All championship experiences in sports are not created equal. When a team is a pre-season favourite, or spends the most money, or is stacked with the best players in the game, its never quite as special. This is why the Kansas City Royals, who finally dropped a post-season game by losing 7-1 to San Francisco in the opening game of the World Series Tuesday night, have a chance to go down in baseball history as one of the more remarkable champions of this generation. Already the Royals have made winning look more fun than anyone else in sports. The Royals don’t just celebrate like millionaire athletes. They have that pinch-me-I-can’t-believe-this-is-happening-and-it-reminds-me-of-what-it-felt-like-to-be-a-kid-again kind of fun. They buy rounds of drinks for their fans in bars after games, they have a player who gave out playoff tickets to a fan on Twitter and agreed to go to dinner with him. It’s become fashionable in sports for players to place winning championships above all else in sports. The standard answer as to where an athlete should want to play? Why wherever gives him the best chance to win a championship, of course. Teams such as the New York Yankees have used that selling point since the dawn of free agency in the 1970s, with baseball’s other big spenders such as the Angels, Boston, or the Dodgers also opening their wallets to do what some might call invest in talent, and what others might call buy a winner. Even in a salary cap league like the NBA, we saw The Big Three Found set things up, not just so that they would be able to play together, but so they could win a string of championships. That’s what it was all about and to a degree it worked. But the thrill of victory is never what it could be when one celebrates the accomplishments of a team that had the deck stacked in its favour before the season even began. The Heat winning two championships was maybe good for the NBA. But there was hardly anything magical about it, no sense of witnessing something that made you remember where you were when… It’s just a fact of life that the greatest celebrations in sports are always those that seem the least likely, the emotional energy inversely proportional to the likelihood of it occurring, for both participants and spectators. The greatest celebration I can recall ever seeing in sports? Probably the 1980 US Olympic Hockey Team in what became known as the “miracle on ice,” a scene that appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated magazine without a headline. The scene simply spoke for itself. The Royals aren’t quite that kind of story but their journey thus far does feel different. There’s a little more unbridled joy, a little more enjoy-it-while-it-lasts. Yes the Royals remind us that even in professional sports, there are different degrees of joy. New England Patriots Jerseys China . Louis against the Blues. The Canucks picked up their second straight victory in the swings opener on Tuesday in Calgary before getting routed in Minnesota last night, 5-1. Custom Patriots Jerseys . The 25-year-old native of Milford, Conn., has 18 points in 41 games this season. The five-foot-eight 166-pound centre also has 28 points (10-18) in 15 games with AHL Oklahoma City. http://www.cheappatriots.com/. The Sioux Falls Canaries scored two in the seventh and three more in the eighth to come back from a 3-0 deficit and defeat the Winnipeg Goldeyes 5-3 in front of 6,769 at Shaw Park on Sunday afternoon. Stitched New England Patriots Jerseys . Woods said Friday that his charity event, which attracts a world-class field even without being part of any tour, will move in December 2014 to Isleworth, the course where he honed his professional game from 1996 until moving away to south Florida two years ago. Wholesale New England Patriots Jerseys . - The Oakland Athletics say they are stopping negotiations to extend their lease at the Coliseum.INDIANAPOLIS - Adam Vinatieris greying temples and greyer beard reveal one part of his remarkable career. At age 41, he is the NFLs oldest player.Hes not slowing down.Nine years after the leagues best clutch kicker made the surprising move to leave New England and sign with rival Indianapolis, Vinatieri is still finding ways to kick it in a young mans world.At his age, he could probably just leave practice and say See you on Sunday. But Vinnie works just as much now as he did when he was 25 years old, teammate Pat McAfee said. The reason he is so good and can be so good for however long he wants to be is his work ethic.McAfee was 9 years old when Vinatieri was a rookie in 1996.Over five seasons as Vinatieris understudy, the Colts punter and kickoff specialist says Vinatieri has advised him on everything from how to eat right to finding the proper balance between football and life. McAfee believes those life lessons have helped him thrive, and remain the primary reason Vinatieri seems to be on the cusp of milestones every week.The next chapter could come Sunday night when Vinatieri will try to become the first player in league history with 17 seasons of 100 points. He needs eight points to break a tie with Jason Elam, and it would be a fitting moment as the Patriots (7-2) and Colts (6-3) renew their rivalry.Hes as good of a kicker, good of a clutch kicker, and consistent kicker thats probably ever been in the game, New England coach Bill Belichick said Wednesday. Mentally, hes as tough as they come in terms of concentration, focus, discipline, blocking out all the things that he cant control and just doing his job.Vinatieri, after all, made decisive last-minute field goals in each of New Englands three Super Bowl wins. He earned his fourth Super Bowl ring in his first season with Indy. He made two equally memorable field goals during a New England blizzard, to tie and then beat Oakland, as the Pats made their first title run.Last month, he became first NFL player to score 900 points with two franchises and hes just 60 points away from making it an even 1,000 with both teams. With two points Sunday, hell also join Morten Andersen, Gary Anderson and Jason Hanson as the only players to reach 2,100 career points.TThings havent changed much this year.dddddddddddd Vinatieri is 32 of 32 on extra points and 20 of 20 on field goals. His current streak of 26 consecutive field goals made is the third longest in franchise history.But Vinatieris legacy cannot be measured purely by numbers.Hes played for Hall of Fame coach Bill Parcells, Hall of Fame finalist Tony Dungy and, of course, Belichick. Hes played with three No. 1 overall draft picks -- Drew Bledsoe, Peyton Manning and Andrew Luck -- in addition to certain Hall of Famer Tom Brady. He also played for the defunct World League of American Football long ago.Not all of his moments have been memorable. His Super Bowl kickoff against Green Bay in 1997, returned for a touchdown by Desmond Howard, has appeared in the NFLs Hall of Fame. It made Howard the only special teams player to ever win the MVP award.Vinatieri put that behind him long ago. An avid hunter, he also learned at a young age about the necessity of maintaining a steady heart rate before taking a shot.Backup quarterback Matt Hasselbeck saw how good he truly is when Vinatieri popped in a video of a lion hunt in Africa. As Vinatieri tracked the animal, the guide started explaining it was no longer safe.I feel like Im pretty unflinchable and my heart was racing, Hasselbeck said. I remember thinking, Theres no way a field goal is going to get his heart racing.Teammates dont just respect Vinatieri for his experiences. Theyve given him one of the rarest titles a kicker can attain, locker room leader.Not surprisingly, Vinatieri doesnt let the milestones, the nickname, the honours or the buzz get in the way of what he does best. Thats how he got a foothold in the NFL. And thats how he intends to keep it until he leaves, on his terms.Its been a lot of fun, he said. There have been so many great moments throughout my career -- the first time you win the Super Bowl is something you dream about as a kid. The Snow Bowl game was fun. Tackling Herschel Walker as rookie was great fun.When you get to my age, you focus on staying healthy and staying productive, he added. If thats a year or three years, I dont know. 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