Letters to the Editor
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"America, f^ck yeah"
If you are alive in America, and plan on continuing that trend, here are some sports thoughts to come to grips with:
NFL is King. Once a week, on a day when people are off work, it provides an excuse for men to drink beer on a day when we shouldn't. It is violent. Gambling opportunities, cheerleaders, tribalism. Did I mention violence?
College Football and Basketball are seated at the right hand of God(ell). These sports let us feel slightly better about ourselves. See, these people play for free. Wait! No! They play for the opportunity to get an education. Okay, so that’s bunk. They are sweet effing sports, and it lets us remember our own college days and nights. Also, we feel a unique personal connection. I barely graduated from that school! Kill the opponent!
Baseball fits in right about here. It reminds us of when dad and mom used to be together. And when dad’s dad was alive. And when a car was a nickel. It’s quite reflexive.
NBA. American Gladiators without growth-plates, all set to the tune of 50cent. What’s not to like?
Then hockey. Yeah you got some violence, but so does Rocky 5.
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I have embraced the Niche
I am happy that hockey is a niche sport. I honestly hope it stays that way. This niche has added to the mystique of the sport and I ,for one, am grateful. Why am I so happy to back my niche? Let me count some of the ways:
- Cheap seats. I believe that since hockey does not get a bigger piece of the sports pie, that keeps prices down. I can go to a pro game, have a beer and popcorn all for under $30. I can't even get a seat at the local NFL or NBA game for that.
- The best fans. When you see people at the rink, you know they are fans. You can have an intelligent conversation about hockey and how a player is playing. We don't have to talk about how many fans got beat up when the players were in the stands.
- Great Players. I don't know if King has interviewed any hockey players but ask you local sports writer who they like to talk to the most. I can guarantee that your sports writer prefers to speak to hockey players because most of them are great people.
I want to go on but I will end with more niche-ness than you can handle. Watch the U-18 or the U-20 World Championships of Hockey. You will see some of the most fantastic hockey, EVER. By the way, if you don't understand what U-18 or U-20 stand for, then I will not tell you. If you do know, then I salute you my fellow niche-ians.
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OT was on VS?!?
Will someone please tell me whether I'm stupid for not realizing that the overtime period was broadcast on Versus? It's not like I'm not aware of Versus; I've watched a lot of hockey there, and truth be told, it's been a pretty good deal for me. As a Sabres fan in the greater Philly area, it's been nice having a national cable channel that was at least semi-likely to carry a game I cared about now and then, as opposed to the local stations having all Flyers, sucking all the time.
But I had no inkling that I could have broken away from the exciting coverage of light rain at Pimlico and actually seen the end of the game. Did I miss the announcement? Was I wrong to expect NBC to at least break in with regular updates on the hockey game? Was my growing rage at realizing my niche sport had been out-niched justified, or was my ignorance strictly my fault?
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Niche me up!
I agree King, niche sports are cool. Sure, it stings a bit when the sport you love most is being marginalized by incompetent management (and I include the NHLPA in that) and an increasingly crowded market. But like Buffalonian said, as long as I can find the games somewhere on TV, whether it's OLN or VS or Oxygen or the Military channel, I will watch them. It'll only get better- I heard somewhere (and maybe it was in a dream) that DirecTV was thinking about broadcasting the NHL network in the US, where it's now only shown in Canada. If that happens, I'll need a bigger TiVo.
As for the FoxPuck thing, it made it worse. The halo around the puck didn't change size depending on where it was on the rink, so all depth perception went out the window. It also had the charming feature of having a halo dancing around in the 3rd or fourth row of seats when the puck was on the near boards. Horrible idea? Maybe not. But it sure was a horrible implementation.
Where can I watch the Champion's League final? Is it only on PPV?
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Nerd of Nichiness
I'm doomed to enjoy niche sports - must be some mutant gene that kicked the ass out of the gene that told me I should be a rabid Cincinnati Reds fan (my grandmother, for %#*@! sake, is a "Rosie Red" and my grandfather was their bootlegger back in the day.)
Baseball? GOD. I prefer dull forks being stuck between my toes.
Me, I like tennis and open-wheel auto racing - I'm too niche even for NASCAR - and fencing and track and field. I run from niche to niche, avoiding large stadiums and teeny little people playing things way down there.
The sucky thing about being a nichinerd is that those Other Sports constantly co-op your sport. Golf is the worst. Last weekend, I missed a huge chunck of Indy 500 qualifying (thrilling to the rest of you, I know) for soft-focus womens' golf features and about 15 rounds of playoff holes with a woman that even the sportscasters were getting impatient with, because she took forever to set up a shot. Me and the sponsors of Al Unser's car do not thank you, slow golf lady.
The best things about being a nichinerd?
1. You get awesome sportscasters that are too knowledgable or too passionate or too interesting for the networks and main ESPN channels. There is no better way to spend a morning than with Steve Matchett, David Hobbs and Bob Varsha calling a Formula One race. I hope Varsha writes a book someday, because he's called just about every sport ever played, and called it brilliantly.
2. You can go to events and actually get close to the players. I've seen the magnificence of Federer, Serena Williams, Sampras and Safin close up, like four feet away, during the early rounds of the US Open - and it didn't cost me a fortune. This has its drawbacks, too. I got to chat several times over the years to a young and brilliant open-wheel driver, Greg Moore, and then watched him die in a devastating accident at the California speedway. It was the one time I'm glad I was watching the race on TV and not from the stands.
But still...I cherish my niches.