Sports bars, Olympics, cigars and beer

I think I finally get it. What do I get? I get why I never want to go to a sports bar to watch an important game. Sorry, let me be more specific; I will never, ever go to a sports bar again to watch a game of national importance. Going to watch football with Tannis and Ryan is one thing. The place is half empty and all the football fans interact with each other. Going to watch an Olympic hockey game is a totally different animal.

Wednesday night, Tannis and I decided to go to the bar to watch the Canada/Russian quarterfinal game and wow was I in for surprise. Very few if any were wearing jerseys, strike 1, they cheered for everything (the drop of the puck, a mundane neutral zone turnover an easy save) strike 2, but what really brought it down a notch was the guy who had no interest in the game, bringing a girl on a first date and then repeatedly complaining that the Raptor game was not on, while his ditzy, skanky date kept tying to prop her boobs up for him to look at. It was pretty sickening actually. Her piercing voice was grating on me, along with the crowd lacking in any knowledge or appreciation for the game. I love patriotic behaviour, but this was bordering on stereotypical American behaviour….jumping on the bandwagon of anything and everything just to wrap yourself in the flag. The best example of that is when Americans were in love with Lance Armstrong for each successive Tour de France victory, yet they did not know the first thing about cycling. People were not interacting amongst groups, nobody shared high fives with each successive goal, or big hit. It was very impersonal which I found very bizarre.

I was actually embarrassed that the crowd knew as little as they did, but it also confirmed what I have always suspected; real hockey fans hang out with real hockey fans, bandwagon jumping flag wavers go to Philthy’s. What made it even worse, was that this influx of wagoneers made them cancel their regular half price wings promotion. Thanks a lot Mr. Soul Glow!!!

I’d love to be able to revel in the trashing of the Russians, but I much prefer doing it at my house or one of my friend’s places. A place where we can raise our glasses, share high fives, maybe even a few head rubs. The atmosphere there is far more natural than the contrived environment of a bar. Besides, I wont come out broke AND drunk…

Speaking of celebration, what is with the Americans making such a big deal about our GOLD MEDAL WINNING women’s hockey team sharing a few beers and stogies at centre ice after the arena had been cleared? This is one of my main issues with a 24 hour news cycle…you always need something to inflame the public with. They had just completed a perfect run through the Olympics, and countless months of grueling training, yet the media chooses to focus on the “negative”, trying to stir up controversy where none exists. This is truly disgusting behaviour. The IOC and all their fat cats, until recently would be bribed, had prostitutes delivered to them and who knows what else by cities vying for the Olympics. They stay in 5 star hotels, bask in the surplus of money, while the athletes who make the money for these leeches eat rice and macaroni. It is almost worse than NCAA football and basketball. Talk about hypocritical! This is why I find the Olympics to in many ways be a farce. It has lost its meaning and is now a means for the rich to get richer off of the blood , sweat and tears of athletes, who God forbid enjoy a beer with teammates to celebrate.

CNN of all things should not be so quick to judge; they show WAR live on television and have created a culture of fear to keep people reliant on the government. I wonder if the Canadian women had been firing off guns on the ice if that would have been acceptable? I love the contradiction of their culture (and I am not speaking of American citizens, just their government and media). Guns, violence and killing…GOOD. Celebratory Beer with teammates, and public healthcare…BAD. As Chris Rock said, you can go to war at 18, but can’t drink until you are 21. I think the being allowed to kill thing is a little worse than having a beer. Talk about backwoods.

By the way, I am having a beer right now, and really enjoying it

The harsh reality about Men’s and Women’s Canadian hockey…

So as we go into tonight’s elimination game against Germany, I am finally seeing that many Canadians accept the reality. We are NOT the most dominant hockey nation on earth in terms of an Olympic team. I have been saying this the entire time. Not to say I do not want them to climb back and win it all, I just did not think it was going to be as easy as everyone else seemed to.

We do not have the most talented players anymore, nor do we have the best goaltending. Since most Olympic squads are made up of NHL players we no longer exclusively have the grit and toughness Don Cherry claims sets us apart from other nations. I mean, did you see that hit that Ovechkin laid on Jagr the other day??? Our best are no better than the USA’s, Sweden’s, the Czech Republic’s, Russia’s, or Finland’s. The difference is that we could conceivably send 3 teams that would be equally as competitive as any of those countries. We have the depth which in and of itself poses a huge problem when selecting a team. Steve Yzerman has to weed through all the stats and the film and ultimately guys who are very deserving will get left off the roster. How do we know that in this situation those guys are not the difference between a gold medal and an embarrassing early bow-out.

We also have a nasty habit of not recognizing when it is over, or when it is time to pass the torch. Case in point, Martin Brodeur. He is arguably the best goalie we have seen in our lifetime, however he has looked disinterested, and lackadaisical so far in these Olympics. Sure, he helped us win the gold medal in 2002 (after aging Curtis Joseph blew up vs. Sweden), but this is 2010. Roberto Luongo should have been given the reigns from the beginning. He has not looked himself all season and this should have been acknowledged. With so much pressure on this team to win they needed the best available goaltender to carry the load, and Brodeur clearly was not that guy. It is easier to hide decaying skills in the NHL where every team is not four lines deep, but here at the Olympics you get no shifts off. The torch needed to be past and it wasn’t early enough. Lets just hope that it is not too late.

As for Women’s hockey, I am not sure why anyone is excited about watching blow out after blow out. Has Canada even allowed a goal so far? This does not bode well for the health of the game and I certainly hope that other nations can close the gap or else Women’s hockey will possibly be dropped from the Olympics. It is a foregone conclusion that Canada and the US will meet in the gold medal game (with one exception in 2006…which was the biggest fluke ever). I am not knocking the quality of play as the Canada/USA rivalry is very exciting, I am just saying the lead up I painfully dull and unexciting. I hope it corrects itself and the Women’s hockey Gold Medal will start to mean something.

Go Canada Go!

See you tomorrow Russia…