millbank

During the time Darcy Regier has been general manager of the Buffalo Sabres and Lindy Ruff has been his coach, the Florida Panthers have employed five different general managers and six different coaches. Over the same nine years, the Leafs have had three general managers and are about to hire their third head coach. "Change, more often than not, destabilizes your franchise rather than stabilizes it," said Regier, the general manager nobody knows or at least notices. "I think if you miss the playoffs three years in a row and blow everything up, you're more likely to miss the playoffs seven years in a row. We got lucky here. We didn't get fired. The team was sold. We could have been fired. Ownership gave us a chance." And here they are, in Round 2 of the Stanley Cup playoffs in a playoff matchup that is almost unfair. It's too early for either the Sabres or the Ottawa Senators to lose. Not the way they play the game. Not the way they have fit in to the new National Hockey League. Darcy Regier Way

Marv will be on WGR this morning at 8:30 am speaking about the draft with Howard and Jermey. Its interesting how local Buffalo media have been largely supportive of Bills drafts decsions this year opposed to national media. At least they seem to be saying settle down lets wait and see.

not a great risk for the 248th pick, sometimes the light does go on....

May I ask what you are having ......?

the girls made some soft pretzels and home made root beer, nobody getting pixelated here....

This is kind of fun from a school talent show. Super Mario Re-enactment

winning goal

Edmonton beat Detroit 4- 2 with Micheal Peca having a good game. Series even now heading back to Edmonton. - Brad Winchester was the biggest nobody in the NHL before Sunday. Now he's definitely somebody. Winchester, who failed to stick with the Edmonton Oilers despite call-up after call-up from AHL Hamilton during the regular season, scored the winning goal in his first NHL playoff game Sunday in a 4-2 victory over the Detroit Red Wings. The first-round playoff series is tied at one game each. Edmonton - Detroit

The Swarm actually came back from being down 10 - 5 and tied it with five straight goals, before the Bandits scored winner with three minutes remaining and then just hung on..

Bandits eek out a 11-10 win over Swarm ...... Bandits will now play next week in eastern division final.... sorry Chris..

Hmmmm, think Mother and i have seeded enough in the home area, not that we dont ... you know yes its time for feed corn and vegetables ect.

Yes, Mr. Chickensquirt, i was saying the same thing to my good friend Mr. Dorfus Waffletush who is working at present . The Gizzardhump family are busy seeding today....

Snickle Gizzardhump............

80

Take this test and see how Evil you are, its a Salon link still the test is fun Are You Evil

Sex cues ruin men's decisiveness Article Catching sight of a pretty woman really is enough to throw a man's decision-making skills into disarray, a study suggests. The more testosterone he has, the vaguer he will be, according to work by Belgian researchers. Men about to play a financial game were shown images of sexy women or lingerie. The Proceedings of the Royal Society B study found they performed worse than men who had not been exposed to the alluring images. The suggestion is that the sexual cues distract the men's thoughts, preventing them from focusing on their task - particularly among those with high natural testosterone levels. The University of Leuven researchers gave 176 heterosexual male student volunteers aged 18 to 28 financial games to test their fair play.

ooooooooooh !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Paul Godfrey now President of Blue Jays, headed a group years ago to get a baseball franchise in Toronto, a consortium of very rich men Canada's richest behind it, Howard Webster, Ken Thompson, amongst them Ken Thompson Many of the same men and now also with Paul Godfrey as spokeman have been seeking a team or new franchise for a number of years, its not a question of if , its a question of when, these people of the worlds richest

oh my

Turkey Drop Johnny on Disco

The playing field is leveling out, except in the NFL FOLLOW THE MONEY. It is what Deep Throat told Woodward and Bernstein in the parking garage in "All the President's Men," and it is what every sports fan knows is the only real truth. The money might not be the be-all and the end-all, not in every case, but it explains plenty about our games today, and everybody knows it and nobody should forget it. And, so, this: We have just finished a very competitive 5-year period in professional sports - much more balanced and much more competitive in baseball, basketball and hockey than the 5 years that preceded it, and less balanced in football. The reason is money. That's it. More than anything, sports sell hope to fans. These last 5 years, more fans have been hopeful. When it all comes down to it, all fans want is a fair shot on Opening Day. These last 5 years, more fans have walked through more turnstiles on Opening Day with just that thought, smiling a splendid maybe. Money is the reason. Balancing spending is the reason. We'll begin with the aberration, the NFL, and we'll begin with a definition. What we're going to do is count the number of teams that made it to the final four in the playoffs over the most recent two 5-year periods. They are, by this definition, the teams that had a real and legitimate shot at winning it all. And while it is probably flawed and limited as a concept, it is also instructive. And so, in the NFL, from 1996 to 2000 and 2001 to '05, the number of franchises that reached the final four fell 25 percent, from 16 to 12. In the first 5-year period, it was by far the most wide-open league in major North American sports. In the second 5-year period, it was the least wide-open. You know the reason, especially if you spent any time reading the papers last month, when the NFL and its union did battle over a new collective bargaining/revenue-sharing agreement. The NFL was the one sport where the revenue sharing was decreasing significantly, and where rich teams - because of new-stadium revenue that was both breathtaking and unshared - had the growing potential to spike their spending in a way that hadn't really existed before. The result? Less competitive balance. Fewer teams playing in conference championship games. Compare that to baseball. In the earlier period, it was the least competitive of our sports with 10 final-four teams. In the more recent period, that increased by 30 percent to 13 teams. Why? Because they got control of spending with a luxury-tax system and a revenue-sharing scheme that, while imperfect, has proved to be fairly effective. If you can believe what is occasionally reported, there are more profitable baseball teams now than at any recent time and there is more balanced spending. The Yankees are still wildly off the charts, but there is more of an equal distribution below them and the results are clear. The NBA is the same way. It went from 11 franchises that made the final four in the earlier period, to 13 in the more recent period. The reason? The luxury tax. It is a ridiculous salary-cap system, the NBA's. It is so full of exceptions and creates so many hurdles to making trades and fixing mistakes that it gives you a headache - and really can cripple a team that gets caught. But the simplest thing, a luxury tax on payrolls over a certain level, now rules everything. It is a tax that every team declares from every available rooftop that it will not pay. It is a tax that has created a very effective ceiling on team payrolls. When that happens, more teams can compete. Simple. Finally, hockey. In its last 10 seasons, it was very competitive in the first 5-year period (12 teams) and it was the most competitive in the next period (15 teams). Why is this? Wasn't the NHL terribly broken, which forced the yearlong lockout and the remaking of the system? Well, kind of. What everybody in the league knew was that payroll growth - which had skyrocketed at one point - was shrinking in the last couple of years and, in fact, almost manageable with some tweaks. The old system was slowly self-correcting. It's just that the league didn't want tweaks and it didn't want slow - it wanted immediate, absolute, idiot-proof cost certainty, and it was willing to fight to get it. Still, it was a better economic system at the point of the lockout than it had been 5 years earlier - and, so, the game was more balanced on the ice. As for the NHL's future, with its new model agreement, you have to expect even more balance. Again, just follow the money. In hockey, though, it is a little bit complicated. Because in hockey, unlike the other sports, money is a hot goaltender. Article

wkrp opening

COMSTOCK PARK, Mich. -- Two children were injured in a scramble to grab cash being dropped from a helicopter as part of a promotion after a minor league baseball game. About $1,000 in cash was dropped Saturday from the helicopter over Fifth Third Ballpark's outfield as children lined the outfield fence. After the cash was dropped, the children scrambled. A 7-year-old boy was trampled and taken to a hospital, while a 7-year-old girl got a bloody lip after being pushed onto the ground. The boy, Tino Rodriquez, of Grant, suffered bruises to his chest and back, said his grandmother, Rita Rodriquez. "Doctors said he got trampled pretty good," she said. The cash drop took place after the West Michigan Whitecaps' 3-0 win over the Southwest Michigan Devil Rays. It was the first time the Class A affiliate of the Detroit Tigers had conducted such a promotion. advertising "It's for fun and games," spokeswoman Katie Kroft said. "This is why we have everybody sign a waiver." Tino's grandfather, Ruben Rodriquez, said he was surprised that children as young as 5 were allowed to participate with others as old as 12. "It was tiny kids against big kids," he said. "It's like playing football. You can't put a 12-year-old versus a 7-year-old." Promotion

cows need be milked everyday.....

Sundin 4 goals , 2 assists , Leafs win 6-5 in overtime. A excellent game by Sundin no matter what you want to call it.