Photo of the Day: Diving in

JIN MAN LEE/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Start of a 50-metre freestyle heat at the Asian Games.

Related: World record for weightlifter at Asian Games.

Weekend bits: Evolution to elephants

Some things you may have missed this weekend in Maple Syrup Nation:

ESPN's Scott Burnside on the maturation - okay, let's call it the evolution of Darcy Tucker:

"You have to remember how much the game's changed in three to four years. There were so many more scrums in the game of hockey, whether it was during the play and after, and Darcy always found a way to be in the middle of those things," (Paul) Maurice said. "So, as a spectator, it maybe distracts you from watching the other things that he did offensively. Now, with the power play that we have and the way he plays the game, you start to realize that he has a really good sense of timing of when to bring it to the net and when not to. There's a lot more game offensively."

Toronto's Jonathan de Guzman scored the winner to salvage something out of a terrible week for Holland's Feyenoord Rotterdam.

Still on Euro footy in Holland, check out Dutch photographer Hans van der Meer's European Fields photo essay - fantastic (great catch by SportsFilter).

One more from over there: Thierry Henry says he's out for a month with a nerve problem, and perhaps there's more to the story.

The New York Times' Harry Hurt gets in touch with his inner George Plimpton, going under centre for three plays with the Jets:

The offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer waved me to the sidelines for a final dress rehearsal. Nick Mangold, a 6-foot-4, 300-pound rookie center, crouched over to deliver my first practice snaps. I was mortally afraid Nick would hike the ball so hard my hands would break. But he laid it in my palms like a pigskin pillow.
My second fear was that I’d suffer a 54-year-old’s senior moment, and forget how to call my three plays. I actually blurted the correct words, but my voice was so loud it could be heard out on the adjacent turnpike. “Keep your voice down in the huddle,” the starting quarterback Chad Pennington admonished, “like you’re having a conversation.”

For the video, which although a little long is quite well done and very much in the spirit of the dear departed Plimpton, go here.

Haile Gebreselassie, already among the all-time greats of distance running, cruises to his second marathon win in four months, taking the famed Fukuoka in Japan.

The Times Online gets up close and personal with elephant polo, while activists mount campaigns to end it and Scotland beats Sweden for the world title.

And finally, here's How to Say Nothing, as Hockey Night in Canada's Kelly Hrudey sets up Saturday night's Colorado at Vancouver tilt:

"This is hugely important but I don't want people to read too much into this, or make more of it than there really is. It's the first part of December, obviously, and although these are big points and you need them right now, you can make up ground later in the season."

Into the weekend: Long bombs to short putts

With winter arriving today, JABS Mansion is into full and festive mukluks-and-corn-starch mode, having sacrificed a perfectly good golf umbrella to the wind this morning and getting soaked to the skin, only The National's Abel blaring in the ears to ward off the chill. We're leaving early, in other words, to get outta these wet clothes and into a dry martini.

But first, a quick look around the week's bits, and to put another Canadian football season to bed, let's start with Sean Smith at sportsBabel, who along with Rod Murray wrote The Narrative of Long Bombs, a provocative, thoughtful look at football's military connection. Here's a taste, but read it all:

. . . What is ironic is that this sponsorship comes at a time when the Canadian military has waived its requirement of a minimum fitness level to join the service. While this is clearly one sign among many that the Forces are on a desperate mission to increase their numbers, apparently general recruitment has little to do with requiring fit bodies. The thrust to recruit soldiers via football suggests that there must be some congruency between military and sport cultures.
(snip)
Of course, the choice of an athlete, or any Canadian, to enlist in our armed forces is a deeply personal one that should be respected. But when the business of sports intersects so dramatically with the decisions of our political and military leaders, we should take pause. Canada should support its soldiers, but if war is a continuation of politics by other means, that support should begin before they are sent off to fight. In other words, when the slick marketing campaign is pulled back, are the right questions being asked? And if so, are the right answers being given?
Pat Tillman's family doesn’t think so.

One last e-mail. Wade Tomlin figures the notion of a Sam Mitchell watch in the media is vastly overrated - at least in the Toronto sports media (the Raptors are en fuego, as they say on the sports broadcasts, zooming up to 5-10 on November since Wade wrote this early in the week):

To me firing Mitchell is as straightforward a situation for Bryan Colangelo as you see in sports. You have a team that everyone seems to accept has improved its roster, yet the team is off to forget about a slow start, but a similar one to the horrible start a year ago (1-11, 3-9, there is no real difference) and you have a coach who is now on the verge of his third losing season, who has no previous track record of success as a NBA head coach, who just last year was voted the worst coach in the N.B.A. by league players.
It is getting embarrassing as a fan to hear this idea that the Raptors have some form of excuse for this sorry start, there called standards and the Raptors organization, and many of the people surrounding the team (the announce team, sportswriters following the team), seem to have none when it comes to winning. Fire Mitchell now or this team will continue with its mantle as the new Los Angeles Clippers.

DICK LOEK/Toronto Star file photo

Ballard warms up for '75 Latvia finals.

One last "Is on fire! Let's NBA!" I don't know who did this, but some wicked wit who goes by the handle of Lockdown on the RealGM board has a pretty take in Sam Mitchell: The Graphic Novel. (Just in: Part II.)

One last invitation. To journalists covering next spring's world hockey championships, from the International Table Hockey Federation (via Babelfish, I presume. Either that or Borat):

"Also it is significant that this tournament will be restored in Riga, Latvia. Latvia is not only famous with their noisy and ice hockey loving fans, but Latvia is the first country in the world where table hockey is recognized by country officials as sport."

Table hockey as sport? Now that's a country.

One last Official Golfer of JABS update. That'd be Miguel Angel Jimenez, he of the lobster arms, ruddy ponytail and pot belly, who headed out for nine holes with GolfMagic and demonstrated admirable sponsor loyalty:

AMY SANCETTA/Associated Press

Jimenez: Give me Ping or give me death.

As we crouched down to read a tricky putt on the penultimate green he was intrigued by the shape of the Elmer M1 putter I was reviewing for Golfmagic. But he refused to handle it.
"No, no I cannot be photographed with another putter. That would be wrong, it would be disloyal to Ping. I've been with them for 15 years. Besides they would kill me!"

Sports around town. One of the more intense college rivalries in the neighbourhood gets renewed this weekend as Humber Hawks hosts Sheridan Bruins at 7 p.m. tonight.

Watching. Super Dogs and Horse Relay (3 p.m., Saturday, TSN). Frankly, I was hoping to take in some Elephant Polo this weekend, but I guess this will have to do. Super Dogs? Are they wearing capes? Do they rescue the horses from a burning building?

Pooch Punts. From Super Dogs to Jinks the Viszla, who promises to go at least 1-4 with his kibbles-or-cookies picks this week and thereby keep pace with the other public handicappers:

CHICAGO (-9) over Minnesota
Tampa Bay (+7) over PITTSBURGH
NEW ORLEANS (-7) over San Francisco
GREEN BAY (+1) over NY Jets
Seattle (+4) over DENVER

Photo of the Day: Playing for peanuts

GOPAL CHITRAKAR/REUTERS

Babar meets Elmer - okay, it's Scotland (?) vs. Nepal - at the World Elephant Polo Cup in Nepal.

Related: 25th World Elephant Polo Association championship website.

The Never-Ending Story

In this here today, gone tomorrow business, it's heartening to find a story that can truly be called timeless - a story that, like Santa Claus, Wiarton Willie and Britney's adventures in exposure, can be impressive simply for the fact that it remains. And so it was this week when incoming NFL commissioner Roger Goodell etched his name into the books with his first pronouncement on the NFL in Toronto: Go on, pull the other one story:

Within the next decade, one of those cities -- most likely Mexico City or Toronto -- could be host to a National Football League franchise, he added.
"We can envision that," Goodell said of expansion outside the United States, in response to a question. "I don't know if it will become a reality, but it's certainly a possibility.
"The closer to the border, probably the more likely from a geographic standpoint; but I don't think in today's world that's a hurdle to overcome," he added.

According to the time-honoured script, it was followed by this one:

"The stories made it look more significant than it was," said NFL spokesperson Greg Aiello. "He wasn't announcing anything, he was responding to a question specifically about expanding internationally and he didn't rule it out."

International expansion to where? Selling the NFL in just about every part of the world is like taking herringbone tweed to the desert. They've tried Europe, and apart from finding an excuse for a handful of disaffected Eurogoths to play dressup during the real footy off-season, it really hasn't made a dent. And no wonder. American football is America, as intoxicating as Vegas in its blend of bone-crunching danger, cheesecake and making real estate deals. It's Glengarry Glen Ross, with the end zone standing in for the steak knives (hey, Al Pacino starred as Al Davis in GGR and Any Given Sunday). George Will put it best: "Football incorporates the two worst elements of American society: violence punctuated by committee meetings."

But well played, Your Highness Rog Mr. Goodell.  You are now firmly on board, alongside Santa, Willie, Britney and your illustrious predecessors. Long may you obfuscate reign.

 

Photo of the Day: Snowless in Switzerland

PETER SCHNEIDER/ASSOCIATED PRESS

A farmer works the bare ski slope in Adelboden, Switzerland.

Related: Skiers concerned by climate change.

Photo(s) of the Day: Beards of the NBA

KEVORK DJANSEZIAN/ASSOCIATED PRESS

So what do you prefer? Courtside grizzle a la Jack and Morgan ...

KIMBERLY WHITE/REUTERS

... or those charismatic Spurs's neck beard and Parisian ombre d'cinq-heure?

Related: Make your own Pau Gasol beard!

We're waiting (UPDATED - NBA review complete, score stands)

Here we are, nearly four days removed from Friday night's scorer's table debacle in Atlanta. Hello, NBA? Anybody home?

Perhaps the long weekend in the U.S. has something to do with the league's slow response, but as long as the league delays, it amounts to a p.r. disaster. If the checks and balances in place to keep a proper score fail, and during a close game as well, and in a manner in which the game's entire complexion is changed, what do you do?

So far, the NBA's answer is: nothing.

Here's the relevant rule, which would indicate that it's over:

Rule No. 2, section VI (d): Errors which occur in the fourth period or overtime(s) must be discovered and rectified prior to the end of the period.

Replaying the final 4 1/2 minutes next time the Raptors are in Atlanta on Feb. 2, given that the game turned on the missing basket, would be the fairest course. And by then, we can all chip in and buy Sam Mitchell a ticket to the game.

But it's just about a given that the Hawks will be fined. When is the question.

UPDATE: E-mail from the NBA arrived at 3:47 p.m., and I apologize for the slow reply but I was caught in a meeting: According to the league, the review of the play in question and Friday's game is complete: "A mistake was obviously made but the score will remain as is," said an NBA spokesman in an email. I'll try and get more on this and post it here in an update.

UPDATE II: NBA spokesman Tim Frank said no fine would be assessed to the Hawks, whose scorers' table made the error (meantime, the NBA-responsibility referees crew missed it, and so did the Raptors, who can answer only to themselves for their ignorance - total breakdown at all corners) in missing T.J. Ford's basket with 4+ minutes to go, which the NBA agrees was the pivotal play. Frank: "Our philosophy has been once they come off the floor, the score stands ... it's obviously not something you want to see happen."

My take: Either the Hawks have been fined but no one's saying, or the blame can be distributed so evenly by the NBA's basketball operations department (who did the review) that they figured hell, just go with the score.

One thing, though: The score was wrong, and it impacted on the result. Bad call, NBA.
A W-L swing, and it's been sloughed off. Just wondering: How would this have played out if it had have involved New York, say, or the Lakers?

Photo of the Day: Smokescreen

MARCOS BRINDICCI/REUTERS

Diego Maradona: Either a new training regimen, or he's rehearsing to replace pal Fidel.

Related: Diego checks in.

'The Biggest Mouth in Sports'

This works as something of a bookend, at least I reckon, to yesterday's post on goals, fights and fine writing: ESPN.com's Scott Burnside on Don Cherry (via SportsFilter):

Cherry: A poet, and he knows it.

The popular perception is that what separates Cherry from almost everyone else in his position is that his internal wiring system does not include a fail-safe switch, that he draws an average of 1.4 million Canadians every Saturday night who believe what is about to follow is some kind of out-of-body experience, a raw, roiling, undiluted stew of anger and opinion, passion and outrage.
Cherry couldn't disagree more. "I know exactly what I'm saying," he says, "so that when I'm fired, it won't be a slip of the tongue. Everything I want to say, I say."

Some of what's in here won't surprise if you're a Cherryholic - the Lord Nelson at the bridge self-image, the inflammatory rhetoric and the fists-up approach. The Rush Limbaugh/Madden analogy really doesn't work for me either - except perhaps from the self-promotion point of view. Cherry is a unique figure, and although he infuriates at times, life (and HNIC) would be awfully boring without him. The only thing about him that seems contrived is his wardrobe. All caveats aside, it's still a must-read, and besides, it gives an excuse to roll out the latest from The Collected Works of Donald Stewart Cherry, which last season got regular space here:

This, my first Blue
Isn't she beautiful like this
Some lady
sent in this tie
and I can't remember
her name
and
I feel bad.