Thursday, October 05, 2006

Opening night, and I'm a little ticked off

Opening night is finally here, let's hope '06-'07 gets off to a better start than last year.

Before I get to the big story of course relating to the Pens, as I mentioned yesterday as being probable, the Pens did indeed call up Noah Welch today.

Now to the news.

As has been widely reported for about 24 hours now, the Penguins officially announced that Jim Balsillie, CEO of Research in Motion (or RIM, as the industry calls them) has signed a purchase agreement to buy the Pens.

Just as a personal note, I do regular business with RIM and know a lot of people employed by them, both in Canada and in the States. Let me just say this, if Mr. Balsillie runs the Pens like he runs RIM, we have nothing to worry about.

And that's running the Pens in Pittsburgh, for those of you who might want to slant the story north of the border.

And here's the part of the story that's really irritated me all day.

Let's see, ever since the story broke last night that Balsillie would be purchasing the Pens, the vast majority of the Canadian hockey media has continously slanted the story towards the possibility of the Pens moving to Hamilton, even after TSN, ESPN, the Penguins, and even Mr. Balsillie himself confirmed today that his intention is to keep the team in Pittsburgh.

Now, is there still that possibility of the Pens moving ?? Absolutely, after so many years of the Pittsburgh politicians dicking around with new arena plans, you can never be sure of that fact until the groundbreaking ceremony.

So how about some journalistic integrity, Canada ?? The man himself said he wants to keep the team in Pittsburgh, so how about we stop with the fan polls that are asking "should the Pens stay or should they go" ??

And let's be realistic here, take off your naivety blinders and acknowledge that Mario Lemieux would NEVER sell the Pittsburgh Penguins to someone whose PRIMARY intent was to move the team.

Much less announce it on opening night.

OK, off of the soapbox for now.

Let's go Pens, let's get physical in the Flyers face all night and come out of it with an opening night win.

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