With international hockey in the rear view mirror it is time to exhale just a little.
Sure some sports fans are excited by the NFL playoffs, but that does not include yours truly, as my football of interest is played on this side of the 49th parallel and in summer.
Certainly there is lots of pro hockey and the Raptors working through their myriad of injuries in the NBA, plus the Saskatchewan Rush in the National Lacrosse League and even the Major Arena Soccer League sadly sans the folded Mississauga MetroStars, so it’s not that there isn’t anything to watch. But all four of the leagues noted are at mid-season, or earlier in terms of their schedules, so it’s not quite time to live and die with every game. It’s sort of the same as the world in general, the post-Christmas mid-January doldrums extending to sports.
While the DVR is still booked rather solid in terms of recording sports content to watch for late eve leisure, it is also a time I find myself delving back into places on the web such as YouTube in search of some new, weird, unusual, fringe, different sport to see if they can make my ‘enjoy watching list’.
It has been on such excursions over the years that I have found the aforementioned MASL, as well as pro ultimate which are both solidly top-10 team sports to watch in my world. I am sure some scoff at the idea of a sports list extending to 10, but in team sports alone one can quickly amass a list of 30-plus so there are a multitude of choices out there is one digs just a little.
The problem becomes finding content online that is somewhat current, or a certain quality to make it worth watching, and then ultimately with English commentators. It is possible to mute sound and simply watch, but after a half century of being trained to watch TV sports with commentary, it is a difficult habit to shake.
Which brings me a sport such as bandy, a game that has my interest, come on, it’s basically hockey played on an iced-over soccer pitch, but finding games to watch has proven a challenge, making it hard for my general interest to grow beyond curiosity.
There are professional bandy leagues in countries such as Sweden and Finland, which is not surprising given their climates and interest in winter sports in general, but it does create a language barrier, and easy online access to games. It’s not that I am opposed to paying a reasonable fee to watch online content which is of interest, the NLL and AUDL being examples, but I was well aware I liked both box lacrosse and ultimate before e-transferring a fee to watch games.
It certainly seems to me that bandy should be a sport Canada is more involved with than it is at present, but becoming a true fan is proving harder than most sports I have discovered. The trek will continue, and should I find success, I will no doubt share it in the future.
For now maybe I need to look into some kabaddi.
