A couple of social notes to start your weekend. . . . Detroit Tigers ace Justin Verlander is said to be dating actress Kate Upton. Ahh, so that‘s what happened to him in Game 1. . . . Actress Eva Longoria and New York Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez apparently have visited Splitsville. As Cam Hutchinson of the Saskatoon Express noted: “Apparently, he couldn’t complete a pass.” . . . Oh, and one more. Eric Lindros is getting married later this month, to Kina Lamarche, a Montrealer who has worked in Toronto for the last few years. Lindros has decided to say yes to Quebec after all. . . .
Headline at The Onion: David Stern Gets Down On One Knee, Places Title Ring Upon LeBron James’ Finger. . . . One more headline from The Onion: Ben Roethlisberger Admits Wearing Steelers Throwback Jersey Lowest Point In His Life. . . . If you saw the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday, you will agree with their quarterback. Those were bad. . . . Ray Ratto of the Comcast SportsNet Bay Area tweets: “NHL should just go years without playing, and then have a surprise season every noe and then.” . . . Rob Vanstone, in the Regina Leader-Post: “The Shellbrook Aardvarks, who play in the Saskatchewan High Schools Athletic Association’s six-man ranks, have the best nickname in football.” . . . Hard to argue with that. . . .
Gary Bettman, the commissioner of lockouts, has muzzled NHL owners so we aren’t able to ask Kamloops Blazers majority owner Tom Gaglardi how he’s enjoying his first full season as owner of the Dallas Stars. . . . Interestingly, Elliotte Friedman of Hockey Night in Canada has written that Gaglardi, who took over the foundering Stars during last season, may be one of the hardline owners. Friedman, who admitted that this was an “educated guess,” writes that it would be “a mistake to underestimate” the hardliners. “There are several who would rather cancel the season than accept a bad deal because they are hemorrhaging money and need immediate satisfaction,” he writes. Remember that it only takes eight owners to steer the NHL ship and Friedman thinks Anaheim, Columbus, Florida, the Islanders, Phoenix, St. Louis, Washington and Dallas may be hardliners, along with the likes of Boston and Philadelphia. . . . The Stars haven’t laid off any employees during the lockout and that’s a credit to Gaglardi. . . .
After New York Yankees GM Brian Cashman stated publicly that trading A-Rod may not be a realistic possibility, Janice Hough, aka The Left Coast Sports Babe, wrote: “Translation, we don’t think even the Los Angeles Dodgers are crazy enough to take him.? . . . Justin Bieber doing the halftime show at the Grey Cup game? Is he old enough to partake in the festivities during what is affectionately known as the Grand National Drunk? I‘m thinking they should let Gordon Lightfoot, who also will be on hand, show Biebs the ropes. . . .
Here’s RJ Currie, from SportsDeke.com: “Rumour has it Arnold Schwarzenegger’s estranged wife, Maria Schriver, is attending the L.A. Clippers Halloween home-opener dressed as Mozart. When Arnold heard about it, he said, ‘I’ll be Bach.’ ” . . . Poor Lance Armstrong. Even when he loses, he loses. He finished 868th in the 2006 New York City Marathon and organizers have said they are likely to erase that result considering Armstrong’s recent PED problems. . . . And now comes word that the good citizens of Adelaide, Australia, want him to return the key to their city. . . . Oh, the shame! . . .
Why didn’t the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars trade for quarterback Tim Tebow, who is a legend there because of his college success, wonders Johnny Van Zant of Lynyrd Skynyrd. As he told the Orlando Sentinel: “They would have filled the stadium with chicks alone.” . . . “Everybody’s talking parity in the NFL, but I look at it differently,” writes Steve Simmons of the Toronto Sun. “Can’t remember an NFL with so few great teams and so many weak ones.” . . . I’m thinking the same thing could be said of the WHL this season. . . . The Vancouver Giants ran up the white flag earlier this week, trading defenceman David Musil to the Edmonton Oil Kings, and they had played only 14 games. . . .
Ron Judd of the Seattle Times offers up “This Week’s Lord-of-the-Idiots Award: Donald Trump appears on David Letterman, shills for (Mitt) Romney, highlighting his tough talk on trade with China, then proceeds to pimp new Trump-brand neckties — pointed out by Letterman to be made in China.” . . . After NBA commissioner David Stern announced his impending retirement, Judd wrote: “Stern generously agreed to stay on for two more years, giving the league’s search committee ample time to turn over enough slimy rocks to make sure they’ve found the best available lying, extortionist replacement.” . . . You do realize that if you’re playing oldtimers’ or recreational hockey this season, you are getting paid just as much as is Sidney Crosby. . . .
A post-World Series note from Greg Cote of the Miami Herald: “I rechecked the preseason predictions of ESPN’s panel of 50 ‘baseball experts’ and here is how many of them predicted a Tigers-Giants World Series: Zero. Proving again that TV — neither watching it nor appearing on it — makes you smarter.” . . . When the Vancouver Whitecaps and the Galaxy met in Los Angeles in that MLS playoff game on Thursday, Darren Clark of Kamloops was the fourth official. . . . Doubt that he lunched with Posh Spice, though. . . .
Mike Leach, the head football coach at Washington State University, has laid a Twitter ban on all his players. To which Chip Kelly, the head coach at Oregon, responded: “If you can’t trust your players on Twitter, you probably can’t trust them on third down.” . . . You may have noticed earlier this week that the TRU WolfPack women’s basketball team announced the signing of Ryan Kennedy of Okotoks, Alta., for next season. She is the daughter of former NHLer Sheldon Kennedy and you can bet that Ryan will be looking for a place to work with horses when she arrives here.
(Gregg Drinnan is sports editor of The Daily News. He is at gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca, gdrinnan.blogspot.com and twitter.com/gdrinnan. Keeping Score appears Saturdays, except when it doesn’t.)
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