From Cork to Toronto

The CBC's sports department is a rapidly shrinking animal given the loss of the Olympics, curling and CFL football so it is interesting that the Blue Jays are in talks with CBC to either have them replace TSN as secondary carrier of Jay games or to do so in addition to TSN, the current contract holder. Due to the mutual parentage of the Jays and Sportsnet under the Rogers corporate tent, the primary contract is not up for grabs. In NBA news - when Toronto got its 27th win last year it was April 15 and they had lost 55 games. This year they have lost 23 and are 9-1 in the last ten after their defeat of Kobe Bryant and the rest of the Lakers . As for the Leafs - after last night Nashville is still the only NHL team never to lose to Toronto, albeit over the short history of the franchise. This is a big sporting weekend for me, tomorrow morning will be spent watching United and Sunday morning (10am EST) the historic first international rugby game at Croke Park against France - an...

I have been been unkind to Toronto's NBA team in the past but the city's newspapers are perking up to the recent run of form which culminated with last night's win over Atlanta, giving Sam Mitchell and Company 24 wins and 23 losses (0.511). After November's controversy over the Atlanta scoreboard operator in one of two losses to the Hawks, the location of win 24 must have been satisfying. This result gives them a thin but growing lead of two games over Vince Carter's Nets at the top of the Northeast Division. It's been five seasons since they had a winning record at this point in the season. It was also extremely unlikely back in November when Sam Mitchell's position must have been somewhat shaky. December began the turnaround with the blog " Pink Slip Sam " dormant since the 10th of that month. It's difficult to get too enthusiastic - still only two games up and their record would be only enough for third at best in any of the other fi...