Cold Canadian blogger sentences mystery BBC writer to a hike (in a soccer kit) from BMO Field to High Park TODAY!

Canadian MLS fans who"don't like the cold" departing for January soccer game.

I have been keeping a file of my offseason TFC thoughts and news, intending to share prior to the MLS Superdraft this coming Thursday January 15th. Stay tuned.

A web article caught my eye and I felt that a response should go to the top of my outbox. 

 Nothing inspires quite as much as encountering observations of the intensely stupid variety.

Recently a post on the BBC Sport site was written as a 10 point guide on MLS (meant to be an education for Steven Gerrard). I think he can read it until point 8 arrives.

8. “MLS fans don’t like the cold”.

What?!?!?
Stevie G. in L.A. may never encounter the winter cold and conditions that most of us survive annually. If he ever has to play a MLS playoff game in Utah or Colorado he will quickly get the absurdity of this comment. Where did this BBC writer get this ice nugget from? It is a botched attempt to explain why the soccer season in Canada and the US does not follow the Euro winter schedule.

It is not a dislike of cold, it is avoidance of frostbite and death by exposure. Long before MLS was brought into being, soccer in North America was forced by our harsh winter climates to be a spring-summer-fall sport. 

Look at team sports in North America that inhabit cold end of the calendar. Basketball is 100% indoors. Hockey is an indoor sport 99.9% of the time (with a recent fascination with once a season outdoor spectacles).

The only outdoor team sport that stretches from summer into winter is football of the CFL/NFL variety. The CFL (Canadian football league) ends their outdoor season at the end of November. The US NFL (National Football League) has their playoffs in January and the Super Bowl in February, but they benefit from indoor stadiums and southern climes. When American football has outdoor games in cold climates (Green Bay Packers come to mind) they also have players clad from head to toe in thermal gear and huge heaters on the sidelines so that players off the field are warmed. BBC Sport should know that nobody playing in the NFL spends 45 minutes on the field without a visit to the bench. Even in the day of two way players (playing on the offense and the defense) there would have been timeouts and special team plays that would have kept the extremities from falling off.

Hey BBC Sport -Outside my home this morning the temperature was -17 C. Welcome to January in Ontario. We pursue winter sports outdoors. We have a respect for the cold, not a dislike. Properly dressed it is possible to ski, skate and snowshoe. Soccer comes back when wearing shorts becomes a feasible activity. For the pro players that is March, for the amateurs that is May.

I can tell you that MLS bloggers don't like BBC Sport writers who are clueless about climate...