SouthernWingsFan

Never work braces, so crooked teeth it is. Always have had one bent awkwardly, so oh well. The older I get the less I give a hoot about it. Jawa or Ewok

Maceo Parker - Inner City Blues Play this. Bob your head and move around. Repeat it over and over again. Absolute goodness of a funky song. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u66c25jb-M0

You never once mentioned drought there, and I am not talking anything about drought or lack of rain. That sucks and I don't wish that on anybody. You were talking about temperature only and I responded with temperature only accordingly. I have lived in a place all my life that has been hot and humid. I lived in the Dallas-Fort Worth area for five years when it often got hot in the 100s, and humid sometimes as well. So you can check your "I have no idea what the conditions" are like attitude at the door. Temperatures aren't changing anytime soon here or there, so it's wasted energy for me complaining about temperature numbers when they are supposed to be what they are in the summer in any area. You learn to live with it. I wish it wasn't hot, but it's not going away. It's very numbing to hear it being complained about over and over and over again not just by you but by all people when they know it's coming and are used to it. I get it. It's hot.

REAL! Beavis or Butt-Head or Butt or Head

Don't really think about the temperature much one way or the other down here this time of year. It's summer in Southeastern Louisiana. It's hot and humid. It's supposed to be that way. Not one to complain about temps when they are supposed to be what they are. I deal with it fine. The person below me thinks this is funny.

One of those players is not like the other!

The playoff series 2 years ago, you could make a claim where the officials played a bigger part than necessary in helping the Sharks win (specifically, game 2 I believe). Sharks dove nearly every single play it seems. Bush league, but if the refs weren't going to penalize them, I don't blame them for keeping on doing it. This year, not so much. Sharks got a few bounces here/there to start the series, but that's how they often go and they rarely needed the benefit of refs this time around. The Wings made an absurdly valiant effort to pull off the stunner but just came up short. While officiating in general in the NHL stinks, I'm having a hard time pinning losses on them or thinking they played a bigger part than necessary. While I am one of the first that goes absolutely bonkers over phantom interference calls for example, I'm getting tired of the officiating excuse as well.

Fingers. Dark Helmet or Darth Vader or

Don't really have one. Like 'em all pretty much. Country cheddar, gumbo, etc. The person below me thinks this is funny.

Yep, anything is possible. They got the personnel, they just need to produce. You could definitely say the same thing about our favorite team with personnel and playoff trouble for most of the 90s until we finally broke through in 1997. And while I get that there can be a playoff jinx or not going to the next step or whatnot, I think most times it is often overblown by media outlets in general. Sure they might have underperformed, but with 3-point games and so much parity in the NHL today and no real playoff series being a slam dunk for any one team, whether you are the #1 seed or #8 seed, I don't completely buy into the playoff choker deal or whatever you want to call it.

Nope. The person below me thinks this is funny.

Never had a Labatt so Molson I guess, but it's beer, I'm not all that picky. Woo or Hoo

*shrugs*

Who pooped in your cereal this morning? None of the above might happen, but that doesn't mean people can't talk about it.

Anyways, been waiting to respond in here after getting a bit of an understanding from people who are much more knowledgeable and aware than I am. As long as the majority of owners overall are happy with Bettman, he isn't going anywhere. He played a part in dragging this league into their most recent lockout but he's done a good job slowly/surely getting the league out of it and getting the league into some relevance again in the general population, again slowly/surely. Shoreline and haroldsnepts pretty much state my thoughts on him more/less. I acknowledge and give him credit for doing a decent job, but he still comes off as a fuzznut to EXISTING fans/EXISTING customer base. He dodges questions masterfully and always tells people what fans "think" when a lot of the times I find what the fans "think" to not be fully accurate from him. While I think so many existing fans of this product aren't going abandon watching the sport anytime soon, in business (and professional sports is no exception), one of the most important principles if not the most important is taking care of your existing/current customers. Him getting just peppered with boos nearly every year now presenting the Stanley Cup to the winning team or Conn Smythe trophy, regardless of if it is home/away team or player, that goes to show you not a lot of current fans/customers like him. What also helps his, and the NHL's cause right now, is the recently labor disputes in the NFL and still ongoing one in the NBA.

Aside from Doc Emerick and Pierre being unbearable to listen to at times, overall I liked Versus, though I'm not really too hard to please. As long as I can watch my games somewhere, I really don't care what station it is. It could be on the Food Network for all I care as long as it is available somewhere. Anyways, while I think VS was slowly and surely becoming more known, can't see how this won't help NBC compete more with CBS and ABC in sports, etc. assuming VS keeps some of their current sports contracts. NHL obviously, and Versus also broadcasts MMA, the Tour de France, etc. They've also broadcasted college football games (and some basketball to a lesser extent I think) in the Mountain West Confernece, as well as the Pac-10 (now the Pac-12) and the Big 12. I think the Big 12 might've moved on this past season, but they usually had the top pick of games for the MWC every week and a 2nd or 3rd pick in the Pac-10/12 conference if I had to guess. To compare/contrast, CBS Sports Network did a re-branding recently as well, so you wonder if this is some kind of standard now. That station was first CSTV (College Sports TV), then it went onto CBS College Sports, and now to its present name. I don't watch the station much outside of college football season or an occassional college hockey game but I'm guessing they are going with more sports/reach now. For college they often broadcasted games in the Mountain West Conference as well in addition to Conference-USA, and they'd replay plenty of games from the SEC and such. Just some FYIs and cool little tidbits I find interesting.

Nope, got one this past week. The person below me thinks this is funny. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAicqWrlcTA

"I think Pringles original intention was to sell tennis balls. Then a big truckload of potatoes came up and they said, 'What the hell.'"

Depends, I've done both. Would you rather have a baby poop on you, or a baby pee on you

For watching online, it's not going to be 100% perfect every time, but Hockeystreams is a solid (and fairly cheap) investment for a season's worth. I've watched as well on free sites as well, pretty much others have mentioned those sites already. Also another plug-in for myp2p.eu as well, that's also reliable.

On Ericsson, at first I raised an eyebrow like pretty much everybody else at the amount Ericsson was offered. I would've been glad to have him back, but I didn't think he was worth that much. But when you look at all the ridiculous overpayments to free agents those first few days of crazy free agency, it makes it a little bit easier to take. With that in mind, I would not have been shocked if Ericsson would've been offered more on the market by another team. It's just that Holland re-signed him first before a lot of the absurd overpayments happened and before a lot of the smoke cleared, hence most people in here going bats**t for better/worse. Also, keep in mind that Datsyuk and Krownall at the times when they were offered their current contracts, they really underperformed some as well when it counts most in the post-season and a lot of people were going bats**t then about their contracts. Now, those deals are looking better and better every day. Now, I don't think Ericsson has that same potential as Datsyuk and Kronwall, but I still think he has room to improve. Hopefully in due time, he will live up to this contract. Unfortuantely, we won't know if that will happen yet.