Episode 312 of TPB continues it’s Canucks’ season preview with an exclusive interview with goaltender Cory Schneider. Schneider talks about his first AHL season, expectations for this upcoming season with the Moose and his future with the Canucks. After Canucks talk, its more football.

The CFL has just played through the labour day weekend and more classics were played, but the Lions didn’t have a positive outcome. Following a second straight loss the Lions made a blockbuster deal. The hosts discuss. Finally, we talk NFL with the season right around the corner. What are you looking forward to this NFL season?

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THIS WEEK’s TPB QUESTION of the WEEK: Who do you think should be the Canucks captain this upcoming season and why? Email your answers to live@thepressbox.org.

The Olympics are complete and now TPB turns to focusing on the game played with the pigskin on episode 311. The show faces off with Province sports writer Howard Tsumura joins the hosts to talk about the SFU Clan football team ending their 25-game losing streak versus the UBC Thunderbirds.

More football talk folllows as the hosts discuss this week’s stories in the CFL (including the Leos and the Bishop trade) and then NFL injuries are discussed. And although the Olympics are complete, the hosts look ahead to Vancouver 2010.

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A week after Shaheed and Zameer were complaining about Canada not having medals in the Olympic games, they were singing a different song as Canada has surged in the medal standings. The hosts talk about whether Canada’s showing can be considered a success or if the expectations were simply too low.

After some more general Olympics talk, Shaheed and Zameer interview Vancouver Canucks prospect Dan Gendur who is looking to play his way onto a professional team in the Canucks organization at the upcoming Canucks training camps.

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Originally written for and published by InsideHockey.com

After a few sports hernia surgeries this past season and another surgery this summer to mend his broken foot, Kyle Wellwood says he’s healthy and ready to play an abundance of minutes in every game with the Canucks organization this season.

“I looked at the roster, and I’m hoping that I can come in play like a top 6 forward,” Wellwood said in an interview with a Vancouver radio station earlier this summer. “That’s where I’d like to be and get those kinds of minutes.”

Wellwood’s intentions are clearly to play the role of a scorer for the Canucks team, and become a possible compliment to the Sedins’ hockey talent, on the power-play or 5-on-5.

And why not?

Labeled as a playmaking center, the 25-year-old Wellwood carries a lot of potential on his shoulders, having displayed much talent in only three seasons in the NHL. As seen in the past, a healthy Wellwood has the numbers to be a scoring threat and a thorn in the opposition’s side, putting up near a-point-a-game totals in the past. However, an unhealthy Wellwood has quite the opposite effect.

Kyle Wellwood’s injury streak began during the 2006-2007 NHL season and continued through the summer of 2008. Wellwood suffered a sports hernia injury and underwent surgery during a campaign that still saw him accumulate a notable 42 points in 48 games in the 2006-2007 NHL season. The injury troubles continued the following season. Wellwood’s sports hernia troubles had him watching the first 15 games of the Maple Leafs 2007-2008 season from the bench. Wellwood returned November 9^th, 2007, putting up less than impressive numbers. Only when the Maple Leafs were statistically eliminated from playoff contention, did Wellwood go under the knife to surgically repair his sports hernia injury. To his disappointment, that wasn’t the end of his unfortunate injuries.

“I was just warming up from a workout and playing some soccer indoors and I rolled over on it and cracked the side of it,” Wellwood describes exactly how he managed to break his right foot during the offseason to a local Vancouver radio station. “We went to the hospital and they confirmed that there was a crack in the foot.”

Based on these previous injuries to the Oldcastle, Ontario native, it is fair to say that there should be a few questions and concerns within the Canucks organization. Questions and concerns that focus around Wellwood’s health and his commitment to rehabilitation should he get injured again.

The Canucks organization has the familiarity of failing to meet targeted expectations due to injuries to key players. As recently as last year, the Canucks struggled through the season with key players, such as Sami Salo, Mattias Ohlund, and Brendan Morrison, on the IR list. The Canucks realize that they need to have a healthy team through the majority of the season to have any success.

Wellwood would fill up some decent minutes as a possible second line forward. But if an injury should occur to Wellwood, then the Canucks prospects line-up is only so deep, that it might not be able to pull out another unexpectedly-talented player, such as Raymond or Burrows, from the farm in time to replace Wellwood.

The Canucks should also note that even the Maple Leafs, who are in dire need to replace the talent of Mats Sundin, did not want to take anymore chances with the injury-prone Wellwood and his inability to follow proper recovery methods. “The Leafs are going in different direction,” Wellwood reports from a recent interview. “My name was one of the question marks. I was coming off injury and I didn’t have that good of a year last year and I guess they evaluated me off of that.” The Leafs had placed Wellwood on waivers, where the Canucks picked him up in late June.

Wellwood was also quick to agree that he did not handle the injuries well during his time with the Leafs. “I didn’t communicate well enough with the Leafs, in terms of how I’m feeling,” said Wellwood, “I always took my talent and things for granted, and you know, I ended up losing my job.”

The Canucks’ need to have healthy players in order to accomplish a successful regular season, merged with Wellwood’s habits of finding and sustaining new injuries, seems like a bad combination from the start. However, Wellwood will be the first to tell anybody who is willing to listen, that he is a changed man with a fresh start and new habits.

“For me, this is a second chance to prove I can be a professional and prove I can be a character guy for the team, I’m going to try and take advantage of it.” Wellwood assures any pessimists that he has learned from his previous mistakes, and what’s more, is that he is past his earlier injuries. “I was playing full time after five weeks, and I ended up re-hurting it there. I just didn’t do a well enough rehabbing it, and training well enough,” a remorseful-looking Wellwood said in an interview earlier this summer. “From a rehab perspective, I think I’m over the hump.”

There have been countless instances in past years where young players have come into the NHL and have had made the mistake of expecting everything to come easy. However, only a few have come to realize that this, in fact, is not the case and have quickly disciplined themselves early enough to maintain success in the league.

Let’s hope that Wellwood has learned from his mistakes during his time with the Leafs and is a much better player for it, now that he’s with the Vancouver Canucks.

Reigning Olympic Champion, Adam van Koeverden, in Athens 2004. Courtesy: cyberus.com

We are now into Day 8 at the 2008 Olympic Summer Games in Beijing, China and Canada still has a medal count that is equal to the total of Stanley Cups the Toronto Maple Leafs have won in the last four decades: zero. Leading up to the Olympic games, the Canadian Olympic Committee (COC) was predicting that this games would see the Canadian Team finish in the top 16 when it came to medal count, but with Canada still have no medals won, and the medals leader China have 41, it does not look like Canada will be able to achieve the goal set out by the COC. In fact, it doesn’t look like they will even come close.

Canada’s 0-for showing is not for a lack of effort, as Canadian athletes have been training their whole lives and giving it their best during the Olympics. Neither is Canada’s inability to win a medal due to a lack of opportunity. Canada has had plenty. Swimmer Brent Hayden was a favorite to medal in at least one of his many swims individually and for the Canadian Swim Team. Heading into the Beijing games, Hayden was coming off a win at the recent World Championships and was looking to defend his title. But he couldn’t even medal and those who weren’t favorites, performed like it.

But all is not lost for Canada in these Olympic games and in Olympic games in the future. While Brent Hayden did not win a medal these Olympics and admittedly may not have managed his swims like he would have liked, he and other Canadian swimmers along with other athletes have exceeded personal and team expectation for these games. The Canadia Men’s swim team posted a Canadian record in the 4×200m relay. Annamay Pierse posted a Canadian record in the 200m breast-stroke. Many other athletes, like Dylan Armstrong in shotput, posted personal and Canadian bests, far surpassing what was expected and anticipated of them going into the games. If these athletes and others continue to put up results that have never been achieved in Canadian history, it won’t be long before these results compete with the best in the world.

Personal and Canadian bests do not excuse Canada’s poor showing when it comes to medals in this year’s games. But the poor showing label should only be given to those who were expected to win a medal and did not meet their expectations. Those who went beyond what has ever been done by Canadian athletes should be congratulated and encouraged to continue to be come better.

While we as fans should be assured that medals are coming for Canada in upcoming Summer Games, the games of the 29th Olympiad in Beijing are not yet complete and medals are coming for Canada in these games as well. In rowing, both the Men’s and Women’s Eights will be competing in the finals and both went qualified for the finals in strong ways, leading their respective races. The men’s pair of Dave Calder and Scott Frandsen along with the women’s pair of Melanie Kok and Tracey Cameron both won their semi-final heats and head into the finals with the intention of winning. Let’s not forget reigning Olympic champion  Adam van Koeverden.

And there will be more. The likes of Alexandre Despatie (3m diving), Simon Whitfield (triathlon), and Jessica Zelinka (women’s heptathlon) will all be challenging for medals. So before we jump down the throats of our athlete’s lets 1) wait for the games to come to completion and 2) evaluate the results not necessarily by medal standigns but by individual performance and expectations.