Left field

Sports review 2011 – A memorable year for the wrong reasons

By Steve Keating

The trouble with putting together a top 10 list of the year’s biggest sports stories is that one person”s number one is another person”s 10.

For those of us lucky enough to spend our time chronicling these events the period before New Year is generally one of reflection where we, like every other sports fan, take stock of what we have seen.

It is a search for the moments that generated a buzz, moments that lingered instead of simply appeared and vanish. Moments that inspired and others too grim and unsettling to be ignored or forgotten.

As 2011 prepares for its final bow, an astonishing number of disturbing events are the first that leap to mind in a year dominated by scandals, lockouts and legal wrangling that overshadowed what took place on the field of play.

There are no defining lists only subjective ones. Some lists are restricted by particular sports, others by geography bounded by country or city borders.

For us Canadians the return of the NHL Jets to Winnipeg is at or near the top of every list but would not crack the top 10 of any American or World yearend round up.

Soccer team of the year?…APOEL Nicosia

Alright, alright I know most of you will be screaming “what about Barcelona?” right now but they get so many plaudits that I thought I could argue a contrarion position.

Yes World, European and Spanish champions Barca have been brilliant and in time we may say they were the greatest ever club side to play the game.

But given they have Lionel Messi — who also in time may be viewed as the world’s greatest ever player — the biggest stadium in Europe, vast finances, the bedrock of the team of world champions Spain and an organisation which calls itself “more than a club”, Barca should be one of the world’s top teams.

They ought to have won more than their four European Cups, three of which have come in the last five years. Barca are also not actually top of La Liga at the mid-season break with Real Madrid three points ahead.

APOEL Nicosia meanwhile have no high expectations.

APOEL weren’t even Cypriot champions in 2010 and had to battle past three other Nicosia sides — that is a lot of derbies — to win the national championship in May.

They were then thrilled just to make the Champions League group stages after three rounds of qualifiers.

DRS in cricket…to use or not to use?

By Sudipto Ganguly, India sports correspondent

The inconsistent use of the Decision Review System (DRS) has put the International Cricket Council (ICC) in the firing line once again, strengthening the already popular notion that the governing body is helpless against the wishes of its most influential member board – India.

As the rest of the cricketing world went up in unison in a huge appeal, like a stern umpire, India once again shook its head and refused to budge on the use of technology in the game.

The Indian cricket board (BCCI) remains sceptical about DRS, basing their objection on the ball-tracking technology which is not fool-proof and vetoed its mandatory use.

BCCI convinced ICC to leave it to the participating boards in a bilateral cricket series, thus ensuring DRS, which allows teams to challenge umpires’ decisions, does not feature in any series involving India.

Initially there were concerns about the cost of the technology and whether smaller boards can afford it but BCCI insisted cricket does not require any technology which is not fool-proof.

ICC claimed DRS had improved correct decisions by more than seven percent in the World Cup but BCCI was not convinced.

Packers dilemma: To rest or not to rest?

You’re Green Bay Packers head coach Mike McCarthy, it’s the final game of the regular season against the Detroit Lions, and you’ve got a dilemma: play your strongest team, a winning combination, or rest your stars fearing serious injuries to any of them.

What do you do? McCarthy said on Monday he wants veteran left tackle Chad Clifton to play the game, he wants Clifton’s experience for the playoffs so naturally he needs a run out against the Lions. Easy.

But what about MVP favorite Aaron Rodgers?

“There is something to be said about trying to finish the season well though…and it would be nice to finish out the season, the way we started with a strong showing in a home game,” said the quarterback. Easy then..or not so.

Injury to Rodgers could spell disaster, but you get the sense he wants to play instead of understudy Matt Flynn no matter what the situation.

However, with no real game for almost three weeks, would a win against the Lions with a full strength team really give the Superbowl holders any more momentum than they’ve already built up all season?

The Packers are clicking on all fronts, just ask Donald Driver, speaking at the start of the season. It’s hard to see McCarthy not resting his main players come the last game of the regular season in the new year.

NFL Week 16 Christmas Lineman picks

By Steve Keating

Well, after two weeks of 4-2 the Lineman is still searching for that perfect Christmas gift and hopes he has found it with this six-pack of holiday picks.

Keeping in the spirit of the holiday season, the Lineman offers you all the best and may all your picks be winners HO HO HO.

Record: 47-43. Last week 4-2; Pick of the Week: 13-2

PICK OF THE WEEK

Denver Broncos (8-6) at Buffalo Bills (5-9) (Line Broncos minus-2.5)

You do not need to be one of the Three Wise Men to know this has the look of a Christmas Special.

Can the Clippers break the Laker stranglehold on LA?

By Larry Fine

The Lakers have owned Los Angeles in the NBA sense for 50 years since moving to the City of Angels from the Land of 10,000 Lakes where they were born the Minneapolis Lakers.

 Now with a startling suddenness since the end of the NBA lockout, the famed franchise with its 16 NBA titles looks ripe for a challenge for local hoops supremacy from their Staples Center co-tenants – the perennially sad-sack Los Angeles Clippers.

 Add premier point guard Chris Paul to the Clippers, along with veterans such as Caron Butler from the NBA champion Mavericks and Chauncey Billups of the Knicks, and subtract Lamar Odom from the Lakers and one can feel the rumbles of abalance of power shift in Southern California.

 Mix in an injury to the shooting wrist of Kobe Bryant, and waves of worry have hit the Lakers faithful, who had to endure back-to-back defeats to the Clippers in preseason warm-ups.

 Last year the Lakers, who have won five NBA titles with Bryant on the roster, were 57-25 while the Clippers were 32-50 even with all the highlight reel dunks from former number one overall draft pick Blake Griffin.

All I want for Christmas is…NBA – five teams and players to watch

The new NBA season took a while to come around after a five-month lockout spent negotiating an improved labor agreement. What better day to start than Dec. 25. Merry Christmas!

Read the season preview here courtesy of Larry Fine, and our American sports editor Julian Linden weighs in with five players to watch as well as five teams sure to set pulses racing over the shortened 66-game programme.

All in all, we can’t wait for the games to begin. So whether you’re in an office scrunching up receipts and taking aim at the waste paper basket or on a basketball court shooting hoops, bring on the action. NBA, we’ve missed you.

Picture: Los Angeles Lakers power forward Pau Gasol of Spain slam dunks against the Los Angeles Clippers during their NBA preseason basketball game in Los Angeles, California December 19, 2011. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

Swedish football family suffering Christmas unrest

By Philip O’Connor, Scandinavia sports correspondent

Sweden’s soccer year officially came to an end last week with Wednesday’s traditional press conference and Christmas lunch at the football association’s Rasunda headquarters.

The normally sedate affair was given extra spice by Alexander Gerndt’s conviction the previous day for domestic violence and the FA’s reaction to it.

The Utrecht striker’s hearing in a Helsingborg court appeared to catch the Swedish game’s governing body by surprise.

Chairman Lars-Ake Lagrell, soon to retire after 21 years at the helm, first appeared to suggest that the suspended sentence and fine was punishment enough and that the Gerndt would be given no further sanction.

National team coach Erik Hamren said on Wednesday he had not been aware of any impending verdict in the case.

In a land as conscious of equality and respect as Sweden, that was never going to be enough.

Post-Christmas cheer in Oslo for out-of-contract players

By Philip O’Connor, Scandinavia sports correspondent

For many football fans, the post-Christmas blues will be banished by the prospect of their club buying big when the transfer window opens in January.

But the out-of-contract players taking part in the FIFPro Winter Tournament in Oslo are hoping to get their futures sorted out before the window opens again.

On a full-size indoor pitch, players affiliated to Norwegians, Swedish, Finnish and Irish unions got together to play a tournament in front of invited scouts and club representatives from across the region.

All the players are out of contract, and many are desperate for a chance to stay in the game.

“We had 120 players looking for places in the squad,” Irish players’ union boss Steephen McGuinness told Reuters. “Last week we took the decision to bump the kitman, just so we could bring another player on the plane”.

For McGuinness and some of his players, it’s their second visit; some of them got short-term deals at the first tournament here in January, but with many clubs in Ireland and elsewhere only offering short-term, 40 week contracts, several have come back to try their luck again.

from Photographers Blog:

The Tebow phenom

By Rick Wilking

Do a Google search on this new celebrity and there are 299,000,000 results. Brad Pitt? No, he only has 187 million. I’m talking about the newest phenom in the world of sports – Tim Tebow.

Being a Denver-based photographer where Tebow plays starting quarterback for the Broncos has kept me in the vortex of the Tebow storm. Going back to his first start late last season and then training camp in August, we’ve been focusing on his young career. Would he start this year or would he not was the hot topic back in late summer. Kyle Orton was eventually chosen as starter but when the team went 1–4 Tebow got the nod and Orton was out. Then the fun really began.

Tebow was a superstar in college at the University of Florida (first sophomore to win the Heisman Trophy, won not one but two NCAA National Football Championships) but how would he do in the big leagues? He was a first round draft pick in the NFL meaning many had high hopes for him to succeed. But the NFL game is so much different than college there’s no guarantee a player will repeat. Scrambling around on the field can only go so far in the NFL before getting tackled repeatedly by much bigger and faster players will destroy you. Being a rookie in the league with a great pedigree means extra attention to start with but then add this element: religion. I don’t think a sports writer out there can remember any athlete starting most press conferences with “First and foremost I have to thank my lord and savior, Jesus Christ.”

Growing up the son of active Christian missionaries Tebow has always been devout, and very public about it. Now that he's on the biggest stage in American sports he’s not about to clam up. In fact he has said he uses the attention to spread his beliefs whenever he can.