Snow Job

We are snowed in.  What does that mean?  More posts of course! 

Here’s an update on what we found curious of late:

• TFC has Sold OUT its allotment of season seats (16,000) for 2009.
• We were excited about the De Rosario deal to TFC.  Here’s the Dynamo take.
• Ernie Whitt gets to take the Team Canada helm.
• VanOC is already dropping the ball for 2010.
• Sigi is the man in Seattle.  Talk about starting with the top coach on the market!
• One man’s journey at the Bills in Toronto game!  Check out the Hilites and Lo-lites!

We welcome Beer, Beats and Bites to our linkages!  Eat, drink and be merry!  Who could you ask for more in a blog?

This Game has Gone Country

As a blogger, you depend on a lot of third hand info.  Since you can’t always be at the game or even watching it on the tube, you tend to rely on other sources for your info.  Recently, we had the opportunity to personally visit Nashville, TN. Home of the NFL’s Tennessee Titans and the NHL’s Nashville Predators. The Titans’ home field and stadium was impressive. A 69,000 seat monster on the shores on of the river across from the downtown and entertainment core. It was expected that we would see many Titans’ fans and paraphernalia… and we did. What was not expected was the equal amount of Predators stuff we saw. Rumours were that the town and folk supported the Preds even though the ownership and future of the franchise continue to be in flux and unstable. Yeah, whatever we thought… we’d heard that kind of stuff from the PR dept. of the NHL before. The Pred’s Sommet Center is in the shadow of LP Field but the inequality ended there. Really does size matter? Ok, don’t answer that… but Preds fans were everywhere downtown and the support in the core (which is where everyone visiting Nashville goes) could be seen in all the shops, bars and on the streets. It totally blew us away that hockey was so widely accepted and ppl knew the team and game well!

The sights left us with hope for the game in the US. That in some of the newer markets, it can succeed. Lets hope that this is one town the NHL will never leave and they can sort out their off-ice mess. With the kind of fan support we witnessed it would truly be a sad day for the league if they ever did leave. The fans deserve better than what they are getting and kudos to them for still supporting the team in these uncertain times. Perhaps this is once the PR machine got it right. Until we saw it with our own eyes, we thought it was all a myth.

PS: We found the only Timmy’s in Kentucky and it sucked. Avoid at all costs. Its not like our homebrew and the doughnuts were….well, how can we put this nicely… uh, horrid!

PPS: We will post some Nashville pics on our flickr site once we can spare a few minutes.

We’re Going to Use This Win as a Building Block.

Here’s what we’ve got on our mind today:

• The IA trade wildcard in the matter appears to be that of Piston Coach, Michael Curry.  The rookie coach appeared slightly unconfident, unprepared and nervous when talking to reporters about the trade.  This is the guy that is supposed to lead the team to the promised land? His resume says differently (ie: praise for his leadership qualities, demeanour, etc) so maybe it was just a bad day at the office for Mr. Curry or something.  Regardless, we plan on closely monitoring his courtside manner tonight in Toronto to see what the real deal is. 
• The Wellwood Story in Vancouver is great.  Kudos to the guy for coming back from the minors and clearing waivers to lead the team to victory with some sweet goals.  Sometimes its not the goals themselves but how they were scored that matters.  That was the case last night.  Now we won’t jump on his bandwagon quite yet.  But if he could begin to contribute regularily that would be a start. That way we can at least stop worrying about him being in the lineup. 6 goals to lead the team is a decent way to get into our good books!  Keep ‘em coming!
• A good feature on Carolina Hurricanes’ Dan LaCouture coming back from the brink and now back in the NHL at age 31.
• The NHL numbers are in for October.  All positive it seems.  The most striking number is that the Chicago Blackhawks attendence is up a whopping 71%.  Was it really that bad there?  Guess so.
• It would be great to ollie around the Terry Fox monument in Thunder Bay.  Its close but not close enough.  Good on Tbay for getting a sk8park!  Check out the construction pics here!
• Finally, guys and girls take note of the Language of Beer survey results.  What does YOUR BEER say about you?  More things to consider when out at your fave watering spot!

Pumpkin Ales!

So in the “spirit” of the Hallowe’en season, we tried 2 Pumpkin Ales over the weekend:

• Post Road Pumpkin Ale by Brooklyn Brewery.  At first, the ale tasted like it had gone bad.  As if we’d gotten a bad bottle or something but we stuck with it and midway thru, the taste started to change.  By the end, the mix of spices and pumpkin was quite pleasant.  Therefore we can assume that if we’d had the foresight to actually pour the pint into a glass instead of just straight from the bottle, we’d have nothing but good things to say about this one.  Lesson learned for next time.  Fantastic finish!  RANK: 7 out of 10.
• Pumpkin Ale by Great Lakes Brewery.  T’was excited by this one and with good reason.  Not only was the bottle larger than most North American ones, the cap had foil around it much like a wine bottle!  It had to be good!  Pfft!  Not only was this horrible and wretched but we coudn’t even finish it.  We ended up pouring the remainder down the drain.  It was that bad.  And yes, we did try it in a glass so the brew was mixed enough.  Top marks for presentation, lowest possible marks for product.  Ending up going down the drain is the WORST POSSIBLE OUTCOME for a brew since we’ll drink practically anything to its end!  RANK: 0.5 out of 10

Weekend Beer Reviews #1

Every so often we’ll post some beer reviews when so inspired.  Most likely it’ll be because we’ve found something that is either really good or really bad.  This weekend is all about the downright nasty:

1. Creemore URBOCK.  Lately their lager has been our beer of choice hence why we tried the Urbock.  The lager is usually on tap everywhere we go and not offensive.  This is not the case for the Urbock.  It’s been awhile since a beer has made me cringe when trying to drink it.  That is how downright nasty this is.  We are seriously considering throwing out the rest of this 6 pack because the refund money is more worthwhile.  Maybe it’ll go down better with the fireplace on (its marketed as a winter “festive” beer) but i doubt it.  The aftertaste was just pure YUCK!  Tar has got to taste better than Urbock.  We’re never going anywhere near this again.  Might keep it to give to visitors we don’t like over the winter season.
2. Iron Spike Amber.  We’re all about trying the local beers whenever possible and this was the reason we dove into this one head on.  3 pints later it was deemed ok enough for cosumation but lacking in any remarkable overtones.  A good comparison is to Old Milwaukee.  A beer that is drinkable and that is all.   Only thing memorable about Iron Spike was the lingering, nasty upset feeling afterwards.  Not a good way to close the deal and we’ll be avoiding this beer like the plague in the future.

How Low Can You Go? Could Free Beer Save the NHL in the US?

We were just starting some research on the ‘net about this story we’d read about an EPL club that was having difficulties bringing in fans.  Bolton offer free beer and cheap pies in bid to bring the fans back. A hilarious and also envious notion that once it settles in, becomes a sad comment on the state of affairs of some of our professional clubs. Indeed to offer “free beer” to get fans in the gate is a desperate move. Most likely one of last resort.  So we thought of course of the weak NHL clubs that in a gate driven league might be in need of this idea and if they had tried it.  We discovered 2 occasions in recent times this had been done:

• Lightning offer free beer to season-ticket holders
• Blues cancel ‘Tuesdays on Tap’ before it even starts

We also caught this blog’s report on the issue that brought up the fact that once in the building these fans will more than likely buy team gear and merch.  Therefore nulling any cost the free beer offer has. 

Could this notion work in the NHL?  In the past, MADD has spoken against these offers and squashed both of our examples.  That doesn’t mean the plan couldn’t work.  If its a move of last resort, any team would take the calculated risk of bad press to get their bottom line better.  Wouldn’t any coverage of the league in the US be a good thing?  The US mainstream press barely recognizes the NHL.  So what if a group complains as long as it grabs a few headlines.  We think there’s gotta be an owner out there with this idea in their back pocket.  With a third of the teams in the league not making money, the law of averages applies!  Mark our words, free beer will be offered in Atlanta before the team moves to Toronto!

The NHL Beer Cost Index 2008

Listed from most expensive to least.  Though its universally agreed that the beer is expensive at a game, depending on where you are at it could be worse!

Legend = Team Name, the beer price, the size of the beer, the cost per ounce.

Nashville Predators $6.75 (12) $0.56 per ounce

Philadelphia Flyers $5.75 (12) $0.48

Boston Bruins $7.00 (16) $0.44

New Jersey Devils $7.00 (16) $0.44

Anaheim Ducks $6.75 (16) $0.42

Edmonton Oilers $6.75 (16) $0.42

Calgary Flames $4.97 (12) $0.41

Chicago Blackhawks $6.25 (16) $0.39

Colorado Avalanche $6.25 (16) $0.39

San Jose Sharks $6.25 (16) $0.39

Los Angeles Kings $7.75 (20) $0.39

Dallas Stars $6.00 (16) $0.38

Detroit Red Wings $6.00 (16) $0.38

Montreal Canadiens $6.10 (16) $0.38

Vancouver Canucks $6.10 (16) $0.38

Phoenix Coyotes $6.00 (16) $0.38

St. Louis Blues $5.25 (14) $0.38

Tampa Bay Lightning $4.50 (12) $0.38

Toronto Maple Leafs $5.88 (16) $0.37

New York Islanders $7.25 (20) $0.36

Florida Panthers $7.00 (20) $0.35

Ottawa Senators $4.69 (14) $0.34

Minnesota Wild $6.50 (20) $0.33

Buffalo Sabres $5.00 (16) $0.31

Carolina Hurricanes $5.00 (16) $0.31

New York Rangers $7.50 (24) $0.31

Columbus Blue Jackets $6.00 (20) $0.30

Atlanta Thrashers $5.75 (20) $0.29

Washington Capitals $4.50 (16) $0.28

Pittsburgh Penguins $5.25 (21) $0.25

 

Just some suds for thought taken from this article.