Trade Deadline Day

So it was trade deadline day for the NHL - otherwise (and more properly known) as Gary Bettman's Totallty Unfair Jim Hating League. The GBTUJHL. And a couple of hours into the day, when it looked like the Hamilton Phoenix Coyotes were going to stand pat and not make any trades, I had my communicatons "counsultants" burning up the phone lines to the media outlets all across Canada. Every sports writer, editor, bingo caller and broadcaster heard the same message:

"Can you believe what the NHL is doing to the team in Phoenix? They are supposed to be competing like any other team but with the NHL funding the show it is obvious they aren't allowing the team to make any trades. They are more concerned about the dollars than how the franchise competes, their ownership is a joke. Just a slap in the face of the so-called 'fans' there, that's what it is."

And, like the good minions and chattels they are, the cream of the Canadian sports media started working on righteous and indignant stories about the evil GBTUJHL and how they were making a mockery of the game.

Which made it a real pisser when that fuck Maloney turned out to be actually making trades to make the Coyotes better, and they started coming across the wire less than an hour later. What to do?

What do you think I did? I had my loyal minions get back on the phones and dial up each and every one of the hacks they had called earlier in the day:

"Can you believe what the NHL is doing to the team in Phoenix? They are supposed to be caring for this franchise and keeping the expenses to a minumum, but they let the team use NHL money to make all these trades. They are more concerned about their league image than the dollars, their ownership is a joke. Just a slap in the face of the so-called 'fans' there, that's what it is."

Now you might laugh. You might think that the sports media in Canada wouldn't be that pathetic and that eager to please. You might think one of them would call me out on this obvious two-faced bullshit.

And you, my friend, would be wrong. Newspapers and radio stations across the country parroted that second phone call, falling for it hook like and sinker, and completely ignored the contradictory first phone call, just like they were told to. Don't believe me? Do a search - you will not have to look very far before you start coming across some of the articles in question.

Any why are the august members of the Canadian sports media so eager to please me? So eager to be my sad little lackeys and dupes? Listen for yourself:



It's amazing what you can do with a few shitty phones with a Canadian flag decal and the words "This is our game" slapped on the back.

Honestly, this shit is just too easy.

Why We Don't Care About The "Tablet"

Stupid people keep bothering me at my speaking engagements. This is a pisser to begin with - I am not there to talk to common rabble or interact with you and your stupid employees and/or delegates, I am there to get my large fee, read a few quotes that I cribbed off the back of those Starbucks cups, and get the hell out. But it has been even more annoying lately because these people who seem to think I actually want to talk to them are also thinking that I care one way or the other about Apple's upcoming "tablet" dealie.

Listen up, stupids. I'll explain this once, and once only, and I will use small words and simple sentences so even people from Hamilton can understand it: We don't care about any wonderful product that Apple may or may not announce and that may or may not change the way people think about computing. It might be the greatest thing since sliced pizza, it might cure cancer ... we don't care. It won't affect our business one bit.

The key word in the previous paragraph is "think". We don't care about and we don't pander to people who think. We sell Blackberries to robots and drones - corporate morons who do and believe whatever they read in their glossy little copies of "Management Today" and "Technology Review" and whatever other magazines we keep on our payroll at any given time. A long time ago we realized that the easiest way to make a lot of money with not a lot of effort was to target bottom-of-the-barrel products directly at stupid people. Think of it as Jim's Law:

There are a lot more stupid people than smart ones, and they have just as much money.

Sure, the iPhone is awesome. Hell, I use one myself - it beats the fuck out of anything we make for virtually every single task. But stupid people can't figure that out for themselves, and as long as we continue to buy off writers and editors in the kinds of magazines that inept managers turn to as gospel, it will never ever matter. The magazines say "only the Blackberry can serve the email needs of the enterprise" and the kinds of morons who either have MBA or MCSE after their names repeat it like a mantra. Hell, "email needs of the enterprise" means absolutely nothing, and these dummies are too stupid to even see that. With all those lemmings out there buying our crap in droves, why should we spend dollar one on any sort of usability or performance or UI improvements? Our core audience and biggest market share can't tell the difference between "good" and "total crap" so why not just milk it?

It's like we are the Toronto Maple Leafs of technology. We sell dismal and outdated crap to stupid people, and they cheer us for it! Is there any wonder that I wanted a hockey team in Ontario?

Hell, even the Storm was a complete joke. Sure, it had a touch screen, but it still used the same crappy UI and the same crappy apps that we had all along. It only ever saw the light of day to get up some press when all anyone was reading was "iPhone this" and "iPhone that". We wanted ink and air time, but we never cared - and still don't care - if we even sold a dozen of the damn things. We just needed to get our names in the paper.

So am I worried about the Apple tablet/thingie/whatever? No, not in the least. My only worry about it is that I might not be able to get one for myself on the first day. And that I can't find a way to hide it when I am in public.

Coming Clean About Doug MacLean

There are a lot of people who are accusing me of not telling the whole story on the Doug MacLean hiring. They say that I could have hired any retard - say, someone off the street in Hamilton - to make sure the team sucks, why choose that blowhard MacLean?

Okay, I admit it. There was more to the hiring than meets the eye. Yes, I wanted a complete tool who would be sure to make the team into a bunch of losers - and to be frank, you are more likely to do that with MacLean than with some moron off the street. Hell, that moron could turn out to be some sort of hockey savant, right? But the rest of the reason for hiring MacLean was this: I wanted to prove that anyone can be bought. In the immortal words of Ted DiBiase, "everyone has a price".

Don't believe me? Check out this audio clip of Doug MacLean on the radio a couple of months ago accusing me of being a raving asshole and out to destroy the NHL:



And now he is working for me. Pretty good, eh? Like I said - anyone can be bought. Judges, media, lawyers, even an jerkoff like MacLean.

Oh - in case you were wondering, you heard correctly there - the host of the radio show pronounced my name "balls-lie". So yes, he was bought and paid for too. It's good to be me.

In The Bathroom With Gary

So I ended up in the can at the same time as that twisted little gnome Bettman today. And it reminded me of something that happened to me back in university.

McMaster was playing Waterloo in football, and I was at the game and ended up in the washroom with some guys from McMaster. They were at their urinals and I was at my urinal and we were all pissing away and then when we were done I walked over to the sink to wash my hands and those guys just started walking out. So I yelled over "Hey, what's the matter, don't they teach you to wash your hands after you piss at McMaster?" And they yelled back "No, they teach us not to piss on our hands!"

I still don't quite get what they meant by that, but whatever.

Anyway - that is what I was reminded of today when I was in the shitter with Bettman, because after he pissed he walked out without washing his hands! I saw him! But then the weird part - and this is pretty weird - is that outside of the washroom he shook my hand and his hand was wet! How weird is that? I mean, if he didn't wash his hands after he was pissing, how could his hand be wet?

I totally can't figure that one out!

Why Do People Keep Asking This?

See this picture? Pretty awesome, I know - great looking dude, awesome suit from Moore's, stepping out of a bitching car. I mean, if I was a chick - especially a big-titted college chick looking to get some experience as an intern - I would be all over this:


So why do people keep emailing me this picture and asking me if Heidi dresses me in the morning? And when I answer "Yes, of course she does, why else would I have married the little shrew?" why do they all ask me if she hates me? Am I missing something here?

Welcome, Doug MacLean

So Dick is insisting that we need to at least pretend that we aren't just using the morons in Hamilton for two or three years, and that we need to have some sort of "reason" for packing up and moving the team to Kitchener-Waterloo as soon as my real arena is ready. I had figured that "Hamilton is full of filthy working-class losers and the city smells like a sewer" would be reason enough, but Dick says no. He says we need to make sure the attendance starts to suck in the second or third year so we can get the hell out.

Personally, I think he is overreacting - once the average Hamilton jerk gets it through his dim little brain that the Maple Leafs won't be playing there every night ... the place will be half-full at best. But Dick thinks that we have to make sure the team sucks, too. Now, really, this is the Phoenix fucking Coyotes we are talking about here, how much worse does a team have to be? Just to be on the safe side, though, we are going to hire a bona fide idiot to help run the team, one who is not only a complete tool but who has proved it over and over again.

So please join me in welcoming Doug MacLean to our team. Take a bow, Doug.

Doug single-handedly made sure that the Columbus Blue Jackets not only sucked on the ice, but were a laughing-stock and a pariah in the community as well. He could quite easily be the worst executive in all of hockey - and that includes that weird Russian league where players just randomly die on the ice. Better yet, Doug doesn't know he is a complete failure, and thinks that he is being hired for his hockey "knowledge", so we can all get a good laugh every time he opens his big stupid mouth and says something moronic in that big stupid voice of his.

Hamilton and Doug MacLean - it's like they were made for each other.

Hamilton Is Dead To Me Now

So these dumb fucks in Hamilton have some fucking nerve, is all I can say. Sure, if I get a hockey team I am only going to use their crappy arena for three years until I get a real arena in Kitchener-Waterloo. And sure I expect them to spend 200 million of their taxpayers' money on that ugly arena to make it fit for me to set foot in for those three years. And sure I expected them to tear the name of their beloved Victor Copps (anyone ever heard of this guy? I sure haven't) off of the marquee and replace it with mine. But does that give them the right to screw me over?

Of course not. I'm Jim fucking Balsillie! But they did ... those selfish miserable low-class FUCKS from Hamilton did.

Here is the deal: I told the mayor that he had to cancel the lease of the Hamilton Bulldogs - the team that was in MY arena - this summer, before the AHL schedule came out. He said "But Sir, you don't have a team yet" and I said to him "Listen, you filthy piece of garbage, I am fucking Captain Canada and you do what I say, it doesn't matter if I have one team or no team or five teams. If i say 'shit in your hat, Fred' you had better fucking well run out and buy a nice hat and take a fucking dump in it! If I say 'kill your kids and grind them up for sausage' I want to see you out running the fucking hot dog cart on the street that fucking afternoon! You understand, you pathetic little shit?"

Now, to be honest, I don't remember his answer to that because my intern du jour chose that moment to drop her Blackberry and then bend over and pick it up and I got a really good cleavage shot - god damn but I do love those college-girl tits - and I was distracted. But it shouldn't matter what he said, the dumb fuck should have just done it.

Now I find out that the AHL schedule is out and the Bulldogs have their dates booked with the stupid ugly arena and now I have to pretend that I am willing to work with them and co-operate and shit. Co-operate! Me! I'm Jim Balsillie - I dont fucking "co-operate" with anyone. People fucking well do what I say! Co-operating is for poor people. You know, like in Hamilton.

Un-fucking-believable. You filthy Hamilton fucks are really going to pay for this one.