Zebras, Free Agents & Bruno Sammartino

Wednesday June 27 10:30 PM

Just got back from a wonderful afternoon and evening with members of the NHL Officials Association. Last year Montreal native Dave Jackson organized a BBQ in his back yard. Today we were at an art gallery in Lachine. Beautiful place. New York style loft run by Mike Valee. If you need a fully equipped loft to showcase art or rent it out for a private party, cd launch or Scientology convention be sure to contact Mike:
http://www.canvasmontreal.com/

Much like a year ago the officials were terrific guests, offering thoughtful, insightful commentary on the state of the game and their profession. Most noteworthy moment for me was Don Koharski's response to my question about there being no doubt that the post lockout NHL rulebook has delivered on it's promise, no matter the criticism.
"3o years in the league...it's the best hockey I've seen" said Koharski who runs an officiating camp every summer in Boucherville.
http://www.dkrefcamps.com/

The officials get together each year to honor the late Stephane Provost and to help his young family.
http://www.nhlofficials.com/display_news.asp?articleID=106

For the last two years we've had the opportunity to spend quality air time with Jackson, Koharski, Mike Leggo, Don VanMassenhoven, Terry Gregson, Greg Devorksi, Jean Morin,
Brian Murphy, Pierre Racicot, Brad Watson, Rob Shick, Bill McCreary and Director of Officiating Stephen Walkom. The NHL would be doing itself a big favour by allowing these guys the freedom to talk at length during the season and the playoffs. They care every bit as deeply about their sport as players, coaches, and managers. (I hesitate to add owners only because Boston's Jeremy Jacobs has been named Chairman of the Board of Governors. What's next-Bill Wirtz as Director of Marketing?)
http://www.nhlofficials.com/home.asp

And now for your viewing pleasure, described by Greg Devorski as the easiest fight he's had to break up since both guys were so tired...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJJPivHWy2k

I liked the idea of having this year's draft in prime time but couldn't GM's have done a little more to co-operate? I realize you can't force guys to make trades but if the event were any duller it would be called The NHL Awards Show. Thank goodness Pierre McGuire was around to describe the slippage of Russian Alexei Cherepanov as "Unonscionable". McGuire was just about the only TSN Staffer to win props from former hockey fan Bill Simmons in his post draft blog on ESPN:
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/070625

Why all the continued hand-wringing over the Habs decsion to skip Angelo Esposito? Don't think Max Pacioretty will raise the passion level in Lasalle and St. Leonard?

I'm far more interested in right now. I've believed all along that Bob Gainey will make a dramatic player move or two (trade, free agent signing or both) beacuse he has to. A team that hasn't played to an empty seat since 2004 has to deliver more than a 10th place finish. So, assuming Sheldon Souray is gone, who becomes the most sought after free agent for Habs fans come Sunday morning? Here's how my shopping list would look, with even more slippage anticipated than Cherapanov and Esposito combined:

1. Chris Drury - perfect combo at C, might get 7 million
2. Brian Rafalski - best playmaking D, much better than Souray
3. Ryan Smith- Oh Canada and Oh can he play
4. Peter Forsberg - superstar C who plays like a Sutter; expiry date very near
4. Daniel Briere - Oh Quebec
5. Scott Gomez - Scary good and just 27
6. Jason Blake - last 3 goal scoring seasons: 22, 28, 40
7. Paul Kariya - yes Habs need size, but if he wants to play here...
8. Teemu Selanne - retiring after 48 goal season? Imagine Koivu & Selanne...
9. Roman Hamrlik - when Rafalski signs elsewhere
10.Brad Stuart - ok, so when Hamrlik goes elsewhere...
11. Scott Hannan - strong leader type
12. Corey Sarich -big, strong, young, much needed RH shot
13. Brent Sopel - Souray lite
14. Andy Sutton - thus ends our run of defensemen
15. Todd Bertuzzi; And just for fun Ed Belfour because once the Habs trade Huet they'll need an experienced back up...and while we're at it...Ladislav Nagy & Eric Lindros...then sign restricted free agent Sean Avery and watch 110% studio implode....oy, it's getting late

But seriously, Michel Ouellet cut loose by Pittsburgh at 25 is very intriguing; as is 6'5" 26 year old winger Brad Winchester non-tendered by Edmonton. And I'd like to see the Habs bring Aaron Asham back to play alongside Maxime Lapierre/Steve Begin.

You can watch the free agent frenzy unfold live on TSN. Don't look for the Bill Simmons sequel on monday.

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story/?ID=212042&hubname=

The first thing I thought of after hearing the news that wrestler Chris Benoit had killed his family and then himself was Phil Mushnick. Mushnick is a New York Post columnist who made his name critiquing members of the electronic sports media in the Big Apple. He usually takes the high-sometimes too high-moral ground on issues but can be relentless once he has a target in sight. But to his credit, he's usually way ahead of the curve on the most important issues dogging the world of sports and the sports media world. For instance, this is just one in a series of columns he wrote on the sad state of professional wrestling. This was ELEVEN years ago:
http://www.solie.org/articles/gilbert.html

And five years later:

WWF DROPS GOP INTO GUTTER
(New York Post, August 13, 2000)
By Phil Mushnick
The worst forces of popular culture now are more powerful than mainstream, two-party American presidential politics.
To sleep, perchance to dream - even a bad one - has become a welcomed alternative to the nightmarish reality of witnessing the free fall of common decency and common sense at the highest levels of media, commerce and politics. Anything for a buck, anything for a vote.
Two weeks ago in Philadelphia, in nominating George W. Bush as its presidential candidate, the Republican Party reached a new low in expeditious, Machiavellian pandering.
While the Republican Party ostensibly stands for good, old-fashioned family values, its special guests during its presidential convention were none other than the leading action figures of the World Wrestling Federation, an organization practiced at wearing its sweet, civic-minded mask when needed, but that's long been in the business of popularizing degenerate acts.
That the Republican Party was able to escape widespread and lasting ridicule for embracing the WWF during a presidential convention is evidence of a news media that is either sorrowfully blind to the WWF's content or, in the case of television news, co-opted by their networks' investments in pro wrestling.
Two Mondays ago, as the Republican National Convention began in Philly, Vince McMahon's WWF staged a nationally televised show in Atlanta. It featured its usual pornographic, hateful and violent performances that have made it so attractive to children, young adults and now, three months before a presidential election, to the Republican Party.
At one point, a group of barely clothed, large-breasted WWF women paraded outside the Georgia Dome in a mock demonstration. They encouraged onlookers to chant, "Save the Ho's!"
"Ho's" is street for whores. Little boys now reflexively refer to little girls as bitches and ho's in large part thanks to McMahon and his national TV enablers, which now, incredibly, include NBC and CBS.
As a WWF camera panned the crowd, children, some no older than 8, chanted, "Save the Ho's!"
During the in-house, scripted prime-time TV show, McMahon's latest top star, The Rock, slammed a shapely female wrestler to the mat. She was left stretched out, "unconscious," on her back.
The Rock then grabbed a folding chair and hit a male nemesis over the head with it. He staggered, then fell, also "unconscious." He landed with his face in her crotch and her face in his crotch. And there they stayed as The Rock sauntered around the ring, grinning broadly and knowingly. The live audience, comprised of thousands of children, was delighted.
Two nights later, this same guy, "The Rock," sat on the podium, among the Bush family, including the ex-President of the United States and his wife, Barbara. The Rock was an honored guest of the Republican Party and a featured speaker at the Republican National Presidential Convention in Philadelphia. This is the state of our nation.
In fact, Vince McMahon and his WWF were bestowed fully credentialed, VIP treatment at the convention. Within the same WWF show that included 8-year-olds chanting "Save the ho's" and The Rock's latest vile performance, came remote video reports from a WWF announcer working the floor from the Republican National Convention.
If only The Rock had brought along the tape from that show, two nights earlier, to demonstrate to the delegates and to national TV audiences what makes him so popular among younger folks that he was worthy of featured speaker status at the Republican Presidential Convention. And just how badly the Republicans were being had.
If only he had brought along tapes of some of his celebrated TV acts, like the one where he demands sex by hollering a profane expression for the female genitalia. That one was popular enough to inspire McMahon to sell merchandise carrying The Rock's visage along with the unprintable expression.
Why didn't The Rock and McMahon demonstrate to the assembled exactly why they're so popular that they were worthy of invites as honored guests and speakers? Why so circumspect before this audience?
Linda McMahon, Vince's wife, addressed a Republican Convention symposium entitled "The American Dream." Why didn't she distribute some of those oversized, foam rubber hands - the ones with the raised middle finger - that the WWF sells to kids at shows and features on TV?
Why didn't she explain to her Republican Convention audience how one of the WWF's most popular acts features wrestlers pointing to their crotches and hollering "Suck it"? Why didn't she provide full disclosure to her audience, especially to the uninitiated, as to how she and her husband have fulfilled their American Dream?
"Ladies and gentlemen" she might have begun, "I stand before you today to tell you that we've grown fabulously wealthy by selling violence, homophobia, misogyny, twisted sex, negative ethnic stereotyping and senseless hate to American children!
"We have grown rich, famous and powerful by doing dirt to society, but especially to your children. That's the realization of our American Dream. Oh, and God knows how many of our wrestlers are juiced to the max on steroids. Good day."
The Republican Party is one that largely embraces the sanctity of the Bible. Why didn't Mrs. McMahon or The Rock or Vince, while working the convention, tell their audiences how Stone Cold Steve Austin, another WWF American Dream money-maker, draws approval among young audiences by making lewd gestures and mocking the New Testament?
Why didn't Vince, or Linda, or The Rock speak of the modern, ongoing history of the WWF - and all of pro wrestling, for that matter - that includes rampant and systematic drug abuse? Why not a roll call of the wrestlers who have died closeted deaths from drug overdoses in order to "get big" for the likes of the McMahons?
Why not talk about the ring announcer/ring boss in the McMahons' employ who was widely known to use his position to sexually prey on under-aged boys? He operated with Vince's knowledge and to his amusement. McMahon cracked jokes about his deviance.
Why not show the tape of the transvestite oral sex scene that the WWF staged and aired in primetime? McMahon claimed to have loved that one, so why not share it with those delegates who might have missed it?
Why not a moment of silence for Owen Hart, who died last year performing a pay-per-view stunt for McMahon? Why not note for the assembled that after Hart was killed the show not only continued, but the next night, McMahon, rather than allow his wrestlers to mourn, gathered them for a national TV show to exploit Hart's death for bigger-than-usual ratings?
Or why not tell the Republican National Convention how the WWF's physician did a stretch in federal prison for distributing drugs to McMahon and his wrestlers?
Why not tell the Republican Party about how major TV advertisers, including the U.S. Armed Forces, pulled out of WWF shows because their content has become so vile?
Of all the "works" McMahon has pulled, this one's tops. The Republican National Committee provided the WWF with a starring role during its presidential convention. Staggering.
The WWF is extremely hot among the young, so the Republicans wanted a piece of the feel. They may not know why it's hot. They may not even care. Look what pro wrestling did for Jesse Ventura.
McMahon lately has talked big about how 14 million eligible voters watch the WWF every week. Bigshots within the Republican Party must've bought that.
While the WWF is enormously popular, on a good night it attracts roughly 7 million viewers, nearly 40 percent of whom are minors. How does that translate into 14 million voters?
But that's McMahon. One day he says the WWF is adult entertainment, the next day he brags about the increased number of kids who watch. One day he says it's up to parents to monitor what their kids watch, the next day he grows solemn and speaks of how his father was never around when he was growing up.
One day he says that there's no drug problem within the WWF, the next day he admits that there's a big drug problem within the WWF. One day he holds a news conference to declare that he has instituted rigid drug testing, the next day he says there's no drug testing because no one cares if his wrestlers are on drugs.
And just a few days ago, he and his charges took time out from producing another disgusting, kid-desensitizing national TV show to be the honored guests and speakers at the Republican National Presidential Convention. And the WWF, we're told, will be embraced by the Democrats this week in Los Angeles. God help us. _________________________________________