Women’s National Basketball Association

Let’s talk about Bobby Orr’s boot-licking…a rout for the Drab Slab…ignoring female sports…and other things on my mind…

A Monday morning smorgas-bored…and welcome to the 71st November of my lifetime…

So, I’m doing some research the other day and I stumble upon this May 9 headline from the Boston Globe:

“50 years later, Bobby Orr remains gracious, humble, and incomparable.”

Oops.

Few have been describing Robert Gordon Orr as gracious, humble and incomparable in the past few days. More like dumb, ignorant and fallen idol.

All that because the great No. 4 has outed himself as a hard-core Trumpite who plans to scratch an X next to the name Donald Trump on his ballot for tomorrow’s U.S. presidential election.

Lest there be any doubt about his political posturing, Orr took out a full-page ad in the New Hampshire Union Leader last week to confirm his unwavering devotion to the current resident at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW in Washington, D.C., trumpeting Trump as “the kind of teammate I want.”

I’m not sure what Derek Sanderson or Eddie Westfall or Wayne Cashman or Pie McKenzie have to say about that, but I suspect one or two of Bobby’s former big, bad Bruins teammates might be cringing.

Many among the rabble and numerous pundits certainly are.

I mean, this is Bobby Orr. Canadian icon. Squeaky-clean boy next door. The greatest player in National Hockey League history on many scorecards, including mine. And he’s marching in lockstep with a man known to put children in cages, who believes groping women is harmless horseplay, who wouldn’t know the truth if it slapped him on his orange face? That’s who Bobby Orr has cozied up to?

What, he couldn’t find a better pair of boots to lick?

The same could be said, of course, for golf great Jack Nicklaus and Brett Favre, one-time flinger of footballs and renowned flip-flopper. They, too, are confirmed Trumpites. But we don’t care about them so much on this side of the great U.S.-Canada divide.

It’s Orr who has taken a paddywhacking in print and on social media, as if he’s the product of Satan’s loins.

Some examples:

Stu Cowan, Montreal Gazette: “It’s always a sad day when your childhood sports heroes let you down. I’ll never again look at Orr with the same boyhood wonder. (The endorsement of Trump) hit me like an open-ice bodycheck. It shouldn’t have because I’ve been around pro sports as a journalist long enough to know that sometimes the less fans know about their heroes away from the field or arena, the better off they are. But this one did hurt. I’ll sadly scratch him off my hero list. The stain of Trump just won’t wash away.”

Damien Cox, Toronto Star: “Sadly, Orr’s comments reek of appalling ignorance, of a man who has watched too much Fox News. He says he just wants ‘my grandchildren to know the America that I know’ and then chooses to cast Trump as some sort of victim.”

Ted Wyman, Winnipeg Sun: “It’s not easy for many sports fans to hear that men they have held as idols for the last half century would endorse a political candidate known for his racism, his sowing of divisiveness in his country and his thorough disregard of the severity of the COVID-19 pandemic. Like most golf fans, I’ve always revered Nicklaus. Like most Canadians, I’ve always idolized Orr. Like many, I’m bitterly disappointed in them.”

Bruce Arthur, the Toronto Star/TSN: “These guys are wealthy. They’re really rich and Donald Trump wants to airlift money from the poor to the rich, and that helps them. This tells you a lot about Bobby Orr and Jack Nicklaus, what they value in life and what they don’t have to worry about.”

Cathal Kelly, Globe and Mail: “On one level, Orr’s and Nicklaus’s statements took some stones. Neither of them needs the hassle. This opens them up to all sorts of nastiness from the other faction. On the other level, it is dumb beyond measure. Not because of their choice (though that is also dumb), but because two giants of their respective games felt the need to announce it. The United States is tilting sideways for a bunch of reasons. This is one of them.”

Well, let me say this about that: Must be nice to be so filthy rich that you can afford to take out a full-page ad in a newspaper. But I’ll robustly defend Bobby Orr’s right to be as horribly wrong about Donald Trump as any of the other lemmings wearing a MAGA cap. His choice. And if you don’t like it, don’t put halos on athletes.

Last week in America: The sports power couple of hoops great Sue Bird and soccer star Megan Rapinoe announced their wedding engagement and, one day later, U.S. senator and Trumpite bootlicker Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told “every young woman” that “there’s a place for you in America if you are pro-life, if you embrace your religion, and you follow traditional family structure.” Which means there’s no “place” in Graham’s America for a woman who’s won Olympic gold for Uncle Sam in basketball and another women who’s won Olympic gold for Uncle Sam in soccer, because they’re lesbians. Lindsey Graham is a special kind of messed up.

Why is it that whenever I watch men’s tennis highlights, there’s a trainer rubbing down one of Milos Raonic’s broken-down body parts, or either Denis Shapovalov or Felix Auger-Alliassime are tossing racquets?

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: The Drab Slab is kicking butt when it comes to coverage of lower-tiered sports in Good Ol’ Hometown. I know this because I monitored both the Freep and Winnipeg Sun sections during the past three months, and both rags do boffo work on the big-ticket beats—Blue Bombers, Jets, Moose, Goldeyes and Valour FC. But it’s a rout otherwise. Here’s the tally on coverage of local/amateur sports (excluding pro teams):

Free Press
August ……..32 articles, 6 briefs
September….39 articles, 6 briefs
October……..49 articles, 3 briefs
Totals……..122 articles, 15 briefs

Sun
August ……..1 article
September….7 articles, 3 briefs
October…….10 articles
Totals………18 articles, 3 briefs

Seriously, 122-18. That reads like a Harlem Globetrotters scoreline.

Do readers want more local coverage? My experience tells me they do, but the suits at Postmedia in the Republic of Tranna won’t let them have it in the Sun. And that’s wrong. So don’t point accusing fingers at the Sun’s Scribblers Three—Paul Friesen, Ted Wyman, Scott Billeck. It isn’t their fault. It’s a corporate call.

Here’s something I found interesting: In a recent edition of his morning Playbook feature on the Drab Slab website, sports editor Steve Lyons took issue with commissioner Randy Ambrosie and the aborted Canadian Football League crusade. “It’s been a little over two months since the CFL cancelled its 2020 season,” he wrote. “Since then, a Stanley Cup has been awarded; Game 1 of the World Series was last night; the NFL is into Week 7; LeBron James won another NBA title; heck, even the upstart CPL had a championship. The CFL? Silence.” Notice something missing there? That’s right, no mention of the Women’s National Basketball Association starting and completing a season, nor the National Women’s Soccer League commencing its Fall Series. Unfortunately, that’s the default position for too many upper-management people in sports media—female sports is an after-thought. Or no thought at all.

I’m still reading and hearing that the signing of Dylan DeMelo improves the Winnipeg Jets defence. That simply is not true. Repeat after me: DeMelo was with the Jets last season. That’s not an improvement. It’s status quo. So the glass-is-half-full pundits can cease with their false narrative any time now.

There’s talk of the Ontario Hockey League going to pure pond hockey this winter, which is to say no bodychecking. Hmmm. If they had that rule when I was a kid, I might still be playing.

And, finally, Agent 007, Sean Connery, is dead and I still don’t know what I’m missing, because I’ve never watched a James Bond movie. Loved Sir Sean in Finding Forrester and The Untouchables, though.

Let’s talk about a fresh batch of ruffled feathers…Wheeler’s classy gesture…no-throw Jimmy G…the real NFL MVP…a lesbian at the Super Bowl…Denis the Tennis Menace…Tie Domi and the Dream Gappers…and curlers have day jobs, too

Monday morning coming down in 3, 2, 1…and I had a dream last night that dozens of enormous meteorites hit Earth and the only thing to survive was women’s hockey. Unfortunately, there was no one else left to watch it…

Oh…my…gawd.

The Winnipeg Jets held a players-only, closed-door, navel-gazing session immediately after their 5-2 loss to the Blackhawks on Sunday in the Toddlin’ Town, and you know what that means, don’t you?

That’s right. Cue the controversy and scandal.

I mean, the last time the Jets blocked entrance to their changing chamber and told news snoops to twiddle their thumbs on the heels of an irksome stumble, we were advised that the National Hockey League club was “rotten to the core” and the dressing room was “fractured.”

Why else would the local lads duck and hide, right?

Thus, galloping gossip ensued and we heard about fist fights in the room, fist fights in the parking lot, one player dating another player’s lady, Blake Wheeler and Dustin Byfuglien in an alpha dog power struggle, Patrik Laine pouting, jealousy over the amount of money in pay envelopes, and head coach Paul Maurice tossed some petrol on that bonfire of speculation at his season-end squawk with the boys and girls on the beat, mentioning something about “ruffled feathers.”

None of those charges was ever proven in a court of law, or even a kangaroo court, but there was no stuffing that genie back in the bottle. The Jets were “rotten to the core” and a closed-door meeting was the smoking gun.

As if.

Let me tell you something about closed-door meetings in hockey: They’re as commonplace as spitting.

There’s been a handful of them this crusade, and I believe the Tranna Maple Leafs have held two, although defrocked head coach Mike Babcock described the first one as a “family discussion.”

So, hopefully, news snoops at the Drab Slab won’t do the Chicken Little thing this time around and commence to writing fiction. Unless, of course, they can provide ample evidence that there’s something rotten in the state of Denmark. If so, we’ll be all ears..

Classy gesture by Jets captain Blake Wheeler when, before departing the freeze following Sunday’s skirmish, he congratulated Patrick Kane of the Blackhawks on his 1,000th NHL point. Nice touch.

A question about the San Francisco 49ers offence: Do they have any receivers? I mean, quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo tossed what, eight passes in Sunday’s 37-20 victory over the Green Bay Packers? He went more than an hour and a half without flinging the football. I’ve seen guys in straightjackets get more use out of a right arm. I can’t see Jimmy G getting away with that against the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LIV, though. Let’s see him try to beat them with one arm tied behind his back.

After watching Patrick Mahomes do his thing in dismantling the Tennessee Titans on Sunday, I can’t imagine anyone in the National Football League is more valuable to his team than the Chiefs QB. Lamar Jackson will get the MVP nod, but it won’t seem right when Mahomes is playing in the large match on Feb. 2 in Miami.

Hey, check it out: One of the 49ers assistant coaches is a woman. And gay. That would be Katie Sowers, who works with the San Fran offence that put 37 points on the board v. the Packers. Imagine that. A lesbian coaching in the Super Bowl. Who’d have thunk?

Early Super Bowl LIV prediction: Kansas City XXXV, San Francisco XVII, JLo/Shakira X out of X stars.

Something tells me we’ll be seeing more of the spoiled-brat side of Denis (The Tennis Menace) Shapovalov on tour this year. Our guy Shapo is strung tighter than banjo strings, and he was reduced to a racquet-tossing mess in bowing out of the Australian Open on the weekend, losing 6-3, 6-7(7), 6-1, 7-6(3) to Marton Fucsovics of Hungary in the opening round. At one point, Shapo was tsk-tsked by umpire Renaud Lichtenstein for racquet abuse, which produced this growl: “It’s my racquet. I can do whatever the hell I want with it. What are you talking about? It’s a terrible call! Do your job! Do your job! That’s an absolute joke!” It wasn’t quite up to John McEnroe or Serena Williams standards on the rant-o-metre, but Shapo’s young. Give him time.

The Dream Gappers need to do themselves a favor—tell Tie Domi to shut his pie hole. Pronto.

Domi, you see, awoke one recent morning and, much to his deep disappointment, arrived at the disturbing realization that the world wasn’t paying him enough attention, thus he started talking about women’s hockey.

That would have been acceptable, I suppose, had Domi confined his comments to the family dinner table or a convenient man cave. Alas, he was given voice on the Spittin’ Chiclets podcast; the deep-thinkers plotting strategy for the Professional Women’s Hockey Players Association thought it would be a swell idea to include him in their Closing The Gap function; Tara Slone and Ron MacLean provided him a pulpit on Hometown Hockey; and, finally, he used his Twitter feed to insult anyone who has the bad manners to disagree with the Gospel According to Tie.

“I’m gonna do whatever I can to help these women have a real league, and they deserve it,” Domi informed Slone and MacLean a week ago. “The NHL started with six teams and I think we could start, in good markets, I think we could start with six teams and, uh, that’s my goal, to help them, whatever I can do.”

“Amen,” swooned Slone.

Well, let me just say this about that: Ponytail Puck needs Tie Domi about as much as Michael Jordan needs a comb.

Domi was an NHL thug and still acts like one (more on that shortly). He couldn’t cut it in today’s NHL, because players need more in their tool box than two fists and a head full of poured concrete. He wears his 333 career fights—plus one with a spectator—as a badge of honor, and seems to think his history of cement-head hockey and an out-of-nowhere interest in the distaff side of the game qualifies him as a spokesman for Ponytail Puck.

“I’ve watched it three times now,” Domi boasted on Spittin’ Chiclets.

Three women’s games. Wow. That many, eh? I suppose if he watches three episodes of Grey’s Anatomy or New Amsterdam he’ll begin to share his knowledge of open-heart surgery with us, too.

Domi adds nothing to the conversation, except a bad attitude and to parrot what others have already said about the absence of a viable women’s pro league: “The NHL and the NHLPA really have to get involved. Fifty per cent of the crowd is girls, or women, so, like, you’re gonna have interest. And what do they have right now? They don’t have anything right now. They don’t have anything ’cause it got taken away from them, so…I’m a true believer it’s gotta be fixed, and that’s on the NHLPA and the NHL to get that right.”

Actually, they do have something right now. It’s called the National Women’s Hockey League. It’s just that Domi and those he pretends to squawk for—the PWHPA and its Dream Gap Tour—would rather trash talk than discuss ways of bridging the great divide in Ponytail Puck.

Consider this Twitter exchange last weekend:

Domi: “If you think that’s the best quality woman’s (sic) hockey has to offer your (sic) 100% wrong! NWHL is hurting woman’s (sic) hockey and the sooner they figure that out the better for the Sport! The time has come!”

Corinne Buie Stan Account: “Can you explain to me, in your own words, how the NWHL is hurting women’s hockey?”

Domi: “Your (sic) dumb.”

(We’ll have to excuse Domi has glaring spelling errors. After all, it must be difficult typing with two clenched fists.)

Anyway, the always-charming Domi went on to insult other NWHL supporters, telling them, “your (sic) dumb” and “your (sic) dummer (sic).”

That from a guy who, on Spittin’ Chiclets, claimed, “What’s most important is when people treat you with respect, you give it back, and I’ve always been that way.”

Sigh.

Once a thug, always a thug, and I’m surprised a number of the Dream Gappers have welcomed his voice to their crusade. Mind you, it wasn’t so long ago when Hilary Knight of the PWHPA was mean-mouthing the NWHL as a “glorified beer league,” so I suppose crapping on the women who just want to play hockey in an actual league is part of their strategy.

And that’s sad.

By way of contrast, consider what the NWHL has to say about members of the PWHPA participating in a 3-on-3 game at next weekend’s NHL all-star shindig: “Congratulations to the outstanding national team players from the U.S. and Canada selected to participate in the Elite Women’s 3-on-3. Every major showcase of women’s hockey is an important moment and a victory for all who care about the sport. This game will have speed, skill and magic, and we can’t wait to see it.” So, one group wants a cat fight, the other wants to keep it classy.

According to the PWHPA, total attendance was 4,310 for their six Dream Gap Tour scrimmages last weekend in the Republic of Tranna and Vaughan, Ont., which works out to an average of 718. The top head count was 1,151, the lowest 203 (there were actually less than 100 when they dropped the puck). Meanwhile, the Dream Gappers were in Waterloo on Saturday, and let’s just say the empty seats greatly outnumbered the occupied seats. How anyone expects to earn a livable wage at those numbers is a mystery, but I’m sure Tie Domi will be presenting his business plan any day now. And, naturally, he’ll dig into his own pocket and help bankroll the league.

Just as an FYI, here are the average attendance figures for three professional women’s leagues in 2019:
Women’s National Basketball Association: 6,535 (high: L.A. Sparks, 11,307; low N.Y. Liberty, 2,239).
National Women’s Soccer League: 7,337 (high: Portland Thorns, 20,098; low Sky Blue FC, 3,338).
National Women’s Hockey League: 954 (high: Minnesota Whitecaps, 1,200; low Connecticut Whale, 423).
I couldn’t find official head counts for the dearly departed Canadian Women’s Hockey League, but the Toronto Furies averaged about 200 patrons per game pre-Christmas 2018, and it was 500 after Santa’s annual visit.

With so many people anxious to spend the NHL’s money, I find myself wondering what Puck Pontiff Mark Chipman thinks about subsidizing a women’s league. I’d really like to know if the Winnipeg Jets co-bankroll is for or against the notion, and I wish someone in mainstream media would ask that very question.

I find it interesting that Billie Jean King has thrown her full support behind the PWHPA, but she says squat in favor of the NWHL, which actually pays its players and has a 50/50 split on merchandise sales. Is the tennis legend and social activist in favor of all female athletes getting ahead, or just the select few that ask her for photo-ops?

Tip of the bonnet to The Hockey News, which doesn’t consider the NWHL to be hockey’s evil empire and continues to cover both sides of the great divide without prejudice.

I’m fully on board with one pro women’s league, but I really wish they’d stop talking about what they “deserve,” simply because they’re the best in the world and shouldn’t have to hold down day jobs to put food on the table. Look, Kevin Koe is a world-class curler (perhaps the best), and he holds down a day job as a surface landman with Repsol Canada. “The day somebody says I’m going to quit (her or his day job), I’m going to be a full-time curler because I’m making so much money, well I don’t see it happening,” he told The Morning Cup during the recent Continental Cup event in London, Ont. “I’m not complaining, but I’m not about to quit my job…and I’ve been a pretty good curler over the last decade.” Pretty good? How about four Brier championships and two world titles worth of good? The planet’s top Pebble People spend anywhere from $150,000-$200,000 a year to compete, and they pray they break even. They receive no health benefits. They spend upwards of 200 days on the road, playing from August to May. Koe throws rocks during lunch hour so he can be home with his bride and their two daughters at night. He trains on his own time and on his own dime. The only way curlers get paid is to win, and that’s the only way they can attract sponsors. It’s the same story for 99.9 per cent of them, but I’ve yet to hear any of them talk about what they “deserve” out of life. When they believed they were getting a raw deal, they started their own league and made it work. It’s called the Grand Slam of Curling.

And, finally, some have asked why I’m still writing this blog after I vowed to shut it down. Simple: Doctors orders. I’m supposed to take two Aspirin and write in the morning.

Let’s talk about Ted Green OF THE WINNIPEG JETS…a “family discussion” in The ROT…double speak from Mike O’Shea…Edmonton Eskimos fans eat well, Winnipeg Blue Bombers fans drink well…no female news snoops in Canadian Football Hall of Fame…a twit on Twitter…and other things on my mind

Another Sunday smorgas-bored…and bravo to the 20,907 souls who trudged through the white stuff and made it to Football Follies Field in Fort Gary for the Bombers-Larks skirmish on Saturday…

I remember the day Teddy Green retired. He cried.

Not for himself, understand. I don’t recall Teddy ever feeling sorry for himself, even though he never experienced a pain-free day after Wayne Maki clubbed him over the head with a hockey stick.

So, if the tears couldn’t possibly have been for the one-time toughest dude in hockey, who?

“I remember a guy who used to play on the Million Dollar Line before he came to Boston,” Green explained the day he stepped away from a professional playing career that had come full cycle, starting in Winnipeg with the Warriors in 1959 and concluding with the Jets in 1979. “He went out and busted his butt every game and then would sit at the end of the bench spitting out blood. Murray Balfour was dying of cancer. I’d like to think I fashioned some of my courage from Murray Balfour.”

None of us who traveled with the Jets back in the day ever questioned Teddy’s sand.

We’d watch him hobble onto buses and through airports like an old man on a pair of knees that had endured the slicing and dicing of a surgeon’s scalpel five times, and we knew all about the headaches that often put him into a state of paralysis. But Teddy was tire-iron tough. He played through all the searing discomfort, and did so admirably. We marveled.

“I only missed one game in seven years because of the headaches,” he said with a proper level of pride on the January 1979 day he bid adieu to his playing career, but not the game.

The headaches, of course, were a reminder of his ugly stick-swinging duel with Wayne Maki of the St. Louis Blues on Sept. 21, 1969. They had clashed near one of the nets in a National Hockey League exhibition game, Teddy wielding his lumber first, striking Maki with a blow to the shoulder. The St. Louis forward retaliated and, unfortunately, he had better aim, chopping down on Teddy’s head with Bunyanesque force.

Teddy lay on the freeze in a contorted mess and was whisked away from the rink to an Ottawa hospital, where medics spent five hours repairing his fractured skull and keeping the Grim Reaper at bay. By the time Teddy was fit enough to rejoin the Boston Bruins, in 1970-71, there was a plate in his head and a helmet on top of it. He helped them win the Stanley Cup in the spring of ’72.

“I never met a guy with more intestinal fortitude,” Phil Esposito said of his former teammate, who drew his final breath the other day at age 79.

The thing you should know about Teddy, is that his on-ice persona didn’t match the man away from the freeze. A bonfire burned in his belly in battle, but once removed from the fray he was gentle, thoughtful and soft spoken, sometimes to the point of mumbling. His words were often accompanied by a devlish cackle, as if he’d just pulled a prank, and he probably had.

The 1959 Winnipeg Braves. Teddy is second from the left in the back row.

As mentioned, Teddy’s career began and ended in Good Ol’ Hometown. He started on the frozen ponds of St. Boniface, and upper-level hockey people began taking notice of the tough guy on defence when he lined up on the blueline with les Canadiens in the Manitoba Junior Hockey League. Legendary shinny lifers Bill Addison and Bill Allum recruited Teddy to join the Winnipeg Braves for their Memorial Cup crusade in 1959, and they won the national Junior title, beating the Scotty Bowman-coached Peterborough Petes in five games.

Teddy added a Stanley Cup with the Bruins, he captained the New England Whalers to the inaugural World Hockey Association title, and he added two more after joining the Jets in 1975-76.

“I ended up in Winnipeg, which was a real plus, and I won a couple of championships,” he told me at his retirement presser. “I also got to play with one of the best forward lines ever put together in hockey in Ulf (Nilsson), Anders (Hedberg) and Bobby (Hull). And I was part of the European influx.”

Teddy always kept good company on the freeze, dating back to his time with the Braves, an outfit that included Ernie Wakely, Bobby Leiter, Gary Bergman, and local Junior legends Wayne Larkin and Laurie Langrell. He played with Bobby Orr, Espo and the Big Bad Bruins, Hull, Hedberg and the two Nilssons, Ulf and Kent, with the Jets, and he coached Wayne Gretzky, Jari Kurri, Mark Messier and the boys on the bus in Edmonton.

Most of the headlines and dispatches since his death have been devoted to Teddy’s time with the Bruins and Oilers, but his formative years on the rinks of River City and three-plus winters with the Jets should be more than a footnote.

He was one of us, a local lad who found his way home to bookend his Memorial Cup championship with two WHA titles.

Great career, better guy.

Shame on the Drab Slab for reducing Green’s death to a sports brief. That’s all he deserves? What, no one at the broadsheet has a phone that works? They couldn’t call some of his former teammates? Do they not realize this guy was hockey royalty in River City? The Winnipeg Sun, meanwhile, ran a nice piece by Jimmy Matheson of Postmedia E-Town, but it was totally Oilers-centric. It’s as if Teddy never played hockey in Good Ol’ Hometown. Well, he did, dammit. He earned his chops on our frozen ponds and he was a significant part of the Jets’ WHA glory days.

Oh dear. After three straight losses, the Tranna Maple Leafs felt obliged to conduct a special think tank to discuss their repeated face plants. “A family discussion,” is how head coach Mike Babcock described the behind-closed-doors to and fro. “It’s just honest. Like any family, you keep each other accountable.” So, when les Leafs huddle on the QT it’s a “family discussion,” but when les Jets do that very thing some zealots in the media tell us the changing room is “rotten to the core” and “fractured.” Go figure.

I note that Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister has declared a state of emergency. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think the Winnipeg Blue Bombers’ quarterbacking situation is that bad.

Ever wonder why news snoops become such cynical SOBs? Well, consider the sound bites delivered by head coach Mike O’Shea when asked if his Bombers would recruit a veteran quarterback to baby sit Chris Streveler:

Sept. 30 (to Knuckles Irving on the CJOB Coach’s Show): “That’s not gonna happen, and I’m good with it. I like our guys. Very confident in our guys. Dance with the one you brung.”

Oct. 2: “To really think that a guy’s gonna come in and change your franchise this late in the season, it’s pretty difficult in football. Even if you trade for a veteran presence, unless he knows your guys, it’s really hard for even a veteran guy to come in late in a season and lead. I really just don’t think those scenarios work or can be applied to football this late in the season. Especially (a quarterback). Quarterbacks usually do a lot better when they’ve got a playbook and a training camp and exhibition games to play with.”

Oct. 10 (after the signing of veteran Zach Collaros): “I think it’s a good move. We said right from the get-go about bringing in a veteran guy. Now we got a seasoned veteran who comes in and, you know, will have a role and it’ll definitely be a good guy to have in the building. Knowing Zach, he’s a smart guy, a competitive guy, he’s going to pick things up very quickly. I’m sure the concepts are very familiar to him. The terminology will be probably different, but, I mean, that’s the reason we talked about a veteran guy, because it comes that much quicker and understanding CFL defences is something these guys do no matter what the play call is. That’s important.”

So, to sum up: O’Shea never wanted a veteran QB but he wanted one “right from the get-go,” and even a veteran QB is too stupid to pick up the system in a short time, except Collaros isn’t too stupid to pick up the system in a short time. Good grief.

Well lookee here. According to Gaming Club Casino, there’s no better burg to be a Canadian Football League fan than Edmonton, with Winnipeg a solid second. First thought: Obviously, it has nothing to do with winning. Sure enough, the folks at GCC used six measuring sticks, only one of which—touchdowns—

involves the on-field product, so findings were based mainly on ticket costs, precipitation, pollution and the tariff on burgers and beer. Turns out that E-Town has the best burger prices and the second-lowest admission fees, while Good Ol’ Hometown has the cheapest booze, which is probably a good thing. I mean, when you’ve been watching your team lose every year since 1990, chances are you need a drink or two.

A couple of peculiarities in the GCC study: B.C. Lions received the worst mark for all the wet stuff than falls in Lotus Land, except for one thing—the Leos play in the air-conditioned comfort of B.C. Place Stadium. Indoors. Under a $514-million umbrella. Meanwhile, Ottawa scored high marks for being the least-polluted city. Hmmm. Apparently they didn’t watch either of last week’s federal election debates.

This year’s inductees to the media wing of the Canadian Football Hall of Fame are former colleagues Steve Simmons (Calgary Sun) and Larry Tucker (Winnipeg Tribune). That brings to 14 the number of CFHofFamers that I worked beside at one time or another during my 30 years in jock journalism. My all-time all-star team from that bunch: Trent Frayne, Jack Matheson, young Eddie Tait, Shakey Hunt, Jim Coleman and Knuckles Irving.

It’s worth noting that the media wing of the Canadian grid hall is the ultimate boys club. There are now 99 card-carrying members and, unless I missed something when I called up the CFHofF website, not one of them is female. Zero. Nada. Seems to me that they should have made room for trailblazers like Joanne Ireland, Ashley Prest, Robin Brown and Judy Owen by now.

The CFL has always been blessed by quality news snoops on the beat, and I don’t think anyone covers Rouge Football better today than Dave Naylor of TSN. Just saying.

This week’s Twit on Twitter: The aforementioned Simmons of Postmedia Tranna. The Vancouver Canucks put on the glitz for their home opener last week, and the production featured an on-ice, in-uniform cameo appearance by Todd Bertuzzi, he of the infamous Steve Moore goon job. That prompted Simmons to tweet, “Sad.” My oh my. How thoughtless of the Canucks for not clearing their guest list with a mook columnist from the Republic of Tranna. Never mind that Bert is among Vancity’s favorite hockey sons and the Canucks had every right to include him in their puck pageantry. A mook columnist from The ROT says it was wrong, so it must be. As freaking if. Simmons’ morality metre is sorely out of whack. He believes Bertuzzi should be persona non grata for mugging Moore, yet he celebrated the arrival of a woman-beater, Johnny Manziel, to the CFL. “Personally, I think the CFL is stronger, maybe more fun, possibly more fan-appealing, with Manziel playing or trying to play the Canadian game,” he wrote. “Where do I sign up?” So, if you’re scoring at home, Simmons believes an on-ice mugging is a more egregious trespass than beating up, and threatening to kill, a woman. The mind boggles.

When soccer’s purple-haired diva Megan Rapinoe shouted “Gays rule!” during last summer’s women’s soccer World Cup, she wasn’t kidding. Rapinoe, a lesbian, was anointed FIFA female footballer of the year. Jill Ellis, a lesbian, was anointed FIFA female coach of the year. Elena Delle Donne, a lesbian, is the Women’s National Basketball Association MVP and league champion with the Washington Mystics. Katie Sowers, a lesbian, is an assistant offensive coach with the San Francisco 49ers, who remain unbeaten this year in the National Football League. Meanwhile, all the gay guys remain in hiding.

Price comparison: A standing-room ticket to see the Jets and Chicago Blackhawks on Saturday in the Toddlin’ Town was $27. Meanwhile, a standing room ticket to watch the Buffalo Beauts v. Boston Pride, or Metropolitan Riveters v. Minnesota Whitecaps, of the National Women’s Hockey League went for $20. I don’t know if the NWHL is overpricing its product or the Blackhawks are underpricing, but a $7 difference seems out of whack to me.

Hey, check it out. Head coach Tim Hunter of the Moose Jaw Warriors has hired a female, Olivia Howe, as one of his assistants. That’s a first for the Western Hockey League, and I say good on Hunter.

And, finally, if you’re having a gobbler dinner with all the fixings today or Monday, be thankful that turkeys don’t fly.

About Winnipeg Blue Bombers Coach D’oh!…an odd final round at Royal Birkdale…gay female athletes dating…pretty on the tennis court…and why don’t some guys just shut up?

I cannot survive in a 140-character world, so here are more tweets that grew up to be too big for Twitter…

I’m not sure what happens to Mike O’Shea when he gets to B.C. Place Stadium.

Maybe it’s the drinking water. Ya, that’s it. Someone is spiking his H2O with mind-altering drugs, because it’s become evident that the Winnipeg Blue Bombers head coach is seeing things that aren’t there. I mean, the rest of us see an impossible 61-yard field goal attempt, but O’Shea sees a ho-hum chip shot. We see Justin Medlock as a punter/place-kicker, but O’Shea sees him as Dieter Brock or Kenny Ploen.

He’s delusional like the Nevada Parole Board.

Mind you, nobody can accuse the Bombers sideline steward of being a one-trick pony.

He did, after all, give us two displays of hocus-pocus for the price of one on Friday night in Vancouver. Trouble is, an argument can be made that O’Shea’s smoke and mirrors is the main reason the Bombers were found wanting in their Canadian Football League skirmish with the B.C. Lions.

Yes, I’m aware that a fake field goal was executed to perfection and resulted in seven points. Kudos for venturesome and creative football. Alas, we were also reminded that there’s a time and place for sleight of hand, and midway through the fourth quarter—on third-and-15 with the ball nestled on your own 26-yard stripe!—is neither the time nor the place for Justin Medlock to be passing instead of punting.

Unless, of course, you’re Coach D’oh and you’re hallucinating.

O’Shea’s fourth-quarter brain cramp also resulted in points. Eight of them. For the Lions, who were less into gimmickry and more into gutting it out while turning a 15-point deficit into a 45-42 success.

Go ahead and give O’Shea full marks for his daring if you like. It can be get-out-of-your-seat exciting. But it’s folly for a head coach to double dog dare himself into making dumb decisions, which seems to now be the rule rather than the exception for the Bombers puppet master on the Wet Coast.

It’s all about picking your spots, and when O’Shea allowed Medlock to pass rather than punt while nursing an eight-point lead on Friday he picked the wrong spot.

“We don’t think of them as trick plays,” he advised news snoops after the fact. “They’re well designed and well thought out and well executed by the players that buy into that.”

Well, okay. Except receiver Derek Jones must have missed the memo, because he had his back turned to Medlock’s wonky pass on the “called play.”

It was just dumb, dumb, dumb.

So, was the faux punt really a “called play” as O’Shea insists or was it a Medlock ad lib? “I’ll take the blame for it,” Medlock said post-gaffe. “Whatever comes if it, I’m not going to sit here and point fingers.” And I’ll take that to mean someone else screwed up. In either case, it still comes down to coaching. Football is very much a situational game, and an alert coach doesn’t permit his punter to fiddle fart around when it’s third-and-15 at the 26-yard stripe while nursing an eight-point lead with slightly more than eight minutes to play.

A few words about the final round of the Open golf championship Sunday at the Royal Birkdale in Southport, England: Brutal and brilliant. Ragged and remarkable. Seriously. Champion golfer of the year Jordan Spieth was all over the British Isles through the first four holes, carding three bogeys, and his tee shot on 13 hole was so far off the mark that the ball almost landed in Ireland. It took him half an hour to complete the hole. Then he goes birdie-eagle-birdie-birdie in less time than it takes to whip up a full English breakfast. Incredible. What I like most about Spieth, who now has a collection of three Grand Slam titles, is his manner: He seems like a lovely, young man.

Attention Politically Correct Police: If sports scribes choose to describe ascending tennis star Garbine Muguruza as pretty or sexy, spare us your squawking because they have her blessing. “I see a lot of criticism sometimes when a sportswoman wants to feel pretty on the court,” the reigning Wimbledon and 2016 French Open ladies’ champion says. “I want to feel pretty out there, I’m going to feel more comfortable and confident if I have a beautiful dress on. It doesn’t go against being an athlete.” So there. Don’t scream sexism when a jock journo writes about her appearance.

Seattle Storm guard Sue Bird, at 36 the oldest player in the Women’s National Basketball Association, tells ESPNW magazine that she’s a lesbian and, except for the fact she’s dating American soccer star Megan Rapinoe, it’s a ho-hum revelation. There’s a reason for that: Gay female athletes at the highest echelons are commonplace, whereas their male counterparts are about half a century behind when it comes to acceptance and inclusiveness. Both Bird and Rapinoe, by the way, are Olympic gold medallists, further evidence that having gays on a team roster is not an impediment to success.

The quote machine has gone into overdrive the past couple of weeks, and much of it has been painful to hear and read. For example…

Boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr. said this about Conor McGregor, his opponent in an Aug. 26 bout: “He totally disrespected black women. He called black people monkeys. Then he spoke disrespectfully to my daughter’s mother and he spoke disrespectfully to my daughter.” Yo! Floyd! You’re a serial woman-beater. You’ve gone to jail for beating up women. Don’t talk to us about disrespecting women.
Former National Football League quarterback Michael Vick had these words of advice for blackballed QB Colin Kaepernick: “(The) first thing we got to get Colin to do is cut his hair. I’m not here trying to be politcially correct, but, even if he puts cornrows in there, I don’t think he should represent himself in that way. The most important thing he needs to do is just try and be presentable. He may need a life coach.” Yo! Mikey! You used to torture and kill dogs in a dog-fighting operation. You went to jail for torturing and killing dogs. Don’t talk to us about life coaches.
Unconvicted killer and convicted armed robber O.J. Simpson said this while sweet-talking four members of the Nevada Parole Board into granting him his freedom after almost nine years behind bars: “I basically spent a conflict-free life,” and “No one ever accused me of pulling a weapon on them.” Yo! Juice! You beat your ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson so severely one night that she was taken to hospital, you hacked her and friend Ron Goldman to death, you robbed people at gunpoint. Don’t talk to us about non-conflict and deadly weapons.

Frankly, while wooing the Nevada parole commissioners, I’m surprised the dreadful Simpson didn’t tell them that he absolutely had to get out of jail to resume his bogus search “for the real killers” of his ex-wife and friend. No doubt he’ll resume his search on the first tee of some swanky golf course in Florida. What a disingenuous, deplorable cad.

Patti Dawn Swansson has been scribbling mostly about Winnipeg sports for 47 years, which means she’s old and probably should think about getting a life.

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