We saw everything that makes hockey great: goals scored, nice passing, good defense and fighting. We also heard one of my favorite sounds: the horn when the Wild scored.

I can live with being mad at Joe Nathan for blowing the save and Carlos Gomez for making a stupid play, but the call Cuzzi made was inexcusable. He was exactly where he needed to be: mere feet from where the ball landed. Yet, he failed to see the ball hit the fielder’s glove and then land in fair territory. He had one job to do and he failed miserably on what should have been an easy call. I say fire Phil Cuzzi and bring on instant replay. This sort of “human element” that replay detractors seem to romanticize is moronic.

http://www.youtube.com/v/a8iSIs_NFPU&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0

One of the many people I keep track of in the fantasy football world is Matthew Berry, aka the Talented Mr. Roto, who works for ESPN. I like him because he has good information, but also because he’s a bit strange. Here’s an excerpt from a recent article; it’s just one of the many random things that gets mixed into football talk.

When I first got to ESPN, I was told I could subscribe to three magazines the company would pay for. I chose US Weekly and People as two of them. They were like … uh, really? And I was like … yeah. Absolutely. And they said … most people order, like, sports magazines and stuff. And I said, “Yeah, here’s the deal. I know sports. But pop culture — that takes research, baby!” I had to justifty to my employer, in writing, why I wanted a bunch of chick mags. Today, I feel completly justified.

The rest of the article can be found here. Perhaps this is what you get from years of staring at and analyzing statistics.