Game On...

Well it looks like things are finally going to be settled and we will be seeing hockey again this fall. So that means this blog can actually get off the ground. We started out with some coverage of the World Cup, then with some lockout coverage and a little bit of Moose news. Frankly, I quickly tired of lockout talk and I also realized that any Moose coverage would be inadequate considering the lack of televised games. So I decided to put this blog on hiatus until the lockout was settled. There was some Canuck news to report during the lockout, most noticeably the partial sale of the club. However, I made the decision that I was going to go see what life would be like without hockey...

To my surprise it really wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The CFL took some sting out of the fall months and the NFL started up shortly after the Grey Cup was awarded to the dirty Argos. I'm not a big NFL fan but I found my interest increased dramatically. For awhile I was getting by without really thinking about the lack of hockey... that was until winter set in. Now for the most part I didn't miss hockey during the week, there was plenty of good television and dvd's to catch up on. There was even the odd Moose game on the tube and some interesting "Classic" matchups. But the real downer was those hockeyless saturday nights.

What a drag. I missed the typical routine of waking up on a saturday morning(or in some cases afternoon), with a hangover from the night before, laying around on the couch waiting for 4 o'clock to roll around and the HNIC music to kick in. Then half watching the stupid Leaf game, and figuring out what the plan for dinner is(delivered Chinese is always a good bet) and then settling in for the 7 o'clock Canuck game. Oh how I missed that. Good times.

But alas, it was not meant to be.

It really wasn't all that bad. Winter went by rather fast and soon enough pitchers and catchers were reporting to spring training and a new baseball season was upon us. Every now and then some lockout news would pop up, but I didn't really care all that much. I had survived the first winter of the "Cold War".

To my surprise it looks like that will be the only winter of the "Cold War". The players have come to realize that there was no way they could win this war and pressure from the non-hardline NHL owners has forced the owners to get a deal done even if it wasn't exactly what they wanted. Both sides realized that the NHL must startup on time this year or everyone will lose a lot more money than they've already lost. It's just too bad they didn't all realize this 12 months ago.

Oh well nothing can be done about it now.

But enough of that talk, on to this year...

There will be a lot to sort out once the CBA is finalized. New on-ice rules, a huge number of free agents and an entry draft. Basically, there will be a lot to blog about in the upcoming weeks, so stay tuned...