MattPie

That Buddy Christ sweater is kinda awesome.

That would be delicious.

Happened to find the boating certificate thing, with the certificate phase-in info: https://parks.ny.gov/boating/education.aspx

Talking about age in a interview is possibly illegal under the Equal Employment Opportunity Act (EEOA); most won't because it sets them up for age-discrimination complaints.

It is pretty silly, although I could see using it out of habit as short-hand for "salary cap hit".

I'll offer an alternate fantasy take: the Pegulas decide to sell AdPro, dRacculia got mad and quit both; or Legends didn't want him and he decided to cut all ties.

I'm sure *some* players care about that 10%. Me? I'm taking $4.5M to play where I want over $5M every time single time. I seriously doubt I'm the only person that thinks this way. FWIW, I moved from PA (moderate taxes) to NY (higher taxes) two years ago specifically to live in Ithaca. The tax implications were an afterthought (at best).

Ugh. We bought our last car (used) from the local place, but I think we're going to try Carvana or equivalent next time. Our transaction was messed up from the start and we ended up driving on dealer plates for a couple months. Turns out the sold the car to us before they had the title in hand, and then that drug out for awhile (it was a returning lease where someone in Oregon was leasing the car for their daughter in Ithaca for school). It all worked out but wow. I bought one car at a Subaru dealer near DC that was a straight $400 over invoice for every car on the lot. I know they didn't necessarily pay invoice for it, but I don't care because it eliminated that part of the process entirely. Only crappy part of that was they didn't send my NYS plates back (I had just moved) and some time later NYS suspended my license (that I didn't have any more) for having a car without insurance. That actually came up when I moved to Ithaca, but it didn't turn out to be much of a thing. The bigger thing was my PA license was only re-issued a few months before and because it wasn't 6 months old they wouldn't automatically transfer it to NYS. I even brought the previous licenses going back 15 years. I ended up just waiting until 6 months was up, lol.

Sure, Arizona, but NYC, Philly, LA, or Chicago (just to randomly name cities) would be close.

I think he wants to be wherever he can make the most money. Maybe that's Toronto, maybe that's somewhere else. I usually discount the whole tax argument for the most part (I think players will go where they can win or personally succeed, even if that costs them an extra few %), but Matthews might be one of those guys that cares.

Probably a combination of both. If Matthews is smart he won't say anything unless he's committed to burning a bridge. And The Leaf Blowers couldn't imagine anyone wanting out.

Ugh, I used to be like your daughter; we'd all go do something and everyone else would have it but not me. It was a wonderful time.

I got a little poison ivy at least a week ago, and somehow new spots keep popping up. I assume the oil is on something I touch, but I can't figure out what it could possibly be.

Or you already have wished them luck during the new endeavor process, and rewishing luck now would be redundant. Like this guy, apparently.

What does the trade package look like if McDavid himself engineers the return to make sure the Sabres are still stacked after?

You're well outside the Buffalo "all the pizza is pretty good, some are better than others" radius, unfortunately. I'd think there's at least one or two good places in Bradford (right?), but I've never stopped there to have any evidence of it. I haven't had La Nova in a very long time (possibly 12-ish years ago when MsPie and I were first dating, if not then in the 90s when I worked at the Big G), but it wasn't my favorite back then. I haven't had many of the places mentioned here, we order from Pasquale's in East Aurora while we're in town since that's local to our parents' houses. I'm not sure it's great Buffalo pizza, but Pizza Plant is pretty good for interesting options; there's one right next to the Arena if you get the itch.

I have to assume it's disbelief, although that would be better rendered as:

I'd be interesting to see if "elite" players follow that same curve. My guess is yes, but I could also see a high plateau of hitting their stride at like 20-21 and maintaining until their early 30s.

I was going to say "opposing forward for 2-4 games this season".

While I can't comment on your team, my team is predominantly male and we talk about all kinds or stuff on our staff calls. I'd say for me, it brings the team closer together and helps when things get tough. I don't think it's a coincidence that this is the highest performing and most cohesive team I've been on; we really have each other's backs and there's zero toxicity.

Spicy.

Of course not; you need to put a bunch of compression on to make sure it's consistently loud.

Might feel like 2005-7 again.

I managed to sneak it in yesterday evening between the noon-time rain and night rain. Wasn't even that wet that the mower complained much. Complaint: not enough time to ride bikes.

Paul Gaustad (Ducks... wait, Gooses? I dunno)