570News - Gary Doyle

When I got home after work yesterday my wife was watching Oprah. I am not a fan, so I’ll say that off the top. The Diva of Everything was doing a weight loss segment, so I got sucked in. Then she made up a word and lost me completely. The men that lost weight on this particular plan were her heroes…or as she said HE-roes….therefore, the women were her SHE-roes. What? The word is heroes or for the phonetically trained here-ohs…not HE-roes. If you need a feminine version there is one already. It’s heroine. To millions of people, Oprah is a heroine..but she’s no SHE-ro..

I tire of everyone asking me about the trade rumours involving the Kitchener Rangers and the London Knights. The Rangers have 21 victories in 25 games this year. Goaltending is not a problem. Perhaps after last nights’ whooping of the Knights the Rumourmeister can find something else to do with his time.

The naysayers will tell you it wasn’t the best Grey Cup ever, by a prairie mile. I rather enjoyed it. Not only did the team I used to follow professionally win, it was ugly, trench warfare. Defence wins championships. The Green Riders, or Gang Green, as they used to be called were the better defenders. The prize, a Grey Cup parade in Regina that the whole province can watch. literarlly.

Welcome back Old Man. Winter is here. It’s November 22nd and the morning commute this morning was spent worrying about the cars around me that were covered in ice, except for the “eye hole” on the windshield. How old do you have to be before you realize winter driving requires patience and preparation? Never mind, it was rhetorical.

That is the question I’ve been asked too often in the past 24 hours. The RECORD decided to run a speculative piece on a potential (fictitious) trade involving the Kitchener Rangers and the London Knights. The problem is, they printed names. I’m not against investigative journalism, but when both sides say “No Comment” and “Nothing to it”, why involved individual players, their parents, agents, school friends classmates and fans? There is a popular website that Ranger fans use to create their own scenarios. Perhaps it’s best left there. One of the first things they teach you at journalism school is GET IT FIRST, BUT FIRST, GET IT RIGHT.

I must say thanks to all of you who contributed to my “team” at the JDRF Ride For The Cure on wednesday. I would have written sooner, but I’m in pain. Thanks to the combined efforts for the 55 teams riding stationary bikes at LA Fitness, we raised over 50-thousand dollars. Awesome. As proof that I’m getting smarter, I brought three Kitchener Rangers with me. Not only are they an attraction, they can pound the pedals. Steve Jensen, John Murray and Myles Barbieri made me look like I was sitting still. Brian FItzpatrick filled out the team and was as wheezed as I was.

Again, from the bottom of my pancreas….thank you..

The biggest trade of the OHL hockey season came down late yesterday and it means another Western Conference contender just got stronger. The Windsor Spitfires acquired Plymouth All Star goalie Michael Neuvirth in a multi-player, multi-pick deal that didn’t really cost as much I thought it would. It means Western Conference teams are stacked between the pipes.
Windsor…Neuvirth
Plymouth..Jeremy Smith
London…Steve Mason
Soo…Kyle Gajewski
Guelph..Thomas McCollum
Kitchener..John Murray/Josh Uice/Mavric Parks…

With that line up, it may come down to which team gets the best available sniper.

stay tuned..

Growing up just west of the Thousand Islands makes me miss the area now that I haven’t lived there for 30 plus years. A great place to fish. Summer or winter. When we went ice fishing we never drilled a hole as big as the one left in the ice at the Kingston Memorial Centre. Hours before the Rangers were to make their final appearance in the dilapitated old barn a worker ruptured a brine pipe and voila, instant indoor lake. It cost the Fronts the home date, the Rangers another bus trip to Kingston in December and the City of Kingston a black eye. The rink situation should have been addressed at least a decade ago. The new rink won’t be ready on time, but after walking by the construction site on saturday morning, it should be a first class facility, equpped with all the amenities. Hopefully that means shorter drill bits.

That’s the unofficial total. The Kitchener Rangers haven’t said yet exactly how much money they raised during the annual Remembrance Day One-Of-A-Kind Sweater Auction. The sweaters themselves were amazing this year. In fact, some of the players asked if a second set could be made up so they could have them as souvenirs. (nice try) The Kitchener Rangers were the first OHL team to bring in the Teddy Bear toss for Christmas and now all teams celebrate Christmas in that way. I’m waiting for other teams to pick up on the sweater idea.

What a disappointment. We had only 15 trick-or-treaters ring the doorbell last night. That’s a personal low. We could have turned out the lights at 7:15 and gone to bed. Instead, I waited up for stragglers that never showed. Bummer. I now have 45 little bags of nachos in a bowl in the hall. On the brightside, our boss came around to everyone on staff yesterday, said “Happy Hallowe’en” and handed over peanut butter cups. (my new favorite). Intent on not indulging, I gave mine to my producer, who had already finished off hers. Hence the title.