EDITOR PATRICK JOHNSTON THE DAILY VOICE, THURSDAY, APRIL 5, 2012 8 CARISSA THORPE photos Terminal City Rollergirls having been warming up for their season kick-off at UBC’s Osborne Gym Rollin’ out for the new season Roller derby enthusiasts ready for season, raising funds for charity ROLLER Derby HM Teams have five By CARISSA THORPE Hard-hitting, body-slamming, roller derby action is back again for another season and this year things are kicking off for a good cause. The Terminal City Rollergirls are opening up the roller derby league’s sixth season this Friday night. Proceeds from VIP ticket sales for the season opener will go towards bur- saries for The Cinderella Project. Two young women who are graduating from high school will receive funding to pursue post-secondary education while also participating in athletics. The Cinderella Project is a Vancou- ver-based charity that encourages youths to complete their high school education in the face of financial hard- ship, with the ultimate goal of breaking the cycle of poverty. Vancouver's first female roller derby league, the Terminal City Rollergirls was started in 2006 to showcase “strong, sassy and smart Vancouver women,” according to their website. They also aim to provide entertain- ment and build both the team mem- bers’ character as well as their commu- nity. Among the 60-plus women who make up the four teams in the player- owned league are nurses, teachers, construction workers, television pro- ducers and aspiring rock stars. The teams will face off in two bouts on Friday at Kerrisdale Arena: the Riot Girls taking on The Bad Reputations, followed by the Faster Pussycats bat- tling Public Frenemy. The charity also makes prom a real- ity for 165 high school students by pro- viding them with formalwear they oth- erwise couldn’t afford. Donations of prom dresses, accesso- ries and shoes for women and dress shirts, ties, belts, accessories and dress shoes for men will be collected on site at the Rollergirls’ bout. The donated clothes will then be distributed at the Cinderella Project’s upcoming Bou- tique Day at the Renaissance Vancou- ver Harbourside Hotel. New toiletries, new makeup and Groupon deals for manicures and pedi- cures are also being accepted to help the teens prep for prom. Tickets for tomorrow’s Terminal City Rollergirls opener are $15 (plus service charges) in advance or $20 at the door for adults and $10 for children over five (kids five and under are free). Season tickets are also available for $75, giving ticket holders access to all six of this year’s major bouts, but are limited. Doors open for Friday’s event starts at 5 pm and the action begins at 6 pm. Advance tickets are available online through the league’s website at www. TerminalCityRollergirls.com. members each Hi Teams score points by having players attempt to lap opponents Roller derby at- tracted 5 milllion spectators across the U.S. in 1940 n consideration for inclusion in the 2020 Olympics Source: wikipedia.org Playoffs ask bloggers to put their thinking caps on Bloggers add to the sports discussion by providing fans with a more personal ap- proach and providing deeper analysis By OMAR SHARIFF To keep up with all the latest hockey drama, more and more, fans turn to sports blogs to stay up to date with the action. Fans are focused on which teams from the NHL’s Western and East- ern conferences are going to clinch the final spots for the upcoming Stanley Cup Playoffs, starting on April 11. For the upcoming play- offs, Wyatt Arndt, a Ca- nucks blogger for The Province, believes that the Canucks have a chance of going all the way and winning the cup. “T just feel that with the depth Van- couver has, and with the lessons they learned from last year, that the Ca- nucks have as good a chance as any team to make it back to the Finals.” Cam Charron, who blogs for The Province, the Score and Canucks Army, thinks that sports blogs are so popular because there are just so many differ- ent kinds of blogs to choose from. “There are just so many directions you can take [a blog],” said Charron. “You can have analytical blogs, hu- mour blogs, mainstream criticism, or even fan rants.” Arndt believes that bloggers play a big role in helping fuel fan interest in their local teams. “In a market like Vancouver, where people seemingly can’t get enough hockey, you help maintain that ‘24/7 hockey’ mentality by providing more and more hockey content on top of the content traditional journalism pro- vides,” he said. Arndt said that people are attracted to blogs because fans can identify bet- ter with the more personal approach to sports that bloggers provide. “Many of us talk like you would talk with your own buddies, just hanging out and talking hockey,” said Arndt. “Most bloggers are starved for atten- tion and dying to carve out a market for themselves, so they will readily talk to any fans that want to talk hockey with them,” he said. Charron devotes a lot of time to maintaining his blog to keep his read- ers entertained. “Nobody is going to keep checking a blog for updates if they’re sparse, no matter how good the writing is,” said Charron. “It also needs to be fresh ma- terial.” Both the division-leading Canucks and St. Louis Blues have confirmed their spot in the playoffs, but Los Ange- les, the third-ranked team in the west, still has to contend with divisional ri- vals San Jose, Phoenix and Dallas to secure their own place in the playoffs. pring brings baseball fans hope Vancouver fans pin their allegiances to two seperate squads, but shouldn’t set their expectations too high By QUINN MELL-COBB With spring training and preseason play now complete, opening day for the 2012 Major League Baseball season has arrived, kicking off another action- packed year. Vancouver baseball fans generally find themselves split between our Pa- cific Northwest neighbours, the Seattle Mariners, and Canada’s lone remain- ing MLB entry, the Toronto Blue Jays. Last season the Blue Jays had a mid- dling season, winning exactly half their games. The Mariners have had little success the last two seasons. Last year they won just 67 of their 162 games. The year before was worse: they won only 61. For Blue Jays supporters, there is a sense of optimism heading into the new campaign. The league’s offseason revamping of the playoff format, which added a wild card playoff spot in both the AL and NL, combined with the Jays’ reputation for always finding itself the bubble fora postseason berth, means this could be the year for the Bluebirds’ long-await- ed breakthrough. However, Craig Calcaterra, the lead blogger of NBCSports.com’s Hardball- Talk, isn’t convinced the Jays will be playing beyond September. “Tt’s not out of the realm of possibil- ity, but I think the Jays’ [pitching] rota- tion has too many question marks,” said Calcaterra. “The Yankees, Rays, Red Sox, Angels and Rangers are all too good.” Regardless, the Blue Jays were im- pressive during spring training, post- ing a Grapefruit League-leading 24-7 record. Alas, it’s something that Jays fans have seen in the past — a good start that eventually declines over the summer and finishes in frustrating fashion. “For the Jays to transcend those old patterns, they need to get contribu- tions from multiple players so they can weather any slumps from key guys like Jose Bautista and Ricky Romero,” Cal- caterra said. As for the Mariners, far less is ex- pected from them compared to the Blue Jays. Seattle’s roster isn’t nearly as tal- ented as Toronto’s, although Calcater- ra sees the possibility for some im- provement. “T think they are way better off then they were a year ago,” said Calcaterra. “They just need to see what happens with a full season of Dustin Ackley, de- termine whether Chone Figgins and Ichiro [Suzuki] still have greatness, or something close to it, in the tank.” Ackley, the second-overall selection of the 2009 MLB Draft, is someone who Calcaterra sees making a “pretty big” impact for the Mariners in the years to come. As for looking way ahead to the sea- son-ending World Series, perhaps un- surprisingly, Calcaterra does not fore- see the Jays or Mariners challenging for the championship. He’s predicting a big-money match- up of perennial contenders in October, with the New York Yankees defeating the Philadelphia Phillies.