Oh, Canada!

So I just got back from the holiday weekend where I spent a couple of days up in Toronto. I am happy to report that Toronto is both a lovely city and a great sports town for 2 reasons:

1. The Hockey Hall of Fame. The HHOF is just a tad shy of being cooler than Cooperstown. The actual building where the HHOF is housed is a gorgeous church-looking structure on the corner of Front St., between Bay and Yonge. It is so shrine-looking, in fact, that you don't even realize that it's a museum, you just walk by it and think, "Oh, what a pretty church that is!" Inside, the HHOF has the right mix of permanent, interactive and film exhibits as well as games and a good gift shop. What makes the HHOF so incredibly cool, of course, is the trophy room. This room has a huge domed ceiling with a beautiful stain-glass roof and all of the game's trophies (Stanley, Bing, Vezina, Calder, etc.). Just being so close to the Stanley Cup made me appreciate hockey in a new way. It's not a sport that I can enjoy or get into but I see why people love it so much. It's got great history and tradition in the same way baseball does and in a way that the NFL and NBA can never understand.

2. Rogers Centre (aka Skydome). Beth (my girlfriend) and I went to check out a day game between the Twins and Blue Jays on Sunday afternoon. We got amazing seats, 25 rows behind home plate on the field level, just high enough to be able to see over the ump's head. We were fortunate enough to catch Roy "Doc" Halladay pitch the increasingly-rare complete game shutout. He did it in 100 pitches (with 10 K's) so it was a real treat. Despite what purists may say (and I'm 82.47% purist), baseball played indoors on artificial turf is just as authentic and enjoyable as being outside. In fact, as one who hates hot weather, I enjoyed the climate-controlled environment. The sightlines were perfect, the scoreboard and video monitors were great, the sound system was crystal clear and the food was well-varied, tasty and cheap. It's a great ballpark.