Paper Lion still delivers
George Plimpton’s Paper Lion immediately discounts the notion anyone can step into professional sports and perform. The book also does little to reduce romance in the idea. Professional sports can turn intelligent and capable men into fanatics and fools. And…
Contenders and pretenders for Lord Stanley’s Cup
Hockey can sometimes be forgotten this time of year with March Madness and the opening of Major League Baseball dominating headlines. Yet, as the hockey season grinds toward another finish, the playoff push is offering up some pretty compelling storylines…
Tooling around with tourney odds
I don’t have any visions of grandeur with respect to my bracket prospects this year. But that doesn’t make figuring out ways to get an edge in my pool any less interesting. If anything, taking an informed point of view…
Getting Essential and Taking Control
I have a confession to make. I’m easily distracted. I’m also capable. But man do I piss away time when I give myself the chance. And worse, its almost always on innocent stuff like reading the latest on analytics (digital…
Holy ShiftChart – an awesome hockey data visualization
I love discovering stuff like ShiftChart. Hockey, being a dynamic and constantly changing game, can be hard to follow – even for the most experienced and well-versed fan. Tools like ShiftChart make the game more accessible. A perfect rationale for a…
New Era. Same Garbage.
It’s going to take at least three years to undo the damage done by the two-year Pat Shurmur era. After building a bad team to play outdated football, the new Browns regime is left with a bad roster to play…
A Numbers Game Look at Aston Villa
Aston Villa may just be charting a new path to success in the English Premier League. Lost in the noise of the frustrating seasons under Gerard Houllier and Alex McLeish has been the way in which Villa have changed its…
Leadership requires us to embrace paradoxes
Most of us fall into the trap of having unhelpful standards. Whenever we try to prove something, we end up doing the opposite. Once we know something important is at stake, the cognitive load can be overbearing and we crumble…
Blue Jackets playing some outstanding hockey
On March 1 the Columbus Blue Jackets were languishing in last place in the Western Conference with 13 points from 20 games. From that date through April 16, the Blue Jackets have earned the most points in the Western Conference,…
Technology in Sports Raises Issues of Fairness
It seems like just yesterday sports resisted every attempt to introduce technology into their games. Traditionalists decry the removal of the human element. Modernists present technology as a matter of fairness – in that we could finally correct unjust wrong…