The Unknown Poster

If Gadot lusted for me, I might not forget I have a gf but Im not sure it would matter (and I have a feeling the gf would be okay with it).

Which leads to speculation that the Jets are going 7-3 (either Toby waived or they are leaving Myers unprotected). Otherwise, there was little reason to sign Dano this week.

I loved the premise and the cast. Disappointed in the execution.

Hmmm, they dont seem to make note of RFA forwards. They do mention that if a team makes an RFA goalie available, he must be qualified beforehand. My assumption was, an unqualified RFA would not be selectable. But perhaps Vegas can select him but he doesnt qualify as a player a team can use to satisfy their obligation as far as exposure. The Jets needed to expose two forwards who ARE under contract next season. If they were going 4-4, that wasnt a problem because they had Armia, Matthias (and either Lowry or Perrault) available to expose to Vegas. If they somehow go 7-3, they only had Matthias available (unless Im forgetting someone). Assuming they'd protect Scheif, Wheeler, Little Perreault, Lowry - that's 5. They'd protect two of Copp, Armia, Matthias, leaving only one guy. In that case, they needed to sign someone, Dano, so of the four - Copp, Armia, Matthias, Dano - they can protect two and leave two for Vegas. I think thats why people assume the signing points to the Jets going 7-3. If they were going 4-4 there was no urgency to sign Dano this week and he wasnt going to trump Perreault or Lowry as far as who Vegas would select anyway. But going 7-3, they needed him under contract.

Saw Wonder Woman last night. I sort of reminded me of a cross between Captain America and Thor. It wasn't perfect. But I really enjoyed it. As someone else said, the origin story always pulls a film down a bit. The superhero aspects were almost the least enjoyable parts. The human elements were most enjoyable. Gal Gadot is a revelation. She has so much screen presence but in a way that isnt overbearing. She can be the demur one but with a simple change of expression, she commands the audience's attention. And unbelievably beautiful. Easy to buy her as princess or Goddess. Everything about her is perfect for the role from her physical attributes to her beauty to her accent. Chris Pine was solid in his role too. I have a hard time watching him and not seeing Captain Kirk, but perhaps because I havent seen him in a lot of other things. There were some loosey goosey plot points but over-all it was very enjoyable. Easily the best of the DC films and it seemed there was more emphasis on story then spectacle. Im not sure they really needed to connect this film to the larger universe in the way they did. Im not sure if it bothered me...but I sort of rolled my eyes a bit. Let it be its own thing. There is a lot to mine here with a character that is introduced in World War I and hasnt aged in 100 years. Lots of great stories they could tell. For a character who seems to love humanity and see the best in everyone (and believes in love so strongly) you wonder how many men did she love over the last 100 years...which is a real Captain America type angle to play. How did she never become disillusioned when seeing World War II, Nuclear weapons etc. I also love the message. We can debate whether kids should idolize fictional characters (or real characters like sports stars) but regardless, kids WILL idolize them. Here is a female that is not a damsel in distress or a princess in the traditional sense. A female character that is strong, independent, free, brilliant and believes in peace and equality. She took no **** from the men. Its a great character for young girls to look up which is why I hope the sequal continues to be a "period" story because I think you can hit that message home seeing her live through certain times. One major spoiler I will mention under the tag:

He was RFA so he was not eligible. People are saying it makes the Jets compliant (two forwards available) but they were before. However, if they went 7-3, they might have felt they needed someone to lose if they wanted to keep Armia. My point being, perhaps Toby waived and the Jets can protect 7 forwards: Scheif, Wheeler, Little, Perreault, Lowry, Copp and ??? if they Jets wanted to protect Armia, that leaves Matthias as the eligiable forward. So they needed another one. Speculation being the 7th forward protected would be Armia and then Matthias and Dano would be left for Vegas.

The reason that doesnt work is, the NMC waiver list has to be in by Friday at 4:00. But Vegas doesnt have to make their selections until...Sunday? Or whenever. So how can Toby, for example, say yes Ill waive but only if Vegas accepts my NMC when Vegas cant even make that decision yet? Unless the NHL has something in place whereby all existing NMC, even waived, are only for purposes of selection to Vegas and the clauses automatically follow. Another speculation is Dano was signed to the one year deal to flip to Vegas as the price to not select an unprotected Myers. ie. if the Jets could go 7-3 they probably protect Dano but Vegas wants him so Jets leave him exposed and Vegas takes him. Plus Jets send a pick or Petan (always the one rumoured) as part of the price.

Is Vegas allowed to talk to contract players before making their selections? If they take Fleury with the intention of flipping him, would he have to agree? The waiving of NMC is a bit cloudy on this. If the receiving club has to sign an addendum to the contract accepting the NMC, the leverage for the player is he wont waive unless the receiving team does so, But in the case of Vegas' expansion draft, how can they get Vegas to pre-emptively agree to that on players they haven't yet selected? Players have until Friday to either agree or decline to waive their NMC...so how would that work? If Fleury waives and is selected by Vegas, his his NMC no longer in play?

Where did Ducky go?

Finished OITNB. I was disappointed. No spoilers. But it was okay in the sense I like the show so even "bad" OITNB is good. But it was really inconsistent. Thats a regular criticism of the show but I thought this year was particular bad. The tone, the writing, the logic. Very inconsistent. They played almost every serious moment for laughs which inevitably lessened the impact of the moments in question. They had characters (both inmates and authority) acting stupid to further plot developments. And things happened because they needed to to advance the story rather then the story unfolding in an organic way leading to plausible things. I get that part of the appeal is its funny. Funny characters can be funny. And its emotionally resonant when a funny character has a serious moment or a serious character as a funny moment. But literally everyone slipped back and forth between cracking jokes to emoting deep feelings. Rather than being a satisfying roller coaster, it was more of a rickety old roller coaster with few thrills. And this is a positive review because I *like* the show. But they need to add a couple of better writers to weed out the crap.

No but I did speculate as much ;-)

According to multiple sources, the Coyotes majority owner, Andrew Barroway has bought out minority owner Anthony Leblanc and his Ice Arizona group. Its funny when you think back to Anthony Leblanc and all his proclamations about buying the Coyotes when he never had the juice to do it and had to immediately sell off a majority to Barroway. Now Leblanc is out.

Not correct. Its part of his contract. NMC players get traded all the time, because they waive it under specific circumstances (ie. choosing their team). Its still in their contract though.

Because Myers is more valuable than Toby. If Toby refuses you could do that but its going to cost you more. The rumours of the Jets talking to the Stars in a deal that includes Myers could be indicative of Toby not waiving and the Jets still trying to get to 7-3.

I didnt watch all of RAW but watched the opening segment to see how badly they'd screw it up. Miraculously, they didnt screw it up. Great pull apart brawl by Brock & Joe and treated Joe the way he NEEDS to be treated going into this match - as someone who isnt afraid of Brock.

I have only been to one Sun destination - Jamaica for a wedding. We flew Sunwing. And man, did I hear about it from people (and online reviews). Sunwing plays a lot of games. One of their favorites is, for example, if Edmonton-Cancun doesnt have enough passengers and there is room on Calgary-Cancun, they will cancel the Edmonton flight and claim technical issues and have the "direct" Calgary flight divert to Edmonton to pick up those passengers. (or vice versa). The benefit to being in Winnipeg is that we dont have a close neighbor for them to do that with and most people in Manitoba are likely flying out of Winnipeg so the aircraft are likely fuller. We also left first thing in the morning (again, full flight). Other than no seat back entertainment (they had TV's every few rows), the Sunwing experience was awesome. Super nice people, nice planes, no problems (we left Jamaica late, that was it). I upgraded to the larger seats just to be safe though.

This is a common thought though. I admit to feeling it from time to time. Im not sure if its "real" or imagined due to media coverage. But I think the feeling is when a crazy white guy does something in the name of his race or religion, the vast majority of us loudly condemn it. We have no problem with saying that those people are nuts and losers. But when there is an attack made by Islamic terrorists, the sense is the Muslim community is too quiet in their condemnation. How real that is, I dont know. Because they DO condemn it. But I think there is the perception the average Muslim sort of puts his head down and doesnt say anything. And the idea that the Muslim community needs to weed out their crazies more is certainly one many subscribe to. We do see plenty of defensive posturing. For example, open houses at Mosques inviting anyone to attend to see Muslim's in general are not extremists. We're not talking about Muslim's fighting the extremists in the Middle East. We're talking North America. Where there is also the sense that if you see a suspicious Muslim, some people resist the urge to report due to feeling "racist". Which is interesting because there is SO much bigotry towards Muslim's and people who just look like it (I recently debated with a guy about why wrestling fans would cheer Jinder, the guy feeling that it made no sense since he was a "terrorist"). Having a President that condones bigotry doesnt help.

Yes as Rich said, you NEED to protect Toby because he has a NMC which either leaves Myers exposed who Vegas would surely select or you leave Perreault/Lowry exposed, both of whom Im sure the Jets would prefer to keep. Going 7-3 allows the Jets to basically protect the bulk of their forwards. The question is, do they dangle Toby thinking Vegas wont bite due to his age/contract status and take one of their lesser forwards or do they make sure by incentivizing Vegas not to take him? I think Toby is still valuable enough that Vegas might take him. But who knows. Because Toby has a NMC, it sort of makes it tougher for Vegas to take him and then flip him to another team. They'd need Toby's cooperation. What's a reasonable price for the Jets to pay to "protect" Toby (ie. pay Vegas not to take him)? For Vegas, the leverage is "pay us something good or we'll just take him", since 7-3 leaves them with lesser forwards to choose from. I know some will say "let Vegas have him". But that really hurts our LHD next season. Even as a declining asset, Toby is our top 2 LHD with no one behind him ready to step up to that role. And Morrissey was a revelation at that position or the Jets were really in trouble.

I hope so. And I wonder what the quid pro quo would be. Unless Toby is simply fine with either staying or going. But I suspect Jets would reach out to Vegas to protect Toby and then in return, offer Toby an extension. Also, if I heard correctly, the Jets made it known they would not comment on whether they asked Toby to waive or if he agreed. The Jets are always secretive but if he hadnt wouldnt a "we have not asked" or "he has not waived" make sense as opposed to a refusal of comment? The list is going to be released publicly. Our good friend Gary would get the scoop if he was here ;-)

Flair Air bought New Leaf. How it worked was, New Leaf marketed itself as an airline but was just a ticket seller and used Flair Air's planes. Flair Air was solely a charter company. But now that Flair has bought New Leaf, they are a "full service" airline, although with only 4 planes. While reading about that, I saw a story I missed called "The Mexican Game". Air Transat is a charter company that does a lot of all-inclusive sales between Canada and Mexico. Two of my friends flew Air Transat last year and loved the experience. But due to passenger loads, Air Transat contracted Flair Air to do some of the flights. The only problem is Flair's planes did not have the ability to safely fly between Edmonton and Cancun under most conditions. Two planes were outfitted with extra fuel tanks to make it to Cancun but could not make the return flight safely and would have to stop for re-fuelling. But since Air Transat markets the flights as "direct" they lied to the public and aviation officials. They even told Flair to file a direct flight plan from Cancun to Edmonton and once in the air, request a "technical stop" in New Orleans. This pissed off passengers. Flair then instructed its pilots not to inform passengers of the fuel stop until they were in flight. This doesnt appear to impact Winnipeg travel if you are unlucky enough to get the Flair planes. In fact, one Cancun-Edmonton flight stopped in Winnipeg for re-fueling. My friends really enjoyed Air Transat. Said the plane was beautiful, service awesome etc. http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/flair-newleaf-airtransat-aircanada-westjet-airlines-cancun-vacation-discount-airlines-1.4096090 Air Transat's manager of commercial operations was prepared for the planes not being able to make the northbound flight non-stop. In an email to Flair's director of flight operations, Mauricio Diaz gave the following instructions. "Due to Mexican authorities restrictions, we always need to file a direct flight (flight plans) CUN-YEG [from Cancun to Edmonton]," he wrote in a May 2016 email to Flair. "Never file CUN-MSY-YEG [Cancun-New Orleans-Edmonton] because it will be refused by [the Mexican authorities]," the email continues. "When the flight is airborne from [Cancun], you can plan the technical stop in [New Orleans] and advise ATC [air traffic control]." Not only were passengers being misled about being on a non-stop flight, Flair's pilots say they were uncomfortable filing two flight plans. "Problem is, what if you're flying across the Gulf [of Mexico], and you have a communications problem, and you enter American air space, land in Kansas City and nobody knows about it, post 9/11?" one pilot told CBC News, speaking on the condition of anonymity. "How do you think that is going to end?" he added, suggesting that he could be intercepted by U.S. fighter jets. CBC News examined the Cancun-to-Kelowna flights made by Air Transat/Flair this past winter on Flight Stats, an online repository of historic flight data. On 11 consecutive flights advertised as non-stop — from Jan. 28 to April 8 — all experienced stopovers: two of the flights landed in Winnipeg, eight of them landed in Regina, and one was diverted to Kansas City. On two of southbound flights from Kelowna — on Jan. 21 and Feb. 18 — the jets stopped in Calgary to top up. There are no penalties for filing flight plans an airline has no intention of following As for the Mexican authorities, they told CBC News there was no reason to file false flight plans: It is not against Mexican regulations to make a technical stop in the U.S., so there was no reason to play the original "Mexican game."

I stand corrected. Would this not indicate the Jets are going 7-3...and either Toby has waived or they have a deal to shortly consumate sending Myers or Toby somewhere?

I might be confused about the rules. As an RFA can't the jets expose Dano without re-signing him?

Interesting. Going about business without regard to the expansion draft or they have set up something knowing they can protect him? Does a one year deal make him less likely to be chosen by Vegas (probably not as he's still an RFA next summer, I believe). Low salary. Definitely seems like a "show us what you got" contract.