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Everything posted by Down by the River
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Will we see Flower tonight? Your prediction may have come true!
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[Official] Toronto Blue Jays Major League Baseball thread
Down by the River replied to The Stork's topic in Off-Topic General
Feel like the Jays wouldn't be making the same mistake over and over if they still had a guy like Smoak. He was to the Jays what Tanev is to the Canucks in terms of locker room presence. You wouldn't make the same mistake twice in front of "Dad". -
Smart move by Masvidal. The result will be the same, he'll earn a ton of $, and he'll be able to perpetuate the misconception that he is a legitimate title challenger.
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[Speculation] Finnish sniper Laine on the board
Down by the River replied to NHL'er's topic in Trades, Rumours, Signings
Came here to say this. He relies too much on others to get him the puck. He might have 2 goals in a game but had the puck on his stick for a total of 17 seconds. He'd basically be a rental for the Canucks because they won't be able to fit him + Pettersson/Hughes under the cap. -
Mike Gillis interviewed for Panthers GM job
Down by the River replied to EP40.'s topic in General Hockey Discussion
James Duthie told it on 1040 and elsewhere I believe. I can't find a link to the original interview, but it was discussed here: -
Mike Gillis interviewed for Panthers GM job
Down by the River replied to EP40.'s topic in General Hockey Discussion
I think Gillis' draft record gets an unfair rap. It is by no means good. It might even be poor. But it isn't awful. Most were ecstatic when Schroeder fell to Vancouver. You can say that the Canucks should have drafted O'Reilly, but O'Reilly wasn't taken until the second round. The only player from the first round that turned out more valuable than O'Reilly is Victor Hedman (and maybe Tavares). In other words, all 30 teams slept on O'Reilly back then. Hodgson was also only a bad pick in hindsight. His post-draft year was strong, especially at the WJHC. He gave the Canucks a great memory with his Game 8 bar down goal. Also, if the Canucks had their own farm team, maybe their prospects would have experienced a better developmental trajectory. Schroeder et al. were in the Chicago Wolves' system, which was independent of Vancouver. There was no interest in developing prospects. They wanted to win and were laden with vets. Some guys may have failed to develop because of this. I think where Gillis went wrong is his belief that he was the smartest guy in the room. That's a tough personality trait to fix when you're 50. James Duthie tells a story about how Gillis and Aqualini were at the same restaurant as him and Bob Mckenzie. Aqua sent over an incredibly expensive bottle of tequila and the four ended up chatting for the night. Gillis went on and on about how they were going to beat the brakes off Boston and that Vancouver was establishing a revolutionary way of running a franchise. Maybe Gillis was just a bit drunk and over-excited, but the way Duthie told the story made Gillis sound a bit arrogant. -
If you're 2-6, should you even be allowed to have a professional fight sanctioned? Robbie Lawler has some of the UFC's worst tattoos.
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If I say I like apples and then someone says I don't like apples, it isn't a matter of subjective opinion/preference. One person is misrepresenting facts. I have yet to see any evidence that saying "black lives matter" means that you don't simultaneously believe that all lives matter. I don't know why saying that black lives matter gets people so triggered.
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It isn't that you're wrong in making this statement, but you're wrong to think that this is somehow evidence that systemic racism doesn't exist. If we live in a city where 5 black people are shot by police and 10 white people are shot by police, you might think that police are biased against white people. However, when you consider the fact that white people outnumber black people 3:1, then you find that persons that are black are disproportionately shot by police. It is crazy that people that love lines like "facts don't care about your feelings" become reduced to the mathematic competency of a preschooler when issues of race are invoked.
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It is factually inaccurate to say that "all lives matter" if it is simultaneously true that black lives are not valued. So, when people are saying the quote you provided, the argument is not that black lives are more important, or that the lives of others don't matter. Rather, it is suggesting that people cannot say that all lives matter if society clearly does not value the lives of people of a certain background. "All lives matter" cannot be true until "black lives matter" becomes true first.
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Lol at the second part. I understand wanting to watch hockey. I just don't understand why hearing about other things during lulls in the broadcast irks people so badly. For example, in-arena, I would never disrespect a national anthem. However, watching at home, I've almost always got the TV on mute during the anthems. Not because I don't love Canada. Not because I want to protest something. I just don't care to hear it. So I mute it. No big deal to me. Others enjoy it, that's fine, and I would never try to ban anthems or anything like that. I just do something else and its not a big deal to me. Others hear about racial injustice and act like they are being fed propaganda.
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Why do people not understand that defunding the police is meant to help improve the value of education, family, and community. Not to equate crime with a sickness/disease, but defunding the police is about moving resources towards these other domains so that otherwise good persons do not become involved in crime. Defunding the police can actually benefit police. For example, police officers are often asked to do mental health checks. In fact, in Vancouver, most police calls for service relate to mental health calls rather than crimes in progress. This is not necessarily what officers signed up for. Effective funding strategies that help prevent these types of incidents benefit both the community and police. It frees officers to respond to/investigate crimes of a more serious nature, which is likely the job they had hoped they'd have in the first place.
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If you need sports to be a distraction in your life, maybe you need to think about how to improve the quality of your life so that it is not so dependent on something so external/out of your own control. I absolutely love the Canucks. Have owned season tickets basically since I started a career that would allow me the financial freedom to comfortably afford them. But never have I sat down to watch a Canucks game to distract me from my own life. I watch hockey because I love it and not because I don't like other aspects of my life so much so that I need a distraction from them. I'm not trying to sound smarmy. I genuinely think that if people need sports as a distraction, it might be worthwhile to think about why they feel that way and how to find better ways to cope.
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No. It isn't bad enough to be entertained by how bad it is. It is like eating rainbow-colored saltines. They're trying to give the impression of uniqueness, but really its just bland empty calories.
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The billionaire club is a small world. They absolutely have the clout to demand government policy. For example, if I'm billionaire Smith, I could choose to have my new food preparation facility built in Massachusetts. This would generate 1,000 jobs in the area. Creating happy people. Creating people that favor voting for the status quo (i.e., the people currently in government). Creating people that pay tax dollars that help support government initiatives/projects. Alternatively, I could say that Massachusetts has failed to respond to my demands for addressing educational reform and therefore I'm going to build this facility in Connecticut instead. Jobs lost, people angry, tax dollars down, officials are not re-elected. It is time to stop appealing to peoples' sense of humanity because the reality is that making changes that support ending systemic disadvantage also are not in the best interests of people that are already wealthy. The change has to come from hurting the bottom line more than what would occur from making change for the sake of bettering disadvantaged persons. The structure of schools in the United States is just completely backwards. The poorest communities contribute the least amount in tax dollars resulting in the most poorly funded schools. The cycle will be perpetuated until this type of issue is addressed.