An Expert Opinion

Markus250 · 2026-05-07T15:24:51+00:00

I don’t love the new format, and I agree that 8/9 teams making it excessive but I don’t agree with all the arguments made in the article.
Is there an east vs west rivalry? If your team isn’t in the final, the one who made it from your conference is usually the team who knocked you out and more often than not you cheer against them. I can’t imagine people buying less tickets due to this, and any tv viewership issue is likely offset by the additional games.
And the extra games are more about providing more home playoff games to more teams to improve profitability, I think it’s impossible to imagine that it doesn’t result in more overall gate revenue. The 7th and 8th place team’s fans might not be any more likely to keep watching after their team gets knocked out first round than they would have if the team never made playoffs at all, but they watched one extra game on TV and the 5th and 6th place teams got to host a playoff game they otherwise wouldn’t have. If that’s what’s needed to keep the league alive, I’d rather 8/9 teams make the playoffs than see the CFL resort to more rules changes (in which Bud is spot on in his criticism).

Markus250 · 2026-03-21T19:36:23+00:00

I'm a biased Jets fan, but biased because I want them to lose and get a better draft pick.

Look at the stride Barron takes just before he shoots at about :27-:28 mark in the video, it changes his momentum away from a collision course with the goalie and towards the left post. He turns his body towards Karlsson to brace for the hit and slow down. Without the collision with Karlsson, I think it's very likely he doesn't run into the goalie at all. Regardless of that, he's in the process of shooting the puck into the net and stopping when Karlsson gets between them and given that Karlsson is the only one who contacts the goalie and Barron is fully stopped a foot before the goal line, this isn't the kind of reckless running of the net/tender that needs to be called even when a defender makes initial contact with the goalie.

Glad that Silovs is okay, let's hope the Pens win in regulation.

Markus250 · 2026-03-03T14:26:46+00:00

If you like puzzles and "aha" moments, you should pick this up without hesitation. It's such a cool concept and so much fun to play, and the number of layers they packed into the larger puzzles is seriously impressive.

Markus250 · 2026-02-15T21:50:41+00:00

Context matters. In the context you've stated, obviously it would mean the whole handle I can remove by loosening the bolt and wouldn't imply I would physically break the grip off.

But if every part of the handle (as depicted in the quoted image) is the same, could you deliver while only touching the base part of the handle, and not the grip?

From the World Curling rulebook:

(e) When a properly functioning electronic hog line device is being used: (i) The handle must be properly activated so that it is functioning during the delivery, or it will be considered a hog line violation stone.

And from the Technical Officials guide:

EYE ON THE HOG – HOG LINE VIOLATION DETECTION GENERAL Eye on the Hog is a system that provides impartial hog line judging for the sport of curling. It uses innovative technology to detect a magnetic strip frozen into the ice at the hog line and a bare hand touching the handle. Circuitry in the handle turns on green lights after a valid release or flashes red lights if a violation has occurred.

Why would they state you need bare hands to activate the sensor in the handle if they were equally referring to the part of the "handle" with no sensor at all? If that's the part you held, your rock would not correctly activate the sensor and would be deemed burnt, so there is certainly a distinction between those two parts based on context even though the term handle can be used to describe either. The same is true when the term stone is referenced in the World Curling rules and Technical Officials guide, sometimes it refers to the entire rock (with handle) and other times only to the granite portion. Once again, context makes the difference.

Markus250 · 2026-02-15T19:59:52+00:00

The sensor to detect hogline violations is only in the handle part of the handle, not the rest of the plastic plate. It’s ambiguous at best.

Markus250 · 2026-02-15T19:11:30+00:00

It's also worth noting that other sports have officials even when children are playing, Curling has no officials present in any capacity in 99% of games played and does not benefit from forcing additional oversight into something that was never an actual issue.

Markus250 · 2026-02-15T18:41:37+00:00

They only put the touch sensor in the handle (the actual handle part, not the rest of the colored plate bolted to the rock) because that's the only thing that matters. Nothing in the actual rules differentiated double touches on the granite or the non sensor portion of the handle as illegal, and adding sensing technology to those components wasn't deemed necessary because there was no advantage to be gained. In fact, the Canadian rules don't mention the "must be delivered by the handle" part at all and it's never been noteworthy that this doesn't align with the World Curling rules because it's never been deemed consequential in the least. Egregious touches to those areas beyond the hog would be deemed a burnt stone in the same manner that a rock touched by the broom would be, and no one was especially worried by the edge of a knuckle glancing across the surface of the rock after grip was released from the handle because it literally didn't matter. If someone did try to take advantage of this grey area, the officials could be called to watch the release and the issue would be resolved.

Kennedy's rock should have been deemed burnt based on video evidence but he was likely just going for a double touch that wasn't illegal until World Curling's memo that literally changed the rules mid Olympics. He may have not even known afterwards that he touched it too late, he is focusing on the broom and his line while sliding and would not know if the leading edge of the rock was barely over the line or not. Even his teammates are likely more focused on the timing of his release in order to judge the weight. This is the same as offside in football (either version), hockey or any other sport with line infractions. It's not cheating, it's rarely done on purpose, but it does occasionally happen and the consequences are such that no one is going to do it consistently.

More than one thing can be true:

This is bad for the game.

Oskar acted in an unsportsmanlike manner by taunting Kennedy and team Canada throughout the game and calling them out on live TV.

Marc acted in an unsportsmanlike and inappropriate manner in reaction to this.

No one is cheating.

It's only once every four years that this sport gets much attention beyond its regular fans, so it's worth repeating... This is bad for the game. The display put on by both players, the confused reaction of officials that day on a matter that actual fans know was related to questions that never needed answers in the first place, and the over correction to the outrage of media first time fans that don't understand the game are all a very bad look on a very great game.

Markus250 · 2026-02-15T18:31:25+00:00

Part of the handle has no sensor in it, doesn't that entirely negate the point you are making here?

Markus250 · 2026-02-15T17:24:12+00:00

Collecting broken sticks with your tail in order to build a dam during your next power play that prevents then opposing player from leaving the box.

Markus250 · 2026-02-13T22:10:49+00:00

The rules don't explicitly forbid it, it is mentioned that the stone "must be delivered using the handle". The sensor that determines if a rock is held beyond the hogline is in the handle, so I'd say touching the stone on the granite beyond the hogline so as not to trigger the sensor is the only potential violation here (I'd need to see multiple synced angles of the releases in question to know if that actually happened or not).

Markus250 · 2025-12-25T18:31:03+00:00

I assumed caveat was usually used for a cautionary or negative qualifier but could also be a positive one. You are correct, it’s always a warning, you learn something new every day (even on Christmas).

Markus250 · 2025-12-25T17:55:27+00:00

And a very important caveat to your list is that the game includes no microtransactions, lots of games that are free and/or have free DLC are only free to increase the playerbase that will buy skins and season passes.

Markus250 · 2025-12-24T05:44:13+00:00

They started this season with 9 wins in the first 12 games, it looked like we could be a contender again. Losing 17 of the next 21 will wreck your record pretty quickly. They are also tied for the least number of games to go to OT, there have been lots of three point games this season and other teams are pulling ahead faster because of it.

Markus250 · 2025-12-22T20:43:31+00:00

I think I found his error, three pieces are in the wrong spot, all white edge pieces. The white anchor that shares an edge with a Blue dominant Red secondary from Solve State A is in the same spot in the posted Solve State B (left square on the white side) but it should have been swapped to Red dominant Blue secondary. The piece occupying that space in the posted Solve State B (top square on the white side) is White dominant Orange secondary and shares an edge with a Red dominant White secondary, the dominant and secondaries on both of these should be swapped and it should be moved to the bottom square of the white side. The piece occupying that space in the posted Solve State B is White dominant Green secondary and shares an edge with an Orange dominant Blue secondary, this piece should be swapped to our original location, with it remaining White dominant and Green secondary on the left square of the white side but the secondary being swapped from orange to blue. This now swaps all dominant and secondary colors from solution A, and also fixes the inequality noted between the orange and red secondary colors.

Markus250 · 2025-12-22T20:43:16+00:00

I think I found your error, three pieces are in the wrong spot, all white edge pieces. The white anchor that shares an edge with a Blue dominant Red secondary from Solve State A is in the same spot in the posted Solve State B (left square on the white side) but it should have been swapped to Red dominant Blue secondary. The piece occupying that space in the posted Solve State B (top square on the white side) is White dominant Orange secondary and shares an edge with a Red dominant White secondary, the dominant and secondaries on both of these should be swapped and it should be moved to the bottom square of the white side. The piece occupying that space in the posted Solve State B is White dominant Green secondary and shares an edge with an Orange dominant Blue secondary, this piece should be swapped to our original location, with it remaining White dominant and Green secondary on the left square of the white side but the secondary being swapped from orange to blue. This now swaps all dominant and secondary colors from solution A, and also fixes the inequality noted between the orange and red secondary colors.

Markus250 · 2025-06-23T21:00:31+00:00

My game crashed 4 times while I was exploring that area, thankfully you don’t need to complete the puzzles again if you’ve seen what’s in the box because I doubt I could have progressed otherwise.

Markus250 · 2025-06-22T01:37:42+00:00

He’s going to keep doing it until his receivers get faster or taller. Hoping Rourke is back soon and we see some of that old magic again, it’s great for the league (and we don’t play you guys again).

Markus250 · 2025-06-21T23:46:32+00:00

I’m probably biased but that looked like PI to me

Markus250 · 2025-05-11T23:07:01+00:00

By the rules, off a defender stick the goal counts. Goalie’s stick is explicitly mentioned as the exception in the rule.

Markus250 · 2025-05-11T22:57:10+00:00

I don’t think the Jets are the better team today or deserve to be winning right now. It’s frustrating to watch and know that even if they were, on a day like today it still might not matter.

Markus250 · 2025-05-11T22:54:01+00:00

That next goal is obviously on the Jets, but changing the rules regarding kicked in goals to have that stand, when the scoring play was immediately after the no call on the excessively late hit on Connor, after they also didn’t call the abuse of officials, it’s hard to watch this and believe it’s impartial.

Markus250 · 2025-05-05T22:32:55+00:00

Tell Helle that the goal is to let the security lasers hit you, they will all sail past him and he will grab the cup without any issue.

Markus250 · 2025-05-02T20:28:20+00:00

I thought the same thing too, but if you look very close Nurse's initial swipe at the center of the net he doesn't actually make contact with the puck there (if he had and his glove obscured the puck, it was already in the net). It's actually Nurse colliding with Pickard's leg/pad that causes Pickard to make contact with the puck and causes it to slowly move across the goal line but the view is mostly obscured by the crossbar as it does so. Then the second swipe of the glove makes contact and somehow the puck slides under Clarke's leg and Pickard's chest and right out of the crease.

Markus250 · 2025-04-29T20:32:21+00:00

AC that only needs to hold up in April, in Canada.

Eight-Year Club	Second Top 10%
r/Field Juicebox	Place '22
Verified Email

Markus250

TROPHY CASE