Given my recent football tourism to Nebraska (see: trip recap) and then Oregon (see: trip recap), I've been thinking about the notion of sports towns... both those that people are from and those that I would like to visit.
Sports Towns: Home
Let's think first about hometowns in relation to sports. In the most recent Sports Illustrated, there's a profile on Boston Red Sox outfielder Jason Bay written by Lee Jenkins. In the piece, Bay's hometown of Trail, B.C. is described as an 8,000 factory town (or at least when Bay was growing up) with more than it's fair share of athletic (see: hockey) prodigies... "at least 10 current and former NHL players" to date.
This is all conjecture of course, but I would imagine that Trail is the type of town where almost all the local kids play sports (again, likely hockey first and foremost) and then the town pays a great deal of attention as kids reach into their teens and the best players start to emerge. This type of town wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea, of course, but as a dedicated hockey fan, I think it would be a lot of fun to raise a family there (keeping in mind of course the need for a touch of levity around the fact that it's still just a game).
Sports Towns: Away (Tourism)
Pretty much everything written above is about the idea of growing up in a town like Trail, but as I think of my aforementioned college football road trips, I think about the idea of a hockey road trip... one that would visit arenas in these outposts of the game.
Having visited Quebec City during Winter Carnival (but, sadly... after the Nordiques left town), I've seen the passion that people in Canada have for hockey and would love to experience it firsthand.
Might have to look at planning such a trip...
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1 comment:
Your quote of "I've seen the passion that people in Canada have for hockey and would love to experience it firsthand." kinda contradicts a previous quote of "(keeping in mind of course the need for a touch of levity around the fact that it's still just a game)."
As you well know, hockey is simply not just a game in Canada. Looking back when Gretzky was traded from Edmonton, was complete travesty.
Out of Oilerheritage.com:
"Edmonton's Saddest Hockey Day—The Gretzky Trade".
And stated:
After he retired from the game in 1999, Gretzky admitted that every Edmonton homecoming was difficult.
"It was the only place I dreaded playing as an opponent," he said during his jersey retirement ceremony in 1999.
One of the other greatest moments in Canadian history is when the Canadians won the gold in 2002 after a 50 year drought. It was pretty much imperative they win. If they had not, it would have been a Canadian Depression.
Later,
Peter Pickett
Anchorage, Alaska
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