Let me explain. I was watching (American) football on Sunday and there was one play during the Eagles and Falcons game that really illustrates this point. There was a fumble just behind the line of scrimmage and the Falcon player (defense) picks up the ball and proceeds to run down the field. It looked like he was long gone and well on his way to a touchdown.

Then, out of the corner of the screen, you see an Eagles player bolting into the frame, running so fast that it looked like the Falcon player was standing still. He catches up and tackles him. The Falcons went on to score a touchdown on the ensuing drive anyhow, but I have to tip my hat to that Eagles player. When everyone else seemed to think that catching up was a lost cause, he pushed harder. He believed that impossible is nothing and kept playing until the referees blew the whistle.

Chasing the Lost Cause

I feel that this approach to professional sports is much the same as the approach we should all take to our non-sporting professional lives too. Play to the whistle. Never give up. Nothing is a lost cause.

Sure, in your heart of hearts, you might believe that your team has already lost the game, but that doesn’t mean that you should stop putting in the effort. If nothing else, playing hard to the whistle gives you more practice and experience in toughing it out during high pressure situations. This way, when the game really is on the line, you know how to persevere. You know how to play hard to the bitter end.

Not With That Attitude

There are going to be situations where you’ll inevitably ask yourself, “What’s the point?” And that’s how you find yourself in a losing situation. That’s how you find yourself going from just losing the game to being completely blown out.

You hear it all the time. “I’m never going to (fill in the blank).” The person feels that he or she has no chance at achieving that goal, so they don’t even try. They don’t even get started. They’re not playing to the whistle, because they’re not even suiting up for the game. You will never succeed with that kind of mentality.

Instead, go in with a winner’s attitude. Go in with that strong work ethic. Even when you are faced with adversity, play through it and don’t skimp on the effort. If you’re going to do something, do it well. Play hard to the end.

P.S.: Something that I neglected to include in the original post was a concept known as “rage quitting.”

This is a term that may be familiar with people who play video games online. Basically, it a “rage quitter” is when someone exits an online match before the win or loss is officially recorded. They’re on the losing side and don’t want that loss on their record. Playing hard to the whistle (or to the end of the match, in the case of online games) also means accepting your losses gracefully. If you lost, own up to it, learn from it, and prepare for the next game. Artificially inflating your win-loss record does nothing to improve your skills or ability.

Since then, I’ve also stated that you don’t have to play to critique a player’s performance either, whether this be related to the world of sports, movies, music, or whatever else. What I’ve also quickly learned is that you don’t have to be good at something to enjoy doing it either.

We see this all the time. Golf is a fantastic example. There is certainly no shortage of horrible golfers out there, but they still hit up the links on a regular basis. They may display their frustrations, they may vent their anger, but there’s a reason they also go back to the course so often: they love playing the game.

I’m largely the same way when it comes to tennis and with video games, among some other hobbies when I have the time to enjoy them. I don’t claim to be any good at them, per se, but I do enjoy playing them.

And that’s the point. I’m still playing to win, to be sure, even though I recognize that my chances of winning most of the time are probably slimmer than I’d like to admit. While we all want to get better at what we do, and we should all work toward improving our games, we must also recognize the great value of play for its own sake.

Not that I’d complain if I won. Winning feels pretty good too.

In addition to our wealth of cultural festivals, Vancouver is also home to a lot of sporting competitions. Since I happened to be in the neighborhood last night, I took the time to check out a local bike race.

The Giro di Burnaby is an annual road bicycle race that pays tribute to “our colorful Italian community and the world famous Giro d’Italia.” The prize purse is worth over $15,000 and some real cycling pros come out to compete. The Giro di Burnaby is what is known as a criterium race, meaning it uses a short course (typically under 2km) and is run on closed-off city center streets. In the case of this race, the course was 1.85 kilometres in length.

The women’s race had about 20 competitors, while the men’s race had over 70. They say that the cyclists reach speeds of up to 60km/h. The competitors were also led and followed by a couple of Ferraris. That must be the “colorful Italian community” kicking in again.

I also thought that the “primes” (pronounced “preems”) were interesting; they offered cash rewards for winners of select laps. The biggest one was a cool $600. That’s for one lap. To put that into perspective, the overall first place finisher in the men’s race took home $2,000.

Given my notoriously bad sense of balance, there’s no way I’d ever compete in something like this. That said, it was a lot of fun to watch. Here’s a video I put together, along with a few photos.

Julia Garnet (pictured below) was the big winner in the women’s race, followed by Jenny Lehmann in second and Karlee Gendron in third. On the men’s side, Cameron MacKinnon won in a photo finish, followed by Bailey McKnight and Justin Kerr. Congratulations to all the winners.

It’s been exactly one week since the Vancouver Canucks lost to the Boston Bruins in game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals. It’s been exactly one week since downtown Vancouver was brought to ruins. Now, we can look back at the riot with sober eyes and give it the proper retrospective. Normally, I only offer five links, but given the seven day window since game seven, I thought seven links would be oddly appropriate.

In case you missed it, I offered my perspective on the role of social media in bringing the scumbag rioters to justice. The ubiquity of cameras and the intense interconnectedness of today’s online world are really what make the 2011 riot so different from the one in 1994.

Justine Galo provides a response to Camille Cacniao’s public apology. Camille started a new WordPress blog just for the apology, but does not appear to be allowing comments. In short, Justine feels that Camille is selfish and her apology is insincere. Do you agree?

While Ray Ebersole and I don’t always see eye to eye, we can always agree to share our opinions. Ray has some choice words for Vancouver, telling us to “get a grip” and remember to treat hockey as just a game. After all, there’s a Stanley Cup Final loser every year, but we don’t see riots like this in every other city when that happens.

He might be in Calgary, but Buzz Bishop lets us know why the riot happened: because we let them. I’ll admit that Vancouver is probably one of the more liberal cities in the country and we let a lot of things slide. Maybe that paved the way for this riot to happen.

Steffani Cameron took a day to think it over and “what a difference 24 hour makes.” She takes a look back at the riot the day after it happened and feels that the people who caused all that damage “need to pay with their time and their physical labour.”

Speaking of the next day, Cicy Chan gives us a look at Vancouver’s Wall of Love, an impromptu canvas where Vancouverites wrote their messages of hope. It’s amazing how a city can pull together so soon after such chaos.

And finally, Darren Barefoot moves away from the topic of the riot to discuss the 2011-2012 Canucks roster. There are some free agents on there, so we have to decide who we want to keep and who we should let go. We also have to consider the next couple years and the contracts that’ll become due too.

Update: One more quick addition from Katy who shows us what is our Vancouver.

If you follow me on Twitter or you’re a friend of mine on Facebook, then you might remember a conversation I had with a professional sports commentator a few weeks ago. I’m not going to re-open that conversation, lest I get accused of being an e-bully again, but I’d like to bring up one of the critical arguments made during that heated conversation.

You see, this hockey commentator once played in the NHL. As part of our back-and-forth exchange, he reminded me of this fact, implying that it made him more qualified to do his current job than anyone else. In one sense, you could say that the professional playing experience offers him a different perspective into the game than people who may not have been quite as intimately involved with hockey operations. However, I don’t think that having played something automatically makes you more qualified to critique or comment on that something.

This idea is roughly an extension of another blog post that I wrote earlier this year. In that post, I said that you don’t have to play a sport in order to enjoy watching it. Aside from some random floor hockey I played in high school, I’ve never actually played hockey. Not at a professional level, not at an amateur level, not at an intramural level. Does that make me “less of a fan” as a result? I don’t think so.

By the same extension, the best players in the game may not be the most qualified to commentate on the game. There are lots of great sports commentators and analysts who have never played the game professionally. It takes a completely different set of skills to be able to play the game exceptionally well than it does to analyze that exact same game. Many of the best military strategists may not have ever fought on the front lines.

Another great example of this in an entirely different realm? The man shown in the image at the top of this post. Roger Ebert is arguably one of the best movie critics of all time and, to my knowledge, he hasn’t otherwise “participated” in the movie business in another professional role. He’s not an actor, but he can critique an actor’s performances. He’s not a director, but he can comment on how a film is put together. He’s not a screenwriter, but he can talk about how a plot is filled with holes.

Along with many other people in this city, I think that Ryan Kesler is a great hockey player. Does this mean that he’d make a great coach? A great play-by-play commentator? A great hockey team owner? No, not necessarily, but that’s perfectly acceptable and understandable. These roles all take different skill sets and areas of expertise. Being able to play effectively and critique effectively are entirely different challenges.

As you may have heard, the Vancouver Canucks won last night. That brings them to the Western Conference finals for the first time since the storied 1994 Stanley Cup playoff run and this city is positively electric as a result. This got me thinking, though, about something from a marketing and branding perspective.

A trend that seems to have emerged in these NHL playoffs is the temporary rebranding of companies to demonstrate solidarity with the home team. Undoubtedly, part of the goal of this rebranding is also to get some media attention and attract some more customers. Professional sports represent big bucks, not only for the sports franchise itself, but also for a range of other businesses related or not related to the team at all.

Let’s take a look at two recent examples.

The Montreal Canadiens faced off against the Boston Bruins in the first round of the playoffs. During that time, all Boston Pizza restaurants in Habs territory changed their names to Montreal Pizza. Naturally, there was really nothing official about this and they didn’t go to re-register all their business licenses or re-do all their payroll information, but it was an interesting marketing and branding effort.

Did this result in increased sales? Did more Montreal Canadiens fans make their way to Boston Montreal Pizza locations to watch the hockey games? I’m not sure, but it certainly got the attention of local newspapers, bloggers, and other media outlets.

More recently, Predator Ridge golf resort in the Okanagan temporarily changed its name to Canucks Ridge. Part of this came from lobbying by the local community, but it proved to be an interesting marketing effort for the golf course too. After all, you don’t want to be perceived as supporting the Nashville Predators when the (almost) local Vancouver Canucks are in the playoffs against them.

So, we find ourselves looking forward to the third round of the NHL playoffs. The opponent for the Vancouver Canucks in the upcoming conference finals could be determined later tonight, if not in the next couple of days. If the San Jose Sharks win tonight, that’s who the Canucks get. If the Detroit Red Wings win two in a row, then they’re off to Vancouver for the first game of the Western Conference Finals. And this got me thinking about some of the local businesses that might take on the rebranding effort too.

• Shark Club -> Canucks Club?
• Wings -> Nucks?
• House of Wings -> House of Luongo?

As an aside, it’s great to see Ryan Kesler playing some of the best hockey of his career. He’s involved in just about every play, living up to his billing as a true two-way forward. Whether the Canucks get to dine on shark fin soup or chicken wings the next round, I’m super stoked.

GO CANUCKS GO!

Last night was a great night for Vancouver Canucks fans. Our hometown hockey team had already clinched the Northwest Division, as well as the Western Conference, but it was with last night’s win over the Los Angeles Kings that the Canucks clinched the Presidents’ Trophy. That’s the award given by the NHL to the team with the most regular season points.

But that’s “just” the regular season. As Ryan Kesler tells us, the team is “not satisfied” and they have to “keep going.” It was with that mentality that they won the Presidents’ Trophy and it is with that mentality that they’re going to approach the playoffs.

And that’s where we can all kick off the party. Even though playoff tickets don’t go on sale until tomorrow, I’ve managed to secure a pair of tickets to Game 1. We know the Canucks have home ice advantage throughout the playoffs, so we already know the first game of the first round will be played right here in Vancouver.

Being the generous guy that I am, I’m going to give away these Canucks playoff tickets to one lucky Beyond the Rhetoric reader. All you have to do to enter is follow me on Twitter or like me on Facebook, sharing a link to this post through either platform. Then, post a comment in this post saying that you’ve done this and you’re in! I’ll draw a winner at random this coming Monday.

Here are the highlights from last night’s game in case you missed it. Not a bad way to start the month of April, eh?

UPDATE: Happy April Fool’s Day!
In case you didn’t figure it out, this was an April Fool’s Day gag. To really win some tickets, check out the contest details in this YouTube video. Cheers.

A couple of random musings that I thought might be worth sharing are described below. I’d be interested to hear your opinions on both, really, so feel free to do that through the comment form at the bottom of the post.

An Awkward Male Version of The View

One of the biggest stories to emerge in the last week was Keith Olbermann’s sudden departure from MSNBC. I don’t watch Countdown very much, but I do enjoy watching his “Special Comment” segments via YouTube and other sources.

Now that Olbermann is without a job, it got me thinking about where he could go.

And then it dawned on me that at least two other hosts are either already out of a job or on their way of the job. Can you imagine if Keith Olbermann decided to partner up with Larry King (whose show was recently replaced by Celebrity Apprentice winner Piers Morgan) and Regis Philbin to make a very awkward older male version of The View?

Philbin is leaving behind Live with Regis and Kelly, so who knows what other pursuits he is considering. Would it be weird to have these guys sitting on a couch each day, discussing everything from politics to fashion statements? If so, who would be the other two “personalities” to complete the set of five? Papa Bear O’Reilly?

You may not necessarily agree with his opinions and it can be sometimes difficult to get “beyond the rhetoric” of Olbermann, but you have to admit that he has a great on-screen presence and his cadence is amazing. His Special Comment on race is particularly gripping, as was the one he did on the Ground Zero Mosque.

A Pick-Up Game of All-Star Hockey

By and large, all star games don’t matter. The NFL Pro Bowl is this weekend, but none of the players from the Super Bowl-bound Packers or Steelers are going to be playing. Even if they did, the game doesn’t matter. It’s not really a real game.

Over in the NHL, they’re trying to shake things up too. In the past, they’ve pitted East vs. West, North America vs. the World… this year, they’re doing a pick-up game. It’s like having a real life fantasy hockey game. At least, that’s the idea.

The “draft” is set to take place in a couple of hours and it could pit Sedin vs. Sedin, for example. I don’t know if this is necessarily good for the game, per se, but at least it’s a little different. I wonder who is going to be the last player picked for gym class.

Good night and good luck.

It’s something that I hear all the time from people who aren’t exactly fans. I get told all the time, “Why are you so into hockey? You don’t even play. You get all emotional over the Canucks, and you’ve never even laced up the skates to hit the ice for a game. Why do you watch? Why do you care?”

Newsflash: You don’t have to play the sport to enjoy watching it.

Absolutely, it’s true that I have never played a game of ice hockey in my life. I’ve played a little bit of floor hockey in my younger days, but the only real hockey in my life these days comes from the Vancouver Canucks and the rest of the NHL. And I’m okay with that.

If we were to follow the logic of the hypothetical naysayer above, I wouldn’t really be able to enjoy most of the entertainment that I find online, on television, or anywhere else. I don’t play the guitar, so I shouldn’t listen to rock music. I don’t bake, so I shouldn’t watch Cake Boss. I’m not involved in corporate America, so why should I follow who Donald Trump fires each week?

You don’t have to be able to do what you see in order to enjoy what you see. I throw my hat in with the Canucks the same way I threw my hat in with Team Canada during the Winter Olympic Games. Sports allow us to live vicariously through the athletes, participating in a competition and riding those same kinds of emotions without, well, actually participating in the competition.

A Roller Coaster of Emotions

It’s the same kind of experience you get with a particularly profound movie or a particularly thrilling TV series. You live vicariously through these characters, fictional or otherwise, and you get to ride that emotional wave along with them.

Professional sports are especially exciting when you have an allegiance to a certain team. That said, there’s no “local” NFL team in Vancouver, but I’m just as excited about the Super Bowl each year as I am about the Stanley Cup. Will I ever be able to do with Tom Brady or Daniel Sedin are able to do in their respective sports? Probably not… but I can watch them do it and revel in the competitive spirit.

I much prefer the “reality TV” of hockey and football over the “reality TV” of Snooki and Kate Gosselin.

Playing, But Not Watching

Interestingly enough, the reverse is also true: You don’t have to follow a professional league in order to play that sport either. I started playing tennis well before I expressed any interest in watching it on TV. I started curling in high school before I feigned any interest in watching it. In all honesty, I don’t watch curling at all (aside from the Olympic medal runs).

Are you a sports fan? Why or why not? What is (or isn’t) the appeal to you?

As you may recall, I made 10 predictions for 2010 and, for the most part, my predictions have come to pass. From sports to technology, it seems like I had my finger on the pulse of society.

While I don’t believe that I am the second coming of Nostradamus, I thought that it would be fun to make a few predictions for 2011 too. Some of these prognostications are a little bolder than the others, so we’ll take another look back in twelve months’ time to see if my batting average has improved or diminished.

1. American Dollar Struggles to Bounce Back

The economy was supposed to start bouncing back, but it seems that the process is taking a lot longer than expected. For my part, the US exchange rate is a very significant factor in my overall income, since I get paid in US dollars by a number of clients. As much as I’d love for the exchange to back to its former days of 40% (vs. the Canadian dollar), I have a feeling the American dollar is going to stay in the pits for a while.

2. Google Buys Groupon Alternative

Groupon rejected a multi-billion dollar offer from Google not that long ago, but I don’t expect the search engine giant to sit idly by, twiddling its virtual thumbs. It’s very possible that Google will buy one of the bigger alternatives, like Living Social, or a large number of smaller group buying sites to form its own huge network of online coupons.

3. Netflix Canada Faces More Streaming Competition

The single greatest reason why I have not yet signed up for a Netflix Canada subscription is that the selection is still very much lacking in comparison to its American counterpart. In the meantime, I expect some new competitors to enter the Canadian TV and movie streaming market, like Blockbuster and Zip, or maybe even a Google-branded alternative.

4. Windows Phone 7 Gains Traction (But Not Enough)

Windows Mobile was sitting in the smartphone basement for a very long time, despite being at the top of its game for years prior. The new Windows Phone 7 platform is slowly gaining market share, but I don’t think it’s going to eclipse iOS, BlackBerry, or Android any time soon. The rumored partnership with Nokia might prove fruitful for both companies though.

5. BlackBerry PlayBook Fails to Win the Game

As I prepare for my trip to Las Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show, I fully expect to be hit with an onslaught of tablets from a number of manufacturers. Research in Motion is trying to stay optimistic, but the PlayBook has already been delayed until May. It’s not going to dethrone the iPad, but I think Android-based tablets could start to make a much larger impact.

6. Philadelphia Eagles Win Super Bowl XLV

I was right about last year’s Super Bowl prediction, but it wasn’t exactly the boldest prediction at the time. For Super Bowl XLV, I anticipate that the Philadelphia Eagles will make it to the big game to face either the Patriots or the Ravens. Michael Vick has a lot to be proud of, despite his less than stellar public image going into this season.

7. The Social Network Does Not Win Best Picture

If you read yesterday’s post, then you’ll know how much I liked The Social Network. Aaron Sorkin is positively amazing with what he does, but I think the “Facebook movie” will ultimately get snubbed at the Oscars. It’ll get hype, but it won’t win.

8. Windows 8 Announced at CES (But Not Really Unveiled)

Windows 7 represents a major improvement over the PR nightmare that was Windows Vista, but Microsoft isn’t done. Life cycles are getting shorter and I think Ballmer and crew will officially announce Windows 8 at CES 2011. However, there will be very little in terms of an “unveiling.” It’s more about previews and feedback with a final release to be determined.

9. Ricky Gervais Replaces Steve Carell on The Office

This is the final season for Steve Carell on The Office and we’re still left wondering who is going to run the Scranton branch of Dunder Mifflin. It’s possible that Dwight or Jim could step into the lead role, but it’s more likely that someone like Ricky Gervais comes to fill in Carell’s awkward shoes. He’s a natural replacement, but a relatively unknown newcomer could be cast too.

10. China Adds Facebook to Friend List, Great Wall

Mark Zuckerberg recently took a trip to China, one of the few remaining places on the planet that isn’t fully engulfed in Facebook land. Zuckerberg does have over 500 million “friends” on Facebook, after all, so why not add another billion or two? After some fervent negotiations, Facebook will finally get past the Great Firewall of China, but it’ll likely face a fair bit of scrutiny and censorship at the hands of the Chinese government.

11. Vancouver Canucks Finally Hoist Stanley Cup

If history has taught me anything, it’s that the Canucks will get my hopes up as they approach the playoffs, only to dash my dreams once again in the first or second round. The logical side of me tells me that the Sedins and crew will face a similar fate this season, but the emotional fan in me says this year is different. With Ehrhoff, Hamhuis, Malhotra, and even Raffi Torres, among other key additions in the last couple of years, this could be the best Canucks team in years.

Happy new year, everyone! Do you have any fun predictions for 2011?