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Sports Talk: A Russian love story in every sense

Because this is a thing in 2018. Chris Christie, the outgoing governor of the state of New Jersey, signed dozens of new laws into existence on his final day in office, Jan. 15. One of them dealt with drunken droning. I kid you not.

He signed a bill making it illegal to operate a drone if the person's blood alcohol content is above the legal limit of .08 milligrams, similar to drunk driving. I'm sure I can warm to the idea but for now, I'll laugh at it. Plus, Christie is gone and not a moment too soon.

On to something else that can be laughed at:

Boys will be boys

The next time you get invited to a team dinner involving players from Avangard Omsk, take either a bodyguard or protective padding.

The Russian hockey team, which plays in the Kontinental Hockey League, hosted a team dinner earlier this month and, for some reason, two of the team's players, Andrei Stas and Mikhail Fisenko, went at it right in the dining room. The only video of the incident was provided by Aivis Kalnins, a journalist based in Russia, and it appears to show a dispute involving a woman – maybe a wife of one of the players – and she's upset about something. My Russian ain't what it used to be so I'm not sure why she's losing her crap.

Next thing we see is Fisenko and Stas duking it out. According to Kalnins, it was so one-sided that Stas had to be tended to by paramedics after getting the formaldehyde – and some amount of blood – beat out of him by Fisenko. All of this took place in front of children, even, which is absolutely unacceptable.

Why they fought is still a mystery but I'm fairly certain the team's management has looked into this and will make sure these two aren't invited to any more team dinners. If they are, put them at the kids table because that's how they acted.

Maybe some steam to this?
Seems the International Olympic Committee likes what it sees in Calgary as a potential host city for the 2026 Winter Olympics. So much so that the world's largest operating contradiction paid the 1988 Winter Olympics host city a visit earlier this month.

This is a panorama view of the Olympic Oval in Calgary, the venue for long-track speedskating at the 1988 Winter Olympics. If the International Olympic Committee comes to its senses and allows for host cities to use existing infrastructure, this would be a perfect venue for the event again. photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Now, we all know that the IOC has had trouble in recent times trying to get cities outside of dictatorships, both hard and soft, to bid on hosting the 16-day festival of glad-handing, prawn-sandwich-eating, royalty-meeting and king-making with some semblance of sport thrown in so as not to confuse the locals.

And it would appear that the IOC is listening to the throngs of people who have told it that no, we don't need to build shrine-like temples or architectural what-the-hell-is-that-supposed-to-be-type facilities only to sit in ruin after it's all over. Take a look at what facilities in Athens, Greece look like now after the 2004 Summer Olympics.

Christoph Dubi, the IOC's executive director/chief spinner, suggested after his visit to Cowtown that the IOC is ready to reduce the financial burden on cities by easing up on must-haves such as seating requirements for venues and allowing other jurisdictions to become involved in hosting along with using existing infrastructure for events.

While I'm all for that, I still have a hard time believing it took the IOC this long to realize it. Not everyone has $51 billion laying around like Russia had for the 2014 Winter Olympics, nor can they compete with Beijing's seemingly bottomless pit for the 2022 Winter Olympics. Calgary makes sense simply because everything is there already and the city has struck an exploratory committee.

I hope this goes through because it's easier to sell people on a retrofit than on brand new.

Screw this guy … screw him to the board

Larry Nasser (no, I won't call him a doctor because he's scum of the highest order) is going to jail. His crime? Sexually assaulting nearly 140 women and girls while he was the team doctor for USA Gymnastics from 1986 to his retirement in 2015. He copped a plea deal and will serve jail time for seven counts of sexual assault.

The stories are heartbreaking and I will spare you the details but this anal orifice had the nerve to do something everyone – including myself – is rightly stomping on his scrotum for. It seems Nasser had a hard time listening to the victim impact statements that were being delivered and wrote the judge, Rosemarie Aquilina, to tell her about how it's "mental cruelty" to make him listen to them – all 105 of them. Uncertainty in "my ability to be able to face witnesses these next four days, mentally," he blubbered.

Well, then … let's get this man a blanket and some warm milk because obviously, he's the victim here. It's a shame I can't use the type of language I want to use (decorum, as you know, prohibits me as such) but you get the idea. The best part of the entire court proceeding was when Aquilina read aloud the part of the plea agreement which said, in part:

"The defendant agrees to allow all victims or their parents to give victim impact statements at the defendant's sentencing hearing …"

So yeah, he had to sit through them all. Every single one. And I really don't give a fiddler's fart about Nasser's mental state because he didn't seem to care about the mental and physical state that he left these women in. If you have the stomach, listen to the statement given by Kyle Stephens. That tells you all you need to know about this monster.

And so in honour of this dirtbag, here's Good Idea, Bad Idea:

Good Idea: Larry Nasser being stuffed in a jail cell for the rest of his life.

Bad Idea: Larry Nasser playing himself out to be the victim.

Until next time, folks... rot in hell, Larry Nasser.