Hockey Night in the Rest of Canada
Great moments in sports broadcasting: Hockey Night in Canada, in its wisdom, brings Mike Milbury and P.J. Stock in-studio to comment on a Canadiens-Boston game.
If you're one of the diehards who hasn't abandoned HNIC in favour of RDS's Canadiens telecast, you probably caught CBC's coverage of the Thursday night game. Don Cherry had the night off -thank heavens for small mercies -so HNIC went to its Buffoon B-team.
Milbury and Stock, to the surprise of no one, were highly critical of the Canadiens. They heaped particular scorn on Maxim Lapierre for reluctance to engage in the kind of "hockey" that titillates Milbury and kept Stock in the NHL for an unlikely 243 games.
Stock played most of those games for Boston. Milbury is from Brighton, Mass., and played his entire career for the Bruins.
We can thank Mitch Melnick for Stock. My great and good friend Mitch, whose enthusiasm for pointless hockey fights was nurtured by growing up on the unmean streets of middle-class Chomedey, has never met an enforcer he didn't like. Melnick hired Stock for the Team 990.
Milbury -arguably the worst general manager in NHL history, and you'll find few who'll argue the point -is, to give him credit, a smart guy. He has parlayed his "Mad Mike" shtick into a nice gig on NBC and HNIC.
Milbury also was singled out recently as one of the players Guy Lafleur liked least during his Hall of Fame career. I remember a game in which Lafleur made that loathing manifest by firing a shot at Milbury's face. Scrumming ensued, and it was part of a great rivalry that saw the Canadiens lay regular beat-downs on the Cherry/Milbury Bruins.
Memories die hard in hockey.
Milbury and Stock are, quite simply, incapable of objectivity in games involving the Bs -as is Cherry, who has expanded his pro-Boston bias to embrace the Leafs.
Isn't it funny how Troy Aikman and Chris Collinsworth can analyze National Football League games involving the Dallas Cowboys and Cincinnati Bengals, respectively, without letting their playing careers influence their opinions?
Maybe that is because Aikman and Collinsworth take their second careers seriously and work hard at giving viewers quality analysis. And maybe it's because Fox and NBC consider themselves NATIONAL broadcasting networks whose coast-to-coast audiences are best served by fair and balanced football coverage.
(It would be nice if Fox applied that standard to its news network, but I digress.)
We're different in Canada -and not just because of three-down football.
Our national public broadcaster -supported by the tax dollars of all Canadians, a mari usque ad mare -thinks it is perfectly acceptable to have our national game analyzed by people whose biases could not be more evident if they were wearing short shorts and waving pompoms.
(Time out while everyone washes their eyes with bleach.)
A loudmouth American and an inarticulate former goon dissing a Canadian team on national television?
Is the ROC a great country or what?
If you're one of the diehards who hasn't abandoned HNIC in favour of RDS's Canadiens telecast, you probably caught CBC's coverage of the Thursday night game. Don Cherry had the night off -thank heavens for small mercies -so HNIC went to its Buffoon B-team.
Milbury and Stock, to the surprise of no one, were highly critical of the Canadiens. They heaped particular scorn on Maxim Lapierre for reluctance to engage in the kind of "hockey" that titillates Milbury and kept Stock in the NHL for an unlikely 243 games.
Stock played most of those games for Boston. Milbury is from Brighton, Mass., and played his entire career for the Bruins.
We can thank Mitch Melnick for Stock. My great and good friend Mitch, whose enthusiasm for pointless hockey fights was nurtured by growing up on the unmean streets of middle-class Chomedey, has never met an enforcer he didn't like. Melnick hired Stock for the Team 990.
Milbury -arguably the worst general manager in NHL history, and you'll find few who'll argue the point -is, to give him credit, a smart guy. He has parlayed his "Mad Mike" shtick into a nice gig on NBC and HNIC.
Milbury also was singled out recently as one of the players Guy Lafleur liked least during his Hall of Fame career. I remember a game in which Lafleur made that loathing manifest by firing a shot at Milbury's face. Scrumming ensued, and it was part of a great rivalry that saw the Canadiens lay regular beat-downs on the Cherry/Milbury Bruins.
Memories die hard in hockey.
Milbury and Stock are, quite simply, incapable of objectivity in games involving the Bs -as is Cherry, who has expanded his pro-Boston bias to embrace the Leafs.
Isn't it funny how Troy Aikman and Chris Collinsworth can analyze National Football League games involving the Dallas Cowboys and Cincinnati Bengals, respectively, without letting their playing careers influence their opinions?
Maybe that is because Aikman and Collinsworth take their second careers seriously and work hard at giving viewers quality analysis. And maybe it's because Fox and NBC consider themselves NATIONAL broadcasting networks whose coast-to-coast audiences are best served by fair and balanced football coverage.
(It would be nice if Fox applied that standard to its news network, but I digress.)
We're different in Canada -and not just because of three-down football.
Our national public broadcaster -supported by the tax dollars of all Canadians, a mari usque ad mare -thinks it is perfectly acceptable to have our national game analyzed by people whose biases could not be more evident if they were wearing short shorts and waving pompoms.
(Time out while everyone washes their eyes with bleach.)
A loudmouth American and an inarticulate former goon dissing a Canadian team on national television?
Is the ROC a great country or what?
Montreal Gazette
This is why I watch RDS.http://www.montrealgazette.com/sports/Hockey+Night+Rest+Canada/3997128/story.html
This is why I watch RDS.http://www.montrealgazette.com/sports/Hockey+Night+Rest+Canada/3997128/story.html
