While I compose my “Best of 2011” list for our next visit together on January 10th, it occurs to me that I have to prepare for the advent of the Year of the Dragon with one final rant, one worthy of ending a triumphant year in sports and on a personal note for yours truly. This past week has offered up great stories – The Green Bay Packers’ quest for perfection finally came to an end as did the Colts’ dream of the Imperfect Season without Peyton Manning driving the chariot. Old-timer Dolphins, Buccaneers and Lions can now rejoice with their cases of pseudo-bubbly… your seasons of purity shall survive at least one more year in the public consciousness and we shall all be forced to endure more face-time with the idiotic Mercury Morris whose interviews these days make about as much sense as Chael Sonnen on Off The Record!

Photo: Contributed

Instead, with a nod to my beautiful and bilingual fiancée, Habs Fan and mother-of-my-child, I choose to end the year by tackling the firing of Jacques Martin by the Montreal Canadiens and the subsequent promotion of the talented Randy Cunneyworth from Assistant to Head Coach. It was a necessary move for a team that many feel is underachieving and even the casual observer could see that Martin’s defensive propensities had lost the belief of his team and the one-time adoration of the fanatical Bell Centre Fans. It was a move that in 29 other NHL cities would have been briefly questioned, rationally broken down on a pros and cons basis, applauded by the hockey insiders who recognize Cunneyworth as an up-and-comer and then moved safely to Page 6 of the Sports Section between the Want Ads for rodeo clowns and the ever-unhumerous Hagar comic strip.

Montreal, however, is not one of those 29 cities and Randy Cunneyworth, as unilingual as any Etobicoke, Ontarian can be, has about as much chance of getting a fair shake in that city as Plaxico Burress has of getting another gun license in New York. Given the chance, the Montreal press, buoyed by such Quebec Nationalist groups as Imperatif Francais and Mouvement Quebec Francais will have Cunneyworth and his English-only behind on the same train out of town as Martin, regardless of whether or not his appointment is able to energize a team who, only last week GM Pierre Gauthier thought could be turned around by the addition of the over-paid, under-talented, once-upon-a-time Tomas Kaberle. OK, take a second…breathe, breathe. Here’s a thought for the Montreal Press… before you decide and go all Steve Simmons on the coach and weep openly to the world that he’s not whispering sweet nothings in your ear about every coaching decision he chooses to make (I got your back Brian Burke on this one, I got your back) how about you give Monsieur Cunneyworth a chance to do his job. And while he is trying to get settled in at his new desk, acquaint himself with all his responsibilities and find ways to inspire his team for a meeting with the Champs at home on Monday night, turn your attention toward your thankfully bilingual GM and have him explain the off-season acquisition of Erik Cole. While you are putting his 22 Points in 33 Games in context also take the time to consider that the call-up of 1st Round pick Louis Leblanc, along with Darche and Desharnais makes for a grand total of 3 Quebec-born regulars in the starting line-up. It’s a different global game – even in Montreal.

Meanwhile back at the Nationalist clubhouses, the call has gone out from the powers-that-be that due to the recent promotion of He Who Speaks Only In Tongues, Canadiens Fans should now no longer indulge in the use of, or the purchase of…wait for it – Molson products – who of course own Les Habitants. My Spidey-senses started tingling at this point as I realized for the first time that these particular groups have perhaps fallen completely out of touch with any form of Quebec reality because asking for this form of devotion to the cause at Christmas time in La Belle Provence is akin to requesting that we name poutine the National Dish…actually wait, that’s not the worst idea! Apparently, Molson has ‘failed in its responsibility to protect and promote the language’ and although I agree that the culture of the Montreal Canadiens is unique I was unaware that an NHL hockey team had to factor such a grandiose requirement into its business model. Mind you, Al McNeil in 1971 was the last of the truly unilingual coaches to test the fire. Curious fact to contemplate – 20 of the Habs’ 23 Stanley Cups from the NHL era were won by English-first coaches…things that make you go hmmm.

Photo: Contributed

I have long been a believer that success has a tendency to breed forgetfulness and if Cunneyworth can somehow turn this team around he may be able to remove the dreaded ‘interim’ tag from the sign above his office door. If not, he has the added bonus, that no-one outside of Montreal is going to hold this failure against him. Maybe, we are best served at the end of 2011 to take a cue from Dr. John and ‘accentuate the positive’ and one needs only to look as far as the city of Winnipeg whose love affair with its adoptive son Teemu Selanne was beautifully celebrated this past week as “The Finnish Flash” enjoyed a Christmas season homecoming. There is little doubt in anybody’s mind that Teemu will be a first ballot Hall of Famer and that he should be traded to the Jets on the final day of his illustrious career so that he may retire on a one day contract in the city where he made his name.

To all, I wish you a politically correct Happy Holidays and a less so Merry Christmas. Enjoy the season, hug your loved ones, eat heartily and stay safe.