Buck Martinez had a lengthy baseball career spent with three teams. He chronicled his final season as a player with “The Last Out – The Toronto Blue Jays in 1986″ in which he talks about his team, his season and his life. The book captures moments in time, but fails to hit on all levels. Eric Rosenhek reviews why.

Rating: 8.5/10 I never cared about Cal Ripken. Ty Cobb is a name in the record books and Hank Aaron’s a grainy highlight reel of a man running the bases. Pete Rose exists to me only for the controversy, not for the phenomenal athlete he was. I care about Derek Jeter and I cared about [...]

Rating: 9/10 On April 5, 2011, a Toronto Maple Leafs loss officially ended their playoff run. Almost like clockwork, the Toronto Sun began a series on what’s wrong with the Leafs in the next day’s paper. The regularity of this kind of sportswriting, where a columnist takes it upon themselves to explain why a team’s [...]

Rating: 8/10 I work with a runner. We talk about it every once in a while. Sometimes it sounds like a lot of work. She’ll tell me the only time she can run is early in the morning, when it’s bound to be cold and freezing and she’ll be in a rush to drop her [...]

Rating: 4/10 They say what makes or breaks an effective tale is the way a storyteller portrays it. With the right storyteller, an explanation stating how one makes a peanut and jelly sandwich can be entertaining. The story of the racehorse Secretariat is an inspiring and extraordinary string of events. However, in this case of [...]

Rating: 10/10 Though often attempted, only a handful of sports movies actually have what it takes to withstand the test of time. Some fade eventually and some flop right out of the gates, one such movie that has stood out amongst the pack as one of the classics is 1993s Rookie of the Year, directed [...]

Rating: 8/10 It was 1987 and hockey’s cold war was in full effect. In January, a Canada/USSR game at the World Junior championships ended with both teams brawling as the lights were turned off. A month later, NHL All-Stars and the Soviet National team split a two-game series in Quebec City. In September, they faced [...]

Rating: 6/10 The Blind Side is a powerful movie with heartwarming message that led the way to the 2009 Academy Awards, picking up a Best Picture nomination in the process. Judging by its mass success, the film from director John Lee Hancock can be enjoyed by people of all ages interested in a transformation story. [...]

Rating: 8/10 Professional baseball has been defined by the memorable moments that have occurred over the last 100-plus years. We all have a favorite moment. For me, it was Joe Carters game-winning home run that gave the Toronto Blue Jays their second straight World Series title in 1993. I still get chills every time I [...]

Rating: 10/10 When true stories are adapted for a big screen treatment, it’s usually a hit-or-miss deal. Documentaries, on the other hand, pack much more of an impassioned punch that resonates for a much longer period of time. Murderball, the documentary at hand about wheelrchair rugby, is a perfect example of how these projects are [...]

Rating: 7/10 Frozen is the latest entry in the “bottle film” category. Usually a term applied to television shows, a bottle film is when a movie is shot at one location and that location only. Horror films, like this one, tend to use this method of filmmaking in order to build intensity and make its [...]

Rating: 7/10 127 Hours, the latest film from director Danny Boyle of Academy Award-winning Slumdog Millionaire fame, features sequences of stylistic peril, humor and one of the most gruesome scenes in recent memory. Unfortunately, although the real life story of mountain climber Aron Ralston may be harrowing and courageous, the film manages to fall in [...]

Rating: 8/10 It’s the cliche rivalry in baseball and arguably all of sports: the Boston Red Sox and the New York Yankees. Throughout the history of baseball, it’s been the one lasting true rivalry; it’s gone nearly 100 years. And if you’re not a fan of either team, it’s hard to really care about the [...]