The Flames host the Blues tonight (730PM MST, RSN West). First some miscellany:

**I caught about the last 10 minutes of the Oilers game last night, and wish I had been holding a pen, but a few notes from memory:

• Liles should clearly be suspended for what he did to Smyth. Calling that a "knee-on-knee hit" is actually charitable to J-M. Liles was standing still -- it was a trip, and a bloody dangerous one (the same play is illegal in football).
• Was Liles claiming injury? No misconduct or match penalty was recorded -- just a minor -- and yet Laperriere served it for him. Bit of a noodle-scratcher that I can't find an explanation for.
• Chuckled a bit at the love for Roloson's "beautiful save" on Hedjuk from about 3 feet off the goal line. The one angle showed it leaking through his legs and being pushed back in by... I'm sorry, was that Toby Petersen out there making the nice play with 45 seconds left?
• Obviously MacT is still counting on Horcoff for his defensive play, but #10 just does not look right in the attacking end; he's in a legitimate slump. He made a couple plays on the PP that reeked of desperation. The slapper from the top of the circle that misses far side and ends up behind Roloson is just not a play a guy like Horcoff makes when he's going good. Same with the weak cross-ice feed at Pisani that could have been deflected or intercepted by 3 of the 4 penalty killers (and was). It's startling, really. (I'll let Edmontonians in on a secret: Horcoff had a de facto nickname on Flames radio through the playoffs last year, and it was "If Only We Had A Guy Like". As in, just about every time his name came up, it was in the context of If only we had a guy like Shawn Horcoff... Right now we do, only his name is Langkow and he's the same player as he was before.)

**"The 1927 Yankees don't have this degree of representation in the Baseball Hall of Fame..." -- Colby Cosh has the final word on Dick Duff's induction into the HHOF

** Tyler and Tom have both noted a funny (i.e. crying on the inside) quote from Bill Daly, in response to the Forbes story on increased franchise values: "That's not unexpected. That's what the CBA was intended to accomplish." They're both pretty hard on the media too, and fairly, I'd say.

That said, I'm a forgive-and-forget kind of guy. I'd be happy to give everyone a pass on the crappy, way-too-credulous lockout coverage, if only they'd start thinking more critically now. When the lockout ended, I had 3 questions for hockey writers. Briefly:

1. How do you plan on judging whether the new NHL CBA is an improvement over the old one? Is there at least one objective standard that should be met?
2. The owners won and the players lost. If the new CBA is not an improvement, is it the owners fault?
3. And if so, what level of skepticism would it be appropriate to cast on the owners' proposed solution next time?

Happy Christmas, the war is over, but I'd sure be gratified if the people who might have some influence over the next one learned anything from last time.

**Oh yeah, Game Night! Unlike our Western Canadian competitors, the Flames have gotten the job done against the Blues since the lost year. They got Stempniaked (man, that comment thread is funny in retrospect) in the shootout the first game last season, but won the last three, plus the first this season.

The Blues have been pretty much as expected so far this season: better, but not playoffs better. A Flames win tonight is important. If LT can use baseball jargon, I suppose I can use golf...

The Oil's win last night was like birdieing 18 at the end of a weak round; the scorecard (2-2-1 road trip) doesn't really look that bad. A Flames loss tonight would be like finishing a real good round by double-bogeying the par-5 18th: a lot of the progress against par made through a tougher stretch of holes is somewhat nullified by making a 7 when it ought to have been a 4 or a tap-in 5.

Calgary's malodorous special teams (both 26th-ranked) have got to get it together one of these nights. I'm gonna call a 5-1 win, with 3 PP GF, 0 PP GA, and a hat trick for Mr. Alex Tanguay. Go Flames.