(Editors Note: This post was written by Clark Brooks, who unable to post up the story himself. It's cross-posted from his personal weblog, Ridiculously Inconsistent Trickle of Consciousness with Clark's permission.-- JPF)

Last year, I got a chance to meet Mike McKenna when he was a goalie with the Tampa Bay Lightning. He was called up from the minors due to an injury and it was kind of a surprise to everybody, including him. As a result, he sort of carried an affable "gee whiz, pinch me I'm dreaming" kind of vibe that was endearing, especially compared to many of the professional athletes whose over the top "ME ME ME" personas tend to dominate the sports pages. Between that and the fact that despite having worked for an NHL team and having met lots of players I don't actually "know" any, I decided he would be my favorite player. Having favorite players makes sports fun. So now I root for him, even though he's no longer with the Lightning.

Recently, I was at a hobby store and came across his rookie hockey card (pictured) so I snatched it up. I was so excited that I shared my find with the world via Twitter, "I just got a Mike McKenna rookie card!" A little while later, Mike replied, "Lucky you...I don't even get cards of myself! I guess I'll have to buy them off eBay or something...".

I was stunned. I couldn't believe it. I never made it as a professional athlete (obviously...shut up) but like most American males, I fantasized so much about it that I thought I had a pretty accurate idea what it would be like, and it broke down something like this:

• Being chased around like one of the Beatles by throngs of screaming girls ... 32%
• Playing games in front of huge crowds in stadiums and on television ... 28%
• Travelling the world ... 14%
• Signing autographs ... 7%
• Playing practical jokes and engaging in general horseplay with teammates ... 3%
• Practicing or otherwise working really, really hard ... 1%
• Misc. (playing video games that I'm actually in, golf with celebrities, being on 'The Tonight Show', etc.) ... 5%
• Having the Topps company send me boxes and boxes of cards of myself ... 10%

As you can see the card thing is a huge part of the equation! If that's not accurate, it means some of my other numbers are wrong as well and the whole thing is out of whack.

It's definitely a bummer", Mike said. "You'd think the card companies would send a handful to each player. Still cool though!"

If you say so, Mike. Still, I can't help feeling disappointed...which is nothing new for me; I grew up a Pete Rose fan.

(Mike McKenna is currently with the New Jersey Devils organization and is playing for the Lowell Devils of the American Hockey League. You can follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/MikeMcKenna56)

Were you one of the fortunate ones who caught any bit of the live feed from Saddledome on Thursday night?  The feed of Hockey Canada's Red-White scrimmage? Did you get your hockey fix through it that you had been jonesing for since the Stanley Cup Final in June?

Of course, being an Internet stream, you very well may have lost it during the viewing (if you DID get to see it in the first place), but did you see it at all?

I hope you did, because this was an example of the perfect hockey telecast.  Not just because of the caliber of the players on ice (like an All-Star Game, but players gave a damn) , but because of how the broadcast itself was done.  

This was hockey perfection.  No commentators jabbering in your ear for the sake off filling silence, no jump-cuts or closeups ruining the view of a play developing, there were no graphics and advertisements being jammed down your throat on screen while there was a temporary break in play. 

It was hockey, as it should be, without commercial broadcasters screwing it up with bombast and trying to keep you entertained -- when the game itself is all the entertainment you need.

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Technical and off topic mumbo jumbo here...

I'd like to point out that, for a year or so, I have had in my ownership a domain name of a site that I thought went dead... Tampa Bay Sports Net (the domain name is tbsports.net). I snatched the domain up when it expired and have held onto it for safe keeping and possible use in the future. If you visit the domain, it currently points here (as does Raw Lightning)

While doing some research on Friday for a friend, I happened across... well? Tampa Bay Sports Net -- the same Tampa Bay Sports Net that had previously owned said domain name. I've attempted to contact them through email and through their site (contact form is broken) because I had no malicious intentions when I snatched up this domain name. I was and am hoping to return tbsports.net to it's proper owner.

So let me publicly request someone at TBSN1.com get in touch with me if they'd like their domain name returned to them. Thanks.

(title changed and some other name/grammar edits because I'm a College Football idiot and don't know the SEC from the KGB, FBI, GUI, ennui, etc)

And welcome to the AP top 25 rankings, gentlemen...

Yes it's an OT loss for Auburn but lets be frank and honest -- this was a nail-biter the whole night through (just look at the stat match-up results - the War Eagles never stood up and proved their worth). Yes, South Florida wasn't stellar but neither was Auburn and Brandon Cox was put in a hurt-locker by the Bull defense the majority of the night.

If the Bulls are indeed ranked by Monday morning, it will be their first Division 1-A ranking since the football program at USF was incepted 10 years ago.

New York radio fans might be pissed off to see that 660 WFAN's flagship sports talk show, Mike and the Mad Dog, are starting to branch out when it comes to discussing teams. "Branch Out" meaning that CBS radio is simulcasting Mike and the Mad Dog in Tampa Bay on 1010 WQKY AM and Tampa Bay teams are getting mentioned and talked about now a bit.

For more on the situation and local sports talk discussion, check out Sticks of Fire and Tommy's post on the subject.

You got a hockey game one night, you have a Justin Timberlake concert the next and another hockey game the next evening. Getting an NHL arena ready for it's various functions is no small order and takes lots of manpower as well as lots of dedication.

I could talk up how big a job an arena conversion crew has all day... I'll let the Toronto Star's video of the Air Canada center being converted tell you everything though.

It's Something Awful's sports argument Wiki.

The Something Awful community has there say of snark, sarcasm and black humor about teams, players and sports in general on the aforelinked web site. From cringe-inducing weak barbs such as calling the Devil Rays "The first AAA Team ever to play in the American League East" to the golden and sadly accurate description of the Toronto Maple Leafs:

As a result of this, every time the free agency, the Toronto-based hockey media and Maple Leafs fans everywhere begin wildly speculating as to just how eager the sport's biggest stars are to fulfill their lifelong dreams and come to their favorite organization, and happy they will be to sign for league minimum in exchange for playing for the greatest team in the history of athletic competition.

Providing a list of the players who want to play for the Maple Leafs would surely be a waste of time and bandwidth because odds are that if you can name an NHL player, he would give his left leg to be a Maple Leaf for just one shift.

Maybe that's a little cruel, but if Doug hadn't basically recited above talking points to a T last year here on Boltsmag I woudl try to be kind and dismiss everything as hearsay.

Of course the Lightning aren't left out of the fun but fortunately, their profile is too weak to care.

There are bloggers as well as general readership throughout the sports blogosphere that, at one time or another, have known about or partaken in conversation on the FanHome sports network. FanHome was the leading sports message board community in the past, having a membership of over 40,000 and boasting a robust community of baseball aficionados, knowledgeable hockey fans, a passionate basketball community and the like. It's worth repeating that during it's height, there were players both reading and posting on the network. Baseball relief pitcher Dustin Hermanson had posted news of his 2001 off season trade from the Montreal Expos to the St. Louis Cardinals on FanHome's Montreal Expos forum (which was a happening place, quite contradictory to the atmosphere at Olympic Stadium) before either team announced the deal, or the news wire was made aware of the trade.

To give a comparison, FanHome at it's high was much like Daily Kos is now -- boasting a huge readership and daily traffic that eclipsed anything comparable at the time, sans ESPN and the media's own message forums.

But with the good came the bad for FanHome -- it was launched at the tail end of the dot-com boom and when the dot-com industry went dot-bomb, leadership on the site got discouraged. FanHome ended up signing a partnership deal with TheInsiders/Scout.com that would assimilate the FanHome community into Scout.com's network. It all went down hill from there as corporate bosses don't care for anything but income. vBulletin message board software was replaced by the cheapish EZBoards "Anyone can do it" message boards, and the readership and membership dwindled. Loyal members stayed loyal to the FanHome.com brand however, but FanHome was all but gone.

Well, four long years after FanHome was assimilated by Scout.com, FanHome has become independent again and a re-launch of the network is looming. A lot has changed in four years, however, and one has to wonder what's in the cards for this network if it finds it's feet again? A message board only offers so much, and the possibilities that are out there for a large sports community are immeasurable, especially a community with a recognizable brand name among sports fans on the web (be it bad or good).