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I guess by now if you’re reading this blog you probably saw the previous one and the picture of my ‘Cudda, I am here to tell you that I had the greatest time fishing off the coast of Florida during my holiday. Despite my friend Boomer’s concerns over my choice to use Capt’ Taco as my guide I was able to realize some personal goals, catching some King Fish, a Barracuda, and my first bill fish a smallish swordfish. Didn’t get my Marlin though, it remains my biggest non-work related goal in life. For the record Capt’ Taco is itching to get on the show and give it to Boom, stay tuned.

Really enjoyed taking calls this afternoon on “Olympic Fever”, I have said it before open phones can either be my favourite part or least favourite part of my job, today I thought the call were awesome. The Olympics are a different animal some just love them and some just despise them there is very little middle ground it seems when it comes to the Summer Games in Canada. I openly admit I don’t have the fever going in, I am concerned about the hypocrisy of not spending a second talking about these events for 3 years and 11 months and then analysing them to death for a month, but with that said you know and I know that I will be into by the time they finish.

Looking forward to having Jungle Jim Hunter aboard for the duration of the games, he is a passionate advocate of the Olympic athlete and I have no doubt in my mind that he will shed some light on some of the lesser talked about stories of these games.

Funny, due to rodeo and summer holidays I was away from the Stampeders for about a month, I was shocked how much of a divide there appears to be between the local media and the Head Coach/GM. Let me point out a couple of things here I don’t believe it is the job of any coach to endear himself to the media, not do I believe the media has to throw its support behind the local leader, but man a third of the way through the season there is a clear division. Hufnagel doesn’t have much of a relationship with those covering the team nor does he care, that’s his right, but it can make getting your message out a lot more difficult. Myself I have enjoyed my conversations with John, but honestly I haven’t talked to him one on one since after week 1.

As far as the Stampeders go, it seems like the same old same old to me. The same problems like discipline creeping in, and lots of talk about how it will be fixed, but…. The Stamps remind me of the Flames, at the end of the previous season it was clearly the coach’s fault, so you change the coach and nothing changes. Now what? Some veteran players have to start carrying this team on their backs, Burris, Reynolds, and Lewis for instance.

It has been a busier then expected off season for the local hockey heroes, as the Flames looked like they might have a quiet off season after they bowed out of the play offs, have right up until a week ago or so have retooled the team.

I missed the prospect camp for the 2nd year in a row, I wish I hadn’t, it is always a good time to check out the progress of the youngsters. While I didn’t see him everything I have heard about camp leads me to believe that Backlund could press to make the team this season. Sutter has told us in a prior interview that he only wants last years first pick playing Calgary as a top 6 forward, it sounds like he could do just that.

I know everybody has their player to watch heading into the fall, keep your eye on Brandon Prust the 3rd year pro agitator has as good a shot as anybody to make this team.

The Flames still have some moves to make, while they need to shed cap before the start of the season, there are going to be only 2 ways for that to happen via trade or by demoting NHL players to the minors. The 3 players who were waived through the league at the end of June would be candidates for the latter.

Does the Flames schedule look a little odd to you, I don’t remember being around a hockey club that has as many weekends off as the Flames do this year. The Flames just don’t play a lot of Saturday games this season they play a lot of Tuesdays but not a lot of Hockey Night in Canada games it seems. I am not sure it’s a good thing or a bad thing but it is odd.