The things that are banging around in my head today…
1) Roy Halladay is a professional athlete and as a professional athlete he makes a very large amount of money. He certainly makes enough money to put up with all the crap that is flung in his direction and as a result, no one should feel sorry for him.
However, far too often we look at the professional athlete as the bad guy in those potential blockbuster deals that may or may not benefit our favourite teams. We often ask questions like: Did the jerk stand in the way of the deal? Why did he have a no-trade clause? Why did they give him a no-trade clause?
And on and on it goes.
In Halladay’s case, we might be witnessing one of the rare times when the athlete is the good guy and the people running the baseball franchise are little more than loud-mouthed buffoons.
According to ESPN, the Blue Jays turned own another offer for Halladay yesterday. the best pitcher on Toronto’s staff did not ask for a trade, but two weeks ago Ricciardi made it clear that he was going to shop around his ace and see what he might get in return.
Then, a week later, Ricciardi said the team might not get a deal for Halladay and he could stay with the club although Ricciardi also made it clear he wants to deal Halladay because the pitcher will “probably” test the free-agent market after his contract expires.
What a jerk. For one thing, Halladay has never even hinted he won’t re-sign in Toronto.You an go ahead an assume it might happen but don’t go public a year in advance and suggest that he’ll probably leave the team. That Ricciardi remark was made for Ricciardi’s benefit. It was made to make Halladay look like the bad guy and it’s wrong.
It was a stupid statement by a guy who has failed to make the Jays anything better than a fourth-place team in the AL East.
The fact is this: Ricciardi went public with his desire to trade Halladay. Ricciardi tried to make Halladay look like the villain. Ricciardi is the bad guy, not Halladay.
All Halladay has done is say nothing and pitch two gems since he was put on the trade block.
Halladay is the good guy.
2) Originally, Junior Moar’s plan was to fight a non-title “keep-busy” bout in September and then defend his Canadian Boxing Federation light-heavyweight crown in December.
But in boxing, like no other sport, things can change dramatically in a very short time.
Last week, during an exclusive interview with Grassroots News, Moar revealed that he will now defend his belt against Regina brawler Michael (Flash) Walchuk on Sept. 17, at the Red Robinson Theatre in Port Coquitlam, B.C. He signed the contract for the fight this past Friday night.
Check out the latest issue of Grassroots News (available Tuesday) for Junior Moar’s story. It’s one of the greatest stories in all of sports today.
3) I hate reading a newspaper and seeing something passed off as fact that is, at worst, a lie and, at best, a myth.
But that’s what happened on Sunday when the Winnipeg Free Press claimed — once again — that Winnipeg’s Canwest Park was built for the 1999 Pan Am Games.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The baseball park was built for the Winnipeg Goldeyes of the Northern Baseball League by the team’s owner Sam Katz. The city of Winnipeg wanted nothing to do with the construction of the ballpark and that is reflected in the fact that the city’s commitment to the building was less than $1 million.
The Goldeyes had been playing at Canwest Global Park (now Canwest Park) for more than two months when the Pan Am Games arrived. The Pan Am Games organization paid rent to use the building while the Goldeyes played an extended road trip.
The Mayor at the time, Susan Thompson, did everything humanly possible to stop construction of the stadium. She even publicly backed away from a pledge to make the ball park happen by telling the Pan Am Games organizers to play in Stonewall. If the Pan Am Games baseball tournament had been played in Stonewall, Winnipeg would have been the laughing stock of the baseball world. At the time, there were considerably better facilities in Grand Forks, N.D., than in Stonewall, Man.
As it was, the Pan Am Games executives rented Katz’s ballpark and the tournament was sensational. But the ballpark was NOT built for the Pan Am Games.The Pan Am Games had absolutely nothing to do withe building’s construction. Nothing. Those who contend it did — like the folks in Winnipeg’s mainstream media — are nothing more than revisionist historians.
(NOTE: Want the truth? Just go to www.winnipegmen.com and buy a copy of my book Home Run: A History of the Winnipeg Goldeyes and Canwest Global Park. The true story — much of it from the pages of the Winnipeg Free Press in 1999 — is much more fun than the one the paper likes to sell to its readers today)