He's At It Again -- Morris Dalla Costa, The London Free Press

[professordeb]

Yep, this guy is knocking down Figure Skating yet again while comparing it to hockey in a hockey-mad city.
His article is about the London Knights and their wanting to bid on the 2012 memorial cup. Now I like hockey as much as probably anybody around here, but he really didn't need to say some rather nasty stuff about figure skating to try and pump up his article. Here's a few quotes that ticked me off

Be prepared and be warned. If fans want the 2014 Memorial Cup to come to London, they are going to have to pay for it. It won’t be exorbitant. It won’t be unrealistic. It won’t be a issue of anyone trying to gouge any one. But it will be expensive.
For hockey fans who attended the 2005 event they will quickly find out that it’s going to be a tremendous value when it comes to entertainment and much more beneficial to the city than something like the World Figure Skating Championship.

What a twat! Un-fricking-believable. He then goes on and later says

You know what you have with a Memorial Cup tournament. It sells. It gets great viewership on television and it’s one event that will give London true exposure to the rest of the country. What are the chances of someone coming back to London from Shawinigan or Saint John or somewhere else in Canada after being at a Memorial Cup compared to someone watching the World Figure Skating Championship in Osaka on television? You can figure that one out

Guess he doesn't realize that a WORLD championship means that people will be coming from not just across Canada but from the rest of the WORLD!!! That's world-wise exposure -- something that not every city ever gets, let alone the size of a city like London.

I'm guessing that someone from Shawinigan would return to London Ontario about as much as someone from Osaka would like to visit it -- like next to never! London is not one of those "destination" place where one would go for vacation. It is a place where you would go and see an event over multiple days -- like figure skating or curling or even hockey.

Typical of Morris to go off on yet another rant. I sometimes wonder why I read his articles. Sometimes they're OK but then there's ones like this that just get me steaming. I'm almost at the point where I am thinking of adding a comment to his article. Maybe I better give myself a cooling down period and just remember who he is -- at hockey guy who can't see much of anything else. I think his life is the poorer for having such a narrow focus.

OK, stepping off my soap box now, rant over -- for the time being.

[overedge]

What a narrow-minded tool. Someone should introduce him to Rosie diManno - they would probably be over their mutual dislike and ignorance of figure skating.

I mean, seriously, the Memorial Cup gets more attention and coverage for the home city than a world championship in a sport that gets participants from all over the world? WTF?

[scs]

He typifies the quality of writing in the London Free Press which is why many people in the area do not read that paper anymore.