georoc01's blog: "sports"

Well, With the NHL season ending today, its time to get ready for the playoffs! First round for the Colorado Avalanche will be against its Northwest Division rivals, the Minnesota Wild. Minnesota, coached by Jacque Lemaire, plays a unique brand of hockey. Basically it is designed around minimizing opportunities for the opposing team. Which can make for some very ugly hockey. New Jersey ran this system when they won their cup. While I am dissapointed about the Sabres this year. Congrats to my friends back east who are Caps fans. That was an amazing run not only to make the playoffs but to win the division. Should be an interesting playoffs to the cup. Detroit and San Jose have looked really tough out west. Starts this week. Should be fun!

Tonight I attended my first UFC event in person. It was at the Broomfield Event Center here just NW of Denver. The place holds about 10,000 and was sold out. I left work early about 4 and when I got there the place was packed. If you have never been to a UFC event, the Octagon is placed at the center on the floor. The middle 3rd is basically for the fight. They have a huge lighting cage that sits above it with big screens in all corners plus four above the ring. The seats immediately around the Octagon is reserved for other UFC fighter and media. We were five rows up on one of the middle sides right near the fighters. In fact for much of the preliminaries we were flooded with fans coming down trying to get pictures and autographs from their favorite fighters. And the fighters actually came over and obliged. A big annoying, but nice to see. For the broadcast, they use four cameras, one on each of the main sides. They have a milk crate that the cameramen stand on so they can get a good shot from above the ring. When the action gets close, they jump down and have a face up view. As far as the fights go, the main even was Lauzon vs Florian. Both Boston fighters, with Florian the vet and Lauzon the up and comer. Florian pounded Lauzon into submission and won the fight. The preliminaries were all over the map. Some were disappointing. It appeared that HOuston Alexander slipped and yet the ref ended the fight prematurely as a TKO 8 seconds into the fight. He never looked to be unconsious. Hopefully he gets a rematch. One were the fighter was definitely knocked out was the Anthony Johnson/Tommy Speer fight. Johnson dropped Speer 51 seconds into the fight and Speer looked to be out cold. Others had a range of endings from tap out holds to scorecard victories. It was a fun event. Not sure if I would make a special trip to Vegas to see it, but I would probably go again if they come back to Denver.

As a race car fan, one of the things I have been involved with as a volunteer was Champ Car racing. First when I lived in Oregon, then here in Colorado for the Denver Grand Prix, I would spend the weekend down at the track and meet the drivers, owners and lots of race car fans. Unfortunately, this year's event was cancelled as the Democratic National Convention will be at the Pepsi Center during that time. Of course, Champ Car has also been on its last legs, and this past week ended its run, folding its tent and the teams joining the Indy Racing League. What this means is that, along with the ending of the IRL running at Pikes Peak Speedway is that there is no more top level auto racing here in Colorado. We still have the Mile High Nationals at Bandimere, and the Pikes Peak hill climb, but its not the same. Hopefully at some point top level racing will return to Colorado.

Well, Nascar is back! They had a fantastic Daytona 500. One of the best finishes I have ever seen. Then last week was Fontana which turned into a disaster because of a little rain. They didn't get the race in until Monday. This week is Las Vegas. One of my first races was at Las Vegas. Its a great track, and other than the mob scene making the drive back and forth to the strip, its a fun time. Definitely need to make a trip back there sometime!

What a wild couple of days for the Colorado Avalanche. Coming off a loss on Sunday where the Avs blew a two goal lead in Edmonton. It appeared the season was lost. Down four points with 18 games go to, the team needed one heck of a run to have a chance. But meanwhile, the good news was that for the first time Since December, the team had its three top scorers back in Paul Statsny, Ryan Smyth and Joe Sakic. And now the deals the last two days. First yesterday Peter Forsberg signs a deal with the Avalanche. Peter is probably the most dynamic player I have seen outside of Wayne Gretzky. Assuming he is healthy, he will add a new dimension coming back. Of course, the last couple of games, it was obvious that defense was lacking. Jeff Finger and Brett Clarke have been injured and their have been lapses that cost them. Now they bring back Adam Foote and picked up Selei from Florida. Much bigger and more physical, the toughness on this team just increased tremendously. Big win tonight in OT against Calgary and Vancouver tomorrow night. 17 games to go!

Well, as the playoffs start for the teams that made it. Its time to do a little review of my team and where they go from here.. The season started knowing it was a very difficult schedule. My pre-season projection was 6-10 or 7-9 and the team ended up right about there. There were some good things given that the team set a league record for players on IR prior to week 10. The season actually ended up being predictable. They beat the teams that should have beaten (like the Dolphins and Jets twice) and lost to teams they should have lost to (Like New England). About the only upset was the Redskins, who were coming off the loss of their Safety. And now its the offseason, the GM and Offensive Coordinator have left already. So their will definitely be some management changes. Just as this year with JP Losman, next year we go in with a QB with less than a year of starting experience in Trent Edwards. He will need a big offseason to move this team forward. And questions on his arm strength remain. Next year will be a big year for the Colorado Bills Backers. The every 6 year rotation bring the Bills to Denver next year and last time we had about 500 people attend the tailgate. We will try and do that again. The team also plays both the AFC and NFC west which gives good opportunities for road trips too! Have a great off season everyone!

My mom said I'd always loved the Syracuse Orangemen ever since I was a toddler. She would put me in my playpen in front of the TV and I would jump up and down watching them play basketball. Syracuse was high on my college choices, but I just couldn't justify the extra costs vs the quality of the program I was looking for. But I have always been a fan of their team. From Louie and Bouie show, to the Kermit Sharp dagger that cost them a national championship to the run with Melo, the Orange have always been my favorite college team. Now they start again with a very young team. But they won both games this week and are on their way to the Big Apple next week for the NIT. Go Orange!

This has been a good week for those into the sweet science of boxing. First was a week ago. Calzaghe defeated Kessler to take all of the major belts in the Super Middleweight division. Calzaghe is the definition of a tough man. He is now 44-0 at age 35, this is his first major title. None of the americans would fight him, but once Kessler won the titles earlier this year, this fight was on. Now its up to the Americans to go over there to get the titles back. Speaking of Super Middleweights, on Tuesday was the finale of the Contender. In a grueling, non-stop action battle, Sakio Bika outlasted Jaidon Codrington, scoring a TKO at 2:18 of the eighth round to win. It was a brutal fight, but after the Calzaghe fight on Saturday, its obvious that these guys aren't in his league. But they were so evenly matched. Then last night Miguel Cotto defeated Sugar Shane Mosely. They went the distance, with Cotto winning on points. Cotto got off to a great start, and then broke his right hand about 1/2 through. Mosely came back, but it wasn't enough. This, being the 25th anniversary of the fight that really put boxing into its later stages of life, Ray BoomBoom Mancini killed Du Ku Kim. They were so evenly matched and neither guy gave. Mancini pounded him and Kim just kept coming until he literally gave his life in the ring.

I know they didn't go all the way, but it was a wild year down at Coors field this summer. There was a time where the Rockies were the talk of the town. The Blake Street Bombers sold out all of the their games. And prior to the opening of Coors field, they drew 75,000 a game to mile high stadium, a record that won't be broken. But the lows have been here for the last decade or so. I know its gone back and forth, where the team would give us hope, only to crush it. This season was no different. After the hope of spring training, this team played awful for April and the beginning of May. Then they go on a run, taking two of three from the Red Sox, sweeping the Yankees, only to lose 10 in a row. And this went on all season. I remember with about three weeks to go attending a day game against Pittsburgh. They got killed and lost two of three to Florida, at home. But they were only 4 1/2 games out, but with three teams ahead of them. I remember having a conversation that Sunday with a friend about how close they were. I said at the time, that if they win out, they would have a chance. And how prophetic I was. They lost one game, and ended up in a tie. The play in game was unbelievable a 5 hour marathon in which they won in the 13th. San Diego Takes the lead in the top of the inning and then their closer blows it at the bottom. That would be the last game I would attend this year. The ticket debacle that was the world series tickets just shows how unprofessional the Rockies management has been. Which makes the run that happened even more impressive. Even though they were swept by the Sox, it was a fun year. Looking forward to 2008

Last night's loss to the Knicks was bad enough, now getting blown out by the Celtics? With the guys on this team, they should at least be competitive with everyone. And what happened to the preaching of defense in the preseason, 60 points in the first half by the Knicks? They need to get their house in order by Friday or this west coast roadie is a complete loss