Albertans playing ball in College

 (AP Photo/Eric Francis)

With everyone having the Olympics on their mind, once again it's time to remind everyone that there are still a lot more Canadians playing college ball than there are playing hockey.  Of the almost 700 Canucks playing baseball in the NCAA and NAIA, more than 60 are from right here in Alberta.



Included in this are several players who are on the 2014 draft list:
   Chayse Marion, Red Deer, McNeese State University
   Jake Hansen, Fort MacLeod at LSU-Shreveport
   Brendan Hendriks, Cochrane at USF
   Chad Hodges, Med Hat, South Dakota State
   Jordan Procyshen, Calgary, Northern Kentucky University
   Jeremie Fagnan, Calgary at TCU

Below is the full list:

Playing Pepper 2014 Red Sox

Yes, these are salt and pepper shakers

As mentioned previously, the Cardinals blog C70 at the bat at Cards Conclave hosts an annual series where bloggers from each team answer some specific questions in previewing their team's seasons.

As in previous years, other Baseball Bloggers Alliance members also participated Including fellow Canadian Red Sox fan and blogger Allan at The Joy of Sox, Christine from Boston Red Thoughts,  John at The Mighty Quinn Media Machine, Michael at The Pesky Pole, Bryan at Replacement Level Baseball Blog, Dave at Sox vs. Stripes and Dan at Talkin’ Sox With Dan.  To see how these Red Sox bloggers answered these questions, take a look at the Red Sox "Playing Pepper" page at C70 at the bat.

Below are the questions with the answers that I provided. As always, I welcome your comments and thoughts:

No parity in the NFL - only in baseball

....or not

(editor's note: This post first appeared on Ruben's Rants) 

With the  Super Bowl comes the usual "on any given Sunday" echoes of the superiority and balance of the NFL.  Thankfully this year a few nationally acclaimed writers chimed in to show why there is more parity in the MLB. 

Thought it was a good time to rerun this article written after the 2010 season.

Coming off 10-6 Green Bay's victory over the 12-4 Steelers, I again heard the sentiment that there is parity in the NFL and any team can win on any given Sunday. Kind of ironic given who was playing - Pittsburgh of course was playing in the game for the 8th time, and have an NFL record 6 championships, while it was Green Bay's 5th time, as well as both teams' 7th playoff appearance of the decade.  I'm thinking fans in Detroit, Cleveland and Buffalo aren't feeling that same parity.  Anyhow, you know what I think of a sample size of one, so let me dig a little further.