Def Leppard?

The NHL season is now in full swing. We're pumped here at Waikiki Hockey and other than the Leafs pulling off the miracle upset it was a great first day of the (North American) season. Alex Burrows and Jonathon Cheechoo are on pace for 164 goals and the rebound that everybody is expecting from Kiprusoff will have to wait for at least one more game.

One thing that we thought was truely bizarre was the NHL signing up Def Leppard to play for the crowd before the Leafs-Wings tilt. Isn't the NHL supposed to be young and hip? Or at least convince people they are young and hip. Even Ron McLean was puzzled by the move when discussing the band with Grapes on the Coaches Corner.

Just came back from a visit at Fantasy Hockey Scouts and they had an even better clip of Def Leppard ... so we'll pinch it. Here we see exactly why Def Leppard is a terrible choice to open up the NHL season.

Athletes in Jail...

When you're busy or stressed out at work the best thing to do is to past the buck onto somebody else. The Waikiki Hockey equivalent is forwarding you on to a few good articles for your reading pleasure.

With OJ Simpson's (most) recent legal trouble and Michael Vick getting convicted last year it's looking like athletes are losing their get out of jail free privledges and are actually serving time.

Here's a list of seven players who ended up on the wrong side of the law ... the NHL even had TWO players on the list. Who said the league isn't mainstream?

Of course that list missed a few famous contributors ... we really can't have a list about athletes in jail without talking about Bob Probert can we? SI.com has a slideshow that covers off most of the players that were missed.

Red Sox Suck?

Did you hear what John Lackey said after the Angels were eliminated by the Red Sox for the second straight year?

"It's way different than last year, we are way better than they are. We lost to a team not as good as us. [On Sunday] they scored on a pop fly they called a hit, which is a joke," said Lackey, referring to a popup that was misplayed into three runs. "[On Monday], they score on a broken-bat ground ball and a fly ball anywhere else in America [except in Fenway Park]. And [Pedroia's] fist-pumping on second like he did something great."

Somebody is a sore loser. Well, at least we're not the only ones with a nice amount of Red Sox hatred going. The Score.com went as far to say the Red Sox are replacing the Yankees as the the new team to hate. We're not sure we would go that far ... but there's plenty of hatred to go around.

The Score.com lists a couple of reasons why the Red Sox are so easy to loath but doesn't really back it up with the best evidence. That's where we come in...

1) The Fans
Finding a video showing the typical Sox fan is as hard as finding a drunken Irishman...wait, we think we just repeated ourselves. These two clowns from 2007 were the most entertaining we could find. "If Jon Lester can beat cancer he can beat some (beep'in) Indians!" Nice.

2) Yankees' Suck Chants
In Little League, kids are taught to cheer on their team instead of trash talking the opponents. At Red Sox games chants of "Yankees Suck!" are to be somehow encouraged. We don't mind a bit of trash talking as long as it's clever ... this is a looooong way from clever.

3) Jonathan Papelbon
When Papelbon was a rookie his antics were mildly amusing. He's no longer a rookie. His infamous riverdance ruined a perfectly good Dropkick Murphy's song, he can't speak Spanish, and he does a terrible Milli Vanilli impersonation. Added to the fact he's a bit of a jerk (as the video in the Score.com article shows) and you've got a nice focus for your hatred.

4) Celebrity Red Sox Fans
Watching Game Two against the Angels we saw TBS show Timothy Hutton wearing a Red Sox hat at the game. Do they think we care that Timothy Hutton is a Red Sox fan? Who is Timothy Hutton, anyway? Once celebrities start jumping on your band wagon you know you are close to being the most hated team in America. Luckily for Red Sox fans (like Dane Cook) the Yankees will always have this guy.

5) Fever Pitch
We never like it when Hollywood takes a good book and turns it into a crappy movie. We really don't like it when they take a good book and turn it into 'Fever Pitch' starring Jimmy Fallon. This movie sucked balls and must have made Red Sox haters out of half of America.

We can come up with as many reasons as we want to explain our hatred of the Sox, but it really comes down to one thing .... they win too much and we're jealous. Go Rays Go...did we just say that?

HoffSpace Revisited...

Since it's a boring Tuesday with three hockey-free (except for a couple of pre-season tilts) days ahead of us we thought we would look back in on one of our favourite videos ... the man, the myth, the legend that is David Hasselhoff going to a U of A football game with his daughter and her two young friends which we featured as our 'Clip O' The Week' about a month ago.

There we so many things wonderfully bizarre and creepy about that video that we had to pay Hoffspace (yeah that's the name of the Hoff's website) another visit to see if they posted any more goodies from the game:

We're so glad our father isn't David Hasselhoff. Even though we find it insane he's going to the game with his daughter and her friends we'll admit it's an improvement over the other infamous video featuring both The Hoff and his daughter.

No video from inside the stadium but we did manage to dig up a few photos:

"Watch me creep out a dozen girls at
the same time....woo hoo!"

"No better spot for a recovering alcoholic
than a College Football game...gooooo Wildcats!"

Keep up the good work Hoff!

YouTube's Best Sport Videos of the Week - Sept 22nd to Oct 5th

With our technical difficulties last week this will be a double shot of the best (and worst) sports videos that were posted to the net the past two weeks:

- Amare Stoudemire is doing his 'dancey-dance' on a show for toddlers (we assume).

- When the Cubs clinched a playoff spot it looks like their curse might finally be lifted. Three playoff games later and the curse is still going strong.

- A couple of Los Angeles Kings made guest appearances on 'The Price is Right', as reported by Waikiki Hockey earlier this week.

- Vancouver made a lot of noise when they named their goalie, Roberto Luongo, captain this week. Here's a good article on goalie captains in NHL history and why a rule was created to make sure they couldn't wear the 'C'.

- Three drunken female Cleveland Brown fans kiss each other for a free $5 t-shirt ... Stay classy, Cleveland!

- SportsCenter has made some good ads. Their newest, featuring author Stephen King, is another classic.

- Another CFL TD celebration clip. With the NFL outlawing this kind of behaviour the CFL is trying to fill the void. We're not sure a quick game of duck, duck, goose does the trick though.

- FIFA unveiled their new mascot for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. We're normally pretty horrified by sporting event mascots (for example) but this cheap looking lion is in a class all by himself.

The NHL season started last weekend in Europe. Now that we've had a taste, we have to make it through 5 more non-hockey days. Our Clip o' the Week may have been selected because we have hockey on the brain but it's still a dandy of a save from Carey Price. As Pierre McGuire says it's the save of the year and the year hasn't started yet. Bring on the 2008-09 season!

< Last Week <> Next Week >

Grand Final Day...

Today is the Grand Final in Rugby League. This year the Melbourne Storm will attempt to defend their title against the Manly Sea Eagle. If you're Australian you already knew that and if you're not you probably don't care.

If you want to see who wins go and check Fox Sports but if you want to see a bizarre rugby play continue reading.

In 2004, Wests Tigers winger John Hopoate was suspended for 12 weeks after being found guilty by the NRL Judiciary of poking his fingers up the anuses of three North Queensland players:

This is normally where we try to say something clever but we got nothing. Hopoate said that he was trying to give the players wedgies but he's clearly lost his mind.

This definitely fits the bill as one of the most bizarre moments in any sport. Some of the quotes from the incident are just as crazy:

"There was pressure there. I know he wasn't doing it accidentally. He was definitely pushing." -- Paul Bowman, North Queensland player

"I think I know the difference between a wedgie and someone sticking their finger up my bum," -- Peter Jones, North Queensland player

"It is reasonably common to be touched in the region of the testicles [during a game]" -- West Tigers Coach, Terry Lamb

"Between his arse and his nuts" -- John Hopoate after he was asked where he was directing his finger

You can always count on Waikiki Hockey to continue to lower the bar.