Friday, January 8, 2010

fire bucky gleason, just say what you freakin' mean edition

Mike Harrington doesn't get called out often here, primarily because he writes about baseball and I don't really care to read much about baseball unless it's something about how great the Phillies are. Yep, I'm that much of a bandwagoning homer when it comes to baseball. But Harrington does occasionally write about the Sabres, and in today's morning skate report we got this nugget:

Overtime has really baffled Toronto, as the Leafs are 1-9 overall and 0-7 in games decided by a goal in the five-minute extra session. The Sabres have two of those wins (Oct. 30 by Tim Connolly here and Dec. 21 by Derek Roy in the Air Canada Centre).

Normally I don't get too picky about a blog, because they're a bit more raw and unedited, so I understand mistakes happen. Sometimes you're thinking faster than your fingers can type, and you don't have the luxury of reviewing and revising enough before posting.1 But this is a thought that should never have made it into the post. The Leafs2 are 1-9 in overtime, and 0-7 in "games decided by a goal in the five-minute extra session." Now, I know he probably means the Leafs Leaves are 1-9 in overtime and shootouts, with that one win coming on a shootout. Thus, they're 0-7 when a goal is scored in the overtime period (thereby precluding a shootout). But the way this is written, the Leafs Leaves have somehow managed to play an overtime game where, incredibly, more than one goal has been scored in overtime. This is a functional impossibility. Overtime is sudden death; as soon as goal is scored, game over. So, kudos to the Leafs Leaves for managing to trick the refs into letting the game go on (three times, too, since they're apparently 1-2 in games in which more than one overtime goal is scored).

I understand there's an argument that more than one goal is scored if it goes to a shootout, but that's not the way it is reflected in the final score. Also, going that far just proves my point that this part is way too confusing and silly to have been posted. Try again, Mike.

1 - This is, of course, assuming that Bucky's columns get reviewed and revised before being published. I have a strong suspicion they are not.

2 - How stupid is it that Toronto goes by the Maple Leafs? You learn in like the third grade that the plural of "leaf" is "leaves." Leafs may sound more fun in a sporting team name sense (nevermind, of course, that for whatever reason Toronto is using a symbol so associated with Canada that they decided to put it on their flag, and then Toronto also decided to completely ignore Canadian colors), but it's incorrect. The Leaves haven't won a Cup since 1967 or something, which I am now dubbing the Curse of Poor Grammar.

2 comments:

  1. Harrington actually writes about hockey quite a lot. Baseball is his #1 sport, but he and Vogl basically split hockey coverage. I like him the best of TBN sports reporters (faint praise, I realize). He has his blind spots (as we all do), but he generally provides good analysis and refrains from blaming the fans when anything goes wrong.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I generally have no axe to grind with Harrington. I know he often does the live blog during Sabres' games, but the rest of the day to day stuff (save some blog posts) is left to Vogl. Neither one is terrible, though they'll throw out the occasional Bucky-esque tripe.

    What I do appreciate from Harrington is that, as a baseball guy, he's a numbers guy. And, once you break down the numbers (without cherry picking), it's pretty obvious that the Sabres aren't even remotely as bad as Bucky apparently wishes they were.

    ReplyDelete