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At the Intersection of Sports and Culture

Photo Credit for Header: Alex Foucre-Stimes

Bruins, Habs Game 7 to Determine Better System of Universal Health Care

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The first 6 months of the NHL calender – aka the regular season – are largely irrelevant. Injuries can change the season, you may end up in the half of the league that makes the playoffs… yes, half. The season is so long that little wrinkles, a win or loss there mean almost nothing. Teams will switch goalies mid-season, and as the Vancouver Canucks proved, maybe even mid-first round playoff series!

Playoff game sevens, however, are entirely different. Playoff hockey in general has an entirely different feel. Players skate faster, shoot harder, hit way harder. It is so exciting to watch for hockey fans and Americans alike. In game seven it is all or nothing, and in a game where one puck bounce will make the difference, players are extra focused and work extra hard. Imagine the USA v. Canada Olympic match every time they take the ice no matter the round.

Which brings me to what will likely be the greatest game 7 this year, between the Bruins and Les Habitants. Take it from me, Bruins fans represent a specific type of Masshole. I’ve only been to a handful of Bruins games, but I’m pretty sure I’ve seen a fight in the stands in every one. You get the impression that Bruins and Habs’ fans don’t care much for each other either. That bad blood radiates from the ice.

Lucic’s hit on Spacek last night certainly shows that there in no love lost between these two member of the Original Six. They are hitting hard this series, and tonight it is both teams’ last chance. It is cliche, but that is what drives excitement in an NHL game 7. The players exhibit tremendous skill and athleticism, but hockey games that are close will often come down to some random puck bounce, or an unpredictable goalie rebound. Watching the game you spend half the night trying to catch your breath.

Whichever side you root for, the new incarnation of the Big Bad Bruins, or the Le Bleu-Blanc-Rouge, tonight will be great to watch, that is if you can take the time to locate VS. on your channel menu.

The Royal Wedding of Kate Middleton to Some Guy Other Than Me

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It’s tough not to feel for the good people of Sacramento. First the Maloofs fold their WNBA franchise, the Sacramento Monarchs, and now those crazy brothers are threatening to relocate their NBA team to Anaheim. Good, albeit time consuming, read by Bill Simmons on the current state of the Sacramento Kings ownership group. Spolier alert!!!! It’s not a good situation at all. Closer to the McCourt poor money management/divorce case than most realize.

Speaking of Kings and Queens, I was trying to think up an American equivalent to the Royal Wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton. All I could come up with was a union of Taylor Swift and Tyler Perry or maybe Derek Jeter to Katy Perry. (No offense Russell Brand. But this is not easy, you try!) Bottomline, there probably is no Yank equal to the pomp and circumstance of Friday’s nuptials from Westminster Abbey which is sure to the be the most watched global event since this transcendent piece of jailhouse choreography.

*She’s out of his league by the way. I mean, by all accounts he is a wonderfully grounded, regular guy, who also happens to be the eventual heir to the British throne, but she is really, really attractive. I bet she is so attractive that your wife doesn’t like her a la Brooklyn Decker or Angelina Jolie. Go home and ask, I bet I’m right.

You may wondering: will I be watching at 4am when Prince William and soon to be Princess Kate walk down the aisle? The answer: absolutely! But here’s why, our 11 week old son is so nocturnally unpredictable that I’ll probably be up anyway. He’s getting to the point where he can sleep through the night, or at least come pretty close, but my wife and I are both convinced that he is making the conscious decision to deprive us of as much sleep as possible so that when we go to work on less than 4 hours of sleep we look and feel like extras from The Walking Dead. Therefore, I will be watching** the Royal Wedding starting at 4am because my son will be up anyway and Saturday, with its promise of afternoon nap time, is right around the corner which means I can survive the final day of the work week on espresso fumes and a few hours sleep.

**I caught my first taste of “Royal Fever” last night when I made the conscious decision to watch Piers Morgan Tonight on CNN. He was interviewing a whole slew of beaming Brits from Jane Seymour – Kitty Kat – to Princess Diana’s wedding gown designer who kind of resembled Cyndi Lauper. My takeaway: this wedding is a tremendous source of pride for British people. Prince William represents the lasting memory of his mother who is still universally revered for her charitable spirit. Whether or not we Americans get it is probably not the point. Although, judging from the amount of coverage this wedding is already receiving in the States, the moment is most likely unavoidable.


Monday Morning Musings

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Have you ever tried looking at a map of the world where down is up and south is north as if the globe were flipped over on its axis? Try it sometime and when you do you will realize that it makes no sense. It’s like an optical illusion sure to make you go cross-eyed in a matter of minutes. Well, this is how I feel about the AL East. Sure its fun to look at the standings in early April and see Baltimore, Toronto and Tampa Bay at the top but the longer you look the more backwards it seems. Something just feels out of place until you come to your senses and realize what was wrong with that earlier picture: no New York or Boston. Well luckily, April 25th is here and the Yankees and Sox have reclaimed their rightful place – 1st and 3rd respectively – at the top of the AL East world.

Bitter much? When you’re an Orioles fan, like myself, bitterness is part of the bargain. I only wish I were allowed to hope into May. That would be like an early Christmas/birthday/Father’s Day present wrapped into one. This past weekend series vs the Yankees was a bitter pill. First a rainout on Friday, then a 15-3 butt whipping on Sat night followed by a 6-3 extra inning heartbreaker on Easter Sunday. It was like unwrapping a Cadbury Creme Egg only to find that the chocolate egg has been cracked causing the sugar yolk paste to ooze onto the tin foil wrapper. Very frustrating stuff!!!

And now for your weekly trip around the bases.

1B – Andre Either has a 21 game hitting streak. Pretty impressive for a guy who I actually played against in summer ball.  Unfortunately his prodigious accomplishments at the plate are being over shadowed by the most public divorce in MLB today.

2B – The S.S. Ozzie Guillen is sinking.  The White Sox have lost 9 of 10 putting their overall record at 8-14 bad enough for last place in the AL Central. Good news for us sports fans, you can watch it all unravel here on Ozzie Guillen’s twitter feed.

3B – Granted it was a overcast/cold Friday afternoon in the Windy City but can you remember seeing so many open seats at Wrigley Field? Pittsburgh? Yes. Toronto? Probably. Citi Field…ABSOLUTELY!!! But every thing is different on the Northside. Good news Cubs fans, Bud Selig isn’t overly concerned about the attendance problem.

HR – Speaking of the New York Mets, how about the Amazins rattling off 4 wins in a row? It’s enough for Jerry Seinfeld to forget about his ongoing feud with Donald Trump.

view from an abandoned Wrigley Field courtesy of @DPolacek

Did Mike D’Antoni Kill Rosie Larsen?

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Of course not! Because Rosie Larsen is a fictional character from AMC’s new hit series The Killing and Mike D’Antoni is not a homicidal maniac. Some deranged, overzealous Knicks fans probably felt like they could have gone on a murdering spree after watching their team falter in the Garden last night.

In what was billed as the biggest basketball game in New York City in over a decade, the Boston Celtics took the Knicks, and their fans, to the proverbial woodshed. From the start, the game wasn’t close. Amare was clearly hurting – bad backs are so hard to disguise – and for some strange reason the much maligned Knicks defense allowed Paul Pierce and Ray Allen open look after open look. It got so bad that I started to wonder if a team has ever fired their head coach at halftime. I can’t imagine the Knicks, or Mike D’Antoni, coming back from a 3-0 deficit against the suddenly rejuvenated Celtics.

To be honest with you, I didn’t even really watch the 2nd half. Of course I checked in to see the score a few times but last night gave me a perfect opportunity to see why everyone is raving about The Killing on AMC. Going into the pilot I was worried the show was going to be too much Twin Peaks and not enough Seven. After three episodes the show has surpassed my modest expectations and it’s safe to say that I’m in for the long haul.

A few other things:

– The best part of The Killing is the time/attention given to developing individual characters. I may only be through the first 3 episodes but I thought the actors playing Mitch and Stan Larsen have done a particularly great job of showing viewers the various stages of grief following the murder of their daughter.

-And who did kill Rosie Larsen? Early odds – Jasper & Chris 3:5, Richmond 4:1, Holder 8:1, and longshot Mitch Larsen 100:1.

-Could this series take place in any other city besides Seattle? The Emerald City is the perfect backdrop for this murky murder mystery. I was however disappointed by the lack of product placement. I figured Linden and Holder would have passed by at least 25 Starbucks by now.

-Finally, AMC and HBO have really cornered the market on television dramas. Waiting to get into HBO’s Game of Thrones, which I hear is also excellent, and looking forward to season two of Treme.

view from MSG courtesy of @verosoraptor

That Time I was Booed at Camden Yards for Cheering On the Orioles

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In honor of the 3 game series opening this evening in Camden Yards between the New York Yankees and the Baltimore Orioles, I figured this was an appropriate time to pass along the story of how I was heckled and told to sit down for rooting for the O’s in BALTIMORE!!!!

For years now, well really since the Orioles last winning season in 1998, and especially after Cal Ripken retired in 2001, the club has struggled to draw fans to Camden Yards. The appeal of the still gorgeous looking, trailblazing retro ballpark has not been able to overcome rosters full of overpaid (Albert Belle), over the hill (Miguel Tejada the 2nd time) players and an owner in Peter Angelos who Orioles fans loathe with a passion akin to maybe only the budding relationship between Jerry Seinfeld and Donald Trump. Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, with its various attractions, restaurants, and aquarium, still attract tourists to the downtown area but these crowds do not always migrate the 6 blocks or so west to the Warehouse to catch a baseball game. That is unless the Orioles are hosting either the Boston Red Sox or the New York Yankees.

Like a swarm of locusts they descend upon the Charm City devouring anything that crosses their path. Merchants and hotels love it when these two teams are in town because it means a tremendous boost in sales. Orioles season ticket holders enjoy the return on their investment as Yankee and Red Sox fans are more than willing to shell out the extra dough for a game at Camden Yards because it still cheaper, travel down the northeast corridor included, than taking a family of four to a game at either Yankee Stadium or Fenway Park.

All of this being said, having so many Sawx and Yanks fans in OPACY does not make for an enjoyable experience if you happen to support the home team. Now to my tale. It had to have been around 5 years ago that my girlfriend, now wife, and I made what has become our annual trip down to Baltimore to catch a couple of Oriole games. For us, we go all in. Fancy Hampton Inn 25 minutes outside of the city? Done. Nothing but the finest dinners at places like Pizzerio Uno and Hooters? You got it! We live for the entire experience. That was until the moment where I was belittled in my own ballpark.

I think it was right after I stood up to celebrate a Jeff Conine home run against the Yankees that a New York fan in the Eutaw Street bleachers told me to “sit down and shut up”. If this were Yankee Stadium, I understand a fan defending their turf but this was Oriole Park and as an Oriole fan I thought I had a right to root for the home team. My reaction to this verbal chiding? Nothing. Zero. Bupkis. And here’s why, when the Yankees and Red Sox are in town, their fans outnumber Oriole fans 5 to 1. I must have been surrounded by an entire section of Staten Island’s finest. In this moment of spiritual survival I couldn’t locate a single ally.  A verbal and/or physical altercation would not have worked out for me. Speaking up also would have put my girlfriend in jeopardy of verbal abuse and I wasn’t about to bring that sort of ridicule and embarrassment onto her.

5 years, and as many losing seasons later, I have had to live with the shame of being booed in Camden Yards for cheering on the Orioles. I must also live with my wife constantly reminding me and anyone else who will listen that when confronted by a Yankee fan in Oriole Park, I stood down and did nothing. Of course pride is often the highest form of self indulgence so I can keep my head high while continuing to avoid Camden Yards anytime the Red Sox and Yankees are in town.

view from Camden Yards courtesy of @vtbeach