The Skin of Our Teeth

So the Smallville season 4 premier has come and gone with pretty good reviews. A couple complaints mixed in but that's always going to happen. Could this have used a 2 hour premier? Probably but it worked just as it was suppose to. I'm a bit fond of it but its sad that the writing team has already directed us on where they're going with season 4 and that most of episode 4.01 "Crusade" came off as predictable once it got off the ground. I don't know about you, but at least in season 3, I had only a faint clue where the season was heading. Season 4, it's a bit different.

Too many people are overlooking the three symbols that first, Lionel was looking for, then Lex. With one symbol already inside the Cave Wall, and thus, in the hands of Jor-El, there's only two more symbols out there and what do you know - two 'hiatus' breaks where they show a couple repeats and they finish filming some more episodes. I've stayed away from spoilers these past four months as much as possible so I could be wrong but I wouldn't find it to be any surprise if the second symbol doesn't come into play in Episode 8 or 7. And the third symbol, wherever it may be, will come in around episodes 16 or 17, setting in motion the events that will lead us crashing towards the season 4 cliff-hanger of a finale. Whatever the symbols open up for Lex (and/or Lionel) will play a huge role in the finale and it should be a hell of a ride regardless of knowing how its going to be paced.

So where's the second symbol - on Lana's back. How we get it off Lana's back and into the cave, I don't know but why do I get a feeling it's going to change her forever? Speculation on where the third symbol could be? Atlantis? Peru? The remains of the Mayan Empire? Maybe the city of Teotihuacan? After all the symbols were all supposed to be from advanced ancient civilizations and the Mayans are said to have the calculation for the end of the world - possibly the forefillment of Kal-El's dystiny? Mayan temples would be easier on the budget than say, Atlantis and would be a really cool story line.

And what do the symbols open up? Lex said it would open up knowledge greater than that which was possessed in the Library of Alexandria. What could possible be better than the LoA? Remember in the Superman movie when Clark went traveling to the Artic and stumbled upon the Fortress of Solitude filled with all the records of his home planet and all the knowledge he would need? Perhaps the three symbols (along with the key that Dr. Swann holds) open up the real Fortress of Solitude chock full of knowledge from the stars? I'd say its a pretty good bet that's where they're going with all this. Am I right or just way crazy? The Fortress of Solitude the way the movie did it was stupid and a bit cheesier - this would be a way to work it all in.

And what's Jason's purpose? He's confrimed as a re-occuring character as he was adding into the opening credits, while Lois was not. Is Jason meant to be Whitney version 3.0? That's a sad waste of our time if he's simply that and plus, why do that when you already have Lois? The purpose of Whitney (in season 1) and Adam (in season 3) was to keep Lana and Clark apart and build upon the teenage angst until it exploded. Well we all know who wins in the end, right? Lois and Clark are the end product, not Lana and Clark. Lois is the ultimate stop keeping those two apart and while Lois might not be in Season 5 (and she'll only be in 13 episodes of Season 4), she can work as that dynamic for now.

Jason must serve an entirely different purpose but what is it? Is it to help Lana grow? Sorry, but why does Lana character only grow through her relationships with boys most of the time? I'll admit, not all of her character growth comes from her boy toys but most of it does. Will she always depend on others? Come on and let Lana be her own woman, for christ sake. From what I can tell, He's an American boy living in Paris, and while he may be a student in one of Lana's classes, they chose not to introduce Jason to Lana via one of her classes. They chose for him to meet her on the streets riding a Vespa. He has enough money to scrap together a romantic get-away to Nice - albeit not that far away from Paris, its still a distance away and not a cheap place to go. He may have a job but I don't get the feeling that he does and it seemed in a way he was able to pull some strings at the church to get her to sketch/trace her art project.

So what is he? Who is he? What purpose does the guy serve? If he's a re-occuring character, he'll probably return with Lana when she returns to Smallville. How many students (if he is one) have the funds and time to accompany a girl they have only known one month back to Smallville? I can't help but get the feeling some how he's loaded in money. It would make him a nice rival to Lex but money alone won't be able to do that - he's got to have some business power to even dream of being that, yet I don't get that sense from him either. We've only known the character for maybe five minutes and we really didn't get that good of a read on him.

How did I like Lois? I'm a bit dissapointed that the first meeting between these future lovers wasn't any where near the romantic scale but rather awkward. It's a new dynamic, Clark's got a lot more work cut out for him on this one. Should be interesting. The dialogue written for Lois was witty and great but sometimes she came off as annoying and not at all what we expected - which isn't a bad thing. I'm going to reserve judgement for a couple of episodes.

The Lex/Lionel banter was a bit - old for the first time. Why do I think Lex has already taken the plunge into the dark side? I keep flipping day to day on whether I believe Lex is crazy or not. But we know how he's going to wind up, why would it be too far-fetched to believe he's already on the evil side? This quest of knowledge just might be the last leg of the journey for him. And is Clark (in the previews) asking for Lex's help? You don't leave Lex's circle and expect to walk back in like that. As Martha said, you don't escape the clutches of the Luthors unschaved.

And Chloe's not dead? What a shocker there, as we already knew that but the way they tacked it on to the end of 4.01 was dumb. If the explosion was as bad as we saw, would there be any left of her to bury? Clark just can't keep his mouth shut when using his powers can he?

I'm a bit mixed on the hints that Lionel may have not killed Chloe and Gabe Sullivan (or attempted, at least). If it wasn't him, the sinister impact of the finale of season 3 loses a lot of its punch. You were meant to just despise Lionel's guts and to choke back the bile rising in your throat. If it wasn't him, it falls a bit flat now, in retrospec. Lois's line about Lionel not knowing who gave him this gift or not knowing if he's being set-up pretty much tells us that Lionel didn't do it. 

If Lionel didn't do it, who did? Morgan Edge? Haven't seen him for a while and what would be his motivates? He's not on trial - Lionel is. Lex? Would he want his father off? It's posible, he's a bit zany right now and may still deep down love his father and it would be a shocker for every one. There's also the possibility that Lex staged Chloe's "death" so that when Lionel does get out of prison, he doesn't bother going after her. He may trade Chloe's safety for letting his dad walk free - after all, with Lionel free, Lex can go man to man with Lionel or even join him again - it's always been about who has the power between those two, Lex has gained power while Lionel's been in prison.  Though would he make the mistake of provoking a caged animal? Would Lionel "wound what (he) can't kill?" Both of these guys could be close to going for the juggler - would that not push Lex further down the dark path?

If Lionel didn't plant the bomb - maybe he didn't poison Lex. Morgan Edge keeps coming up in my mind. Would Lex try to poison himself? If he's going nuts, he may in some sort of wierd plan. Got nothing on that one.

A lot of compliants have come in about the use of Black Kryptonite to neatly tie up the story within an hour time slot. What did you expect? It's friggin Superman!! It fits with the mythology and with the way things work in the mythos of Superman. What was wrong with it, honestly? Big whoop, I thought it worked fine.

Margot Kidder's cameo bothered me for a bit. I'd rather have Dr. Swann but Christopher Reeves may not appear in Season 4 due to scheduling conflicts. I know the man is busy with all his lobbying and such but man, we need Swann for season 4. You've got to love her line about her and Swann though. The cameo just wrote itself - it was great in that aspect but I never liked the movie Lois and I mean, this woman was a nut ball. Movie Lana and Movie Lois on screen at the same time *shudders*

The flying - ok I said once I'd drop the show if Clark flew before the series finale - it worked here and I can forgive them here. It's not like he can still fly or he's gained the ability yet. It was a bit of fan service and did little to change the Clark/Smallville dynamic so I'll let it slip.

Here's to hoping 4.02 "Gone" is just as good as this start to Season 4. I could go on and on about this episode but I'm becoming jumbled in ideas - best way to answer questions is just wait and watch.

Every thing about the past couple of nights, and more so today, has been "who to blame" in this lock-out situation. God it's getting sickening listening to people moan and bitch and whine and act like life is over.  I know it's religion in Canada but just because the main church blows up or is torn down in a natural diaster doesn't mean that its the only church in town - there's still going to be hockey. Across Canada and the United States and the world, there's going to be hockey. Back yard rinks, ponds, minor leagues, minor-minor leagues, junior leagues, mite leagues, tyke leagues, midget leagues, high school leagues, pick-up games, rollar games. The insitution of hockey isn't the NHL. Suck it up. I know its going to be hard but thank God you're alive. I've really come in the past couple of months to realize, in the grand scheme of things - these sports really don't matter.  They do create jobs - some of which no longer exist - they do create tourist revenue for cities - they do create a sort of pride for cities - they do create a fantasy construct for us to escape away from our petty lives in. So to say sports don't matter is a lie, they do matter but the NHL's lock-out does not mean the end of the sport itself and hell, probably not even the end of the league.

It somewhat goes back to my thoughts on the NFL Hall of fame induction and the way the fans treated Ricky Williams's depature from the Miami Dolphins. A lot of fans (and I'm not saying all so don't get your panties in a bunch) take the escapism too far.  We tend to lash out at those who do not seem happy or satisfied in our fantasy dream world.  Each one of us secretly wants to be that guy with the walk-off homer in game 7 of the World Series. The guy who scored the game 7 triple-OT game winner, ending the Stanley Cup drought of whomever. The guy who sinks the buzzer-beating 3-point shot in the NBA Finals. The winner of the Olympic Gold medal of whatever. We want to live the life style and we want to play the sport for a living too. And anyone who is living our dreams, if they do any thing to some how tell us they aren't happy with living our dreams or our fantasy life-style, we tear them to shreds. Look for further than Carl Eller - he wanted his HoF induction speech to MEAN something so he talked about a social issue he felt strongly about. What did people do? They lashed out negatively at him, saying "that was not the proper platform" for such talk.  His speech will be remembered and it meant something but no, people wanted the same old boring HoF speech given by John Elway. Hell, I could have muted the TV and receited his speech word for word as he gave it - it wasn't nothing out of the ordinary, reliving his greatest moments, moments we were "there" for, along side him in our minds. We live viacariously through these men.  Ricky Williams says no more to our escape and we call him a "coward." We call him a "desserter." We call him every other dirty name in the book. And yet, Ricky's decision (as it was HIS decision) affects what?

Sports is the only business where we hate people for being sucessful. Someone out there writes a novel and sells ten million copies world wide and becomes a multi-millionaire (or in the case of Rawling, a billionaire) and we say "Good for them." We're happy for them. Happy for the hard work they put in. We maybe applaud them for some of the risks they took to be sucessful. Some one out there takes a pre-existing invention and markets it better making millions, good for him.  But you put "athlete" and "money" or "sucess" in the same sentance and man, watch people verbally pin him to the stake, taking time to make sure the nails go through, bleeding the guy. Yet do sports athletes in this day and age take risk? Do they not work hard to get where they are at? If just anyone can do the things they do - let's say this, would you rather watch Barry Bonds smack 450 foot titanic homers or some double-A calibre guy ground out to second base? They are the best at what they do. The players are easy targets I figure. They're the ones with their faces out there while the people who hide behind the coporate masks, the faces we never see, control the media and tell us its all the players' fault. And we're angry and looking for someone to blame - we'll listen to any one who gives us a name, a face to hate.

Are players in today's sports market maybe overpaid? I don't think anyone will agrue against that statement. There's only so much you can top out at in pay at your job. In a lot of cases, it does feel like bullshit when players hold-out or want to re-work deals after huge deals or when they go shopping around via free agency. And sure they look like the villians - after all they made out pretty darn well under the now-expired CBA. And those masked figures with the name tags saying "Hello my name is Gary" and "Hello my name is Billy" representing another bunch of shadowy faces that the majority of us have never even seen - those masks focus us towards blaming the players, saying that the player's union won't compromise. That's fucking bullshit and I don't know if we have cotton in our ears or we're just too angry, confused and grief-stricken to even consider what we're being told but we take the players behind the scene at their words. It's a bit ironic that its the players we see in plain sight every day out of the season and yet its the faceless who have the control on the media. The players can't even defend themselves properly.

The owners whine that the current economic landscape is crippling them and the players are getting paid way too much for their books. But honestly, who gave these guys the contracts? Who forked over the large amounts of cash willingly with a smile on their fat-cat faces? No one held a goddamn gun to their head. You want to say the player agents made the owners hand out this money? You're fucking crazy and need to go find a way to decapitate yourself. NOW. The owners are businessmen. They made their money by running a business. They (for the most part) are not fools. But sometimes you have to wonder. They anted up this money willingly and now they say the system is broke. It wasn't broke in 1997 when the bargaining agreement was expiring the first time. In fact wasn't it Bettman, on behalf of the owners, who said "the system is working as it was intended to"? Player salaries grew exponetionaly the seasons before the 1997 expiration date and they had no problem with it at all.

Perhaps they did have a problem with it but the owners cannot see further than the tip of their nose and in 1997 Bettman danggled $320 million at their nose and they bit. The league welcomed in the Nashville Predators, Atlanta Thrashers, Columbus Blue Jacket and Minnesota Wild into the 'exclusive club' on the NHL. How do you get in the exclusive club? You pay expansion fees and no owner in their right mind (except the new Canucks owner) would ever front up that kind of cash without a garuentee that the CBA would last past 2000.  Then there's also the cash generated by sending the NHL players to the 1998 Winter Olympics - that cash wouldn't have found its way into the owner's pockets if there had been a lock-out. So of course the deal was working out great then, after all, 2004 was well further out than their noses. And even when they finally did start whining about player salaries, their 'tears' fell on the checks they were writing for the free agents they were signing.

Glen Sather refered to it as a "free enterprise" when he was spending big dollas of the Madison Square Garden group's money. Now what, the "free enterprise" isn't good enough for you anymore? You're not happy with it any more? Maybe you can blame the Rangers and the Stars for spending money driving up salaries but let's face it - every team did it. Even the expansion clubs - look at the money handed over by Columbus to both Luke Richardson and Scott Lachance. Again, these players aren't holding a gun to your head telling you to sign the goddamn check. Wasn't every piece of leverage - even the fans and media - on your side during the Alexei Yashin incident? Yashin had to finally give in and let me tell you something, the guy with the gun NEVER gives in.

But we still hear the whines echoing "the players are greedy."  That may be the case in some instances but let's not escape calling the owners greedy as well. Hell they can't even seem to trust each other under a luxery tax situation - why should we? I've already debated and defeated the idea of a cap but what would stop the owners from abusing and exploiting a Salary Cap? NBA and NFL owners do it all the time. Look at the payrolls of each team in those leagues are really, who's under the cap? Only four NBA teams were last year. There's so many loopholes and clauses in the NBA cap that it's useless - it's nothing more than a sham. Signing bonuses, back/front-loaded contracts get around the NFL salary cap - how else does Peyton make the money that he does. Point is - the NFL and NBA do not make money because they have a salary cap? Think about it - when's the last time you went to a game because the league had a goddamn salary cap? The NFL and NBA make money because - guess what - THEY ARE POPULAR. THEY HAVE A GREAT TV DEAL. THEY MARKET THEMSELVES BETTER. If the NFL or the NBA started to lose money, I know goddamn well that their Cap systems would not be acceptable. They don't do what they're intended to do by themselves.

When your over 75% of your league's revenues come from gate receipts like the NHL, you're going to be in trouble. The NHL clubs will each receive less than $4 million a year from their current TV deal, if and whenever this lock-out subsides. If so much of your income is through the seats - you've got to start wondering how you can put butts in the seats first. I've never heard of anyone going to a game for the league's salary cap. Market the goddamn league! People say hockey can't survive in the south. BULLSHIT. Not if you market the damn thing right. The NHL and its fans believe the product will sell itself. We love it, we know what's cool about hockey and why we watch it. It sells to us but obviously, us as a fanbase needs to grow for the league to survive. You need to sell it to other people - people who are not us. The league thinks it can plop down a franchise any where and it will work. You people are ignorant. Putting a team in a non-traditional market is like buying a puppy. To allow the puppy to grow up big, strong and fully, you need to take care of it and nuture it until its healthy enough. You've got to find a way to market the game right and you've got to try harder. And its not hard, we're looking to buy. Fuck, you put a flashy, shiny package on something and I'm buying it. Does it matter what it is? Fuck no. I'm buying it. "Your father could have sold a ketchup popsicle to a woman wearing white gloves."  Good for father but Bettman has no idea how the fuck to do this. He has no idea what he's doing in his position. No fucking clue. Bettman, you were worried in 2000 about rising salaries? You could have exercised your power then and you either chose not to or you failed to. I have no sympathy for your ineptness.

You want to say the players aren't willing to compromise? Bill Daly and Bettmen are lying out their ass on that one. The owners are the ones saying they will not accept anything less than a salary cap and took only a day or two to reject the player's proposal.  Sounds like real compromise from the owners there. The players' union at least took a week to look over the owners' six proposals before ulimately rejecting each one - all forms of a hard cap. Daly blames the players for stalling - they submitted a proposal back in September of 2003. The league did not respond until July of this year to that proposal. Who's stalling there? The players, who ten years ago were adamantly opposed to a luxery tax, have now agreed to one. Sounds like compromising to me. The NHLPA has submitted the most flexible plan and are willing to give back 5% of their salaries. Sure, to you or I, it doesn't sound like much but it would take a $120 million chunk out of the losses the NHL owners claimed they lost last year. They're willing to make a deal, the owners aren't - yet nope, it's all the players who are unwilling to make a deal.

The NHL wants a salary cap but yet they have no plan nor idea on how to implement it, how to punish teams for going over it, how to expect clubs to get under it, what to do with the huge influx of free agents cut to get under the cap,  how to stop expolitation of the system and other questions. They want it and they have no clue how to use it. Sad, really. The league will not go away from this issue even though they haven't even elaborated on it. They've just thrown the word 'salary cap' out there hoping to cause a knee-jerk reaction - knowing that fans falsely believe that a salary cap is truly the answer to every problem - they have no intentions of fleshing it out it seems, they just wanted the fans to foam at the mouth and go after the players. They intend to crush the union and break them for good. They never had the intention of compromising or making this work in time for the league to avoid a stoppage. And a lot of you bought it.

Who's to blame? Who's not to blame is the better question. Both the players and the owners are at fault here but come on, at least see that one side is willing to compromise while the other is not. Instead of attempting to come to a working partnership between themselves and their players, the owners have decided that they want to be all-powerful and prove a point. What that point is - who the fuck knows, these guys lost their minds in senality years ago.

"and Ye Shall Be Gods"

Ok I'm still going to do the underrated, overrated player for each NHL club but I figured I'd try once again to open it up to the readers (if I have any after my sabbatical and my subject matter) any questions, debates or feelings you want to share about the NHL or sports in general? I'll answer your questions to the best of my abilities. It could be my opinion on a player or a situation or whatever...I'm up for anything - doesn't neccessarily have to be about sports. You guys make the topics this time around.

Either leave them in the comments or send them via email to dynamitehack91@yahoo.com (with the 'mailbag' headline)

Occasionaly I have to do the 'I'm not dead' column. I've been busy and a little bit down on sports. The World Cup has been nice but it feels an obvious couple weeks too early for the sport. My original pick to win it, Finland, goes against Canada in the finals so I'm not changing my prediction. It's about time the Finns join the elite status of the world. I've been trying to pay attention to prospect camps the best I can however.

I felt today would be a nice day for a column though. Taking a look at some of the league's most underrated players (free agents don't count but add Daniel McGillis to the list of underrated players in the league)

ANAHEIM - Hands down it's Samuel Pahlsson. Up until recently, I would have said Steve Rucchin but he's been gaining a lot of credit over the past two seasons. He stays healthy for a whole season and the Ducks turn it around and go to the finals after a couple horrid seasons. Though that theory is slightly ruined as he played in all 82 games last year and it got them Ladislav Smid. A lot of Pahlsson's flack comes from the fact that he was a huge part of the Ray Bourque trade and everyone expected him to be a great return right away as well as a scorer. The guy isn't a scoring but he might be one of the better third line checking pivots right now Strong and agile, he works damn hard every night and will take the beatings neccessary to win. If he learned to shoot more, he could easily top into the 30-40 point range and with his defense become one of the elite third liner centers in the game. He's only 26 so there's still a lot of time and for only $550k he's a complete bargin.

ATLANTA - My original pick was Slava Kozlov. He has had some really shining seasons in his career but everyone use to say it was playing in Detroit that caused it. In Buffalo he was unhappy and forced to either sit in the press box or on the fourth line. In Atlanta he busted out with a 79 point year and people said it was Kovalchuk and Heatley. But watch him a little, he's got maybe one of the top three best wrist shots in the league right now and he's deceptively flashy with it. But the player I'm taking here is Ivan Majesky, the Slovak vetern that played protection to Jay Bouwmeester's mistakes during his rookie season. He's a right-side dman making him valuable yet still people forget him when talking about defensemen in Atlanta. His injury in the World Cup sunk the Slovaks before they had a chance to set sail. Some people believe his knees are shot already at 28, let's hope that's not the case because when healthy, he's one of Atlanta's smartest players.

BOSTON - There's not a whole lot here right now because Mike O'Connell has failed to bring any real contracts in because of the impending CBA diasater. A lot of it will be unproven youth next year and that might mean Kris Vernasky will be pivoting the third line in Boston.  What he lacks in scoring prowness he makes up for in brains and feistiness. Sadly, he just might not have the overall talent to stick full time but he may make a fine coach some day.

BUFFALO - Checkers Jochen Hecht and Paul Gaustad stand out in my mind as does Mike Grier and Dmitri Kalinin. Gaustad will probably find himself competing for the final spot at center in Buffalo and Kalinin is well on his way to becoming a top dman in the NHL and most people are becoming aware of his name. Grier is one player you have to love and should be my choice but I'm going with Hecht and I can't seem to figure out why. At 27, he has yet to tap into his vast offensive potential and has become some what (ok a whole lot) injury-proned. His defense is adequete and he's a whiz out there and can line up at each forward position but we're still waiting for him to top 20 goals. Last year was an injury season and he put up a career best 52 points so here's to hoping he's going to get better. Seeing as I'm basing this on potential - take Grier and Kalinin instead.

CALGARY - The playoff run was sort of a coming out party for a lot of the Flames, Robyn Regehr and Jordan Leopold reached the next level up, Miika Kiprusoff just might be the world's hottest goalie at the moment, Ville Nieminen become the stuff of trash-talking legends with Esa Tikkanen and Claude Lemieux. Stephane Yelle, underrated for years in Colorado, got his due for all the times he played at less than 80%. Steve Reinprecht only saw 44 games and missed almost the entire playoffs but he's probably the only second line player the Flames have, if he were healthy, it may have been a different story in the playoffs. He still struggles with inconsistancy though so my pick here in Daymond Langkow. So many Flames fans felt Darryl Sutter was screwed giving up Oleg Saprykin and Denis Gauthier for Langkow but what they don't realize is they brought in a better version of Craig Conroy. Langkow has matured so much since his "whining" days in Philadelphia and has become a complete player on both sides of the puck. He's also got more offensive flash than Conroy did without losing any of the defense. Maybe slightly not the best draw man in the league but he can hold his own. The Yotes got what they needed in return but if it was just Petr Nedved, I'd take Langkow in a second.

Coming soon, Carolina, Chicago, Colorado, Columbus and Dallas - who's their most underrated player?