By Doug Kennedy
The national football league does a better job marketing its draft than any other pro sports league in the world. They get their fans, celebrities and team personnel announcing their picks. The draft is held over three days, with the first round Thursday night, round two on Friday night and round three on Saturday.
This year, there was five quarterbacks picked in the first round. This is always interesting to watch to see which team or teams got it right. Trevor Lawrence, who was the first overall pick to Jacksonville, is hard to bet against, as he has looked really good the last three years playing at Clemson.
Sixty-seven Canadians have been drafted to the NFL since 1966. This year, we had four Canadians picked with safety Jevon Holland chosen in the second round. Holland played for Oregon and was drafted by the Miami Dolphins. Benjamin St. Justen was drafted by Washington in the third round, out of Minnesota. Wide receiver Josh Palmer was drafted by the Los Angeles Chargers in the third round out of Tennessee and running back Chuba Hubbard out of Sherwood Park, Alberta. He is the biggest name getting drafted by the Carolina Panthers, out of Oklahoma State. Unfortunately, he was injured for most of last year which probably hurt his draft status.
Curling COVID-19 problems
Unfortunately, some TSN staff have tested positive for COVID, which has led to the cancellation of one draw on Sunday morning and has taken the women’s world championship off television until Tuesday.
Team Canada’s Kerri Einerson is off to a tough 1-4 start. The top six teams get a berth in the 2022 Olympics. They can have one more loss and still get to a tiebreaker. Fourteen teams are in this year’s tournament.
Einerson put this team together a couple of years ago and has had great success, until this bump in the road. All four players were previously skips on past teams. Let’s hope her team bounces back. She has had great success in the Calgary bubble the last two months, winning the Scotties, mixed doubles with John Gushie and winning the Grand Slam of curling a couple, weeks ago.
The World mixed doubles are in late May in Scotland.