Unfathomable

March 8, 2004 – Todd Bertuzzi, then with the Vancouver Canucks attacked Steve Moore of the Colorado Avalanche in an act of retribution.  Steve Moore had injured Bertuzzi’s long time friend and teammate Markus Naslund in a game several weeks earlier with what many people considered to be a cheap shot.  Bertuzzi sucker punched Moore from behind knocking him out and breaking his neck.  Several publications at that time indicated that perhaps Moore’s neck was broken after several players piled on top of him in an attempt to get at Bertuzzi.  The sport received a huge black eye as major media outlets across the globe ran stories regarding the infamous incident.  By no means am I condoning what Bertuzzi did, because he is a coward, but in light of the incident I doubt Mr. Bertuzzi meant to injure Moore as bad as he did.  If Moore skates off of the ice that night with a cut on his head and a welt the size of a potato then Bertuzzi probably gets fined or receives a minimal suspension, and is a cult hero in Vancouver.  Instead the public outcry only intensified when the news of Steve Moore’s 3 broken vertebrae was released.  Outrage and public vilification was in full swing, people wanted Bertuzzi banned for life and claimed he was lucky he didn’t kill Mr. Moore.  Todd Bertuzzi was suspended indefinitely pending a review by the NHL.  In total Bertuzzi missed the final 13 games of the regular season and all of the playoffs which amounted to only 7 games for the shorthanded Canucks.  In addition, the IIHF banned Bertuzzi from playing in any other league or tournament that it governs until the NHL reinstated Bertuzzi on August 8, 2005.

Fast Forward 7 years to the day –

March 8, 2011 – Zdeno Chara of the Boston Bruins savagely drives Montreal Canadiens forward Max Pacioretty straight into the glass partition that separates the two benches.  Max Pacioretty is a 22 year old, hard working, grinding third line winger.  Several weeks earlier in a game featuring the two rivals Pacioretty had pushed Chara from behind enraging him in what turned out to be a spirited affair that resulted in countless fights at an unprecedented amount of penalty minutes to both teams.  The Canadiens and Bruins is not a rivalry for the faint of heart.  Last night with the score 4-0 in favour of Montreal with only 20 seconds left in the period Zdeno Chara drove Max Pacioretty into the glass knocking him out cold and breaking two vertebrae in his neck.  It was an absolutely sickening hit and one that could have been avoided.  What was Chara trying to do?  Whether he is known as a dirty player or not that hit was as dirty as they come.  The period was almost over and the big Boston Bruins captain was trying to send a message.  This is all speculative, but after passionately watching the NHL for the past 15 years it is pretty obvious what the Big Bruins Captain was trying to do.  He was trying to send a message to the Canadiens that they wont be having an easy third period and he was trying to provide a spark to his team, to get them to wake up.  Was he trying to injure the young Canadiens player? I highly doubt it, but at the same time he surely wasn’t trying to prevent him from scoring as the puck was long since gone and they were at centre ice.   I don’t think Chara was trying to break Pacioretty’s neck, but neither was Todd Bertuzzi trying to break Steve Moore’s.  Zdeno Chara is a 13 year NHL veteran with 10 of those seasons playing in the NHL’s North East Division with the Ottawa Senators and Boston Bruins.  Both of these two teams are fierce rivals of the Montreal Canadiens and play at the Bell Centre, home of the Montreal Canadiens, a minimum of 3 times a season not including the playoffs.  After 13 years in the league and most of it spent as a rival to the Canadiens, Mr. Chara must know the intricate details of the Bell Centre.  I find it hard to believe that he wasn’t fully aware of the dangerous spot he put his fellow hockey playing colleague.  There is a good chance Max Pacioretty will never play in the NHL again, but I’m sure that is not on his mind as he counts his blessings he is still alive. 

How would the NHL respond?  No doubt they would come down hard on Chara, especially this season, where they appear to be under the microscope.  “Headshots” has been the NHL buzzword of the season and many debates have raged on.  The overall safety of the players is constantly debated by the so called hockey experts.  The blow hard Don Cherry has been uncharacteristically quiet following this incident and he is the biggest advocate against the touch up icing rule which is inherently dangerous.  Cherry’s biggest problem with that rule is that the player is defenseless to the hit and could be seriously hurt.  Similar to how Mr. Pacioretty was completely defenseless and vulnerable last night and was seriously hurt.  Well, today the NHL dropped the ball, again.  Days after suspending a no name player, Trevor Gillies, for 10 games for a hit to the head of Cal Clutterbuck for this tame hit (you be the judge – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgfOpSyqo9M) they are letting Chara off of the hook.  No suspension, nothing, not even a slap on the wrist.  In the word of law – an absolute discharge.  I for one cannot even begin to fathom how the NHL brain trust came to this conclusion.  Whether or not there was or wasn’t malice or intent to injure, Chara DID injure Pacioretty and severely affected his livelihood. He broke his neck, and severely bruised his brain.  Chara must be held responsible for his actions, the same way Todd Bertuzzi was.  Only Zdeno Chara knows what was going through his head at that time and I would hope he is man enough to take some personal responsibility for his actions because the NHL surely isn’t.  When a drunk driver gets behind the wheel of a car and kills someone, did they intend to do that?  Did they mean to do that?  Do they walk away scot free? Hell no! Obviously I don’t want to paint Chara with that broad brush, but he did take Max Paciroetty and direct his body into a situation that caused him to break his neck, case closed.  Judging from the recent suspension to Gillies and the past suspension of Bertuzzi, Chara should have received a penalty no less then 10 games and no more then the rest of the season including playoffs. He should have to forfeit his right to play the game that both he and Max Pacioretty love.  Somebody should have to explain where no suspension is the proper course of action.  If I go to work and severely hurt my co – worker, you better believe I’m going to hear about it, so should Zdeno.

Boner bummer: Worst Celeb Butts

So, as any avid reader of the Truthfully Lying blog knows we recently did a post on the finest celebrity butts on the market. It was a truly stunning piece of internet journalism and i’m sure it will be nominated for whatever the pulitzer prize is for online publishing. Let’s hope Lindsay Lohan and Charlie Sheen are all cleaned up by then and are available to hand the golden mouse to us.

You know, those two should really hook up, can you imagine the competition they would have of trying to outdo each other for media attention? My money is on Sheen for having an orgy in a u-haul that crashes into the zoo which in turn releases Lions into Los Angeles that immediately sniff out the decaying body of Gary Busey and pounce. But I digress.

The real purpose of this post is to counter our previous post with one that will make your eyes water and possibly result in you lying on the floor in the fetal position sobbing uncontrollably. We give you……the worst female celebrity asses.

Ke$ha
Not only is she extremely pale and not nearly as trashy in a bikini as she may appear in a music video but she could probably be used as a stiff board for the next NFL player who gets his head taken off by James Harrison. I can just picture Al Michaels making the announcment now “And they are bringing Kesha out on the cart to keep Vince Young prone now”

Tara Reid
There were much more unflattering bikini pictures of Tara’s ass but in an effort to keep my lunch in it’s rightful spot I was unable to use them.

Notice how Tara uses a pair of low cut jeans to accentuate the fact that she has absolutely nothing to bring to a booty shake contest. She will not be “tagged in” by Nick Cannon or whoever ran that stupid dance contest show anytime soon.

Victoria “Posh” Beckham
Ahhh the only relevant spice girl, and that is using the term relevant very, very loosely. Unfortunately it appears her bum also saw Spice World or heard any of their albums and decided it wanted no part of what the future held. Probably a sound decision.

To be fair, i’m sure she couldn’t care what the blogosphere  says, she has a multi-millionaire husband who’s looks appear to be favoured by a number of ladies, and she can shop till she drops in an effort to find clothes that will help make that hiney look better.

Worst NHL contracts on the books

In our  continued effort to point out how we could easily be better GMs than a number of people currently holding that position in the NHL, we would like to take a moment to highlight some of the worst contracts currently on the books for NHL teams. It may be the ridiculous overvaluation of a player, the length of the contract or the fact that it is hamstringing their salary cap but one thing is for sure – these GMs must have been choking on their crystal meth pipes when they signed these.

Thomas Vanek (Buffalo Sabres)– $6.4 million for 3 more years, cap hit $7 /year
To be fair to Buffalo their hand was forced by a ridiculous offer sheet from Edmonton oilers GM Kevin Lowe. They matched and they have a 25-35 goal scorer who is not even remotely consistent.

Jay Bouwmeester (Calgary Flames) – $6.6 million for 3 more years, same cap hit
No shocker that one of the worst signings can be attributed to Darryl Sutter, hell you could make an entire list of terrible signings from him. This one was just a complete overvaluation for a good defenceman. $6.6 mil a year will buy you Dustin Byfuglien AND Brent Seabrook.

Shawn Horcoff (Edmonton Oilers) – $6.5, 6.0, 4.0 with $5.5 cap hit for next 3 years
Ahh it’s good to be an NHL player in Alberta, overpayments are in adundance. The sheer fact that Horcoff and his agent were able to get this out of the Oilers just proves how clueless Kevin Lowe is.

Scott Gomez (Montreal Canadiens via NY Rangers) – $7.5, 5.5, 4.5 with $7/year cap hit for next three years
Glen Sather must have taught Darryl Sutter and Kevin Lowe everything he knows because he is the original monopoly man, throwing money around like it is nothing. Over the years he has had so many bad signings it’s tough to list them all. Unfortunately for Montreal, they were dumb enough to trade for the perennial underperformer who has averaged under 14.2 goals a season over the past 4 years.

Ilya Kovalchuk (New Jersey Devils) – $6.667 cap hit for the next…..15 years. No big deal
What else can you say that hasn’t been said. To be fair, Ilya is an impressive -29 this year.

Rick Dipietro (NY Islanders) – $4.5 mil/year until 2021 same cap hit
Well thank god Charles Wang locked up his injury prone goaltender situation for one and a half decades when he did. Without that signing they may have actually been able to build a decent team around a decent goaltender.

 Wade Redden (NY Rangers) – $6.5, 5.0, 5.0 with a cap hit of $6.5…if he played in the NHL
Ah Mr. Sather makes another appearance on the list. Good work Slats. Glen has been the GM for the Rangers for 10 years now and has signed superstars such as Chis Drury, Scott Gomez, Bobby Holik, Eric Lindros, and Pavel Bure to long term contracts. None of them really worked out, but that doesn’t phase Slats from returning to that vault and minting more money for players that don’t deserve it.

Sergei Gonchar (Ottawa Senators) – $5.5/year for 2 more years with same cap hit
In a move that didn’t really make a whole lot of sense Bryan Murray signed Sergei Gonchar to a 3 year deal during the last offseason. He already had offensive players that are questionable at defence in Chris Campoli and Erik Karlsson.

Mike Komisarek (Toronto Maple Leafs) – $6.0, 5.5, 3.5, 3.5 cap hit of $4.5 per year
At what point does a defenceman that averages 15 points, + 4, and 110 PIMs turn into a contract that pays him $6 million dollars and averages $4.5 million over five years. Can’t even put into words what a misappropriation of funds that is.

Sure we’ve left plenty off this list so feel free to list your favourite contract on the market right now.

The Ultimate 2010 Playlist

Remember 2010???? Goddamn, now that was a hell of a year. The Olympics in Vancouver, The Town with Ben Affleck, and this blog was started. It’s gonna be tough to follow that up 2011 – consider yourself on notice early this year Rabbit.

Along with the 2010 highlights mentioned above, it was a hell of a year for music-especially the lesser known but madly talented, non-mainstream rock industry which saw some amazing bands brought to the attention of this blog. So that being considered here are some of our favourite songs from this year to create a reminiscent playlist that you will want to put on repeat on your ipod.

1. Kid Cudi – Pursuit of Happiness
2. Mumford and sons – Roll away your stone
3. The Middle East – The Darkest Side
4. Kenny Chesney – Everybody wants to go to Heaven
5. Drake – Over
6. The Black Keys – Everylasting light
7. Katy Perry – Teenage Dream (guilty pleasure)
8. The Arcade Fire – Modern Man
9. B.O.B. – Airplanes
10. The Avett Brothers – I and Love and You
11. Billy Currington – People are Crazy
12. Florence and the machine – You’ve Got the Love
13. Vampire Weekend – Horchata
14. The Band Perry – If I Die Young
15. The National – Blood Buzz Ohio

You can thank us later for the quintessential 2010 Playlist. We’re like DJ Am without the drugs or annoying remixes.

Bottom’s up! The best female celeb butts

Isn’t it annoying when you are looking at hot celebrities behind your girlfriend/wife’s back and you just can’t think of any talent to ogle. I mean let’s be honest it’s tough to think of a hot celebrity sometimes. So we are here to help you, because that’s what we do. But let’s focus on a specific area of the body today…the badonk, the hiney, the booty. Here’s our top four in no particular order. Feel free to add your thoughts.

Jessica Biel – Athletic and fit

Kim Kardashian – A whole yard sale worth of junk in this trunk

Nicole Scherzinger – Could easily bounce some buttons off this dancer’s hindquarters

Jessica Alba – Sculpted by the gods, I dare you to find a flaw

Since I couldn’t figure out how to work the images in tune with the text below is a mish-mash of fantasstic pictures of the above ladies.

Christmas songs to stuff your stocking

Fa la lala la la la la lahhhhhhh! Tis the season people. Grab a candy cane, your favourite little drummer boy, or your uncle who’s puking in the fig tree after too many Rum-Nogs and celebrate the season with these non-shitty christmas tunes.

…and the winner for best outfit worn during a christmas special goes to…AARON NEVILLE!

“Anything to declare?!” “Yeah, Don’t go to London”

I’m sure everyone had the same reaction as I did upon learning that Prince William was finally going to marry his long time girlfriend, Kate Middleton. “OH!, good for them, what’s the score in that hockey game, Dave?” First things first.  William is the real winner after this because the newest Princess to be is a good looking piece of royal ass.  At this stage of my life I kind of wish I was still in contact with my ex-girlfriend so I could show her what a REAL Princess looks and acts like, but, I digress. 

In the days following the news of the latest royal engagement there have been countless stories about the wedding and the rabid dogs that are the british press are churning out stories.  Of course, a royal wedding is a huge, expensive undertaking that the Royal family funds.  I have NO idea how they have so much money and where it continues to come from (i hope it isn’t coming out of my Canadian pocket) but they obviously have some pounds, not euros, real currency, pounds.  Who am I to say how the Royal family spends their money, 30 – 50 million pounds for a wedding isn’t out of the realm of possibilty, wait a minute!!?  “On top of those costs, British taxpayers will pick up the tab for security and transportation, which could add up to $130 million”  How is this a good use of tax payers money?!  The financial difficulties among the English population has been well documented over the last couple of years, due to the mighty recession.  How is Charlie, the 43 year old brick layer from Manchester going to feel he is flipping the bill for this Princesses big day and he ain’t getting squat!  I don’t want to rag on William too much because I am not quite sure if he is the one driving the double decker bus.  However, I doubt Princess Diana would have been in favour of spending the common folks hard earned money on security at her sons wedding especially this soon after such a difficult financial crisis for so many.  That’s easy for me to say because I am not a member of the Royal Family and Princess Diana died many years ago.  However, from what I read about Princess Di (very little) she seemed to be very down to earth and a world leader in charitable causes.  Angelina Jolie wishes she was half the woman Princess Di was – ha – suck on that Jolie, you sexy as hell, old bitch. 

For a country that is hosting the 2012 Summer Olympics I wonder where they are getting all of this money?  The thing about the Olympics  is that the English masses are going to enjoy those sporting events and parties.  The Olympics are nothing short of a two week, patriotic love fest where the whole city shuts down and getting wasted at noon on a work day is the norm, well, maybe a little more acceptable then what probably already happens in London anyways.  My totally irrelevant point is that taxpayes money for the Olympics is a great idea because the country will benefit from hosting these events.  I doubt you would find very many Vancouverites who regret or hated having the Olympics in Vancouver.  What does the English population stand to gain from spending money to watch Prince William marry Kate Middleton?!? nadda.  Perhaps Hugh Heffner could swindle Kate into a little Royal Family Centre Fold to help cover the costs of the wedding, I would have no problem chipping in for that!

Best looking women athletes

I use this term having stolen it from Daniel Tosh. He also probably would not agree with this blog post at all, but fuck it we move forward for the, no doubt, two fans of this blog.

Now, onto the hotties.

Melissa Hollingsworth – Skeleton
A little Canadian patriotism early here because well we have hot ladies and Melissa is at the top of that list. Pictures don’t even do justice to how smoking hot this woman is as she squeezes herself into a tight lycra suit and flys down an ice tube – down boy.  Skeleton athletes need to have strong legs for those quick starts and pushoffs to get them going……Melissa’s just happen to be some of the sexiest out there.

Lindsay Vonn – Downhill Ski
Two sultry ice queens start off the list as they were at the front of my brain as I created this post. But look at this picture and tell me this girl couldn’t be confused with a gorgeous movie actress a la Malin Ackerman or Ellen Pompeo (of Old School fame). Once again a nice tight lycra suit helps to show off Lindsays athletic body and great legs and makes downhill skiing somewhat bearable for the population not from Austria.

Allison Stokke – Pole Vault
That’s right, we’re reaching into the metaphorical, yet true category of sports for this next gorgeous lady. A stand out at Cal University (who knows if she’s good at pole vaulting but she definately stands out in a crowd….ba dump ba dah!) she quickly went viral on the internet before realizing that all the attention was not worth it. So you won’t see any modeling or anything of her online but enjoy the picture of this good looking track athlete. I’m not even going to give the internet people the joy of a well thought out pole joke here, because I respect her too much. Pole Vault teehee.

Isabelle Mercier – Poker
Okay, okay, I know poker isn’t really a sport or an athletic event but I was starting to run out of options. Mercier is a little big more to the yummy mummy side of things but if that lady was staring at you across the poker table we all know you’d go all-in in an effort to impress her, only to have her call your obvious bluff (your tongue hanging out was the giveaway genius) and take all of your chips when you turn over your deuce, eight.

Well that’s all i’ve got, feel free to lip me off and denigrate my manhood but i’m sticking with my choices. If you’re so smart who did I miss? Notice how I didn’t go with the obvious ones that everyone uses (and as Tosh puts it “are 7’s at best”) Jennie Finch, Danica Patrick, Ashley Harkleroad, or Natalie Gulbis.

Is Brian Burke a reincarnation of JFJ?

It can be argued that Brian Burke was the architect behind the current Vancouver Canucks squad, he was the one that dealt for the top two picks in the draft that netted the Canucks Daniel and Henrik Sedin, two of the top snipers in the NHL these days. It can also be argued that he was the man behind the Anaheim Ducks cup run of 2007, even though he really came on board after they had Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry drafted. However, he was smart enough to draft players like Bobby Ryan and re-sign Scott Niedermayer and Teemu Selanne again and again.

So, he had a lot of cache after a couple of years in Anaheim and of course the Toronto Maple Leafs GM at the time John Ferguson Junior was known as….well lets just say it politely, a fucking idiot. So the Leafs were in desperate need of a strong visionary that had the hockey knowledge and smarts about him to bring them back to a power position in the NHL. They have rabid fans and are the top hockey market in the world so suffice it to say they had their eyes on one and only one man to handle the job once they finally smartened up and fired the man that had made outrageous contract offers with Jason Blake, Pavel Kubina and Bryan McCabe (along with no-trade clauses for all of them). Brian Burke was seen as the star GM in the hockey world and Toronto did everything they could to land him. He would be their way out of the darkness that had enveloped the team.

Or so they thought….

Two years into the journey and Brian Burke is not even remotely handling the job in the proper way. I know when he took the job Burke said he would rebuild the Leafs in a non-traditional way in an effort to expedite the process, but why bother? Do you know how the Anaheim Ducks won the cup Brian? What about the Pittsburgh Penguins? or the Tampa Bay Lighning?

They used their draft picks wisely and built a team around top end draft choices. They tanked the team for three or four years and ended up with 3 or 4 top ten draft picks to build a franchise around. Once you have give your draft picks a chance to get themselves into NHL form through play in the AHL or a couple of seasons worth of learning lessons at the NHL level, start signing some free agents to fill out your roster and patch holes in the defence and forward areas.

Instead he has traded two first round draft picks for a sniper who has no one to play with and has tried to create a formidable blue line which has failed miserably. The first first rounder he traded was promptly turned into Tyler Seguin (the top ranked centre in the 2010 draft) who would have probably been a great fit with their Nazim Kadri selection from 2009. Brian Burke’s calculations in thinking the aquisition of Phil Kessel would be the key to the Leafs making a string of playoff appearances shows about as much mathematical accumen as I did in the pre-calculus college course that landed me on academic probation. His probation will be the Leafs mired in another decade of uselessness as the Boston Bruins reap the riches of the Leafs terribleness instead of Brian Burke.

Unfortunately Toronto hockey fans continue to buy tickets (kudos for not being bandwagon jumpers) which means the Leafs never have the time to tank a season and focus on building from the ground up. Until they change their mantra of “Every year we need to make the playoffs” for a couple of years, they will flounder at the bottom to mid range of the eastern conference. They will soon learn from Edmonton how to take a team from the scrap heap and build it into an entertaining product that sells tickets and has success on the ice.

What time is it Mr. Wolf?

Well kid, Mr. Wolf has no fucking clue what time it is because every single one of the clocks he encounters everyday tells him a different bloody time!

How is it possible that of the 10 to 12 clocks I look at a day none of them have the same time on them. Take for example my workplace, where I am sitting right now, which has three seperate clocks all within eyesite: 9:20 on blackberry, 9:18 on computer, 9:16 on phone console……pardon? They are all electronic and the blackberry and computer are literally networked to each other! How is it possible that there are three different times. How do I know which one to trust so that I leave work the second I’m supposed to instead of giving my company a bonus minute or two of time in the office to make up for writing blog posts at work? Ridiculous.

Thematical musical interlude:

And don’t even get me started on the various clocks at my house. The microwave and oven clocks are obvious toss outs because everyone knows those are never even remotely close to the time, but my laptop, blackberry and television clocks are all skewed so harshly that it is impossible to try and guess when to leave my apartment to try and catch the bus when needed.

And have you ever had this one, where you are looking at the clock in your car which you are pretty confident is bang on accurate and then the radio announcer says “…and current time is 8:24” which is approximately five minutes ahead of what time you actually thought it was according to your dashboard clock.

In a digital age isn’t there some kind of instrument that will just sync all your clocks together to match the greenwich mean time or whatever the worldwide clock that is king to all other clocks tell us? Is there an app for that apple?