– I honestly can’t believe how much I miss the NHL, I’m a Bruins fan, but more importantly i’m a fan of the NHL. It’s upsetting to all sports fans when greed takes a hold of both sides. The NHL was down and out for a while. They lost their ESPN coverage, which is huge, they were surviving on  the vs. channel and occasionally an NBC game. a few years ago someone over at NHL headquarters the tremendous idea to play hockey outside on new years day. Wow! was that a game changer, who could forget the Bruins playing the Philadelphia Flyers at Fenway. It was awesome to watch. This years game was supposed to be the Detroit Red Wings vs. the Toronto Mapleleafs outdoors at the Michigan football stadium, which holds 100,000 people. More importantly Hockey on new years day was beginning to be thought of as football on Thanksgiving. I certainly hope they resolve this dispute. Heck, make a call to Bob Kraft, that guy is the king deal maker.

Wanna know how I keep up with the matches and ever miss even a single playoff? click here to find all the answers.

Now that you know how I keep up with all the matches, lets get back into the game.

-The Patriots are playing the Houston Texans tonight on Monday night football. All of the so called “experts” have been saying all season long that the Texans are the best team in football. This should be a great game, but please don’t believe the hype that this will determine anything about the playoffs. It’s just a regular season game. I still remember losing to the St. Louis Rams towards the end of the 2000 season, and we all know how that worked out in the super bowl. Or better yet, when we went 16-0 in the regular season. Unfortunately, we will never forget what happened then. So, just enjoy the game. Win or lose, it will be up to our defense on how far we go in the playoffs.

-The Celtics are moving in the right direction.They have a championship caliber team and we will get Avery Bradley back this week. Avery may not be a household name but trust me, he’s a big part of this team going forward. We all know about Pierce, Garnett and Rondo, but Jeff Green is playing great right now. Don’t forget he had heart surgery a year ago. Danny Ainge is becoming one of the best GM’s in all of sports. The true test for Danny will be when Pierce and Garnett retire, but i’m pretty confident the celts won’t have another 20 year drought.

-If you think it’s getting cold out there, try to remember it’s only 63 more days until spring training.

-A big Dot Rat congratulations goes out to Tom and Gisele on the birth of their daughter Vivian. The little bundle of joy is now, as Warren Buffett once said, part of the lucky sperm club.

– Lastly, when you’re out Christmas shopping spending ridiculous amounts of money on everything. Try to remember the less fortunate out there. Sadly to say, but their will be kids who wake up Christmas morning with out anything. So try to give a few bucks to a charity, or buy a toy and donate it to your local church. It’s the right thing to do. By all means enjoy your holiday’s everyone, spread your cheer, be happy but most of all call a cab or have a friend drive if you’ve been drinking.