What's Another $10000 for our Broken Dreams?

Roberto Luongo is in the news once again.  After becoming invisible since being benched after game 3 of the Canucks first round playoff loss he appeared last week to give his thoughts on the Cory Schneider affair, his time in Vancouver and what to do if someone offers to spot your $10,000 entry fee for a place in a world-class Las Vegas poker tournament.  

Luongo of course, is the hottest goalie commodity unofficially on the trade market since those fifteen minutes when Marty Brodeur hired an agent as a practical joke to mess with Lou Lamorello.  Canuck haters want him to go to Toronto where he can see what it's like to play in a tough hockey market while Luongo supporters want him to go to Florida where he can be closer to his family and he will never have to worry about answering media questions.  However, thanks to his well-deserved ten year contract, few teams are seriously willing to pony up the goods to get that final chip that will enable them to lose in the first round of the playoffs.    

Luongo would rather just play poker and who can blame him?  Well, it seems that most of BC thinks that using taxpayer's money to spot someone who makes $5 million a year $10,000 to go play with 6600 other players (including his less famous brother Fabio Luongo who somehow found $10000 in his underwear drawer to pay his entry fee) isn't the best investment for their money.  They could have bought Tom Fergus twice over.  But if you are the BC lottery Corporation, you go with someone who is publically noted for choking when the chips are down. 

if you got this joke, you're old.

Roberto Luongo is one of the most popular celebrities in all of BC and his presence in Las Vegas, where he is as identifable as the present Tom Fergus, is more than proof enough that he is making a worthwhile contribution to the betterment of our society.  That website's hoodie must have set them back a cool $30 as well.  Although $10G could have bought 1000 starter poker kits for the disadvantaged children of British Columbia or ten tickets at a Canuck playoff game, I am happy that it is being used as a 'thank you' gift from the people of BC for his dedicated work as the Canucks most visible punching bag (after Maxim Lapierre).   

I personally can't wait for my son to be able to distinguish between the hammer and pocket rockets when he's playing with those other marks in his kindergarten class. 
  
So what did BC taxpayers truly get for their $10,000?  A martyred sports celebrity who has all but played his last game as a Canuck to hock a website that features some guy that just looks to reek of too much after-shave, carries the weight of unfulfilled expectations on his shoulders and a future cocaine habit.  Yep, that sounds about right.