sport – mackaycartoons

Saturday October 29, 2016

October 28, 2016 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday October 29, 2016

‘Pretty Good Rich Kids’: Reaching the OHL takes more than talent

What does it take to make it to the Ontario Hockey League?

Skill? Certainly. Speed? Sure. Strength? No question.

November 28, 2007

But it also takes something else — something over and above raw talent and physicality. To make it to the OHL, you also need a winning ticket in the lottery of birth.

A year-long Spectator investigation finds a highly significant number of the league’s Ontario-raised players are from suburban neighbourhoods where most people are well-educated, earn high incomes and live in expensive homes.

The odds of them crossing paths with someone living in poverty are extremely low.

For anyone familiar with the extraordinary cost of playing hockey in Ontario — $15,000-or-so annually for an elite AAA player and getting higher — this won’t come as a shock. If you want to be the next Sidney Crosby, says Wilfrid Laurier University’s William McTeer, “the first question you have to ask is how much money do your parents have and are they prepared to invest in your future as an athlete.”

But cost isn’t the only thing keeping children in Hamilton and across Ontario out of the game.

Several factors, including geography, public policy and the funding mechanisms of non-profits, are making it increasingly difficult for low- and middle-income families to access the sport, particularly at competitive levels.

“I think it’s tragic,” says Philip White, a sport sociologist at McMaster University. “You live in a culture where everybody is supposed to have an opportunity to advance and kids are simply shut out.”

Our analysis is grounded in data. Stick with us while we get the heavy stuff out of the way. (Continued: Hamilton Spectator)

Thursday September 8, 2016

September 7, 2016 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday September 8, 2016

Children and Youth Services Minister Michael Coteau is urging city council to end Hamilton’s bylaw ban on road hockey.

“Road hockey bans are commonplace in municipalities across Ontario, but they don’t need to be,” the minister wrote in a Sept. 6 letter to council that notes Toronto and Kingston have already bucked the municipal trend.

“I am hoping that your council will be next. A vote to overturn the prohibition and let kids play will challenge other municipalities to abolish similar road hockey bans in their own communities.”

Coteau made headlines in July when he publicly urged Toronto’s council to end its own street hockey ban. Council did so over the objections of its own legal staff, but proposed conditions limiting game time to daylight hours and on streets with slow traffic speeds.

January 5, 2002

The move prompted Coun. Sam Merulla — who fought unsuccessfully to kill Hamilton’s bylaw as far back as 2002 — to ask city legal staff to revisit the local ban. A report is expected later this year.

Merulla said he spoke to Coteau about the value of street hockey in the summer and was “heartened” by the minister’s enthusiasm.

But he added the province could help by adding language to the Highway Traffic Act that would head off municipal concerns about liability.

“With a stroke of a pen, they could help all municipalities feel more comfortable overnight,” he said.

Municipal lawyers in several cities, including Hamilton, have in the past suggested the strict language in the Highway Traffic Act doesn’t provide the legal leeway needed for cities to allow sports in the street.

In any event, Hamilton would only enforce its street hockey ban in response to a complaint. But municipal lawyers have argued the rule helps protect the city from lawsuits in the event of an injury.

Coteau said in a brief interview he hasn’t heard from municipal leaders other than Merulla that provincial rules of the road are an impediment to changing local bylaws.

“If (the act) is a barrier … I’d love to have a conversation about it,” he said.

But the minister added, while he is keen to advocate for a “common sense approach,” he isn’t intending to enforce rule changes on any city. “Local policy-makers … have to make those decisions on behalf of the people they represent.” (Source: Hamilton Spectator)

Wednesday March 3, 2010

March 3, 2010 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday March 3, 2010

That podium isn’t cheap

All that gold — and silver and bronze — seemed so shiny and bright on Sunday afternoon and evening. Outfitting ourselves in flags, toques, Team Canada hockey jerseys, “mad-trapper” hats, curling sweaters and the famous red mittens never seemed so, well, patriotic.

Close to 99 per cent of Canadians, according to a poll, say they were pleased with our athletes’ performance. The hockey final broke TV-watching records and the closing ceremonies didn’t come far behind.

The wave of national pride — “I’ve never felt more proud to be a Canadian” was the somewhat hyperbolic theme — is still rippling across the country. The pride is a direct consequence of Canadian athletes’ performance and 26-medal count at the Vancouver Winter Olympics. And that is a direct consequence, by almost all accounts, of the five-year, $117-million Own The Podium program.

But only days after the Olympic flame was extinguished, many Canadians are already hemming and hawing over how much money they want to put toward continuing Own The Podium.

Leading up to Vancouver, Canadian taxpayers put in $66 million; the rest came from the Vancouver Organizing Committee (VANOC), corporate sponsorships, the B.C. government, and national Olympic and Paralympic committees. It is hard to dismiss the argument Canada “bought” its Olympic success. A less cynical view might be Canada finally invested in its amateur athletes and got good results. Either way, it is clear, world-beating athletes come at a cost. (Hamilton Spectator)

Saturday, January 5, 2002

January 5, 2002 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, January 5, 2002

Road hockey: A proud Canadian sporting tradition or a dangerous nuisance?

A Hamilton court will weigh in Monday on a father’s fate after he played hockey with his kids on their street, infuriating a neighbour while breaking a bylaw that divides neighbourhoods nationwide. “The bylaw says we stay off the street,” said Nadia Ciuriak, whose garden has been invaded by countless stray hockey balls from Gary Kotar’s kids over the years.

“If people want street hockey, the proper way of dealing with that is to go to city council and insist that the bylaw gets removed.”

While Kotar’s kids haven’t caused any damage to their neighbour’s property, it’s the principle of breaking the bylaw and trespassing to retrieve errant balls that bothers Ciuriak.

“Initially I retrieved the balls from my garden, but then I decided I had other things to do, and I didn’t want them going into my garden,” said Ciuriak, who has lived with her mother and sister at the house for 40 years.

Ciuriak also objects to the behaviour of some of the players on her street. (Source: Hamilton Spectator)