemmy and the boys one more time before Lemmy gets too old or ends up dying on stage.

As for the opening acts:

Nashville Pussy - these fat drunk rednecks put on a hell of the show, I have no idea why they were on first.  Sure they may live on beer, fried chicken and pot but they rock, they didn't steal the show like AC/DC did at the SARSfest a few years ago, but they kicked ass.

Limited to a small stage as they were the 1st of 3 acts on the night they played hard, they played fast, and they played well.  I must admit however that I was hypnotized by guitarist's Ruyter Suys knockers flopping all over the place and we were sure one of those meat puppies was going to pop out, but she must have some industrial strength adhesive under her bra to keep those suckers secure the way she was manically playing and kicking in the air.  This band just plain rocks.

Reverand Horton Heat - what the fuck were these guys doing higher up on the bill than Nashville Pussy?  They brought down most of the crowd and they just plain sucked sweaty balls.  All I could think while they were up was that if I wanted to hear the Stray Cats on speed I would go the Goodwill store, hit up the bin marked "We'll pay you to take it from us" and get a Stray Cats record and play it at 78 on my player at home. People were headed outside to smoke and I was standing around, yawning, thinking that my slightly warm and flat beer was more entertaining.

Fortunately I have no desire to listen to that rock a billy shit (they claimed it was country influenced, which it wasn't, it was just shit) and my record player isn't hooked up to anything right now, precluding any such desires from happening.  3 Words: They Sucked Ass.

Now, the reason why we were really there:

Motorhead - In a way its good that Lemmy's health problems forced him to quit drinking, and that's the only thing that has changed about the way this man lives life.  They came out fast and hard, Motorhead may have all the precision of the Big F'n Hammer in the tool box, but they are as just as effective at getting the job done when it comes to smacking you in the face with speed and volume.  As Lemmy says, they are Motorhead, they play Rock n F**kin Roll, no pretensions, no apologies, no remorse.  Cirque du soliel was in town at the same time and they are playing nearby, it was harder to tell who were the bigger freaks, the cirque performers or the Motorhead fans.

Motorhead came out with a mix of new and old, "Rock Out, Metropolis, Just Cos You Got the Power" were among the songs that got the crowd pumping their fists while the moshpit bubbled in all its fury, I counted about 5 people body surfing at one time, and there was one girl who must have went past us about 5 time during a couple songs as she kept going back for more "surfing".

They eventually made it up to "Killed By Death" where Danko Jones jumped on stage and screamed the backing vocals to the chorus. Danko was having such a good time that I thought he was either gonna wet himself or have an aneurysm, the veins were bulging out of the side of his head while he was up there flaying about like he was having a seizure, no one can accuse Danko of being laid back.

Then came the encore, the acoustic "Whorehouse Blues" (lets face it, Motorhead's acoustic is about as gentle as a metal grinder cutting through and inch of plate steel) felt like it was going to shake the roof off the building, which brought us to "Ace of Spades", you can't accuse them of not giving the people what they want, yet again the crowd was moshing and fists were pumping in the air while most everyone around us was screaming the words. At this point there was nothing left for them to do but play "Overkill" which has to be their most over top song, Mikkey Dee's drums hit you like a young Mike Tyson pounding on some poor chump, Lemmy's thunderous bass shook the floor, and Phill Campbell's guitar cut through it all, like the aforementined grinder through an inch of plate steel.

Lemmy and the boys may not be flashy, they don't sit and chat with the crowd, they just just play loud, fast and hard, which is all you can ask from them, and they give you more than you were looking. Lemmy was better than I had ever seen him before. I have to add that my frame of reference is years ago as a teenager when Lemmy was downing a 26 of Jack before the show and you would be lucky if he didn't pass out. In two words: "F**kin A"

I just have to wonder, who the hell put Nashville Pussy in the opening slot.  There could only be one of two reasons:

1. the promotors wanted to mellow the crowd before the sonic assault that is Motorhead to make Lemmy et all seem better
2. Lemmy wanted to party with the Pussy before hitting the stage.

I hope it was #2 as Motorhead doesn't need anyone to make them look better.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Does Balsillie really want an NHL team...

or does he just want to embarrass buttman and expose the sham which is the NHL under the little emperor's reign of incompetence?

Think about it:

The first time old Jim tried to get an NHL team (Pittsburgh Penguins) he played by their rules, he was accepted as an owner, and publicly stated that he would only move the Pittsburgh franchise if a new arena was not built, and then at the 11th hour the little emperor stepped in with a bunch of conditions/terms and sent Balsillie packing, basically buttman changed the rules of the game while they were playing.

The second time around, when Balsillie tried to obtain a team buttman sabotaged the entire process in order to have a hand picked owner, Delbaggio, take over the team while brokering a deal for the former Nashville owner to take control of the Minnesota franchise.  It seems kind of odd the the league claims that it didn't know that other owners were stepping in to help finance the Delbaggio's purchase by loaning him the money he needed.  And it doesn't help that the league's due diligence in checking Delbaggio's background failed to turn up anything that reporters and law enforcement easily found but a few months after the NHL welcomed him as an owner.

After two kicks at the can I like to thing that Balsillie has no interest in owning an NHL club while buttman is in charge and his only goal with the attempt to "steal" the Phoenix franchise is to expose buttman's mismanagement and to force the owners to finally do something about their employee, buttman, who seems to think that he is in charge of the owners when it is the other way around.

There has to be a reason why the NBA let buttman go with no fight, and we are seeing it quite clearly with the whole mess that has come to the top of the pot that Balsillie is stirring right now.

I hope that the end result of this mess is buttman's removal from his position, lets face everything he has done has failed.  Sunbelt expansion and the failure of "cost certainty" to control player salaries are but two of the ways he has succeeded in running the NHL into the ground.