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Good morning, folks.
Thank goodness tonight’s Jets game starts at 7 p.m.
These late night starts are not only messing with my bedtime, but also our deadline.
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One of you sent me a note this week asking why there were no three stars or stats in Monday’s paper from the team’s win over the Canucks on Sunday night. What gives, you asked?
Here’s how this works, or in this case, doesn’t:
In order for us to have the right amount of time to print the paper and get it delivered to your door, we have a copy deadline each evening. The good folks who work in our press room have always been accommodating when it comes to holding the presses as much as they can for late sports events, but they also want us to limit the late pages to one or two, at the most.
In the first 18 Jets games of this season, six of them have been slated to start at 9 p.m. — and by the way, they never drop the puck at that time — and two more have had 8 p.m. game times.
While we have been able to get a story and a game summary into the paper for all those games, we have had to sacrifice our Afterburner and Player chirps features for the later-starting games. If it’s a Saturday night late start, we will often run the Afterburner in Monday’s paper. I suppose we could have also run Sunday night’s Afterburner in Tuesday paper. I’ll give that some thought — and of course would welcome your feedback.
Vancouver Canucks left wing Nils Hoglander (36) fights for control of the puck with Winnipeg Jets defenceman Neal Pionk (4) during the first period. (Jonathan Hayward / The Canadian Press)
Kudos as well to nighthawk Mike McIntyre — and on occasion young Jeff Hamilton — for staying up into the wee hours to get those stories filed for you.
Mike was telling me on Wednesday during our recording of our weekly podcast that he’s so wired after filing a report on those games — we give him all of 20-30 minutes! — that he’s not getting to sleep until 2:30 or 3 a.m. He mentioned he’s looking forward to an increased number of games versus the Leafs and Habs for two reasons: a) the start times out east will be more favourable to our deadlines; and b) the games should give us a better indication of just what kind of team the Jets actually are.
As we discuss in Jetcetera Episode 53: Prepare For Turbulence, the Jets are off to an impressive 11-6-1 start to their season, but 13 of those 18 games have come against non-playoff teams in Ottawa, Vancouver and Calgary. Now the real test begins, with 23 of the next 34 against Toronto, Edmonton and Montreal beginning tonight.
We also ramble on about the breakout performance from Pierre-Luc Dubois; Tiger Woods’ devastating car crash, Mike’s pitch to buy my currently unused golf clubs, and my latest hare-brained scheme to ditch my vehicle and travel by two wheels instead of four. Stay tuned.
Enjoy the game tonight folks, and as always you can reach me by replying to this mailing or by sending me an email here.
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