Happy Turkey Day..

The Star is the contributor of the Maple Leaf Turkey article of the day, the author Rosie DiManno who clearly is the woman in sports that Mike Toth spoke of months before leaving the Fan and Sportsnet. (Toth by the way is officially gone from the Fan on a permanent basis). DiManno’s column is, in a word brutal. I have no problem with being critical of the Leafs, but at least make sense. They have offered up lots of ammunition to pick on them and she comes up with utter crap.

“Heretofore the difference between crap and craps: The first is played on ice, too many nights, by the Maple Leafs. The second is played with dice.”

Rosie then goes on, and on on the laws of probability. So if you want to bet on the coin flips or dice rolling, read on….

“A rolled dice always has a 1-chance-in-6 of flashing six pips, no matter how often it is thrown. A die doesn’t change it’s, um, spots.

Leaf shooters have been unable to change their luck either, regardless of how many shots they take in a game – like that club-record tying 61 in Monday’s 4-3 overtime loss to the Islanders.

Now, clearly there are permutations, hockey-wise, because scoring opportunities have numerous variables. This is what makes it a game of skill and calculation rather than chance and finite odds. But the Leafs have been making a whole lot of journeymen goalies look like Dominik Hasek by shooting blanks or taking low-profit swipes at the puck on the theory that, eventually, some of them have to go in. Ain’t happening.”

No you see, here is where she goes offline. The problem with her theory is that despite odds, in sports there are these things called streaks. This is true in every sport. There are times where even the best of players go into slumps and there are times when the worst of players still tickle the twine, cause, well shit happens. Ask a goalie or a baseball batter about the times when the puck or ball looks either like a pea or a beach-ball. Is it mathematically explainable? Not really. It just happens. Does that mean Jason Blake is going to score 50 this year? No. Does it mean they will shoot at the same percentage all year- hell no! Does the baseball player who goes 5-5 on opening day with 2 homers mean he isn’t going to miss all year and score 2 every game?

“The Leafs, arguably, have just one pure goal scorer in Phil Kessel, who has been exactly as advertised. This was the dilemma in the Mats Sundin era, when so much of the offensive burden was borne by a single player, rarely with proficient play-making linemates.”

No shit dick tracey- this is news?

“”Snipers have a weird sense of where to go on the ice and they always find a way to score,” said Sundin, when we caught up with him on Wednesday, enjoying retirement in Stockholm.

“It’s a combination of natural skill and hard work. The best pure goal-scorer I ever saw was Alex Mogilny. Now, he was gifted, but he also worked hard on his shooting every day.”

Sundin cleaves to the keep-shooting mantra.

“At least you’re giving yourself a chance to score.”

Ok, so you talked to Mats….What is the point of this article???? What does anything that you have written have to do with flipping coins and rolling dice? The Leafs are putting forth an effort, and are at least playing a more competitive brand of hockey. Are they winning? No. Does it matter in the grand scheme of things that they are trying hard- not really. Effort only goes so far. The reality is this team is devoid of scoring talent. I don’t care how hard Mogilny worked- he had a gift; he was extremely talented. Wade Belak looked like he worked pretty hard too- he didn’t score like Mogilny did. Next time Rosie – have a point.

By the way, many people have asked the question, TSM reached Brian Burke this evening and was told that the Maple Leafs self imposed holiday transaction freeze kicks in on December 9th.

TSM @yyzsportsmedia

Rosie is here

Opening day of my hockey season, my daughter clearly was excited as she roamed the halls at 630 this morning.

Quote of the day come from Steve Simmons:

“Who kidnapped Mike Wilner and replaced him with a raving Blue Jays apologist on the post-game radio shows?”

Truer words haven’t appeared in Simmons weekly column in a long time. The other day Wilner had the gaul to say, yet again, that Cito hasn’t had much of an effect on the hitters, that the bats were “certain to come around for Gibbons too”. Compare that with the words of Jerry Howarth, who actually travels with the team (not that alone is reason enough to take his word of J.P.’s, I mean Wilners). Jerry comments on almost every broadcast about what a difference the entire team is under Cito…. I have to wonder if Wilner is the guy that Brady is always talking about when he (Brady) says that teams other then the leafs put pressure on their broadcast partners with respect to what they can say on the air…

Rosie DiManno is an idiot. I am sorry, but I am not sure what purpose her articles have, ever. One week she is yapping about VP candidate Sarah Palin and the next she is talking about Jeff Finger. Her article this morning is so outdated. There is not one piece of new information in it. The same story could have been written the day he was signed.

“His was a free-agent doozie deal, the most expensive of Toronto’s off-season acquisitions, even as many wondered if GM Cliff Fletcher had banged his head on a rafter or something for signing the relatively unknown blue-liner to a four-year, $14 million contract – a 733 per cent raise over Finger’s stipend as an Avalanche.”

uh huh, move along, we’ve heard this before, about a million times….

“There will be much curiosity about this particular addition in a season that has already been cast as woebegone, with few even quasi-luminaries in the lineup. Finger is all but guaranteed gobs of ice time. The anonymity he has enjoyed over the past month, since moving into a Toronto apartment close to the rink, will dissolve. Finger claims he’s game for hockey madness, T.O. style.”

Listen honey, no one is impressed with your 5 or 10 point words. This is sports. Write something smart, insightful, newsworthy, or here’s a novel idea…. INTERESTING. It’s amazing your columns aren’t any of the above. You go on the fan and prove that you are a moron. You have never made a comment (let alone written one) that gives me pause, causes me to think or had me thinking or saying , “she is right”. We are lucky in this city to have some amazing female sports journalists, you are an embarrassment to them. For every ounce of progress they make for women in sports, you are the anchor to the stoneage of a male dominated industry. Do us all a favor and stay out of the sports section. You aren’t controversial, entertaining or insightful. You are like parsley on the side of a plate, useless, only good to look at, except in this case, we can’t even say that….

Notice just one site keeps blabbing about a certain former Maple Leaf captain, everyone else has moved on (thank god)…ya think perhaps he is addicted?