I was watching ESPN and saw the worst examples of defense, fighting and sportsmanship that had ever been taped for television.  For NBA fans to sit back and laugh or like this type of street action in an professional setting is reason that the NBA should start to find its identity again.  The NBA first of all is not the NHL.

     I have watched a few games of the NBA and certain announcers will call the NBA "the league".  The copyright and registered trademark that all the teams are known legally and by the public as is the National Basketball Association and the last I heard is that the NHL has the bragging rights to be called "the league"; legally, by the fan base and announcers.  This brings me to the NBA not knowing its own identity, the association is in crisis.  An identity crisis and professional.

     First, the professional crisis is not having set guidelines in the rules for fighting.  This is total unprofessional management  and leadership by the association.  To brawl the NBA way  is to do it anytime and anywhere.  The excuses for the brawl has been everything from the Nuggets running score up to self defense.  I have had fun with those excuses if the Knicks played defense the Nuggets would not need to defend themselves.  The NHL has rules by which the referees can manage fighting, call penalties, and eject or suspend players for instigation and whatever else.  This is one reason why the NHL is the league and not the association.  Its reputation past present was built on fighting not brawls.  It has been maintained professionally for over 70 years.  The association of basketball has built its repuation on professional players running and scoring like Julius Erving.  He did not brawl the NBA way he played and became an icon the NBA way, defying gravity, not defying the rules.  "Dr. J", is the reputation of professionalism in the NBA he made them "the association", the present leadership need to relocate the professionals that make basketball the association and not the league.

    Now, the idnentity crisis of the NBA brand has fans and sports journalists angling as to how cast the blame for the start of the brawl.  The obvious blame can be seen in the players not controlling emotion and the coaches encouraging playground behavior, the playground is not a professional venue.  Another way to play the "blame game" is to say that NBA marketting scheme is not working and is being mismanaged.  The NBA is not the league and never will be.  The association would have to rewrite history for that to happen but then they would have to leave out Magic Johnson, Dr. J, and Dominique Wilkins becuse these players were professionals in "the association".  That is why the NBA is in a drastic identity crises.  The brawl  looked worse than any hockey fight and professional association of players in recent time are being mismarketted as, "the league".  The NBA is an association not league.

                                Habs Chronicles  

                           THE Perfect Sports Team

                                               By-- Royale Jolt

   A perfect sports team would never lose, it would gain popularity and keep it by reaching out to the community and its players would never get in trouble.  The United States would understand why hockey is perfect, it is the action the adrenaline the seizmographic hits and electrifying passes, and the miracle goal that stole the show. 

    So what city has the perfect sports team it has to be Montreal, the Montreal Canadiens have all the history and the goal keepers that make the sports world take notice, it remains a team that has perfection in players like Maurice "Rocket" Richard, and Guy LaFleur, and Ken Dryden and George Vezina.  When the Canadiens will return to NHL prominence is not known but fans of the NHL know it spells perfection when that happens. 

    What about comparisons to the New York Yankees? Comparing the Montreal Canadiens to the Yankees is odious.  The Canadiens are in a different league to the Yankees and when the Canadiens lift the Stanley Cup it is the meaning of perfect moments, memories and sport; the Stanley Cup and the playoffs for it are the best time in sports, the Detroit Red Wings and Toronto Maple Leafs can tell you that, but the Canadiens can show why when they are in the contest for it.

    So hockey fans in the provinces of Canada and the United States of  America get ready for the National Hockey League in 2006-07.  Will perfection be the game in Montreal once again, stay tuned.

Sports is just a game, right?  It is entertainment for the masses?  These questions are simple and perplexing.  If sports are just a game why is it so unifying? If it is entertainment for the the masses then why do fans worship teams and players so ardently?  This post is intriguing for me to. I have to say pepole are hardwired to exaggerate and worship the capacity overstate the simple things like sports and work.  Answers and research are held up to standards that demand an absolute foundation of proof, so life has some absolute truth.  And the truth is sports in its non-categorized form and definition is a unifying competition between persons who seek a prize and or just the joy of being able to stand next to others who are here for the same purpose. 

Sports is our way of life and like it or not when people say it is just a game and entertainment are jaded to the other values of life-- without sport life is mingled and mixed with no aspiration and goals.  Life then is non virtuous and meaningless, sports is about hero and the athletes contribute to each culture that way.

First and foremost--this site is made up of friends and it starts off that way.  I have visited some blogs of creative writers and have not seen other writers represented in the favorites that you would read daily; like the sports section of a newspaper.  While some might have rules for picking favoritess that is fine, hey diversity is welcome here.  I have seen the first five bloggers who say the nicest thing to a new blogger get put up on the favorites and that is it.  I have seen favorites  that only have quality updated blogs, and there are others who have favorites based on the community of the favorite sport they watch the most. My favorites are both quality reads and writers that are in all of the sports categories.  Including soccer, the horses, and Formula 1 racing.

There are no specific guidelines to using this site, but I do know what people expect-- offer constructive criticism in a polite manner. And posting comments help writers here know who is reading the articles.

Writing is about constant improvement, never settling for mediocrity, but how can this be better and even grow my readership.  It is a game in that it is daily challenge to maintain consistent readable material.  It is not a game because it is a craft much like the painting of pictures and photographing of nature and people in original posture.  Writing is exactly like art and imagine the North American continent with citizens that are all illiterate.  That makes this site and books all the more valuable.  Have fun writing and reading.

When psychiatrists and psychologists analyze the ego, super ego and id what do they find when a person has one or two of these out of balance? A individual that is out of touch with community.  The person thinks that friends are made and has a false sense of being confident and looks for more assurance because of paranoia slipping and creeping in through the pores.  This defect in classical terms and literature has been dealt with by Homer in the Iliad with Achilles and Agamemnon; the Greek aliteration to this attitude is called , hubris.

The puffed up pride of Achilles tore apart the unified city states--polis-- of Greece.  Then the forces of King Priam led by Hector "waged war against the forces of the Achaeans". Now there is nothing wrong with confidence, but looking objectively at the field of community there is hubris run amuck.  So with that confidence is like a sword making process; it needs to be tempered.  If it is not then the person will have a false sense of confidence and a pen that is broken because no friends will be found; and petty arguements will ensue over said Briseis.

Enjoy the contest MrNFL, Moore, Shooterb, Rivjo, northsider, hiplains and Drmidnight.

Sports in primitive human communties are about hunting and feats of human endurance.  Like the pictographs on cave walls depiciting the males of the clan together hunting and dominating the prey.   

  How about the ancient societal rites of the Olympics? With so much religious symbolism and the honoring of human feats because of the gifts given to the favorites of the gods.  The Greek influenced cultures of the world have always liked sports and it heros. 

The Americas are thirsting for more sports.  And we watch the playoffs in basketaball, hockey, and the games in baseball leading up to the World Series. So how big a role does art play in sports?  A very big one. Without art there would be no images to make conjured events from the past in words colorful.  No picture of Lou Gehrig standing at the microphone bidding farewell to the fans and the sport would be tragic. 

Art is the forum of the knowledgeable.  The stats and the events are real.  With art sports transforms itself from being a game to live and memorable. Sports writing is art; interpreting the setting  and players in written word so that everything is alive to the reader.

How did prediction, forecasting and projecting where and what teams do become part of the ritual of watching playoff action in sports?  I make  bracketting of the 64 teams in March Madness.  I do that and it adds to the sum of the madness when you have to #### and throw away the trash your bracket has become; especially after George Mason marches to the final four.  Part of the allure of NHL predictions is to see the teams battle in OT and then you know why Stanley Cup hockey is some of the best sport on the earth.

The NBA playoffs is tough to predict as the seeds are more accurate than any other category in sports.  After careful scrutinizing over the stats of the superstars, the power teams, and coaches who motivate the players; it is easy to see why "Cinderella" is a term used only for college basketball.

Now for Major League Baseball and the World Series-- I would like to see the Cubs make it and win in my lifetime, and pre-season prediction about the Cubs will someday break the curse of the goat.  The Tigers are living up to expectations-- Chris Shelton is the next generation hitter in the mould of Dale Murphy; being able to put the ball in play and they both were catchers who made the transition to first base.

As for coffee grounds at the bottom of the mug, tea leaves, and the alignment of the pepperoni on frozen pizza; rinse out the mug, dump the tea leaves in the trash, and bake the pizza and eat it.  Do not know about you I am superstitious when it comes to sports teams in Detroit and the high school athletics I pay to watch. So I never put any stock in fortune telling.  I make my bracket every March and prepare for it starting with the first game of the season for the Spartans and Syracuse.  That is the all the predicting I do.

Take care sports lovers.  One thing I like to predict is what part of the lake  the record breaking bass will be but like my bracket for NCAA basketball I end up trashing my  speculation.  I love fishing.  And predicting the finish of sports teams is like fishing; you never know where the big one is; take the Edmonton Oilers for instance, they won fair and I would like to have caught them and pan fry them over an open flame.

The nine Greek muses were worshipped in the ancient world for inspiration and creative flow. I have researched this-- writers block was not something that was a natural phenomona in Greece, its colonies and the Roman Empire.  It was a spiritual sign to worship more and read more.  Sports and its athletes were written about by the ancients.

For history its annals and canons are full of sport and competition.  The muse for modern sports writers is much the same as it was for the ancient chroniclers.  Writing about the longer javelin toss and discuss throw would make interesiting news and it would have been talked about.  When reading about the first marathon for instance in elementary school books that was at first recorded by historians during the Peloponnesian War.  Now that would have been covered by ESPN, it is interesting to see the wave of the muses. What the muse is for modern sports wrtiers is-- the thrill of not only seeing this event take place, but he actual god given talent to be able to describe in writing on paper the record that fell and the player who did it.  This is the muse-- the great escape of sports that is afforded to the writer.

-Joe Louis Arena Fist/letsgoredwings. 05.04.2006

 This is Tigers Stadium where I watched Sparky Anderson not walk on the base line when changing pitchers because of a superstition of his.  When in 1984 I went to a Detroit Tigers game against the Oakland A's I saw Lance Parish hit a homerun.  I saw the Kirk Gibson hit homeruns over the roof on TV.  When this torn down a bit of sacredness will go with it.

 This is Washington National Cathedral where people gather and worship God.  Confess and repent.  Those are the most sacred times and this the most sacred of places.  Tigers Stadium and any other house of sports in regards to church is not sacred like that.  It is sacred because a dead grandpa and older father were alive, younger and eating food with you watching the team unfold into a World Series powerhouse.

  The most sacred diamond and Baseball Stadium in the major leagues.  If this was ever lost sports would be in need of a new sacred arena. A place to gather and drink beer, eat food, and fellowhip with other cheering fans. 

This is the place that is near and dear to the people of Detroit, Lansing and all points north.

This stadium is the treasure of real football fans and purists in this State.

The sculpted fist of Joe Louis in Detroit, in tribute of a sacred event in sports.

What defines culture,  is it people?  Wars and battles won that make it to epic poetry? IS it polytheism versus monotheism?  This post is not meant for letsgoredwings as I deem that by my strict standardsLGRW  to be a full devoted to sports blog 100 %.

I will define myth as a set heroic stories with true events at the bottom, the crust that keeps the apples from burning and running that would ruin the pie.  So myths are words in action.

Roman Myth- polytheistic and the people superstitious.  The Romans had sports; chariot races, staged naval battles in the Coloseum, and yes Gladiators.  The Roman Empire won battles and wars that made it to epic poetry.

Greek Myth- polytheistic and the people driven by philosphy, not very superstitious but respected the gods.  The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer are two epic poems that describe culture and are considred the first two modern novels ever written.  Not devoid of creation story and gods interacting man.  What do see in sports?  A unified nation at the Olympics.

English Myth-  monotheism including Arthuriana- The British culture has spawned  so much myth that it can be historically and anthropoloically advanced because of the war epic "Beowulf" and the myth of a Celt over lord Arthur.  Did the Brits adopt the Greek and Roman ideal? Some as all culture piggybacks on everyones myth.  England has modern war myth epics as well, The Lord of the Rings and the Chronicles of Narnia. Ok some readers might say 'hold it." However, these works are classified as fantasy they came in to being from the war experiences of JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis.  And as a result the religion of Christianity has worked itself to a war mentality.  Sports are football, rugby, and cricket.

In conclusion American myth is all of the above.  I am Christian and protestant who has not ruled out that non-denominations are the Biblical patterns of the unified church.  The Ciivl War myth of Stpehen Crane, Red Badge of Courage, is a book that I will use as example of how war can unify a disjointed country.  Monotheism is still alive in America and as a philosophical world view is concerned Religions, Politics, and sports bind the culture and cultures of a nation to one cord, truth.  The abscence of it will topple the dome of civilization upon us and we will all be the victims. 

This is my (LGRW) flow with the muse blog.  The island get away from the rigors of sports writing. I love it and am willing to do battle. I also like rest and relaxation. So this is the place I come to.  I am not using this blog to review my posts on LGRW I will stand at the ready to do so here.  This is my hammock near the pulse soft waves of white sand Tahiti.