Photo of the day: In the air

ADNAN ABIDI/REUTERS

Sri Lanka's wicketkeeper Kumar Sangakkara, against Sri Lanka in the ICC Champions Trophy.

Great moments in postgame press conferences

After last night's Dennis Green standup, the subject of ranking coach's postgame press tirades came up.
Okay, I'm game.
Jim Mora's "Playoffs?" riffage has to go up there. Anything from Bobby Knight. Tommy Lasorda on Dave Kingman. Hal McRae and Herm Edwards - on and on.
As for local colour, for years, an audiotape of a John Brophy rant was making the rounds - if Brophy was still coaching in the NHL, he'd be good for three or four of these bombs a season - but try as I might I can't find it anywhere. Any other candidates you can think of, send 'em on in.
Green's bit belongs, but it was piker's stuff next to the top of the class. The leader in the clubhouse for the past 23 years? Lee Elia, Cubs manager, saluting his Wrigley Field fans on April 29, 1983: "They're really, really behind you around here - my (bleepin') ass ... 85 per cent of the world's working. The rest of 'em come out here." (Quicktime audio, NSFW, PG, and every other rating you can think of. A classic).

Sort of related: Well, it's rankings. Hollinger's 06-07 projections are in. Chris Bosh is No. 20, the rest of the Raptors are triple digits.

Photo of the Day: Cardinal rule

ROSS D. FRANKLIN/REUTERS

Dennis Green on the left, Neil Rackers on the right.

Related: Green's postgame presser, and The Sports Economist on field goal percentages.

Photo of the Day: Farewell, Pete III

FRANK GUNN/CANADIAN PRESS

Paul (Pigskin Pete) Weiler wraps up a 31-year career with one last Oskee Wee Wee Sunday in Hamilton.

Related: Thanks, Pete and Tiger-Cats begin search for next Pigskin Pete.

Notes from a weekend

Around the world in a post, even if I haven't had much time to link anywhere but the most nearby places:

The Raptors are invisible no more. This may or may not be good news, depending on how you view preseason games on triple-digit TV - or if you view them or that region of the binary universe at all. The Raptors added yesterday's preseason game (boxscore), while advertising their final two home preseason games -- against Maccabi on Thursday, and against the Cleveland LeBron's on Sunday night. It's the scoreboard feed, mind you, but it is the local team, Chuck and Jack and Norma and the rest. An improvement, that, on the dark screens in the offing last week.

LUCAS OLENIUK/TORONTO STAR

Bosh, Nesterovic: Just add Bargnani and serve hot, Sam.

As for yesterday, a couple of little items from said broadcast. Anthony Parker looks like a poor (and slightly smaller) man's Shane Battier. And Andrea Bargnani does have a lovely shooting stroke, as Jack Armstrong noted between fouls, and wasn't shy to go down in the post and demand the ball - this kid just oozes hoops class. Otherwise, no real surprises, to me, anyway. One thing I'd love to see before this exhibition season is out, as a preview to what we should be seeing later on: Mitchell to give a frontline of Nesterovic, Bosh and Bargnani some minutes together.

Other stuff:

Mats Sundin's tour de force Saturday night was the latest display of shoot-first, ask-later excellence from the revitalized captain. But correct me if I'm wrong here - I didn't see a single hat on the ice after Sundin's game-winner. If any hat trick deserved it, this one was it. Are we too cool for that, too, Toronto? Best pressure performance of the night, though, may have been the relief pitching of Cassie Campbell, stepping in for snowbound Harry Neale on Hockey Night in Canada and handling it pretty smoothly.

Argos DB Byron Parker had another superb afternoon on Saturday and is putting together a pretty remarkable stretch of football -- seven interceptions in nine games, and four of them returned for TDs, since signing on Aug. 6.

Petr Cech is still in hospital after that awful collision Saturday, with a fractured skull. The accident, and an ensuing injury to backup Carlo Cudicini, has touched off a debate about goalkeepers' vulnerability.

Blog fave Neate Sager weighs in on How Detroit Built their Miracle Team. Not even knowing who they're going to play in the World Series, the books already have them favoured pretty handily.

Into the weekend: College hoopla

Time to wrap it up around here, but not before a quick tour through the usual precincts.

One last read. Sports Illustrated's Tom Verducci polled 22 baseball cogniscenti to come up with the 25 all-time all-stars. And get this - Alex Rodriguez is on it.

One last e-mail. Regular reader John Richardson went down east last weekend to visit with his son Elliott who studies at Acadia and plays for the Axemen. Here's his list of "Ten things I learned from spending a weekend at Acadia with my son and his football teammates":

1) Mount Allison beating SFX on Saturday for their first victory in four years is up near the top of the "most humiliating moments in sports" category -particularly if you have friends who play for the X-men. You can never bring that game up too often.
2) Spending $45.00 on fresh pasta is just about right for preparing the Friday night carbs dinner for 10 football players.
3) Why buy two steaks when you can buy four?
4) Real football fans know the college of every single NFL player.
5) You can buy Alexander Keith's LITE in Nova Scotia.
6) Multitasking involves: watching the NFL network; having your laptop open at all times for MSN Messenger: taking turns playing tunes from your computer; and surreptiously googling answers for #4.
7) Saturday night starts at 11:30 p.m.
8) Sunday morning starts at 11:30 a.m.
9) Never ask a university student, "Do you want some money for that?"
10) It's perfectly OK to clean dishes from the Friday night pasta meal on Sunday evening.

One last quote. "Defence is the toughest job in the world" - Hal Gill (thanks to another regular, Carla, for this one. As she noted, "somebody has only a tenuous grip on reality.")

Sports around town. Rah-rah on the ice all around the town: U of T's men's hockey team opens its OUA season with a pair of home games, against Laurier tonight (7:30 p.m.) and Guelph on Saturday (7:30 p.m.), while the women's team faces Waterloo Sunday at 5 p.m. - all U of T games at Varsity Arena. York women's home opener goes Saturday at 2 p.m. at the Ice Gardens. And oh yes, speaking of rah-rah around the town, it's the Toronto Marathon on Sunday, 9 a.m. start (8:30 a.m. for the half). If you're running, good luck on the BQ or whatever your goal is. And if not, give 'em a hand.

Watching. A's at Tigers, Friday, 4 p.m., Sportsnet. It's 5C with a 50 km/h wind right now in Detroit. That's why they call it the Summer Game.

Pooch punts. In which the official dog of JABS, Jinks the Vizsla, makes five kibble-or-cookie NFL picks that are just as bad as the ones you'll find pretty much anywhere else:

Cincinnati (-6) over TAMPA BAY. He barked on this one, and it sounded a whole lot like "Gradkowski!" Best bet, I guess.

Buffalo (-1) over DETROIT. After last weekend, how could anyone invest even a kibble on the Lions?

Seattle at St. Louis UNDER 44 1/2. I've been trying to figure out what he meant by grabbing the cookie and rolling over. It had to be either the Lions or the under, and one's already taken.

Giants at Falcons OVER 41 1/2. Got up on his hind legs. I get it.

Kansas City (+6 1/2) over PITTSBURGH. Not the kind of pick I'd make, but he's my dawg.

An NHL stat I'd like to see

A truism from the (pardon the expression) New NHL™: Special teams are important. A key stat, the PP and its PK flipside. But what I'd like to see: stats kept on fouls committed, and who they've been committed against. The NBA (at least on fouls in the act of shooting) and soccer keep track in their play-by-plays of both ends of the candle, but the NHL, as far as I can see, does not.

Tim Larsen/Associated Press

Gionta: A natural hat trick AND three power-plays created.

I'm not being geeky here. Okay, perhaps a little. But in an age of new statistical paradigms, wouldn't this go further to defining a player's worth? Over at Raking Leafs, Mike noted this week how much more valuable (binkie alert) Kyle Wellwood is because of the fouls he forces opponents into making. It was on display again last night, a lovely little feint at his own blueline leading to an errant stick tap that put the Devils on the penalty-kill.

I kept a scorecard from last night's game on fouls (my call on the infraction, not the official one) - who committed them and (in bold here) who the foul was committed on, along with the ensuing PP result:

First period
Ponikarovsky Tor hooking foul on Gionta, NJ = penalty killed
Brylin, NJ hooking foul on Wellwood, Tor = PP goal, O'Neill
Second period
Peca, Tor tripping foul on Gionta, NJ = penalty killed
Third period
McCabe, Tor hooking foul on Brylin, NJ = PP goal, Gionta
O'Neill, Tor roughing foul on Brodeur, NJ = penalty killed
Gill, Tor interference foul on Gionta, NJ = PP goal, Gionta

A pretty clean and tidy game here - some nights would be a lot messier. But look again, at the contributions of Brian Gionta. Besides that natural hat trick, he created a hat trick of power plays, and scored on two of them. That's outstanding New NHL™ work on the ice, and on and off the official scoresheet.

And while we're at it, on the subject of stats I'd like to see, how about fouls committed? The NHL has always put penalty minutes together, so majors and misconducts are lumped in with two-minute minors. To me, fouls committed and fouls forced are as important and directly related to those power-play numbers you see being tossed around every night. They're telling numbers, and tailor made for the way the game is being played now.

Photo of the Day: Misses Robinson

DARREN STAPLES/REUTERS

A demoralizing night at the office for England's Paul Robinson.

Related: McClaren cancels U.S. trip, Rooney mixes it up with an abusive fan and Robinson's miskick while Borat watches.

The Raptors' invisible preseason

A couple of weeks ago, old pal Charley Rosen was on the other end of the phone.

LUCAS OLENIUK/TORONTO STAR

Andrea Bargnani: At least he's not ignoring the preseason.

“You’re not watching hockey, are you?” he cackled, overhearing the TV in the background. “Preseason hockey?”
Apparently I was. (Funny, but I didn’t notice.) And apparently, I’d broken one of Rosen’s Dictums. “Ignore the preseason,” he advised.
Ordinarily I’d agree (and in a way, I was ignoring the preseason there). There are few issues to settle in the typical preseason – on an established, reasonably successful team. It goes on too long, and there’s not a whole lot at stake.
This year’s Raptors, though, are an exception. There are jobs up for grabs, a rotation to settle on, new faces from exotic lands, and expectations that all this turnover is for the better.
But sadly, it’s all going on far, far away. The house organ, Raptors TV, isn’t broadcasting any of the team’s preseason games (They did show last night’s home exhibition opener, but it was a pickup of the Celtics’ broadcast). As of this writing, the house website hasn’t got around to posting the television schedule for the upcoming season (for that, keep reading).
For a team anxious to establish an identity and woo fans disenchanted by their steady six-year slide to the sub-regions of the conference, this is pretty lame stuff. One of the reasons rumoured behind John Shannon’s departure was that he was spending too much money on the Raptors, with their tiny ratings and immediate-family-only subscriber base, and there’s nothing on display now to refute the notion. Until they get better – if they can get better – none of that will change.
Sadly, ignoring the preseason isn’t an option. It’s the rule.

Over the jump, the TV schedule (from a press release dated Oct. 2):

Lidle's plane crash

There are still plenty of unanswered questions out of yesterday's plane crash in New York which claimed the life of Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle. Here are a few links, in case you missed them:

From the New York Post, a look at Lidle's $187,000 plane - Flash for Less Cash - and his passion for flying.

From the New York Times, a story and graphic of the plane's flight path from New Jersey into a Manhattan high-rise:

The northern end of the airspace over the East River is a treacherous, narrow corridor often filled with helicopters ferrying tourists, business people and traffic reporters along the edge of Manhattan. Small planes like Mr. Lidle’s are allowed to fly through the area at low altitude, but several pilots said they did not dare because it could be crowded.

Also from the Times, some reaction from the Mets' Chris Woodward, who grew up in the same neighbourhood as Lidle:

Woodward became a major league infielder, joining the Mets in 2005, but he always planned to fly at the end of his career.
After Lidle died when his plane crashed into a Manhattan apartment building yesterday, Woodward was asked if his plans had changed. Lidle was flying with his flight instructor and either one could have been flying the plane.
“If I have the desire to do it, I’ll still do it,” Woodward said. “It’s always been my passion.”