Friday, January 27, 2006

The Giz

Good to see The Giz is going to be inducted into the CFL Hall of Fame. I was fortunate enough to see him play live on a number of occasions (can't say the same for Mario Lemieux, in spite of having ESA tickets to see him play his comeback year, something came up). I saw his last game (a bit anti-climactic when he got hurt), when they put him on the wall, one of the game's against Calgary when he ran two back, and the one against Ottawa when he almost ran two back (he dropped the second one on the 5 yard line, for no apparent reason). He definitely hasn't been replaced, on the team or in the league. In terms of the Esks, while Donnie Ashley, Winston October and Tony Thompkins have been good, they don't have that same power or explosiveness. Likewise, Bashir Levingston is too much of feast or famine returner, just as likely to end up with a 10 yard loss. Corey Holmes is good, but of a different mold. Keith Stokes is close, but really there will only be one Giz.

It's also good to hear Matt Dunigan get the call to the hall. While his reputation may have taken a hit during his tenure as Calgary GM and Head Coach, he was a joy to watch as a player. While I missed his tenure with the Eskimos (I went to my first game the year after he had been traded to B.C.), I often found myself cheering for him when he wasn't playing the Eskimos. My favourite Dunigan memory would have to be the 91 Grey Cup. It was after the Peewee Smith catch, so I was going to be cheering for the Argos regardless. The fact that they won while their starting quarterback had to have his shoulder frozen in order to play. I put Dunigan up there with Messier in terms of sports leadership combined with meanness/toughness.

On the topic of sports, I think with his outburst against Ryan Smyth the other night, J.S. Giguerre is showing further signs of being a (more) modern-day Ron Hextall. Sensitive about his crease area, carried a team to 7 games in a Stanley Cup Final, winning the Conn Smythe in a losing cause... Now all he needs to do is deck Chris Chelios.

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