MattPie

Yep, I really should have seen the Ruff firing coming, otherwise it would have been just another game that can wait for later. :)

A few weeks ago. I did bring her flowers earlier this week and we cooked a nice meal last Thursday, but I'm on the hook for a proper date still. :) The plan for today was dinner at a great Vegan place downtown, but she's not feeling like it so it either a Indian/Thai place or a great beer and modern American restaurant closer to home.

AM radio is neat, in that it'll bounce around in the upper atmosphere if the conditions are right. I often get scratchy WGR all the way down to Harrisburg PA. Some guys here (in SE PA) were just talking about how they used to listen to WKBW Rock and roll shows all the time. My uncle said WKBW would sometimes come in in Texas. A few weeks ago, I was listening to the NFL playoffs and found a particularly clear station with the game on as I drove. I was in Lancaster PA as the game ended, and on comes Mike Robitaille talking about cheese. WTF, I think, before I realize I had been listening the WBEN 930 the whole time.

I prefer to call it "My Day". :) Missing the first Sabres game that will be truly interesting. :(

I hope someone starts up a "Thank you Lindy" chant Saturday. I really do.

Scheduling "Valentine's Day" 1 week after the real V-day (today) so restaurants would be less busy and flowers would be cheaper seemed like a great idea a few weeks ago when my wife suggested it.

I remember games here and there pre-Lindy, but didn't really follow the team that closely until the Nolan/Lindy era when I was in college. The other day I was going thru some stuff with my wife as part of her moving in and found a puck my Dad bought me at a game, probably 82-83 ish. His friend has tickets in the oranges on a corner in the 2nd row. I don't remember who was playing (I was 7), but I remember a couple of the early games I went to were against the Nordiques.

Man, the Amerks board is going to light up about how Buffalo is stealing all their talent now.

I think it was the second choice behind rotating coaches monthly.

Yep, calculated guess, I'd assume. I'm curious, when I coach is relieved in the middle of the season how often is the rest of the staff relieved at the same time? It seems like it would be difficult to lop off the heads of the team when there's a game tomorrow.

I wish I had your hope.

"Phew, I'm sure glad Darcy missed this round of layoffs." -- no one.

I wasn't old enough to drink when he was hired. EDIT: oops, i was. By 3 weeks.

So long Lindy, and thanks for all the fish (fry-fridays). Really wanted to see you win a cup here. So has Lindy called Barry Trotz yet to congratulate him? Heh, I just found this. I know it's something wikipedia editors must put up for every team, but it just seems silly: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nashville_Predators_head_coaches

OK, So O'Reilly is some sort of ELFA (Entry-level Free Agent), and not an RFA in the usual sense. Now it's making sense. He's not holding out, so I was mistaken about that, and it changes the discussion quite a bit. So right now, any team can: - Offer sheet him under the usual offer sheet rules - Trade with COL for his rights, and then hope that O'Reilly and the team can come to a contract agreement. If O'Reilly doesn't agree with the new team after a trade, what next? Does he become UFA at the end of the year? Sounds like the Sabres could trade for a guy that may never play an a game and then lose him at the end of the season to the highest bidder.

So Leopold (for example) is playing (or sitting, as the case may be) without a contract right now? That doesn't make sense to me.

OK, I'm clearly confused. There's some kind of RFA that doesn't happen in the last year of your current contract?

"Yeah, well you try to win with Hatcher on your team!" (Flyers fan after a Buffalo goal, November 2006)

I'm not sure how character jives with holding out on a contract. Is fulfilling your obligations not part of the character equation?

I completely understand where you're coming from. But I'd wager $100 that the contract that NBC and each of the 'team stations' (MSG, Leafs TV, FoxSports Dallas, etc.) have with the NHL says something to the effect, "The NHL grants *exclusive* rights to [station] to broadcast this set of games.". The stations would be stupid to sign anything else that would allow people to watch the games somewhere else, and the NHL survives on it's TV revenue. It's business. Now, you could make the argument that the NHL *might* be able to make a go of it if they got rid of all their TV contracts and streamed everything over the Internet, which is the only way I'll ever get local games on gamecenter. NBC stumped up $200m (I think) this year alone, I doubt the NHL is going to get over a million people to pay $150/yr for streaming.

Simply put, it's how TV entertainment contracts work. Leafs TV (in your case) pays a bunch of money for the rights to broadcast games. And since they're paying the money, they make sure that they have the exclusive rights to those games so the Leafs (or NHL) can't sell the rights to someone else, too. Leafs TV has to do this so they can tell their advertising clients that all the Leafs fans will be watching our channel during the game. Second to that, your local cable company pays Leafs TV for the rights to have their programming on their cable system. If people have the ability to watch the game somewhere else, Leafs TV becomes far less valuable. It's how the business works. Would it be great if CI/GameCenter was complete? Sure. But it'll never happen until there's a fundamental shift in the way TV distribution works. I'm doing what you just described, and I just go over to a friend's house or out to a bar when the Sabres are on cable here (NBC Sports, NHL network, or Flyers games).

Yep. I was passing thru town on a Monday night and ended up staying for 2 nights it was so nice.

Further, the statement only really makes sense if nothing else in the system (lowercase 's', not the Lindy System) changes in the mean time.

Probably more people watching L&S. :)

I was there last June on a riding vacation, and it's great. It may be the first time I've seriously considered moving somewhere that wasn't a transfer due to work. It's a somewhat 'hippie' town, like a larger Ithaca or smaller San Francisco. Lots of little restaurants, shops, and breweries downtown, with the more national chain stuff on the outskirts.