Jiji

Steeeeeve Smith! Nah, even he's like "now that's a boner, son."

Well, they're two of the most undervalued assets in the league and offense costs too much. It's a smart strategy. Somebody should write a book about it!

Steph Curry hit 77 threes in a row at practice. O_O

Dudes, it's here! How crazy of a wait has this been for you Winnipeggers? One season without watching a truly significant game feels like an eternity. I can't imagine what 19 would feel like.

Yeah, the game's incredibly cruel sometimes. One other thing that's been around forever and needs fixing pronto: errors on pickoff throws. Baseball has stats for everything, how many pickoffs to first end up in the bleachers? If they were going into the dirt or wide left/right the odd time, sure. But it's always 5 feet over 1B's extended arm. I called up Bryant and am having more success. I get what Maddon's going for with his batting order but it wasn't working for me, so I've gone to something a bit more traditional and am scoring ~3 runs per game or so. Progress! BTW, Bryant hit a double at his first AB and then smoked a single off the wall in right for his second AB.

Wait, what? The Konami code works?!

So, with the release of the 2015 OSFM for The Show, I thought I'd start a franchise with the Cubs. Man, this game is super frustrating but ultimately rewarding. Just an outstanding son of a bitch. I was getting killed time after time after time after time with the changeup and curve (more so the change) but I'm starting to recognize and predict it better. After suffering through three consecutive shutouts (my first games with other teams weren't great, but certainly not this bad), I finally started hitting. Had 4 doubles and was winning 3-1 heading into the bottom of the 9th in Pittsburgh. Rondon comes in and whiffs their first batter. Then, in the first instance of the game actually feeling like it's unfair, I induce a broken bat soft grounder near the mound. Rondon fields it just fine, but Anthony Rizzo, the first baseman, is just standing there, jackin' it real casual-like instead of going to his bag for the putout. For some reason, Rondon is chraged with an error. And of course Pittsburgh wins two batters later with a walk-off home run because fuck me. I'll probably just hack my way through this franchise casually until the Hybrid OSFM drops in another month or so. That sucked but I'm enjoying The Show overall and listening to bad Spotify playlists simultaneously (such a great app, so much better than that one Sony was running and charging $10 a month for - I just haven't found many good playlists yet).

Don't worry, Shea Weber will ram his head in the turnbuckle and then give him the corner 10 punches. More people should join the DVDVR bracket challenge (pass: bacon). It takes like 5 minutes to sign up and make your picks.

My favourite part of that video is finding out Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi is still playing at 39 years of age. Pompey legend and World Cup hero! Now I'm going through Japan's 2002 WC squad. Ah, the memories... ALESSANDRO SANTOS! STARTING LEFT BACK! I'm having so many Winning 11 and PES flashbacks right now.

As they should, really. I remember Savage's sit-down protest on an episode of Nitro being one of their highest highs. When Sting came out, said nothing, and IIRC gave him a bat, followed by them going through the crowd together, I WAS READY FOR STING AND MACHO FUCKING UP THE NWO. Instead, Savage joined the nWo (this was for the first time, right? My memory of this is sketchy because it's so illogical and they had way too many turns) and it made zero sense. This was right after Halloween Havoc, wasn't it? Where Hogan cheated unmercifully to get the W over Savage... Fucking WCW. Sting's army of hobos... er, vigilantes would've ruled hard and that money angle where he buddies up with Savage would've been the perfect start. Have him do the baseball bat angle with DDP that was also so very, very good and you've got a trio. Bret joining makes sense too, and I guess Luger could've joined as well - which would have had its own huge, emotional arc with Sting forgiving his musclebound dolt of a best bud for doubting him way back when. 5 v 5 wargames and you're swimming in money.

Good Lord, I laughed way, WAY too fucking hard at this!

They had Al MacInnis and Chris Pronger on the same team at the same time. That shit wasn't fair. Demitra was also at his best during that era. I miss that guy.

The Rangers and Habs have bad fancy stats. I originally had the Habs because Carey Price is fucking awesome but I'm not feeling them after looking at some numbahz. Winnipeg is surprisingly really good according to the fancy stats and I think a bunch of people, myself included, pick them to beat the Ducks. And the whole nothing's really an upset is why this year's playoffs are going to rule hard. I would say the two favourites should be Chicago and St. Louis, but if they both lose in the first I wouldn't be all that shocked. Wild have been tearing it up and have a hot goat lender, similar to Ottawa in the East. and because goat lender reminds me of Cherry calling Luongo an "escape goat," i must post the best gif on the internet: Makes my day.

I always liked you. I never win - it's a poisoned chalice. I've already changed my mind about the east. Speaking of which, if you want some homework, there's a good article here which looks at advanced stats and playoff performances. Here are some of those advanced team stats.

I will hate hockey with a deep passion should either the Oilers or Kings win the lottery. Eichel seems made for the Oilers.

Eff yeah. Let me know if there's a problem joining. The always excellent Justin Bourne has a great piece on how bonkers these playoffs could be. Right now I'm thinking the Blues beat the Habs in the finals but I wouldn't be surprised if it's something awesome and wacky like the Islanders beating the Jets in 7 games.

To keep fans of the non-playoff teams entertained for the next few months: NHL Draft Lottery Simulator! Toronto won it 2 out of the 3 three times I tried it.

2011 obviously. The entire backend was fucked, as were our three best forwards. I created an NHL bracket challenge league. "Death Valley Driver" is the league name and "bacon" is the password. Bonus points if you get the reference!

Getting one of the top 2 picks would legitimize that.

It'll have to come outside of free agency because this is the weakest class in recent memory. Mike Ribeiro tops SportsNet's list of the top 15 free agents, hah.

I think the Central foursome is so gnarly, that whoever survives it will be so beat up they'll struggle against a likelier weaker team in the WCF. If Kane's healthy now, he won't be in a few weeks. Can you imagine Winnipeg beating the Ducks and one of Winnipeg, Vancouver, or Calgary will be 4 wins away from the finals. lol, I love the new format. Edit: should I start an nhl.com bracket challenge league for us? We can have bonus questions as per tradition to serve as tiebreakers.

Nonis is awful and I would think could only hope for assistant GM jobs in the future. Just awful. Step 1 in fixing Toronto's shitbumminess.

Hey, should we do a straight up bracket for our playoff pick'em or do the traditional round by round set-up? There's no more reseeding, right? Meaning NCAA-like brackets are doable?

Dear, Boston:

Ottawa is in! 5 Canadian teams in the playoffs and there's a ~20% chance of McDavid going to one of the two shitbum organizations that didn't make it in.