It's no secret that league insiders in all sports leagues 'leak' information to the press. They always speak on the condition of anonymity, presumably because they were told to keep their mouth shut and they most likely fear repercussions. It happens so regularly that I sometimes wonder if leagues don't hire individuals whose only job is to supposedly leak news to the public. The quote above though left me scratching my head. Here is a league insider who publicly acknowledges that Hasek deserves a certain level of respect and therefore should announce his own retirement but this informant uses this acknowledgement as the excuse to keep his own name private, not to actually keep the fact that Hasek is retiring private. I know it's trivial but come on, is this insider that stupid to actually go on record saying such a thing. His quote and subsequent actions are directly contrary to each other and taken together he is essentially saying, "I know Hasek is an all time great and has earned the right to tell the world he is retiring himself but I'm a sniveling little weasel so ill tell you now, only you cant use my name because I respect Hasek too much to be blamed for telling you he is retiring, even though I am." What? I've never seen a 'because' statement have so little to do with the statement it is trying to rationalize. Its hockey though, so really, does anyone even care. Probably not.

On another note the NBA finals have started. And with it the most insane best of seven format in all of sports. While all other sports including the NBA conference playoffs follow the 2-2-1-1-1 format the Finals of the NBA switch to the 2-3-2 format. Don't get me wrong I understand their rationale. They are trying to cut down on traveling cross country multiple times. But why? I know it's a noble cause this day and age but cutting down on their carbon footprint is not a priority of the NBA and it's not why they change the format. What amazes me is the inherent unfairness as a result. Teams battle all year for home court advantage. In every other professional sport and early round NBA action, no lower seed ever has the opportunity to play more home games then the higher seed.

Theoretically every team should win at home and the NBA would certainly love every series to go 7 games to increase exposure and revenue. In most series' game 5 is the most pivotal game. Either the series is tied 2-2 and is now a best of three or one team is up 3-1 and has the chance to close out the series while the other desperately needs a win to stay afloat. In either case the higher seed played all year to become just that, the higher seed. The benefits of which are hosting the all important game 5, but in the NBA somehow the lower seed gets to host the most important game of the series, in the most important series of the year, all in an effort to reduce traveling. Which, by the way, wouldn't shorten the time it takes to play the series since there are wasted off days in the current format.

You would assume that in a sport that relies so heavily on which team has the leg up in the momentum column that providing the home game to the lower seed in game 5 would unfairly affect the outcome of the series. Then again apparently the league has been manipulating outcomes for some time. Though much like hockey, we are talking about basketball here so does anyone really care? Probably not.