The Montreal Expos were very important to me. Baseball was of course a summer sport and my buds and I definitely played some ball in between swimming in Lower Grant lake and goofing off at Chester Race Week. Our coach was a man by the name of Paul Gale, now 'Pops' i believe, and he taught us the best way he knew how. We were like the Bad News Bears at times but what fun we had. Pops would later play basketball with us in various pick up leagues and still to this day remains a figure we look up to. Montreal was our team.
The Expos, with their baby blues, Youppie and a catcher named 'The Kid' would tantalize us all summer with grace and power. I can still picture them all in my head, Tim Raines, Cromartie, Andre Dawson, Gary Carter, Tim Wallach, Francona, Parrish, Scott and the infamous Steve Rogers who in the end gave us what we all know as 'Blue Monday', a starter coming out of the bullpen (instead of Jeff Reardon, who maybe should have) in that fateful 5th game of the NLCS to serve up a crushing homer to Rick Monday and the Dodgers. I'll never forget my friend Garnet and I watching the game together and losing our minds when it happened. I think we beat up my brother actually. We cried as well. That's how big of fans we were. They, like the Ottawa Rough Riders, left and took a piece of our hearts, leaving another league I really don't feel like watching anymore. The memories will always stick though. Even the announcers were the greatest! Dave Van Horne and The Duke! Gary Carter had the 'check swing' homerun (my brother still laughs when i say that), The Hawk patrolling centre field and Tim Raines stealing bases with ease. It was magical.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and the LA Lakers....A book was given to me about a guy named Lew Alcindor. I knew him to be Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as I followed the Lakers and had heard about his UCLA days with John Wooden. What I didn't know was how interesting a man Kareem really was. A good portion of the book was devoted to the relationship he formed with Bruce Lee during his early years in the NBA. He was actually a student of Lee's, who taught him martial as well as meditation. Kareem used this new found learning to help him in his sport and as many of you know, Kareem went on to be the most prolific scorer in the NBA, amassing over 40 000 pts with his patented Sky-Hook that to this day has never been used or perfected by any other player. All of those Laker-Celtic battles that happened so frequently in the 80's were watched by my buddies and I and then we'd go out, no matter the weather, and battle it out on the court ourselves. If you weren't a Lakers fan, you didn't like Kareem and you absolutely despised his hook shot and laziness. I loved it!
It's not hard to tell from these last two sports posts what really motivates me. I have a passion for all of these teams and players and whether they were forced upon me or just draped on my upper torso, I have never given up on them and that includes the ones that have disappeared. If you see me on the couch watching Green Bay or the Canadiens in the play-offs, well you better be prepared to see me on the floor in agony or jumping with a fist in the air. Nothing in this world makes me as nervous as watching them. I believe the only time that this will change is when I decide to try coaching a team by myself. Those poor kids won't know what hit them!...The 'Drive' comes from the 'Passion'......
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Coming Soon!
Just to let everyone know that there will soon be a few contributors to my blog. They will be helping with a daily sports section and a Nova Scotia rant portion....Once started, I will be giving some background on them and letting the words flow....coming soon...
Where did I get my competitive drive?
I am a sports fanatic, well, fanatical about certain teams especially and still like to play any chance I get. Those who know me see a completely different Jesse when I get on the court or field, an intense individual who wants to win. Where did I get that drive? It's a question I ask myself many times. What moments in time shaped who I seem and want to be while competing? I can't say for sure what it was, but I do have memories of a certain few key moments that played a part for sure.
#1-Tony Gabriel....One of those earliest 'sport' memories was walking with my Dad when I was only 5 or 6 yrs old. We were walking down a street in Ottawa (where i was born), my Dad holding my hand, when a very large man walked by in this blue suit. He was a giant to me and it looked like Dad thought this man was something special as well as he nodded hello to him. After he had passed us, Dad crouched down and said, "You know who that was? That was Tony Gabriel! #77 for the Ottawa Rough Riders. The best receiver in the world!". I of course found it strange that he was in a suit because as a kid you just think that sports heroes are always in their uniforms, but on this day he was a business man. We would later go to many games at Lansdowne Park, watching Tony Gabriel and his magic hands leading Ottawa to victory. I became a huge fan of the Rough Riders (and not the Western Riders either) and I believe it was that passing by of Gabriel that did it. When they left Ottawa the first time, I gave up watching the CFL. Haven't watched it since. A real sports fan understands this. A Cleveland Brown fan feels my pain.
#2-Montreal Canadiens...Growing up most of my life in Nova Scotia meant you were either a Boston Fan or Canadien man (Leaf fans were in Cape Breton and NFLD). I picked the Bruins early on before I really knew what hockey was, taking a liking to their logo and their jersey colours. That quickly ended one Saturday night as I tuned in to Hockey Night in Canada and heard Danny Gallivan and Dick Irvin Jr (biased SOB) call the game. Gallivan and his 'cannonading shot!', with old Irvin talking about his Dad all night and this great Montreal Canadiens team who were flying all over the ice! How could I possibly like the Bruins?! Guy Lafleur, Larry Robinson and Bob Gainey sold me that night on what was a dynasty and still the last Canadian team to win a Stanley Cup. Yes, a sad truth, it was 1993 when our country last hoisted the most famous trophy in all of sports.
#3-Green Bay Packers...No televised sport has captivated me as much as the Green Bay Packers and the NFL has. In all other sports I will only watch my team play, but sit me down on any Sunday during the NFL season and I'd watch the Buccaneers take on my buddy Buff Benoit's 49'ers, i don't care! I love NFL football that much. Green Bay has always been my team though and everyone that knows me can attest to that. Brett Favre's pic is on my wall, waving good-bye from his last game as a Packer (he'll be the source of his own post here very shortly) and I bet I own 35 Packer hats and tons of other gear. I got to see them play at Lambeau in 2003, the year they rebuilt the stadium and on opening week-end had a huge party. It was amazing to just walk on the field. This year of course I get to enjoy immensely as Super Bowl XLV was won by them and a new great QB in the making has emerged. What made me a GB fan all these years? Once again it was a simple moment in time, a jersey i received when I was 8 or 9, a Bart Starr #15. After that I started to read up on the famed dynasty, Lombardi and the tradition and I was sold once again............Next up, "The Expos, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and a thing called Passion"
#1-Tony Gabriel....One of those earliest 'sport' memories was walking with my Dad when I was only 5 or 6 yrs old. We were walking down a street in Ottawa (where i was born), my Dad holding my hand, when a very large man walked by in this blue suit. He was a giant to me and it looked like Dad thought this man was something special as well as he nodded hello to him. After he had passed us, Dad crouched down and said, "You know who that was? That was Tony Gabriel! #77 for the Ottawa Rough Riders. The best receiver in the world!". I of course found it strange that he was in a suit because as a kid you just think that sports heroes are always in their uniforms, but on this day he was a business man. We would later go to many games at Lansdowne Park, watching Tony Gabriel and his magic hands leading Ottawa to victory. I became a huge fan of the Rough Riders (and not the Western Riders either) and I believe it was that passing by of Gabriel that did it. When they left Ottawa the first time, I gave up watching the CFL. Haven't watched it since. A real sports fan understands this. A Cleveland Brown fan feels my pain.
#2-Montreal Canadiens...Growing up most of my life in Nova Scotia meant you were either a Boston Fan or Canadien man (Leaf fans were in Cape Breton and NFLD). I picked the Bruins early on before I really knew what hockey was, taking a liking to their logo and their jersey colours. That quickly ended one Saturday night as I tuned in to Hockey Night in Canada and heard Danny Gallivan and Dick Irvin Jr (biased SOB) call the game. Gallivan and his 'cannonading shot!', with old Irvin talking about his Dad all night and this great Montreal Canadiens team who were flying all over the ice! How could I possibly like the Bruins?! Guy Lafleur, Larry Robinson and Bob Gainey sold me that night on what was a dynasty and still the last Canadian team to win a Stanley Cup. Yes, a sad truth, it was 1993 when our country last hoisted the most famous trophy in all of sports.
#3-Green Bay Packers...No televised sport has captivated me as much as the Green Bay Packers and the NFL has. In all other sports I will only watch my team play, but sit me down on any Sunday during the NFL season and I'd watch the Buccaneers take on my buddy Buff Benoit's 49'ers, i don't care! I love NFL football that much. Green Bay has always been my team though and everyone that knows me can attest to that. Brett Favre's pic is on my wall, waving good-bye from his last game as a Packer (he'll be the source of his own post here very shortly) and I bet I own 35 Packer hats and tons of other gear. I got to see them play at Lambeau in 2003, the year they rebuilt the stadium and on opening week-end had a huge party. It was amazing to just walk on the field. This year of course I get to enjoy immensely as Super Bowl XLV was won by them and a new great QB in the making has emerged. What made me a GB fan all these years? Once again it was a simple moment in time, a jersey i received when I was 8 or 9, a Bart Starr #15. After that I started to read up on the famed dynasty, Lombardi and the tradition and I was sold once again............Next up, "The Expos, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and a thing called Passion"
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