Green Bay, Dallas, Manchester United, and The Burden of Fandom
It hurts to be a fan. But it doesn't have to. Three fans, three different teams, three different ways you can make fandom a burden.
Read MoreIt hurts to be a fan. But it doesn't have to. Three fans, three different teams, three different ways you can make fandom a burden.
Read MoreWith the Super Bowl just a few weeks away, the NFL has already entered the free-agent phase of its business calendar. But this free agency is not some superstar player looking for a big pay day with another team. This free agency is the movement of NFL franchises— even longstanding franchises dating back half a century— to a market that is seemingly greener.
Read MoreFor a tournament that didn’t have an under-23 team, I suppose the World Junior Hockey Championships were alright. I mean, those close games and dramatic finishes are nice if you like that sort of thing, but without Team Europe as your drawing card, it’s hard to make these 18/ 19-year-olds look interesting.
Read MoreRousey's loss to Amanda Nunes was a tragedy. Rousey's dominance was unlike anything the sport had seen. She became an icon - and icons inevitably crumble.
Read MoreThe Chicago Cubs. The Cleveland Cavaliers. Leicester City. We called them all here at IDLM in 2016. Okay, it was after they’d won, but still… so let’s set some sports resolutions for 2017.
Read MoreThe year 2016 was not a great year for aging pop musicians, Democrats or the newspaper business. It was, however, a year for the shaggy dog, the longshot and the raggedy-pants rabble who walk the sporting earth.
Read MoreIt’s time once again for Auston City Limits, our horse-race analysis of the 2016-17 contest for the NHL’s Calder Trophy, symbolic of the rookie of the year. We’re calling it Auston, of course, in honour of the Toronto Maple Leafs wunderkind Auston Matthews, the kid from the desert who sharpened his skills in Switzerland.
Read MoreThere is a joke that goes a little like this: How many Torontonians does it take to screw in a light bulb? One. They just hold the bulb while the world turns around them. Yes, Toronto has a God thing. They act like they were the first to recognize opposable thumbs. What’s theirs is theirs. What's yours is theirs too. But even for those who chafe beneath the unholy yoke of the TIFF city, you had to like what you saw on Saturday night in the MLS Final at BMO Field.
Read MoreTiger Woods is back. And it’s safe to watch the PGA Tour again. At his own tournament this weekend in the Bahamas, the Hero Challenge, Woods showed enough traces of the greatest golfer ever with a sizzling 65 in Round Two and a respectable fifteenth-place finish overall. This after missing almost two full Tour seasons.
Read MoreConor McGregor has been stripped of the Featherweight title, leaving a paper trail of paper titles. With McGregor having left the Featherweights in disarray, its former king, Jose Aldo, has decided to stay in the division. He shouldn't. He should abandon it. McGregor did and on one seemed to care enough to until now.
Read MoreToronto made a significant contribution to Canadian football during this year’s stirring Grey Cup Festival. Okay, it was the only contribution southern Ontarians made this year to the Grey Cup (beside the acres of empty seats that were papered over for Sunday’s game).
Read MoreTalking heads still seem to think the NFL Draft can be gamed. That a smart General Manager can find inefficiencies a la Moneyball. Yet Dak Prescott went in the fourth round because 32 teams -yes, the Cowboys included - felt he was not a 1st, 2nd, or 3rd round player.
Read MoreThe election was fixed.
No, this is not a test of the Donald Trump Emergency Warning System. We are referring to the heist perpetrated in full view last week on Detroit Tigers star Justin Verlander. Verlander, who fashioned a 16-9 record and had the lowest ERA (3.04) for the Tigers, was denied the America League Cy Young Award by a voting scam perpetrated by two voters who failed to put Verlander in their top five selections for the award.
Read MoreBarely an hour removed from removing Eddie Alvarez’s wits, belt, and pride, McGregor made his boldest statement yet. McGregor wants to be set for life. As in, never having to lift a finger until he’s too old to even capably lift a finger. That doesn’t come working hard to make millions of dollars. It comes from making millions of dollars work for him.
Read MoreBack when he was the King of the NBA, Michael Jordan was constantly being sought by political groups to support black and liberal causes. Jordan always demurred. When pressed on his silence, Jordan said simply, “Republicans buy running shoes, too.” A man with a stake in the running-shoe millions through is Air Jordans understood the nature of bipartisanship in a very practical manner.
Read MoreThe defining history of MMA is by who is the best and when. Who was the first best? Whose reign was the shortest? In the beginning, a skinny Brazilian, a Dutchman, and a Japanese superstar all sat on the throne. But reigns are meant to end.
Read MoreA couple of years ago, Canadian author and social behaviour wonk Malcom Gladwell famously remarked that, in 25 years, no one will play football. (He also said no one would eat red meat, but for the moment let’s focus on the dire prediction for the NFL.) In the weeks after making the remark, Gladwell expanded his hypothesis to say that the NFL is living in the past and has no connection to the society it inhabits.
This attention grabber seemed a little far-fetched when Gladwell spoke. The NFL has lapped the field in popularity among team sports and rakes in over six billion dollars a year from TV networks anxious to broadcast the games. If ever there were a lock cinch for security it’s the NFL shield and its attendant communication, marketing and gambling tendrils.
Read MoreAuston Matthews, the rookie star of the Toronto Maple Leafs, has been the talk of the NHL this young season. The first draft pick overall last June in the 2016 amateur draft, he’s shown that the hype about him was justified. For the woebegone Leafs, that is significant.
What’s also significant was the way Matthews got Toronto. The American product did not play in the Canadian Hockey League, the top tier of junior hockey. He did not play in the NCAA for an American college. He instead chose to play his final year before the draft against grown men, not fellow teenagers, in a professional league in Switzerland.
Read MoreLast season the IDLM editorial desk created the Loonie League of Canadian NHL clubs. The idea was to declare a Canadian champion from amongst the seven domestic team. We all know how that went: a big Ofer. As in, zero for seven squads getting into the playoffs.
So we are going in a different direction for the 2016-17 season. We’re calling it Auston City Limits. As in Auston Matthews and the limits of this highly touted rookie class in the NHL. Judging by the major-market effect of Matthews in Toronto alone, this rookie crop could be one they will talk about for a generation. Certainly the NHL can always use an infusion of good news in the star department.
Read MoreIn the current American League Championship Series, it is the nickname that dare not speak its name. At least, not among some prominent members of the media.
Several notable sports announcers— including Toronto Blue Jays radio play-by-play man Jerry Howarth—- are refusing to use the team nickname of the Cleveland Indians as they cover the ALCS. According to figures such as Howarth and Bob Costas of NBC, the team name demeans native Americans. By extension, so do nicknames such as the Braves (Atlanta, MLB), Blackhawks (Chicago, NHL) and Redskins (Washington, NFL).
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