Tuesday, February 27, 2007

Another ninety minutes and there’s not much movement

Note all times reflect the western time zone of your faithful transcriber here!

The 9-10:30 block saw a lot of panel discussions and not much in the way of breaking news. TSN convened Dave Hodge’s panel of the Reporters who examined the George Laraque trade to Pittsburgh and how it portends to a new dark age of physicality in the NHL.

The trade of the hour appeared to be Domenic Moore heading off to the Wild, which was probably expected after Gary Roberts, was picked up by the Pens.

Over at Sportsnet they’re playing some bubble hockey and introducing the Deal or No Deal babes, the crew proclaim that today’s action is live on Sportsnet and the Fan 590 in Toronto, an audience that surely isn’t quite catching the full value of the Deal or No Deal babes..

TSN is giving Mike Keenan and Glen Healey free reign to reminisce about the golden days of Stanley Cup victories in New York City, we’re sure they’d like to do the same for the Leafs but the members of that golden moment team are taking their afternoon naps and the bus from the seniors centre probably won’t arrive until after the three pm deadline. As TSN breaks for commercial they promise more War Stories from Keenan et al

I notice that Jim Kelley is blogging notes on the Sportsnet website, I’m sure he’s part of the broadcast but I keep missing his appearances. This is one of those times I wish I had the picture in a picture feature thing on my television set. I always enjoy Kelley’s observations on hockey and perhaps Sportsnet should have given him a more prominent role on the broadcast. Or at least post when he’s going to be on so we can pick up some interesting tid bits.

Oh wait, it’s 10:10 and there’s another trade. The Rangers are apparently moving Aaron Ward on to the Bruins, though the B’s haven’t contacted the lucky Bruin heading down to Manhattan. The move of Ward doesn’t come as a surprise since he’s been in Tom Renney’s doghouse for a while now and recently got into a bit of a session with Jaromir Jagr.

At 10:20 the Sportsnet correspondent is asking Shawn Horcoff what kind of pizza he likes, we can’t wait for the “what is your favourite colour” question that surely will pop if there isn’t much more action.

Sportsnet features mascots playing bubble hockey while Kypreos and Stellick talk about Mark Messier’s impact on hockey and what his future might be.

Finally saw one of the Eklund segments, the mystery blogger who is hidden up in the Sportsnet gondola, who throws out a tease on the salary negotiations between Ryan Smyth and the Oilers. Eklund does not sound like Deep Throat of Watergate fame, actually has more of a Woody Allen quality to his observations.

Bill Waters is trapped in the back of his limo, apparently traffic can be bad in TO on deadline day as he’s been driving for some two hours now trying to find his way to the Deadline Bash. While he idles away in the back of the car, he thinks back to his days as Leaf exec and the many exciting times they had on deadline day. Not sure they can carry this bit on for another hour and a half, for one thing the Leafs never seemed to do much on Deadline day that ever took them to the Promised Land and two another hour and half on the road and he should be well into Hamilton.

Back to TSN where the Reporters crew discuss the merits or lack of the Rental players, a growing sub culture of NHL players that play through the playoff stretch and then the playoffs only to return back from whence they came.

The Score added a new participant it looks like Al Strachan, who hasn’t been seen on television for a while, though many might suggest that he’s still not on. They have Pierre LeBrun in the insider room which kind of resembles your average family study.

The Score’s host is a very, very loud fellow. Buddy, there’s only four people on your panel and they’re sitting right beside you, there’s nobody in the studio and probably not many watching at home. You don’t have to yell, you're not at the Sportsnet Deadline bash, where they have to yell cause they can't hear themselves talk!

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