Blogger 365 Day 53 - Divided Loyalties

     For the most part I have avoided any and all Olympic coverage this year.  I guess there was some drama regarding the women's figuring skating or some such nonsense, but I have argued before that any event that does not involve scoring, but rather judging, isn't a sport anyway.  It may be an incredible physical skill, but unless you have a specific and standard way of scoring it to determine a winner, it is not a sport, it is more like a pageant.

     The one sports that I did follow, (and will follow tomorrow for the gold medal game) is the mens' hockey.  I'll admit, for the most part I wanted the American men to win, or at least medal, so the result from the bronze medal game (Finland 5  USA 0) was a little of a letdown, bu only a little. I am not the fervorous type, sitting in my recliner screaming "USA! USA! USA!" because for me I have a rooting interest not my home country so much as in my hometown, in which case I am not all that unhappy.

     The Pittsburgh Penguins sent 7 players to Sochi this year, 4 of which will win or have won medals, and that means more to me than whether he USA got one.  So while I am disappointed for those players that didn't medal (Brooks Orpik and Paul Martin, USA, Evgeni Malkin, Russia), I am also happy for those that will medal (Jussi Jokinen and Olli Maatta, Finland - Bronze, Sidney Crosby and Chris Kunitz, Canada - either Gold or Silver).  Jokinen and Maatta even scored goals in the bronze medal game against the US, so I can take something from the drubbing the United States suffered through.  If anything, I am happy, Maatta is still young (19 years old) yet he did not look out of place at all playing with the best players in the world on a global stage. 

     So the Pittsburgh Penguins sent 7 players to the Olympics and 4 will come back with medals, sorry USA, but I am perfectly okay with that.