Darren DuPont’s Moose Droppings
1. Catching Up – A lot can happen in a week and a lot has happened over the past seven days. We always talk about the “best time of the year” and often I say the Fall is the best time of the year but late spring is hard to beat. I mean, we have the Stanley Cup Final, the NBA Finals with a Canadian squarely in the spotlight, major championship golf and tennis, plus the CFL has started. That’s pretty damn good.
2. Canadian Open – My week was mostly spent on the golf course at the RBC Canadian Open at TPC Toronto at Osprey Valley. It was a really fun week that ended with a dramatic four hole playoff and a win for Ryan Fox. I was hosting at the iconic Rink Hole and had an opportunity to be up close and personal with both golfers and spectators. If you’ve been following my social media then you already know. It was a ton of fun. Some of the names that we were hanging with? Justin Rose, Gary Woodland, Nick Taylor, Mackenzie Hughes, Sam Burns, etc. Great time.
3. SCF – Even the golf and some work couldn’t keep me away from the Stanley Cup Final though. Fill in the blank: This is the greatest final since _______. I’ll need your help here. This, for me, is right up there with any of the cup finals I’ve seen and we are only three games in! This cup final is like the wild west meets WWE and then some of the best hockey we’ve seen in a while. It’s wildly entertaining and you don’t know what’s coming next. What more could you want?
4. Not Over Yet – Florida may have won Game 3 running away but don’t plan the parade yet. The Oilers are far from finished and I suspect that Game 4 will look nothing like Game 3. I compared it to tennis on Tuesday’s RP Show. When great tennis players like Novak Djokovic start to fall behind in a set they often lose it big. They aren’t concerned about losng a set 6-0 or 6-1. They conserve energy and then regroup heading to the next set. Guess what? It works! We’ve seen the greats fall behind a couple of sets and then come roaring back. Each set has NOTHING to do with the next and I feel the same is true game-to-game here in the cup final. The Oilers will be fine.
5. Lineup Changes? – As of Wednesday morning we have some questions marks heading into game 4. RNH missed practise again on Tuesday and Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch was non-committal on who the team’s starting goaltender will be on Thursday. If I’m the Oilers it’s Stuart Skinner. He will bounce back and be fine. I’m going to guess that he’ll play. I know some Oilers’ fans disagree though.
6. ODDS – Not shocking the Panthers are now the favouries to win the series (-260). Sam Bennett (+140) is the favourite to win the Conn Smythe. Connor McDavid (+240) is next followed by Sergei Bobrovsky (+450) and Brad Marchand (+550).
7. CFL Week 2 – The poll question on the RP Show on Wednesdays during the season is What is Canada’s Game of the Week? It’s gotta be BC at Winnipeg, no? The Thursday night game will be the season opener for the Blue Bombers and they’ll play Nathan Rourke and the Lions who are on a very short week. I am curious if Rourke can continue his hot start against a team I’m expecting to be back in the Grey Cup this November.
8. Best Week 1 Story – The great play of QBs Vernon Adams Jr and Nathan Rourke in week one is my top story so far. The trouble last season in BC lead to the Lions sticking with the Canadian and VA ending up in Calgary. Turns out it’s been great for everyone. What a concept! Now, it’s only one week so that’s quite a presumptuous statement. The bad part? We have to wait until September 19th to see the Lions and Stampeders play each other. I wonder what shape they’ll each be in by then.
9. What Else? – SGA and OKC (google it) bounced back in Game 2 of the NBA Finals with game three set to go tonight. If SGA wins an NBA title he could be considered the best Canadian ever. He’s only 26 and this young Thunder team should content for a while… Thursday marks the opening round of the US Open which we will be glued to. The US Open is often the toughest major when it comes to scoring and this week should be no different. A social media question posed to players this week was which would you rather have? Take even par now or play and try to go lower. Most of the players would take even par if given the choice. We will see a few high numbers this week… I’m sure by now you’ve seen highlights, pictures and stories from the epic 5-set final at the French Open. It took over five hours to play and Carlos Alcaraz overgame three Jannik Sinner match-points to stay alive and eventually win. I had an eye on it while on-course for the final round of the Canadian Open. It really was special.
10. Randoms – Are tennis players the greatest athletes? Former world #1 Andy Roddick suggested as much on his podcast this week. He pointed out that they play “five hours and 40-something minutes” on the biggest stages… no teammates, halftime or timeouts. He makes a good point. I’ve always wondered which sport has the best athletes… Mission Impossible Final Reckoning: two thumbs WAY up. Go to the theatre as fast as you can. Worth it… Next up is The Phoenician Scheme. It has a mega cast and is in theatres now. I’ll be going soon… the trial for the five players from Canada’s 2018 WJ team has wrapped and now we wait as the judge will render a decision on July 24th. I feel like this has gone under-the-radar lately but it will certainly be in the spotlight when the ruling is made.
Until next week,
DD
I feel like the mental fortitude of elite individual sport athletes like tennis or golf has to be on another level. Not only does your body have to be 100% tuned, your mind has to be as well. No teammates to fall back on and rescue you when you screw up, or to take the spotlight away when you have a bad game. It’s pressure dialed up to the extreme.
yeah the only sports where you can quit on the spot and tell people “My mental health…..” Up yours with the mental health.
Don’t even talk to me about Tennis, Golf, or any of that garbage. It’s 1, 1A, 1B, 1C and 2 in this order 1) Hockey – find a tennis player who goes and plays with knees held together with rubber bands or a cracked sternum 1A) Rodeo – find another athlete that calls his house and for the past 2 weeks nobody’s been hom… 1B) – Football – any professional level. Find another guy that puts in just under the pensionable earning in the NFL or plays 10 years in the CFL. – when they get cut on the road… Read more »