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I think VH1 is purposely rigging this to avoid having the happy family ending. People getting along doesn't make for good TV. The first season had everyone hating on Corey Feldman, which was good. The second season had everyone getting along, which was not as good. Now it seems that they're hoping for this show to end with everyone having some level of tension.

Czech, great link ... thanks for posting that. It's been added to the favorites, and sent out to my hockey friends. Good link.

Congratulations to all of the Canadians, and Canadian fans, on this board. I have to admit that I was rooting for the Finns, but that's mainly because I predicted them to win before the game. Having said that, though, I'm stoked that Joe Thornton got to be on the winning team. Two assists last night, six points in the six games ... not bad for the 'checking line' center. Seeing the B's captain celebrate was a pretty good consolation for seeing the US lose, and then the Finns lose after that.

re: the Avalanche being a sucess in Denver ... no offense to anyone that's a Colorado native on this board (are there any?!?) but the Denver sports fan is the most sickening bandwagon jumper in the US. When I lived there, it was the beginning of the "Nuggets suck" era, and the team was buried on page 12 of the sports. When the Celtics are horrible, it's still front page news here in Boston; it's negative but it's still noticed. I'll fully believe in Colorado's support of the Avs when they have a decline and aren't a western powerhouse anymore. My guess is that the arena won't be anywhere near 100% capacity. re: the Stars leaving Minnesota for Dallas ... absolute bullshit, and it's not made any better that a new team moved in. Along with Michigan, and maybe New England, Minnesota is one of the ultimate hockey areas in America. To take a team from there, and transplant it to Cowboy Country (the football team, not the hat-wearing rednecks) is absolute bullshit. re: the Whalers leaving Hartford ... again, bullshit, but less so than the North Stars being moved. I think Bettman saw a relatively overcrowded Northeast and chose a team that had the least amount of support & the worst arena (at the time) and moved them. Hey, Gary, there's a reason why there were so many teams in the NE: we like & follow hockey here. If Hartford had built a new arena (which they probably would have) and then had the players peak at the right time (Irbe, et al that led them to their Cup appearance) then the Hartford Whalers would have had better attendance than the Hurricanes. Of that I have no doubt. BTW, Happy Lockout Day Everyone. Only 12.5 hours to go, and then the lockout will begin.

Laz, I do think blood can be used to add to the importance of a match ... I really won't deny that. But I do think that it's been way overused lately (mid-90s onward) and it's lost it's luster. Like you said earlier, it should be used to signify the end of a hatred filled blood-feud. Not to make a relatively meaningless match SEEM important or hatred filled. (Buzz Sawyer-Tommy Rich needed bloodshed. Magnum TA-Tully Blanchard needed bloodshed. Undertaker-Lesnar did not. HHH-Jericho did not.) And you said that blood makes a match seem more intense. I disagree, to me it just makes a match seem more bloody. I think the wrestlers should be able to convey intensity without squirting blood like a stuck pig. There have been plenty of matches that seemed brutal and intense without guys bleeding away, just like there have been plenty of bloody matches that don't really seem intense. The fact that a guy getting hit with a steel chair isn't seen as being brutal, and needs blood-shed, shows that they've WAY overused the chairshot now. It used to be a killshot, and would end a match. It's now just an excuse to juice.

The hit on Manning was my highlight from week one. And count me as someone that would have put the Giants last ... the Cards didn't look that bad against the Rams, and if the Giants and Cards played this week, I'd probably put my money on Arizona.

nJ, I would: Do Griffin for Ward, but not for Moss. Griffin will get a ton of yards for the Broncos, and get a fair amount of TDs. Not bother with Jordan, I agree with what TMiB said about CMart. If Martin gets hurt, though, pounch on Jordan ASAP. Take Clark over any other TE that you've mentioned, including Graham. Graham drops a ton of balls, so unless his hands of stone have improved this year (one game isn't enough for me to jump on his bandwagon) then I'd let him stay an FA. I think Fauria or Watson will get more TDs for NE than Graham.

Czech, you're probably right that the salary explosion and the relocation of the WHA teams happened at around the same time. I know in '91-'92 there were only something like 15 people making more than $1,000,000 but two years later there were like 30 making twice that amount. So, the salary explosion probably even happened first. But I don't think the Whalers, Nordiques or Jets moved because of the average salaries, really, they moved because Bettman wanted teams in "larger markets" like Carolina, Colorado and Phoenix. Even if salaries hadn't increased, my presumption is that Bettman would have found some bullshit reason to relocate those teams.

Columbus is still riding the "weee, we have a new team" buzz. If they are still a 'middle-of-the-pack, eliminated in the first round of the playoffs' team in 5 years or so, then I think they'll have issues. I just as easily could have put Carolina in that spot, or Anaheim, or Atlanta. No disrepect meant to the true Blue Jacket fans, either one of them. (and out of the newest teams, I think Nashville & Minnesota bring the support more than Columbus or Atlanta.) And, Czech, didn't the Jets & Nords move before the salary explosion? I thought that they moved due to old arenas and small markets more than for actual salary reasons. I might be wrong, though.

Bitter that America lost out? Not really ... the Americans had no business beating a superior Russian team, and I went into the Finland game thinking that the better team would win, and wasn't entirely sure that the US would be the better team that night. I just really think it'll come down to goaltending, and - right now - Kipper > Luongo. If Brodeur is 100% then it's the Canadians. But if it's Luongo or a less-than-100% Brodeur, then I think it's going to the Finns.

Truer words have never been spoken. And I agree about "Bring It On" being one of the best things about "Til Death ...". So many of the other 5th ward rappers that represent on that are money. I became a quasi-fan of Gangsta Nip because of that track. And there are a few other good tracks on that: G.E.T.O., Straight Gangstaism, Raise Up.

Lushus, in answer to your question I do think that the GB still have a place in today's rap world ... wasn't Scarface just on some new albums by Nas and potentially someone else (and by 'just' and 'new' I mean in the last 3 or 4 years)? I think that he's known enough by current rap fans that he might still be considered relavent. Bushwick, Willie D, etc. would probably just be riding his coat-tails to relevence. And I agree ... Big Mike >> Willie D. (kkk, how can you say that he didn't fit in on "Till Death Do Us Part."?!? "Big Mike, how you livin'?" and his lines that follow are the lines that I most often quote from that album.

Laz, I agree with you that the blowoff to a feud is a big deal, but why does a guy have to gig until he's a bloody mess to prove how much hatred there is? Couldn't someone have the shit kicked out of him to the point of utter exhaustion and be completely brutalized without involving massive blood loss? Two different times you said it "made sense" that the guy was a bloody mess ... are wrestling fans so aesthetically based that a guy has to be pouring blood to signify that he had the tar beaten out of him? I've been involved in shitkickings in real life (both on the good side, and unfortunately, the wrong side) where the shitkickee didn't get completely enveloped in blood, and didn't feel it didn't look real as a result. And, I will have to admit that on one hand is probably an exaggeration ... but it would still be no more than 10-15 times. HHH-Jericho having bloodshed was not necessary, if blood is needed to make the match seem more important than it's not a very important match, IMHO. Rich-Sawyer, TA-Blanchard, Austin-Hart ... those matches made sense to be bloodbaths. Something like Lesnar-Taker did not.

I'm pretty stoked, this movie looks good and I love Potente ... Boston is the kind of city that'll get this movie relatively quickly, at least compared to the rest of the US, so I'll definitely keep my eye open for it.

Oly Slam, your argument makes sense, and I agree with a lot of what you said ... until you said to use the NFL & MLB to fill the void. Football works for Sundays, and for most Monday nights, but Tuesday - Saturday will still be empty. I'll watch some college football, but hockey > college football. And MLB? With no level of exaggeration, I'd rather watch ts/tv porn than all 9 innings of a baseball game. (ok, that's a slight exaggeration ... but just a slight one). Rrrsh, there aren't 4 cities in Canada capable of supporting a pro team right now ... even if Winnipeg & Quebec City are given a second chance, what other two cities will get a franchise? (sorry if that sounds like an arrogant American ... if it helps any, I think that there are too many US teams that are located in cities that can't support a pro team, let alone a pro hockey team ... Columbus, I'm looking at you.)

4-2 Finns, Koivu gets the game winner late in the third, and then some defensive-minded forward hits an empty netter (maybe Eloranta).

If you take away Brody's charisma ... and ability to get the fans to cheer and/or boo him (depending on which territory he was in) ... and original look ... and the fact that he was actually a pretty frightening guy, they might be right. Nah, even without all that, Brody > Tomko.

Yes, Max, I'd probably abandon the B's if they traded Thornton (should this say WHEN they trade Thornton?!?) but I doubt if it'd be a life-long change. I'd definitely be wicked angry, and would most likely root for the team that Joe got traded to (with some obvious exceptions: MTL, NJ, Philly, Colorado, NYR). When it's playoff time I'll choose to root for a team in each series but it's only for that series. For example if Philly was playing Toronto (hypothetically) I'd root for TO, even though I really don't like them at all ... they're just the lesser of two evils in that series. If, TO were to win, but then play Ottawa next, I'd root for the Sens for the same reason. But at no point would my allegiances really change: my heart would still be with the B's, even though they'd already be playing golf after losing in the first round ... again.

I've never understood switching allegiances once you've reach adulthood, unless the team that you've been rooting for does something specific to make you hate them (e.g. trade away a superstar or sign a player that you despise.). I'm a Boston fan, through and through, and regardless of how bad my teams become I'll still be a Boston fan (if I can live through the Pete Carroll era, I can live through anything). It would take the Bruins trading Thornton, or signing Brashear, for me to root against them. The Pats can do no wrong just yet, they have the '5 year grace period' until 2008. The Sox & Celts are pretty much my favorite teams only because they're local, I'm not enough of an MLB or NBA fan to really care.

Dead Kennedys: Add "Holiday in Cambodia" to the ones referenced earlier. Sex Pistols: "New York" or "Revolution in the Classroom" are both pretty poppy and 'mainstream-friendly'. Black Flag: "TV Party", while not anywhere near their best work, is the most 'mainstream-friendly' and thus would go over better than a lot of their better songs. Descendents: "Der Wienershnitzel" was in the Pump Up the Volume (the Christian Slater is a DJ movie) so that might be recognizable. The Clash: You might want to go for their barely-punk-but-well-known songs like "Should I Stay or Should I Go" or "Rock the Casbah".

I'm kind of confused ... are you looking for us to recommend songs only by the bands that you listed? Or songs by bands that are comparable to the ones that you listed? Let me know what you're looking for, and I'm sure a bunch of us could help you out.

Max, I don't think I can take your sig ... my only PC access is at work, and they get all sketched out when we d/l stuff onto our work PCs. Will you watch NHL hockey after the lockout is over? Yes, I'll most likely still watch as much NHL hockey as I did before the lockout. I've been too big of a fan for too long to just shut it out altogether. Having said all that, though, if they really do miss this entire year, as a lot of experts are predicting, it'll be really easy for me to have the void filled by other levels of hockey (NCAA, AHL, etc) and thus I might end up watching less NHL than I do now. Will you support an NHL the same way after the lockout is over? Yes & No. The 'yes' is because I've supported the NHL less-and-less these last few seasons anyways, but it was more a small protest against Jacobs & his fiscal demands than against the league as a whole. Now it'll just expand to not traveling to as many away games (e.g. MTL, TOR, NJ). The 'no' is because I'll probably still end up buying the hockey package on cable when there finally is a season. I like watching hockey too much to limit myself to just the Bruins games and the minimal ESPN coverage.

Whoa, whoa, whoa ... you're local feed cut the game off before it ended??? In Mass. we got the entire game, OT included, but then it switched to the football game already in progress. I was at a sports bar, and presumed that they were showing the standard espn2 feed, but maybe they used a satellite or some equivalent to show the entire game. We got the full intermission report while they zamboni'd the ice, and then the full OT of hockey before it switched away. I take back what I said, you have every right to be bullshit.

WMD, I actually kind of agree with you that using blood capsules makes sense, but if they want/need the match to be a bloodbath using capsules wouldn't work. If they want a guy to have a full-on 'crimson mask' it's easy to do things to thin the blood (aspirin, caffeine, etc) so that they cut themselves once but bleed for a while. If they used a capsule, they'd need to repeatedly go back for more, and thus it would be more obvious. Of course, having said all that, I can probably count on one hand the number of times blood was necessary in a match. Doing it for the sake of doing it is stupid.

I wasn't too mad about it, Max. They showed the game in it's entirety, and then switched to what they would have been showing had the game not gone to OT. I'd have liked some post-game wrap up, but the bar that I was watching the game at had people there to see the game that wasn't being shown because of the OT, and they'd have been doubly pissed if it there was 10-15 minutes of Melrose talking instead of their game. I really thought that the Czechs were going to win when it went to OT. I just thought that the momentum would be all CR and the Canadians wouldn't be able to overcome it. I was wrong. Now, I think the Canadians are too fired up, and the Finns are DOA. I couldn't agree more.