Good morning Buzz Hargrove.
Heard your report got NHL player's association director Paul Kelly the Brutus brush-off because he wasn't a mean, nasty, hard-ass who would toadie to the players and talk their language.
Good thinking. That, we assume would be the same (%&$#(0#$) language you used to get the auto workers where they are now.
Memo to the NHLPA
Three executive directors in four years and counting. Nevermind Ron Pink or Buzz. There's only one character who can successfully represent an organization like this: M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E.
Or maybe Eric Lindros? Which is sort of the same thing.
Going nowhere fast
A cow in Japan escaped on its way to the slaughter house, led pursuers on a three-mile chase, knocked someone unconscious , then ran into a fence post and died.
This might be unusual until you consider that in Toronto a similar demise is displayed every Saturday night during the winter. Except here it's called the Maple Leafs power play.
Park 'n' sly
Julio Maglione, head of the Pan American Sports Organization evaluation commission, had much praise for Toronto's bid to host the 2015 Games. "Your highways are excellent and there are going to be good (Go-train) links. It's a city that looks healthy."
Spoken like a guy who has never spent even a minute hanging from a steel pole whilst having your face stuck in someone's armpit during the rush-hour cattle call on the resplendent Oakville express. What did the Toronto bid committee do? Tell him the Don Valley Parkway was the world's skinniest parking lot?
Dog days of summer
The Blue Jays are a lot like those Toronto garbage collectors who walked off the job. Both are perceived to be over-paid and under-productive.
Not to mention, the Jays, with 31 wins in the past 87 games, also seem to have turned in their accumulated sick days this year and called it a season.
Passing fancy
Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford and Texas quarterback Colt McCoy, after finishing 1-2 in the 2008 Heisman Trophy race, became pals and worked the Manning Passing Academy. Says John Henderson, Denver Post: "Which apparently marked the first time a Sooner and a Longhorn became close in something besides a bar fight."
No idea what's up
Buffalo Sabres managing partner/minority owner Larry Quinn claims the team hasn't decided on its stance on territorial rights regarding Jim Balsillie and the Golden Horseshoe area. There are people who might believe this but all of them are currently incommunicado and living in a Florida swamp.
"We're just waiting to see how things play out," claimed Quinn. An NHL owner who has no idea what they're doing. Now there's something you don't hear every .... Uhhh! Oh, never mind.
BILL.LANKHOF@SUNMEDIA.CA
