Sidney Crosby back on the ice for the first time on monday march 14 , 2011 since missing 29 games due to a concussion.
Seriously, congratulations to the Vancouver Canucks on winning the franchise's first-ever President's Trophy. As a hockey fan -- as a sports fan -- it's hard not to appreciate Vancouver. They've battled through injuries and have rebounded from past playoff disappointments and they have red-haired identical Swedish twins as their best players. What's going on out West this year is reminscent of what the Toronto Blue Jays were doing in the late 1980s and 1990s: creating memories that can sustain fans for years; decades even. I'm being sincere when I hope the 'Nucks manage to continue their regular season dominance into the playoffs and bring Vancouver their first Stanley Cup.
Having a dominant team to follow is powerful stuff. As Stephen Brunt writes, even now, all these years later, the 50,000-plus fans that will be filing into the Rogers Centre tonight are hopeful that this team is at the beginning of reclaiming those grand heights.
In Vancouver they're so, so, close; they've done everything right. Past history aside, I really don't see any reason why Vancouver won't be able to get past the Chicago Blackhawks in the first-round of the playoffs.
Anyway, on to other stuff, including sexy celebrity first pitch throwers.
1. Baseball is slowly dying
An interesting premise on Opening Day(s), when the Toronto Blue Jays are sold out and MLB revenues continue to grow. But this feature in the Wall Street Journal shows cause for concern in that - as has been long predicted -- the sedentary pace of the sport isn't enough to keep the attention of today's American 'ute whose attention spans are addled by video games and ...hockey?: From 2000 to 2009, the latest year for which figures are available, the number of kids aged 7 to 17 playing baseball fell 24%, according to the National Sporting Goods Association, an industry trade group. Despite growing concerns about the long-term effects of concussions, participation in youth tackle football has soared 21% over the same time span, while ice hockey jumped 38%. The Sporting Goods Manufacturing Association, another industry trade group, said baseball participation fell 12.7% for the overall population.
"The days of kids being born with a glove next to their ear in the crib and boys playing catch in the backyard by age three, those are over," said Len Coleman, the former president of the National League.
Coleman, who counts Hall of Famers Hank Aaron and Frank Robinson as close friends, said he watched his son, now 23, drop baseball as a teenager for soccer-the sport he starred in at Georgetown University. "I even tried to keep him interested by having him catch so he'd be involved in every play," Coleman said.
According to scouts, the declining numbers are beginning to alter the talent pool in ways that could have a noticeable impact on player quality. "There are still players, but there aren't the numbers out there anymore," said David Bloom, a scout with the Baltimore Orioles. "The great players just don't stand out like they used to."
Todd Hargrove of Rockwall, Texas, had hoped his son, Colton, would play baseball-the same sport he'd played as a teenager. But Colton Hargrove, 18, chose elite hockey instead-and now plays for the Fargo Force of the U.S. Hockey League. "He's 6 -2, 210 pounds, with big hands," Hargrove said. "Could have thrown a mean forkball if he'd stuck with it."
He didn't. "I'd sort of just be standing there on the field," Colton said. "It was kind of boring."
2. What are the chances Sidney Crosby is SIDNEY CROSBY come playoff time?
Pretay, pretay good -- at least say his teamamtes. The man himself is making no promises or predictions about his return to competition, but the guys he shares a dressing room with are confident that if he does come back he'll be the Crosby of old; mainly because this is Sidney Crosby we're talking about: It's trickier for the Penguins to temper expectations about how Crosby will perform if he does return. They can't let him play unless they're confident he's 100 percent again. They shouldn't sell short a player with his gifts, and they don't want to take hope from him and his teammates, who have battled so hard and well without him - not to mention Evgeni Malkin and others - and are so confident in what he can do.
Asked if it is reasonable to expect that Crosby could come back and play like the best player in the game, [Pascal]Dupuis said flatly: "He will. The way I know him, the way everybody knows him on this team, you can expect that he will."
Even coming off something like this?
"He will," Dupuis repeated. "Just because he's that kind of person. Talent doesn't mean anything when you're Sidney Crosby. It's all about work ethic, all about dedication to the game. It's all about wanting it, and he's the kind of person that … I'm not worried at all."
3. One thing about this Final Four; it's not hard to pick who to cheer for:
On one side of the bracket you have Butler and VCU in an historic meeting of underdogs; where two relatively unheralded programs led by a pair of young, seemingly idealistic coaches will fight for the glass slipper. On the other you have UConn and Kentucky, led by Jim Calhoun and John Calipari, respectively, war horses who have made careers out of finding players whose main plan is getting to the NBA as quickly as possible. To Calipari's credit, he's at least upfront about it: In the last two years, much has been made of Kentucky coach John Calipari's recruiting style. That style, basically, is to recruit as many of the best high school players in the country as possible, to encourage them to go pro if the time is right, and to reload the following season with another No. 1 recruiting class filled with elite, game-changing one-and-done talents. To his supporters, Calipari's recruiting philosophy is brilliant and progressive. It uses, rather than fights, the college basketball player's deeply entrenched desire to make it to the NBA as soon as possible. To his critics, Calipari's recruiting style is antithetical to success. Can you really win when your best players are freshmen every single year?
4. Warren Moon is still not happy with how black quarterbacks are treated:
To be specific, the former Edmonton Eskimo great and Houston Oilers great, is not happy how Cam Newton, the black quarterback he's acting as an advisor for, is being treated. He's been the subject of some unflattering media commentary and Moon thinks race is the reason. The advisability of that strategy remains to be seen, as Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports writes: Moon, who also is black, works as an adviser to Newton as he prepares for the NFL draft at the end of April. After 17 seasons as an NFL quarterback, starting at a time when the position was almost exclusively white, Moon has earned the right to broach the subject. His opinion shouldn't be dismissed in a knee-jerk fashion.It is, however, open to fair debate, especially since NFL draft coverage has hardly been kind to anyone, particularly white quarterbacks such as Tim Tebow(notes), Ryan Mallett and Jimmy Clausen(notes).
Even more, how does bringing race into the Cam Newton debate help Cam Newton? Isn't Moon's job to make Newton's transition easier?
Race is a sensitive and complicated matter to discuss, especially on a national scale through the instant-feedback modern media. A 21-year-old QB trying to show teams he can move past numerous off-field dramas doesn't appear to be the ideal vehicle. Moon may be ready for the argument. Is his client?
5. March Madness: one Canadian left standing
She's Natalie Anchonwa of Guelph, Ont. and the first player off the bench for the University of Notre Dame, a No.2 seed who will be trying to slay the giant that is UConn, the Carleton Ravens of US women's college basketball. Anchonwa has been on the Canadian women's senior national team since she was 16 and is an athletic power forward tabbed to be Canada's next elite female player. At Notre Dame she's the freshman X-factor. This story from the South Bend Tribune predicted she would need to be the difference maker in Notre Dame's regional final game against Tennessee and she just might have been as she grabbed five offensive rebounds, two steals and two assists in 24 minutes off the bench. Notre Dame women's coach Muffet McGraw (I didn't make that up) has high hopes for Anchonwa: Over the last five games, she's averaged eight points and seven boards."Since the tournament started, I've been a lot more aggressive about attacking the basket," Achonwa said Sunday. "I've been trying to work on finishing. We have some great point guards, even posts, that are able to pass and get you in position to score. They're getting me the ball in a position where I can score and attack."
"(Achonwa has) really come into her own," McGraw said. "She's done some great things lately. As a freshman, you have a little bit of inconsistency throughout the season. She's really been steady for us. She's rebounding really well."
6. Sonny Weems - looking for love in all the wrong places, like Twitter, for example:
In this most dreary of Toronto Raptors seasons, Dave Feschuk of the Toronto Star manages to find a compelling subject in Raptors guard Sonny Weems' lonely-heart Tweets. To hear Weems tell it, being young, famous(ish) and rich doesn't always translate into off-court success: It's not a stretch to suggest that when pro athletes, both male and female, seek romantic partnership, choice comes in quantity. Quality, Weems will tell you, is another matter.
"A lot of females come to you, and they tell you a story. 'I want to be your girl. I'm different from other females.' Or whatever. It happens all the time," Weems said. "Athletes really have it hard, trying to find that person. Who can you trust?"
...Why, then, would Weems, at age 24, bother seeking a relationship via Twitter? [Reggie]Evans wondered aloud if Weems has grown tired of being a soloist while one of his closest friends on the team, 21-year-old DeMar DeRozan, spends quality time with a steady girlfriend.
"DeMar's been having a girlfriend for a while - it's probably taking a toll on Sonny," Evans said, a mischievous smile ever in place. "He probably thinks he needs someone."
Weems, for his part, said he typed his get-a-girlfriend message "just for fun." And he disputed Evans' third-wheel theory, pointing out that DeRozan's girlfriend, Kiara, has been on the scene since DeRozan attended the University of Southern California in 2008-09. Weems referred to Kiara as "one of the fellows."
7. I'm not even sure if I'm allowed to do this:
But it's the Jays home opener and Friday and everything, so I'm going to go ahead an link to this photo gallery of the 40 Sexiest Celebrity Opening Day First Pitches in Baseball HIstory. I think it's great that Pat Gillick is throwing out the first pitch tonight at Rogers Centre; but he ain't making this list.