Big Buff? Is It Dustin Byfuglien of the Jets or Ryan Kesler of the Canucks?

Random thoughts and cheap shots from the cheap seats on the eve of 17 Wing Winnipeg's debut Sunday at the MTS Centre...

* So, I see where Ryan Kesler of the Vancouver Canucks has posed au naturelle in ESPN The Magazine's 2011 Body Issue. That's right, he's buck naked. And here I thought Dustin Byfuglien of the Jets was Big Buff.

* I guess Winnipeg's return to the National Hockey League truly is a huge story, because even the New York Times has dispatched a scribe to River City to detail all things Jets. Mayor Sammy Katz won't be happy about it, though, because Jeff Z. Klein had the bad manners to mention Pegtown has "a decaying downtown core and a murder rate that, though low by American standards, is the highest in Canada."

Mayor Sammy sees his burg through rose-tinted glasses which blind him to the blight that is downtown Winnipeg, and he stomps his little feet and has quite the hissy fit whenever out-of-towners expose his city's nasty underbelly. Which means the Times can expect a letter to the editor or, at the very least, a subscription cancellation.

* Why are so many people saying and writing that Sunday's joust between the Jets and Montreal Canadiens is historical? It's not like it's the first NHL game ever played in River City. Winnipeg isn't even the first locale to house a second franchise. Minnesota has had two kicks at the cat. Ditto Colorado. And Atlanta is a two-time loser. So what exactly is historical about the baptism of Winnipeg Jets, The Sequel?

* OK, we've seen rock fossils Fred Turner and Randy Bachman on stage at NHL Face-Off festivities. When do Burton Cummings and Neil Young start to tune up? I think Young's Down By The River would be an appropriate number to warble during the fan frolic at The Forks.

* Speaking of fossils, what's the over/under on Donald S. Cherry mentioning the military during his Coachless Corner segment on Hockey Night In Canada tomorrow? One minute? One minute and 30 seconds. I figure the old gasbag will tell us that Winnipeg has "the greatest fans" in the world at the beginning of his rant, then genuflect to the Royal Canadian Air Force about halfway through his diatribe. Oh, well, at least he won't be branding former NHL thugs as "pukes" and "hypocrites." Like he did on Thursday night.

* The end of the NHL's preseason matches couldn't have come any sooner. I mean, if NHL hangman Brendan Shanahan had time to suspend one more player during the dress rehearsals, there wouldn't have been enough skaters left to start the regular season. Not that I disapprove of Sheriff Shanny's overcrowded paddy wagon, understand, but he's got the heaviest gavel hand since Judge Roy Bean. 

* Who'll rank highest on the boo-o-metre at the MTS Centre tomorrow, Gary Bettman or Stephen Harper? And good on the Jets brass for telling Harper that he'd have to settle for two tickets to the opener. Who does he think he is? The Prime Minister?

* I wish these were our fathers' Montreal Canadiens coming to Winnipeg tomorrow. I still miss The Flower, Guy Lafleur, Big Bird Robinson, Ken Dryden, Serge Savard and the boys.

* David Thomson will be in the house that his big bucks helped build. And how ironic is that? The man with the biggest bankroll in Canada (approximately $20 billion) has the smallest NHL rink in the smallest NHL market. This Winnipeg thing has Green Bay Packers written all over it. Without the championships, of course.

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