Frustration & a sports rant
Oct. 21st, 2006 08:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cmk418Between the inability to download the Hawks game with real Hawks announcers and also the clock on the post to change (& I have to do math in my head to figure out the 24 hour time), I'm a bit aggravated. The Blues just scored and that puts the cherry on it. Oh, and my boy Martin Havlat is injured. And now I just tried to adjust the volume by hitting the brightness controls. Sad.
And my St. Louis streaming audio just decided to go crazy on me. Trying the Chicago side again. It kept stopping before. It sounds okay. I really prefer the Chicago guys. Best announcers in the game.
And it looks like the Cards are ::whispering so as not to jinx it:: putting it away.
I was thinking of a few things about the two sports I love that piss me off. (I like football, but truth be told, I wouldn't be able to put forth a good argument either for or against it). These are the perspectives of a 37-year-old fan of hockey (since the early 80s) & baseball (mid 70s, but possibly had knowledge of the game since she was a zygote). And I'll put this behind a cut so as not to tick off any 19-year old Bruins/Red Sox fans** that are out there.
BASEBALL
-The designated hitter - C'mon, American League, teach your pitchers to hit. Some of them may be actually better at it than some guy who sits on his ass for the better part of 3 innings & then is expected to play. And don't forget the salary issues. Teach the pitcher how to multi-task (like they do in the National League) and eliminate the DH entirely
-The pitch count being a factor - Poor, precious little delicate men. Only go to work every four, five or six days, and then can only throw a little white ball 100 times before their little arms are too tired to throw another one (and half of them don't have the stress of swinging a bat). Toughen up.
-The All-Star Game meaning anything - All-Star games are more meaningless than exhibition games, so the fact that the winning team gets home field advantage in the World Series is ludicrous (and I'm not bitter than the AL team keeps winning, no ma'am). It should be either alternated (as it has in the past) or based on the better team (and if the All-Star Game is indicative of which league has the better team and not just the higher salary base, then this should be consistent with the All-Star Game winner)
HOCKEY
-Holding the stick - (No pervs, not that stick) This has to be the second stupidest penalty in the history of sports (obstruction holding the stick is the stupidest). The fact that people take the time to enforce something that fifteen-twenty years ago would be standard clutch-and-grab action is ridiculous. It's even more ridiculous given there is already a penalty called "holding". Just put whatever nonsense you want to call under that umbrella. It just seems more manly.
-Finesse - Ah, the beauty of open ice skating, watching the play unfold. Beautiful skaters belong in the ice dancing competition in the Olympics, not in a hockey game. Whatever happened to checking - I'm not advocating anything that would get a player penalized (at least not at this point) - but there's nothing like the sound of a player or two crashing into the boards.
-Fighting - (now, I'm advocating penalties) When I started watching hockey, if something happened to a guy on your team (slashing, hitting from behind, high-sticking) and it wasn't caught by the referee & sometimes if it was, on the next shift, your biggest, toughest guy would be on the ice and would let the other team know that you meant business (usually by starting a fight). Nowadays, there's all sorts of retaliation that goes on and a lot of it serious injury causing. If two guys dropping their gloves and punching each other in the nose would stop all the other stuff, then that should be allowed to happen.
-Gary Bettman - Ozzites, imagine if Governor Devlin was commissioner of hockey. That about sums it up.
-Expansion, three divisions & the playoffs - I don't mind expansion, but the way the current playoff system is (and this goes for baseball as well) sometimes you wind up with a division that is so weak that none of their teams belong in the playoffs & yet your division gets to send a representative there anyway (the odds of this happening in baseball are better than in hockey). This puts a team that may not even belong in the playoffs in the race. And that's not fair to the teams that actually deserve to be there.
-Shootouts - (Where she pisses off the world) If we wanted to play European style hockey, we should expand the league to include Sweden, Finland, Russia, etc. The shootout is a ridiculous anticlimax to a game that one team fought hard enough to have it end in a tie. We've played 65 minutes of hard fought hockey, now lets sit back and send out 3 ringers to try and close it out. If you don't want the game to end in a tie, then play sudden death until the game is done. That's what happens in the playoffs and really that's what makes playoff hockey so much fun and exciting to watch - the never knowing when it's going to happen. It could happen 7 seconds in to the first OT or seventeen minutes into the fourth OT. Fans are fans - they'd stay to the end. Also, the point system is screwed up. The loser is still awarded one point. That's bull. If a team loses, no points should be awarded. That would help in settling things by the end of the first overtime.
End of rant
I think I need to write some more fic soon. It seems a little deserted around here these days, maybe it's just the time of year or something.
**BTW, I'm not picking on 19-year-olds from Boston. It was just the first example that came to mind.
And my St. Louis streaming audio just decided to go crazy on me. Trying the Chicago side again. It kept stopping before. It sounds okay. I really prefer the Chicago guys. Best announcers in the game.
And it looks like the Cards are ::whispering so as not to jinx it:: putting it away.
I was thinking of a few things about the two sports I love that piss me off. (I like football, but truth be told, I wouldn't be able to put forth a good argument either for or against it). These are the perspectives of a 37-year-old fan of hockey (since the early 80s) & baseball (mid 70s, but possibly had knowledge of the game since she was a zygote). And I'll put this behind a cut so as not to tick off any 19-year old Bruins/Red Sox fans** that are out there.
BASEBALL
-The designated hitter - C'mon, American League, teach your pitchers to hit. Some of them may be actually better at it than some guy who sits on his ass for the better part of 3 innings & then is expected to play. And don't forget the salary issues. Teach the pitcher how to multi-task (like they do in the National League) and eliminate the DH entirely
-The pitch count being a factor - Poor, precious little delicate men. Only go to work every four, five or six days, and then can only throw a little white ball 100 times before their little arms are too tired to throw another one (and half of them don't have the stress of swinging a bat). Toughen up.
-The All-Star Game meaning anything - All-Star games are more meaningless than exhibition games, so the fact that the winning team gets home field advantage in the World Series is ludicrous (and I'm not bitter than the AL team keeps winning, no ma'am). It should be either alternated (as it has in the past) or based on the better team (and if the All-Star Game is indicative of which league has the better team and not just the higher salary base, then this should be consistent with the All-Star Game winner)
HOCKEY
-Holding the stick - (No pervs, not that stick) This has to be the second stupidest penalty in the history of sports (obstruction holding the stick is the stupidest). The fact that people take the time to enforce something that fifteen-twenty years ago would be standard clutch-and-grab action is ridiculous. It's even more ridiculous given there is already a penalty called "holding". Just put whatever nonsense you want to call under that umbrella. It just seems more manly.
-Finesse - Ah, the beauty of open ice skating, watching the play unfold. Beautiful skaters belong in the ice dancing competition in the Olympics, not in a hockey game. Whatever happened to checking - I'm not advocating anything that would get a player penalized (at least not at this point) - but there's nothing like the sound of a player or two crashing into the boards.
-Fighting - (now, I'm advocating penalties) When I started watching hockey, if something happened to a guy on your team (slashing, hitting from behind, high-sticking) and it wasn't caught by the referee & sometimes if it was, on the next shift, your biggest, toughest guy would be on the ice and would let the other team know that you meant business (usually by starting a fight). Nowadays, there's all sorts of retaliation that goes on and a lot of it serious injury causing. If two guys dropping their gloves and punching each other in the nose would stop all the other stuff, then that should be allowed to happen.
-Gary Bettman - Ozzites, imagine if Governor Devlin was commissioner of hockey. That about sums it up.
-Expansion, three divisions & the playoffs - I don't mind expansion, but the way the current playoff system is (and this goes for baseball as well) sometimes you wind up with a division that is so weak that none of their teams belong in the playoffs & yet your division gets to send a representative there anyway (the odds of this happening in baseball are better than in hockey). This puts a team that may not even belong in the playoffs in the race. And that's not fair to the teams that actually deserve to be there.
-Shootouts - (Where she pisses off the world) If we wanted to play European style hockey, we should expand the league to include Sweden, Finland, Russia, etc. The shootout is a ridiculous anticlimax to a game that one team fought hard enough to have it end in a tie. We've played 65 minutes of hard fought hockey, now lets sit back and send out 3 ringers to try and close it out. If you don't want the game to end in a tie, then play sudden death until the game is done. That's what happens in the playoffs and really that's what makes playoff hockey so much fun and exciting to watch - the never knowing when it's going to happen. It could happen 7 seconds in to the first OT or seventeen minutes into the fourth OT. Fans are fans - they'd stay to the end. Also, the point system is screwed up. The loser is still awarded one point. That's bull. If a team loses, no points should be awarded. That would help in settling things by the end of the first overtime.
End of rant
I think I need to write some more fic soon. It seems a little deserted around here these days, maybe it's just the time of year or something.
**BTW, I'm not picking on 19-year-olds from Boston. It was just the first example that came to mind.
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no subject
Date: 2006-10-23 12:51 am (UTC)Designated hitter - totally agree. Learn to play both offense and defense and I'll be more willing to consider you an athlete. Ditto for the pitch count.
Finesse - I miss those wonderful hip checks Luc Richardson used to throw at the blue line. Thing of beauty.
Fighting - If it cuts down on the cheap shots with the sticks, I'm all for having an enforcer around. Yay for Tie Domi and Marty McSorley.
Gary Bettman - OMG, how did I miss the similarities before?
Shoot Outs - Are all that is evil in regular season hockey. And Olympic hockey, but that's another rant.
no subject
Date: 2006-10-23 01:59 am (UTC)Olympic hockey can keep the shootout as far as I'm concerned, because it's European style hockey. Just keep it out of North America. Along with European style play (but I said that already, didn't I?)
no subject
Date: 2006-10-23 02:50 am (UTC)Ah, the Norris Division. I have fond memories. And while Toronto/Buffalo games are usually okay, I'm already tired of the Toronto/Ottawa rivalry they're trying to shove down our throats.
I used to love Marty. I even loved him when he was playing for the Kings and ruined my team's chances in the seventh game of the semi-finals. I turned my eyes away from the last few years of his career. We will never speak of the stick swinging concussion incident again.
And yeah, I want North American style hockey back. Should we start a petition? :)
no subject
Date: 2006-10-23 04:24 am (UTC)And while Toronto/Buffalo games are usually okay, I'm already tired of the Toronto/Ottawa rivalry they're trying to shove down our throats.
Really? It seems like geographically at least that would be a fun rivalry. Do people not travel between the cities for the games? This is coming from a person who thinks the Anaheim Ducks are on a different planet, when in reality they are an hour and a half away. But California hockey is different. It's a non-priority with baseball & basketball & the latest NFL proposal. There are uber-fans, but a lot of them are being priced out (cheap seats now at $26 a game). And the arenas are devoid of personality, but most are nowdays.
Oh, THAT definitely should have gone in my rant.