Sometimes You Tell The Day By The Bottle That You Drink

In today's Globe, Shoalts completes an impressive natural hat trick, with his third "the Leafs are screwed" column in three days. My favourite was probably yesterday's second tally, in which Cheap-Shoalts put his trusty tape recorder back up to his ear, and after some ocean noises and some Rick Astley he thought he'd taped over, heard this pearl:

"This year's edition has to produce a long playoff run to ensure Ferguson survives past the last year of his contract."

Now, where I come from "long playoff run" means conference finals, and I certainly haven't heard that's what Brylcreem Jr needs to keep on keepin' on - simply making the playoffs is the goal most often mooted. Another Shoaltsclusive? I dunno, but at this rate he'll file four negative columns live from the season opener next week, burning himself out by November. Of course the Leafs should be eliminated from postseason play by then, allowing Shoalts to go out in a blaze of glory.