DTotD: Dinamo fans try to stop their own player with firecracker

When fans throw something on the pitch, play usually stops. That's not how Dinamo Bucharest's Gabriel Torje does it, though. When his own fans threw a large, blazing firecracker just in front of him as he made a move towards goal in the Romanian Cup final against Steaua Bucharest, he tried to play on like dodging firecrackers is a part of the game.

The referee did stop play for a moment after that, however, and it seems being unable to take advantage of the diversion hurt Dinamo because they ended up losing the match to their rival by a score of 2-1.

Video via 101gg

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CFL Camp Countdown: Lions look to reach home Grey Cup

We're continuing our series of training camp previews. You can check out our previous entries on Calgary and Montreal. Next in line: the B.C. Lions, based off Tuesday's conference call with president Dennis Skulsky and general manager/head coach Wally Buono.

— Most of the questions on the call obviously focused on the football side of things, but I thought Skulsky's opening statement about the team's business side was notable as well. Of course, the Lions are in one of the most interesting sets of business circumstances of any CFL team at the moment, thanks to plans to split the 2011 season between Empire Field and the newly-renovated B.C. Place, expected to open Sept. 30. Skulsky said that makes this a crucial season for the Lions.

"We have lots of emphasis on our best-of-both-worlds season coming up," he said.

— Skulsky said the team can't wait to get into the new B.C. Place, and construction is proceeding on schedule so far.

"We're looking forward to heading back to what should be one of the best stadiums in North America," he said. "I can tell you, yes, it will be ready."

— The team's going to be holding their training camp in Kamloops again next month (about a three- to four-hour drive from Vancouver for those unfamiliar) with B.C. geography), which Skulsky said is important for trying to build their brand across the province.

"That's all part of the integration and making sure we're the provincial team," he said.

— Grey Cup preparations are moving along as well. Skulsky said having the Grey Cup has been huge for corporate sales at both fields, which will be particularly important at B.C. Place (thanks to its 80 corporate suites versus Empire Field's seven).

"All of our suites at Empire Field, all of our suites at the new B.C. Place for both the regular season and the Grey Cup are sold out," he said.

— In a case where business perhaps touches the football side, Skulsky said hosting the Grey Cup puts extra emphasis on having a good season this year and trying to get to that game.

"The Grey Cup being here this fall will really be an outstanding opportunity for our community and this city to really show off the new B.C. Place," he said. "It's not so often you get the opportunity to play in a Grey Cup game or win one at home, and that's where our focus is."

— Making it to the Grey Cup isn't an easy task, but Buono (pictured above right during a game against Saskatchewan last season) said he's optimistic about the Lions' chances.

"The race for the Cup's going to be a tough road, but we feel good with the nucleus of good young players and the veterans we have and we feel good about our coaching staff," he said.

— One new addition to that staff is former Lion, Roughrider and Bomber Kelly Bates, who Buono said will help Dan Dorazio out with the offensive line. He joins other recent players on the staff, including defensive backs coach Mark Washington and defensive player personnel assistant Barron Miles. Buono said developing coaches is crucial both for the organization and the league as a whole.

"We're doing what we need to do to not only make this a better organization but to help this league grow when it comes to coaches."

— The Lions' season last year was really a tale of two halves, with early struggles followed by a late revival once Travis Lulay took over for Casey Printers at quarterback. Buono said the offensive statistics for the year weren't great, but what they were able to do during Lulay's tenure was promising.

"When Travis Lulay took over, you look at the turn in offensive output; that gives us confidence going into the season," he said.

— One of the key off-season dramas revolving around the team came at kicker, where the Lions had to make a decision between 41-year-old reigning team MVP Paul McCallum and rising talent Sean Whyte. For a while, it looked like youth might convince them to opt for Whyte, but they traded him to Montreal for a first-round pick just before this year's draft and chose Alberta Golden Bears kicker Hugh O'Neill 11th overall. Buono said McCallum's possibly in the best form of his career, so it was hard to justify getting rid of him; drafting O'Neill allows them to keep McCallum for now while developing a replacement for the future.

"Paul's the kind of guy that reacts well to coaching," Buono said. "He takes care of himself. Last year, he might have been as good as he was in 20 years."

— Another off-season issue came around the CFL's new contract rules, which require a minimum deal of one year with a team option for a second and no NFL window between the years. Buono said initially he thought that would keep some talent from heading north, but that hasn't been a large problem so far, as the Lions have found plenty of promising players interested in the CFL during their free-agent camps.

"We've not really had an issue with the length of the contract," he said. "That's not been a major issue, perhaps not as big as I'd thought."

— Buono said the release of star running back/returner Yonus Davis after drug charges were brought against him will impact the team, but they were already planning to bring in guys to compete with him. That's just become more of a focus now.

"It's unfortunate, but we already had a plan to bring in someone to compete for that position," Buono said. "The only difference is that now instead of bringing in one guy, we'll probably bring in four."

Last year saw a lot of new faces on the Lions, and Buono said young players trying to adapt to the league may have contributed to the team's early struggles.

"When the young guys came in, I think it took a while for them to understand what it takes," he said. "When the rookies and veterans started to see eye to eye, things started to go well for us."

Buono said he thinks the team's in a position to compete for the Grey Cup right now thanks to the development of their younger players, but those players are going to have to improve from where they were last year in order to find success.

"I definitely believe the transition is on target, but at the same time, the young guys have to take the next step," he said. "I believe our offence is going to be a lot stronger and I believe our quarterbacking's going to be a lot better than it was."

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Mattek-Sands wears eye black on court, is getting Lady Gaga dress

Bethanie Mattek-Sands to The Tennis Channel's Mary Carillo on why she wears eye black on the court:

I've actually tried playing in sunglasses, the first time I did it I actually whiffed a few volleys. I tried it with the sunscreen and zinc and that didn't run off with sweat. Believe it or not, the eye black actually does reduce the glare.

There's another reason the top-ranked American woman in Paris sports the baseball-style eye black when she steps onto the court. "I'm not going to lie," she told Carillo, "it is a little scary sometimes."

Just ask Arantxa Parra Santonja, who was up a set and a break on Sunday against Mattek-Sands and went on to lose the first-round match. Did it have anything to do with the two stickers under her opponents eyes? Almost certainly not, it was the product of a shift in aggressiveness for the American and a turn toward tentative and defensive play by the Spaniard. Mattek-Sands' game is intimidating enough over the past few weeks. Still, I can't help but think that the eye black helps, if only subliminally. Think of it like this: Assuming you're facing the No. 32 player in the world no matter what, would you rather see her with a ponytail and a polo shirt or looking like she's getting ready for the Super Bowl?

Next month, we may look back on Mattek-Sands' eye black as quaint. She told Carillo she already has plans for what she'll wear at the Wimbledon player party. It's a dress designed completely with materials made from tennis equipment. The guy making it is the same person who designs dresses for Lady Gaga.

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Alex Ferguson wishes he pulled Anfield banner prank himself

You might think that at this stage of his long and storied career, 69-year-old Sir Alex Ferguson's ideal celebration for Manchester United's record 19th title would be drinking a nice bottle of wine and having a quiet dinner with his loved ones. And if you think that you're incredibly wrong. He actually would've preferred to sneak into Anfield during Liverpool's match against Spurs, hang a banner that read "MUFC 19" and escape the city in a getaway car.

When asked about the Man United fans who did just that on Sunday, Sir Alex shared his fantasy (via the Guardian):

"I wish I had taken that banner to Liverpool on Sunday," Ferguson said. "I bet there were 76,000 fans wishing they had thought of that."

Sounds like someone has been talking to Jose Mourinho too much.

It would have been mind-blowing if Ferguson had actually taken part in the prank, though. He would've obviously needed some kind of disguise to get in the stadium undetected, so that alone would've been hilarious. Then if he was caught in the act, Liverpool fans probably would've been too shocked that it was actually him doing it to punish him. For about eight seconds.

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Fans cyber-squatting on the new NHL Winnipeg team name

On May 5, Jeff Malcovich made an unusual hockey purchase.

The former CBC Radio traffic reporter lives in Winnipeg, where the NHL's Atlanta Thrashers could be days away from relocating. The official name of the new Winnipeg franchise has been a subject of both debate and mystery since the move became a probability. So Malcovich decided to make an investment … as the owner of www.ManitobaThrashers.com.

According to the Winnipeg Sun, he dropped $30 for that URL and for MantiobaThrashers.ca, telling the paper, "I play on a beer league hockey team and we might change its name to the Thrashers, so it probably won't be a waste of money either way."

From the Sun, Malcovich isn't alone:

"I've been reading the news that the new team may be called the Falcons, so I decided to scoop it up before someone else did," said Stonewall resident Russ MacDougall, who bought FalconsHockey.net on May 20. "I guess it's like a lottery ticket."

MacDougall is hardly alone. A number of sites relating to the Falcons, Jets, Thrashers, and even Bears have been registered within the past few weeks as word has spread about the NHL's return.

As have Moose; check out what's on WinnipegMoose.com, an URL owned by Zago Creative.

As the paper points out, NHL team sites, with its full name followed by a dot-com, simply redirect to their NHL.com team pages. But it still could be valuable real estate for anyone who owns a URL with a variation of the Winnipeg team name … although one would expect True North to have taken care of such matters before the big reveal.

For the record: WinnipegJets.com looks like this and Winnipeg-Jets.com looks like this and WinnipegJets.ca looks like this … and while True North owns Moosehockey.com, something called CondoReady, LLC has owned Jetshockey.com since 1999.

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McEnroe wants Djokovic to break his season-opening win streak

A lot of you have problems with John McEnroe as a television analyst. I know because the one time I mentioned how much I like him in the booth my inbox flooded with the angry missives usually reserved for when I criticize Serena Williams.

Some of the antipathy stems from McEnroe's playing days when his status as the enfant terrible of tennis turned off many fans. Other people just don't like that he talks too much about himself and not enough about the match on the court.

Love him or hate him though, you can't deny that McEnroe doesn't show deference to the players of today's generation. While some athletes-turned-analysts like to think they played in the halcyon days of their respective sport (ESPN's Joe Morgan was famous for that), McEnroe is never shy about praising current players.

Witness his recent comments about Novak Djokovic's quest to break his record of 42-straight wins to open a tennis season. In them, McEnroe says that Djokovic has it harder than he did back in his day and expresses hope that the Serb will break the mark:

"The competition is much stiffer that it was in my day. The players are fitter and more of them are capable of winning tournaments than you had back in my day. What Djokovic is achieving at the moment is incredible, his confidence is sky-high. [I'd] very much like to see [him break my record]. Almost all of the records I set have been broken, and that's the way it goes in tennis."

There's a bit of a #humblebrag in there but, on the whole, McEnroe shows that even though he's a hothead on the court, he's level-headed off of it.

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Rays apologize to fans for Avril Lavigne’s obscene concert

Chill out, what ya yelling for?

That's the question that the embarrassed Tampa Bay Rays should have thrown back at Avril Lavigne after the punk rawker let loose some profanities during the team's summer concert series at Tropicana Field on Saturday night.

Instead the red-faced Rays just apologized directly to their fans in a statement on Sunday.

Said spokesman Rick Vaughn (via The Heater):

"The Rays demand profanity-free performances from all of our concert performers and we are extremely disappointed by the language used in last night's show. It is not consistent with the family-friendly atmosphere that Tropicana Field is known for."

So what was Lavigne yelling for? Was it because the native Canadian still has a soft-spot for her Blue Jays and the Rays lead them in the current AL East standings? Was she suffering from withdrawal from her normal mall habitat of Hot Topics and Orange Juliuses? Good guesses, but no.

In reality, her salty language was reportedly aimed at the fans who booed the technical difficulties that occurred during the singer's first song.

Between her swear words, Lavigne reportedly noted that live shows ? especially those at a "baseball stadium" ? have a tendency to feature a few glitches. As someone who suffered through George Thorogood's set after a Pittsburgh Pirates game last August, I can attest to that. (I also would have cheered anything that blocked Lavigne's music from being disseminated further, but that's just me.)

Still, Avril should have known better because this was a family atmosphere the Rays were paying her tor perform at. And it was filled with the very same families that Lavigne and her marketing companies have targeted over the past decade by being just the right kind of punk rawk dangerous (which is, to say, usually not dangerous at all).

Were words she uttered probably no worse than the kids in the expensive seats hear from the ballplayers on the field all the time? Probably not, but that still doesn't excuse refusing to drop even a quick "earmuffs!" before her tirade.

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