Cuphead Deals With The Devils (Among Others)

With the All-Star break in hockey, I thought it would be a good time to look at a concept I'd wondered about. The history of hockey is kind of weird because there were so few teams for so long: We're told that certain teams are really great because of all the Stanley Cups they won, but many of those were in the original-six era, when you just had to beat five other teams. You would actually have better odds of winning a cup then, than you do of winning a division now.

So I devised a game to test the accumulated achievement of each franchise. Instead of counting how many cups each team has won, I counted how many teams they defeated to win their cups. In other words, each cup is worth points; specifically, one point for every other team in the league at the time. So a cup win in the original-six era is worth 5 points, while last year's win for Vegas was worth 31 points.

Here are the results (not counting non-NHL teams that won in the early years):

Rank	Team	Total Teams Defeated
1	Montreal Canadiens	231
2	Detroit Red Wings	147
3	Pittsburgh Penguins	128
4	Chicago Blackhawks	107
5	Edmonton Oilers	100
6	Tampa Bay Lightning	89
7	Colorado Avalanche	85
8	New Jersey Devils	81
9	New York Islanders	80
10	Boston Bruins	74
11	Toronto Maple Leafs	63
12	Los Angeles Kings	58
13	New York Rangers	48
14	Philadelphia Flyers	32
15	Vegas Golden Knights	31
16	St. Louis Blues	30
16	Washington Capitals	30
18	Anaheim Ducks	29
18	Carolina Hurricanes	29
20	Dallas Stars	26
21	Calgary Flames	20
23	Ottawa Senators (original)	14
24	Montreal Maroons	13

So what does this prove?

• The Habs still come out on top. While many of their wins were for just five, the sheer number of them, combined with their many cups in the seventies, gave them an easy win.
• The big beneficiaries were teams that won multiple cups post-1980 for twenty-odd points each. Pittsburgh and Edmonton were vaulted past most of the original-six teams, while Chicago has esteem they never used to have. That fits with how someone my age sees the league: the prestige of those franchises outweighs the prestige given to original-six teams merely for being old.
• Unsurprisingly, the big losers were the Maple Leafs. Only two of their cups scored more than five points, and they were from before the original-six era. Thus, they fell behind Tampa, Colorado, and New Jersey. Having said that, a single win now would push them past all those teams.
• The Rangers did better than you might expect. Yes, they've only won once in the past eighty years, but their three cups in the early years were before original-six, when there were more teams.

The Stylus Counsel

I have an iPad, and I've been interested in buying a stylus for it. (That’s the pen-like thing you can draw on the screen with.) Of course, Apple will gladly sell you one, but like most of their accessories, it's shockingly overpriced. I realize it has a lot of impressive technology, and it works quite well, but still, it is a pen that costs $130. Well, it doesn't even have ink, it really is just something to touch the screen with. So even worse, it's a stick that costs $130.

But I'm not going to rant about Apple products being overpriced; everyone knows about that. What I'm finding frustrating is trying to find a reasonably-priced alternative. 

I'm amazed at how bad people are at giving advice. it sounds simple: I’m looking for a cheaper alternative. Yes, I know that means compromising on features. I’m looking for a balance of features and price. That shouldn't be so complicated; it's what people have been doing for years.

But every comparison article just tells you that the Apple pen is the best. Really? The most expensive option is the best? Next you're going to tell me that the Bugatti Chiron is superior to a Kia Rio. And yes, I do understand everything in car analogies; after all, it did make this easier to understand the basic point that in more mature industries, we understand these concepts. But for some reason, the tech industry approaches the situation with the simplistic attitude of a five-year-old. 

You’d think there would be at least some discussion of whether the superior features are worth the extra money compared to buying a Chinese knockoff from Amazon. And I did find a lot of discussions in which people ask the seemingly-obvious question: What's a cheaper alternative to the Apple pencil. And so often the advice from other people is to buy the Apple pencil anyway, because it's worth it.

I think there's a couple of problems here. One is that there's very little understanding of financial realities. A lot of people can afford to spend a hundred dollars on a luxury, so it's not a big deal to spend that to get the best available option. But there are also a lot of people that can't spare a hundred dollars. If you're in that boat then telling you that it's the best option is not a real justification for buying the hundred-dollar stick, even if it is the best.

Also, I've noticed for a while now that techy people are really not good at giving advice on which products are best for others. Specifically, the problem is that they're bad at understanding another person's requirements and adjusting their priorities accordingly. They'll always recommend  the most sophisticated, powerful, configurable option, because that's what they would want. That's why your nerdy cousin convinced your tech-phobic aunt that Linux would be just perfect for her. I've seen the same pattern repeated over and over through the years and across different market segments. Just be glad they don't recommend buying a Koenigsegg Gemera because of the cool valve technology. Oh, there I go again.

Anyway, I did buy a much cheaper stylus from a company I hadn't heard of, after I did find some reviews that said it wouldn't be that bad, I guess. And so far, it seems to be the reasonable compromise I was looking for. But no, this doesn't mean I'm buying my next car from an anonymous online company.

It’s Time (Travel) For Tims

Tim Hortons is advertising retro donuts. That is, they're bringing back some of the old donut styles, for a limited time only.

On the one hand, that's nice. I miss dutchies too. On the other hand, this relates to a big part of why public opinion has turned against them in recent years: the selection is nowhere near what it used to be - it seems like every time you go in, there's one less thing on the menu. On the other hand, there will be some bizarre item that wasn’t there last time and won’t be there next time. These retro donuts are just the latest in the dizzying sequence of temporary specials.

I assume their strategy of recent years is to reduce the selection of available products to the bare minimum for efficiency's sake. They then compensate for the lack of variety by having the endless stream of temporary features. Hopefully you won't notice the jelly Timbits are gone if you're distracted by the new Chili Lasagne Bowls. But now the irony is that they're distracting us from the poor selection with the old selection.

I can understand why a company would want to restore some of what customers used to like about them. But being a temporary feature, it feels like a bit of a tease. “Hey remember how great it was when we had a wide variety of products? And you used to like us, not just tolerate us? That was pretty nice. Anyway, time's up! Next month’s feature is Chipotle Omelette Balls. Enjoy!”

I'm trying to imagine which other Canadian companies could restore what people used to like about them. Hudson Bay has already been having occasional pop-up Zellers stores, which is a similarly odd strategy of acknowledging what people used to like about the company, but without actually committing to it. I also remember Muchmusic had a daily retro video show a few years back, but even that’s gone now. Also, there’s quite a few companies like Sears where I’d say, it would be great if they’d go back to existing.

So enjoy the retro donuts while you can, and eat as many as your arteries will allow. If they sell well, maybe they’ll make a return, soon, and bring some of the extinct Timbit varieties with them. Until then, enjoy the Tuscan Sausage Dumplings.

Mamma Mea Culpa

About a year ago, I wrote about the struggles of the Vancouver Canucks, and their ham-handed handling of a midseason coaching change. I complained that while hockey pundits were critical of the team, they didn't do enough to call out the team's institutional incompetence. I also insinuated that new coach Rick Tocchet was a downgrade who was only getting the job through connections with management.

Well, boy do I look stupid now; the Canucks have the second best record in the league. And now I see that Tocchet is far and away the favourite to win coach of the year.

So I decided to go back through my sports articles to see if there were any more embarrassing proclamations I should admit to.

Weep, The North

I talked about the Raptors predicament in 2017, in which they were a good team that didn't appear to have any chance of winning a championship. This was partly due to a lack of superstar talent on the team. And that discussion became a jumping-off point into the philosophy of sports fandom.

But it turned out that journey into sport existentialism was a little premature. Just over a year after that post, the Raptors took advantage of an awkward situation in San Antonio to trade Demar Derozan for Kawhi Leonard, then took advantage of a banged-up Warriors team in the final, and won an unexpected title. So although the deep discussion of the philosophical and psychological purpose of sports fandom is intriguing, it turns out the Raptors weren't as mired in hopelessness as it seemed.

Also bonus marks for my comment that the Leafs might be blocked from winning a Stanley Cup by, "a dynasty developing in Edmonton." For a start, the Leafs current problem is being blocked from getting out of their own division; running into a good team in the finals is a bridge they’ll cross if they ever come to it. And then Edmonton seems cursed by a similar inability to build into contender status.

Of Goats And Men

I mostly stand behind this discussion of the difficulty in naming the best players in various sports. Just keep in mind that it was written back when Brady could still wear all his Superbowl rings on one hand. But it does fall back on the idea that Bill Belichick made Tom Brady look better than he was. And now that we’ve seen each of them without the other, that sounds pretty stupid.

Mighty Vocal People 

In a discussion of how we determine who gets Most-Valuable-Player awards, I argued that the support for Mike Trout was based on the lazy notion that he was the overall best player, rather than best that season, and the award would really go to Mookie Betts. You guessed it, Trout was named MVP. But I will point out that Betts had a better batting average, home run, and RBI numbers than Trout.

Minor Obstacles

I talked about the controversy at the start of Kris Bryant's career, as the Chicago Cubs were waiting a couple of weeks to call him up to the majors, in order to take advantage of a loophole in the rules that would force Bryant to stay with the team an extra year. I then went over a humourous preview of the career ahead of him, in order to ridicule the odd path many major league careers go through.

But his career didn't really go that way. Obviously, I never considered the posibility that he and the Cubs would actually win the World Series. I think I can be forgiven for that. But the rest of the preview was based on him following the money to big market teams. Unfortunately, injuries have curtailed his effectiveness, and he instead signed with the Colorado Rockies, usually one of Major League Baseball's small spenders. That's unfortunate for him, and makes my prediction look silly. However I stand behind the point I was making: That the weird business of baseball makes for odd, circuitous careers, so complaining about a small loophole is a waste of time.

There's No Nation Like Donation

Universities will often go to alumni looking for donations, which has become a little awkward. I'm sure it made sense in my parents' generation, when tuition was low and education was undertaken in a spirit of enlightenment.

But today's grads look at it differently. Obviously, many are held back by the fact that they're asked for a donation while still paying down student debt. But even if debt isn’t holding them back, university plays a different part in our lives now.

Today, it's more of a business proposition.  The university may not be making a profit on education, but it is charging as much as it can while still remaining a sensible value proposition, much a products on the free market are. Tuition is an investment, that — while expensive — will pay off in the long term. Once you’ve paid a huge amount of money as an expensive long term business investment, You’re less likely to think of that institution as a charity.

It would be like if you bought a car, and it's a really nice car, and you're glad you bought it. But then a year later the car company phones you to ask if you'd care to give them more money. It's like, yes, I like the car, but I paid fair market value for it, so I assumed that was the end of the transaction. It’s not something I think about donating to.

There's lots of things that ask for donations today. I mean, Wikipedia is one biggest ones. It's such an unusual institution to begin with: a widely-used resource that doesn't make a profit or get government grants. So I don’t have any automatic assumptions about giving to it.

In sharp contrast to the University situation, Wikipedia is an institution that you've never given money to through payment for services or through taxes. So its donation requests are unusual: usually charitable giving is purely altruistic, given to a service that others — less-fortunate people — will use. It's not too often that you’re asked to donate for your own sake. The closest parallel is a busker, but you generally don’t choose your buskers. Okay, maybe a better parallel would be a museum with a “recommended donation,” which is kind of what the Wikipedia donation request/guilt-trip is.

(To be clear, I’m not comparing Wikipedia to a University education. I’m aware that the latter is necessarily a lot more expensive than the former)

And now, at this time of the rolling year, many institutions are asking for donations. Not just charities, but also open-source software, and public radio & TV. It’s a reminder of how our world has developed a lot of “free” options that nevertheless need to pay the bills, and non-mainstream media tastes will make it more likely you’ll encounter them. It makes me wonder if this is going to be a viable way of keeping things operating in the future: A labour of love that stays afloat with donations. It’s an odd idea, because we think of donations as going to the less fortunate, in a situation where users of the service are in no position to contribute. But now we’re talking about users paying for their own service, but voluntarily, and hoping that the donations from the wealthy or extra-generous will offset those who can’t or won’t contribute. 

Will it work in the long term? I’m skeptical, though some open-source software has been sustained for a while now with a combination of volunteering and semi-self-interested donations from people and corporations. So maybe it can work.

Only in Blogs

I always used to hate it, years ago, when movie ads would end by saying, "only in theatres!" I was like, Geez, what else would it be? Movies open in theatres, then come out on video months later; that’s the way of the world. How hard is that to understand? But of course, you know they have to say that because there's that one person who would try going to Blockbuster expecting to rent the big movie that just came out that weekend.

I know that sounds weird, but we've all met that one person who just doesn't understand how the world works, even if they've lived in it all their lives. You know, the one who tries to order a Big Mac at Burger King, and is genuinely surprised and angry that they can’t get one.

It would be convenient if there was a name for such a person, like the way we decided that “Karen” would mean self-important complainers. That made it easy for all of us to have a simple name to refer to the concept, even if it did poison the name and lead to prejudice against thousands of innocent people. Maybe for this concept, we should choose a name that's already fallen out of favour. How about Millicent? It’s a rare name, so whatever anger they have over this will be offset by the fact that we're mentioning them.

Anyway, that's why the "only in theatres" line bothered me: the ignorance that it was coddling. I mean, I try to be patient of ignorance, but in this case it's a kind of wilful ignorance. To misunderstand the world so badly, you must be ignoring everything around you. And advertisers were just encouraging it. It would be like airlines placating Flat-Earthers by guaranteeing that none of their flights would go near the edges of the earth.

Though really, I suppose the “only in theatres” line wasn’t to protect the ignorant consumers from wasting their time at Blockbuster, so much as to protect the movie studio from irrational complaints from Millicents disappointed they couldn’t rent the movie hours after its release. And in the process, they’re also protecting that poor kid working for Blockbuster who would have to explain the logistics of the movie industry to angry customers. Customers who probably also thought they could use their Subway Club card to rent at Blockbuster.

But what really bugs me is that today the ads have to specify, "only in theatres," because they might actually be making a major release on streaming services. Sure, it’s convenient that there are so many ways to distribute movies today, but I feel like the simpletons won.

But another way of looking at this is that however complex the world of the 90’s used to seem to these people, that’s how complex the world has actually become. The world was inevitably bewildering to a person who thought they could buy something at Kmart and then return it for their money back at Sears. But now, that’s how complex the world is even to normal people. Today, we are all Millicent.

What A Show, Eh?

See, if the Blue Jays had succeeded in signing Shoehi Ohtani, then that headline is the pun we’d all be getting tired of. Aren’t you glad we dodged that bullet? No, me neither.

It's been a weird offseason for the Blue Jays. It started with a sense of doom:  The team has kind of painted itself into a corner: Several players have expiring contracts, and the team’s offence needs improvement, but there isn’t a lot of offence available in this year’s free-agent class. There was a sense that there was little to look forward to.

Then, unexpectedly, the Jays made a major push to sign Shohei Ohtani. This is a team that has rarely gone after the top free agents, and then they go after the biggest free agent ever. Even though the contract was expected to be at least three times the biggest contract the Jays had ever signed. Nevertheless, as the rumour mill’s list of suitors dwindled, and the Blue Jays slowly rose to the top of the list of potential destinations.

And then, suddenly, it was over. It was like reality reasserted itself, and Ohtani signed with the Dodgers just as everyone expected. Of course, it's entirely possible that the chances of his signing with the Jays was always remote, and it was exaggerated to drive the final price up. For Jays fans it was doubly a let down, missing out on Ohtani, and him signing with a super-rich team, as if to emphasize that fantasy time was over now. Okay, it was refreshing that it wasn’t a super-rich team in the Jays’ division for once. I heard some people suggest that Ohtani’s contract decision was a missed marketing opportunity for Major League Baseball, and they should have made it into a televised spectacle, like LeBron James' first free agency. But it seems to me that would be a disappointment, seeing as the result was so predictable.

(And fittingly, my first attempt to spell Shohei was autocorrected to "Sorry")

The whole experience was very strange, and I'm not sure how to describe it. It was like we jumped into an alternate universe, then got pulled back to reality. The effect was similar to watching this video, which hinges on the odd fact that Tom Brady was drafted by the Montreal Expos:

Unfortunately, the timelines of that alternate reality don't quite line up, since Larry Walker left as a free agent a few months before the Expos drafted Brady. But that's part of the experience I'm trying to describe: surreal dreaming, and now back to a dull reality where you realize that dream wasn’t really possible. But after being allowed to dream, it seems extra depressing. 

On a practical level, the Blue Jays are back in the predicament that began the offseason. But on an emotional level, this incident contributes to a long-running frustration for Jays fans: we'd just like to know what type of team we have. There are big-spending teams like the Yankees and Dodgers, cheap teams like the Rays or Royals; some teams spend strategically, like the Cardinals, and some spend wildly, like the Mets. The Jays, on the other hand, seem to jump between personalities. 

They spent big in the World Series years, then turned into a small-market team for a couple of decades. That was at least predictable. Since then, it's been a crap shoot. They might spend big, or not. They might try patiently building a team of talented youngsters. Or they might go after the biggest free agent in the history of sports. I just wish we could adjust our expectations.