Tag Archives: Sports

March 1, 2010 · 1:23 am

Post-Games Positivity: Celebration over Criticism…until Tomorrow

Post-Games Positivity…until Tomorrow

March 1st, 2010

In the post-game euphoria which followed Canada’s epic overtime victory, as the nation flooded into the streets to celebrate, CTV’s hockey commentators were still getting paid to do their jobs. And so while no one else was thinking about how Canada had given up the lead in the final moments of the game, the commentators were talking about what Canada did wrong, and James Duthie raised an important point: if he had not scored that overtime goal, and if Canada had gone on to lose that game, Sidney Crosby would have been labeled a disappointment.

Sure, he scored a big goal in the Shootout against Switzerland, but Crosby wasn’t a force to be reckoned with on the ice. If the team had lost that game, he would have been singled out as someone who didn’t live up to their potential, who failed to be the next Gretzky or Lemieux as he has been labeled. But because he did score that goal, and because Canada did win the gold medal, no one will ever remember that he had been held pointless in the nine periods which preceded that extra frame; they will only remember that “Sid the Kid” scored the golden goal.

Canada is still wrapped up in post-Olympics euphoria at this hour: sure, my Facebook feed is filled with enough cynical twenty-somethings that the music selections at the Opening ceremonies are under intense scrutiny, but for the most part Canada has exited this games with a flurry of national pride. Four gold medals over the final two days have given Canada a place in the record books as the country with the most Gold medals in a single Winter Olympics, and the hockey victory made the entire evening’s affairs really feel like one big celebration of Canada as a nation. And while I have all sorts of quasi-critical thoughts about the Ceremonies, and about some of the events over the past few days, and certainly intend to more critically analyze CTV’s coverage of the games over the past 17 days in more detail in the future, right now just doesn’t feel like the time.

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February 23, 2010 · 3:06 am

The Ends Have No End (Yet): Second Chances and Relegation at the Olympic Games

The Ends Have No End (Yet)

February 23rd, 2010

When Canada’s Kevin Martin won his tense matchup against Great Britain’s David Murdoch on Saturday night, it was a big win for Martin: it meant that he moved to 6-0, which pretty much guaranteed him a spot in the final four teams heading into the medal round, and thus a good chance of making it to the gold medal game and potentially avenging his loss in Salt Lake City. It was also a big boost for Team Canada as a whole, as it was a pretty disappointing day: despite three skaters competing in Short Track finals, and a legitimate medal contender in the Men’s 1500m at the Richmond Oval, Canada walked away without a single medal, the first day it has been held off the scoreboard thus far in the games. Martin’s win helped right the ship, so the speak, and Canadians could go to bed (or, if they didn’t stay up past midnight in the eastern half of the country, wake up) to.

However, for Scotland’s David Murdoch, it was something entirely different: that loss, his third of the tournament, put the defending World Champion at the edge of elimination, turning his Round Robin tournament into a three-game bout of sudden death. Murdoch has had an uneven tournament, and his only option after that point was to bounce back from a game that was very winnable to win three straight in order to even have a shot at making it to the Final Four. If he loses one more game, he is an Olympic athlete playing for pride, like the short track speed skaters (or Snowboard Cross competitors) relegated to the “B” Final, forced to race to decide who finishes in the positions that no one is really going to care about.

And for the sake of a great curler in David Murdoch, I hope he is able to keep from falling into their ranks.

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February 19, 2010 · 2:04 am

On the Edge of My Seat (Closing My Eyes): Anxiety, Twitter and my Olympics Achilles Heel

Day Seven: On the Edge of My Seat (Closing My Eyes)

February 18th, 2010

When Martin Brodeur stopped the final shot in a shootout which secured Canada an all-important victory in its march towards Hockey Gold at the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics, I was on Twitter.

I’d like to tell you that I spent the final moments of Canada’s tense shootout victory over Switzerland on Twitter because I was interested in researching how people respond to sporting events in tweets, but the real reason is somewhat more embarrassing. Truth be told, despite the fact that I had recused myself of all personal investment surrounding Canada’s quest for hockey gold – “It’s okay if they lose,” I said naively – my crippling inability to handle suspenseful sporting events continues to be my achilles heel.

In 2002, as Canada faced off with the United States for the Gold Medal in Salt Lake City, I spent the third period on the second story of the house alternating between pacing with my ears plugged and putting a pillow over my head to muffle out any possible sounds from my family watching the game downstairs. It’s a serious issue, perhaps even downright psychological, but I just can’t handle the pressure: even when I have no actual investment, where I’m quite fine if Canada is unable to win a Gold Medal, I somehow internalize all of the pressure that the diehard Canadian hockey fans feel, and the pressure that’s on the players (some of whom are younger than I am) to perform at a high level. Basically, I am a helpless vessel for the transferral of crippling anxiety when it comes to suspenseful and meaningful sporting events.

And so I learned of Sidney Crosby’s heroic Shootout winner over Twitter, and Martin Brodeur’s clutch save was communicated to me through the same medium. In order to make myself feel somewhat better about this, I want to talk about how people were responding to the game through Twitter, and how it’s changing (or, as it turns out, not changing) my Olympics experience.

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February 17, 2010 · 11:08 am

Hurry Hard (but Hurry Up): Are you ready for some Curling?

Day Five: Hurry Hard (but Hurry Up)

February 17, 2010

On Sunday night, I watched my first new episode of The Simpsons in a very long time, a show I used to love a great deal (and which I own eleven seasons of on DVD). The allure of curling, it appears, was too much for me, and there I was watching Homer and Marge travel to Vancouver. I’ve got all sorts of thoughts about the episode’s presentation (or lack thereof) of that Canadian city which I’ll save for a later date, but the episode got all sorts of things wrong: no, I won’t complain about Marge pulling off various sweeping feats impossible in real life considering that it’s a cartoon, but the rocks were all the same colour, and the rocks didn’t rotate, and…well, you get the picture.

I don’t actually curl in real life, nor do I organize my entire life around broadcasts of curling bonspiels or tournaments, but yet the sport holds a particular place in my heart. It is a game of pure strategy and execution, where centimetres matter at various different intervals (where you place the broom to guide the throw, where the throw actually goes, where the stones end up, etc.) and where momentum can shift instantly. And so while I appreciate the excitement of the sudden death races like Maelle Ricker’s tense Snowboard Cross victory, and always appreciate the non-stop action of a game of hockey (although preferably in games a little closer than Canada’s 8-0 routing of Norway), there’s something about curling that truly captures my attention.

So long as I have an hour-long buffer on the DVR, anyways.

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February 16, 2010 · 2:19 am

Scheduling Patriotism: Double the Ceremonies, Less of an Impact

Day Four: Scheduling Patriotism

February 15th, 2010

Perhaps I am simply a proponent of less is more, but there’s something about having a large percentage of the medal winners at the Olympic Games stand on two separate podiums at two separate times that seems sort of funny. I understand the logistical issues surrounding it: because the events are scattered all over the place, they don’t want to have to have that many sets of flags kicking around, nor do they want to have the medals spread all over the place for security reasons. Doing most of the medal ceremonies in controlled environments either at BC Place or at Whistler makes perfect sense, except that it creates two separate “moments” for viewers to experience.

At a point during CTV’s broadcast of the medal ceremony for Canada’s first ever Gold medal on home soil from Alexandre Bilodeau, James Duthie made the argument that now Canadians will remember precisely where they were twice: once when Bilodeau won gold, and once when he received it. Now, I would tend to believe that I am never going to be telling my grandchildren that I was sitting in my parents’ living room watching Bilodeau win gold, but I can absolutely guarantee that I will not specifically remember a night later when, free from all suspense, Bilodeau stepped onto another podium and got that medal around his neck.

Both moments are memorable, but the excitement of the former and the resonance of the latter feel disconnected by the separation, and I have to wonder if the logistics (and the networks’ desire to be able to get two separate viewership boosts) are damaging the true impact of these Olympic moments.

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February 15, 2010 · 12:36 am

Going Negative and Going Gold: Villainy and Victory as Canada takes Moguls Gold

Going Negative and Going Gold

February 14th, 2010

Earlier today, I was watching CTV’s Olympics coverage when they aired a video package surrounding Dale Begg-Smith, the defending Olympic champion in the Men’s Moguls competition. Begg-Smith, who skis for Austrailia, is of particular interest to CTV because he used to be Canadian, and used to compete for Canada as a teenager. However, like Darth Vader turning to the dark side, at a certain point he left Canada for Australia for reasons which are subject to a great deal of speculation. To give CTV some credit, they didn’t go too far into the circumstances involved, but if we trust Wikipedia (which we don’t, considering the “citation needed, “but for the sake of argument) this was the situation:

Begg-Smith was skiing for his native Canada as a teenager when his coaches told him he was spending too much time on his fledgling business, and not enough time in training. He subsequently quit the Canadian ski program because it clashed with his business interests and, along with his brother, moved to Australia at age 15.[citation needed] The brothers chose to ski for Australia because the country had a smaller ski program that offered them more attention and flexibility. This ensured that they could still successfully manage their business.

There’s a lot of other rumours surrounding just what his internet business (which has made him a millionaire) entails, and CTV isn’t interested in any of it (especially since it’s all conjecture). What the piece focused on was how Dale Begg-Smith has become a villain, how his lack of emotion on the podium in both victory and defeat makes him seem unapproachable, and how this could be seen as strange for someone who is the face of his sport. While they tried to seem disappointed that he refused an interview request, it only made the story that much more damaging, and anyone who watched the clip would be tuning in that night not only to see four Canadians take part in the Moguls competition, but also to see if anyone could unseat the cold-blooded turncoat who dared to spurn this country.

And, much to the delight of viewers across the country and CTV, Canada found its Luke Skywalker.

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February 14, 2010 · 1:10 am

It’s All That Glitters: Contextualizing Canada’s Obsession with Gold

Day Two: It’s All That Glitters

February 14th, 2010

At times watching CTV’s Olympics coverage, I swear I’m watching the third Austin Powers movie: all that glitters is gold, and anything else is a crippling disappointment.

Now, this is the case for all countries: everyone wants their athletes to win gold, and there’s always disappointment when that doesn’t quite pan out. However, the hoopla in Canada at the moment is to a degree normally associated with our Men’s Hockey Team, as the nation rallies together in a quest to place enormous pressure on athletes to earn the nation’s first gold medal on home soil. In fact, the narrative is so pervasive that even NBC picked up on it heading into tonight’s Moguls event, demonstrating that one nation’s obsession is another nation’s bit of trivia.

The problem for CTV is not that Jennifer Heil failed to win a gold medal in the Women’s Moguls competition, coming a distant second to a fantastic performance by American Hannah Kearney (playing the role of villain for Canadian viewers, heroic spoiler for Americans), but rather that they built all of their coverage around medal hopefuls who would be challenging for gold on Day 2. And after both Heil and Charles Hamelin (who failed to even qualify for his short track speed skating final in the 1500m) failed to bring that narrative to its conclusion, it continues with a whole new set of characters who are supposed to make us forget about the failures of the days before.

And that’s a problem for me.

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February 1, 2010 · 10:09 pm

How I Met Your Mother – “The Perfect Week”

“The Perfect Week”

February 1st, 2010

I’ll get it out of the way upfront: it still bugs me that Barney and Robin were broken up so quickly, and no amount of funny episodes which depend on Barney being a total womanizer is ever going to convince me that it was necessary or advantageous for the show to go about it as it did.

That being said, “The Perfect Week” was pretty funny, a nice collection of “things that we expect to see from HIMYM” with just enough pathos to make the story work. By admitting the hypocrisy inherent in Lily’s actions, and by providing Barney’s actions with at least some sort of emotional justification beyond sexual desire, the episode took a potentially narrow concept and turned it into something that will have no long term impact but remained compelling and meaningful in the short term.

Sort of, you know, like Barney’s one-night stands.

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May 27, 2009 · 4:49 pm

Season Finale: My Boys – “Spring Training”

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“Spring Training”

May 26th, 2009

My Boys has, perhaps, the oddest season structure on television. Its sporadically placed nine episode seasons always feel as if they barely start before they’re done, and they often seem designed so as to make no sense by the time they actually air (with this finale taking place during Spring Training despite finding the Baseball season in full swing – yeah, I said it – or the recent episode about the depths of winter taking place, well, not during the depths of winter).

But, more importantly, the show has this really weird pattern of ending and opening seasons with these highly dramatic scenarios of romantic cliffhangers and major events, but then abandoning them for the entire season in favour of standalone stories that are just about these character hanging out. This wouldn’t be a problem if these two forms were all that compatible, but to be honest they’re not: the end of last season was a bit of a mess, and when the show transitioned into a less serialized format this season it was kind of fantastic. I haven’t been blogging about the show due to time restraints, but there was some really great individual episodes in there, more than enough to convince me that the show is still in great shape.

As a result, it was with some caution that I entered into “Spring Training,” already pretty well knowing what we were heading into: Kenny and Stephanie’s hookup way back in last season’s finale was swept under the rug except for a few moments this season, so it was inevitable that we would be confronting that particular storyline. However, to my surprise, that’s the only attempt at drama the show made in the half hour, providing a finale that draws a simpler cliffhanger, and a trip out to that cliff which let the guys be guys, let P.J. go without any stated relationship trouble, and allowed a pretty great little season go out on a pretty good note.

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April 10, 2007 · 11:49 am

Why Sidney Crosby Has Ruined CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada

I knew it would happen eventually. As a resident of Halifax, Nova Scotia, I felt it was my duty to be annoyed at the amount of media coverage received by Sidney Crosby. While I would never doubt his ability, I got sick and tired of hearing about it in the municipality of his childhood throughout his QMJHL days. It came to the point where Crosby was receiving more attention than Halifax’s actual Quebec Major Juniour Hockey League team, and this frustrated me to no end.

It is therefore mildly fitting that Crosby’s newfound superstardom, including a well-deserved Art Ross Trophy this season, has officially come back to bite Canada in the ass.

CBC Livid as NHL Bows to Americans

(The Globe and Mail – April 10th, 2007)

The CBC is furious over the National Hockey League’s decision to schedule Saturday’s Pittsburgh Penguins-Ottawa Senators match in the afternoon instead of prime time.

The Canadian network wanted the game in the evening timeslot to maximize viewership for the traditional Hockey Night in Canada Saturday night show.

But the league bowed to NBC, which limits telecasts to the afternoon and wants the game because of the marquee potential of Pittsburgh’s Sidney Crosby.

That’s right: because of the apparent stardom of Canadian superstar Sidney Crosby, Canada will not be able to watch its only Eastern Conference hopeful in prime time. It’s a rather bitter pill to swallow for the CBC, and I think for good reasons.

– There is no guarantee for prime time Saturday Night broadcasts featuring Canadian teams unless Dallas/Vancouver goes to 6 games.

– They’re being forced to show Tampa Bay vs. New Jersey in Primetime on Saturday, which is just an embarrassing Hockey Night in Canada lineup.

– The league is arguing that NBC deserves to have the game scheduled for them because it will give the game a chance to grow in the U.S. Guess what, NBC? It ain’t happening, Crosby or no Crosby.

Really, Crosby’s fame has begun to work against Canada; he’s officially the next great hope, the one who will be able to save the game in the eyes of broadcasters. I think this is a fairly huge mantle to be placed upon him, and I don’t think it’s necessarily a fair one either. Crosby cannot be expected to carry the entire game of hockey forward, it’s as simple as that.

But from a broadcasting perspective, the CBC should be pissed right now. Hockey Night in Canada is a tradition that has treated the NHL incredibly well over the years, and yet they’re willing to bow to U.S. pressure. They’re abandoning their core audience of Canadian fans for an American audience who really doesn’t care in the least. So often I think the CRTC are just worthless hacks who fail to see the reality of programming, but their principles are something I agree with in a scenario like this. If a game features Canadian teams, one of only three in the playoffs, then that game should be played in prime time on Hockey Night in Canada. I don’t think it’s that hard, really, and it’s a principle which the NHL should have been following from the beginning.

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