Jon Marthaler bakes up a batch of delicious links just for you. Other times, you can find him here and here. Jon?

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Happy Saturday! Have you planned your Olympic Hockey parties for tomorrow yet? I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that tomorrow's USA-Canada hockey matchup is the most important game of any kind ever played in the history or future of the world. To paraphrase RandBall himself: if you're not watching, you might as well skip the census.

Of course, it hardly seems fair to ask our plucky young American heroes to topple the Canadian monolith twice in one tournament. Unfortunately, the rest of the world capitulated, and so it's up to us once again to save the world from Canadian domination. "Stand on guard," phooey. They're plotting something, and hockey's only the beginning. Luckily, we turned back the Red Menace at the under-18 and under-20 levels already in the past 12 months, and slowed it earlier this tournament; now we need one more win to finish the job.

On with the links:

*On the subject of hockey, an interesting case for fewer NHL teams, based on the Olympics.

*Spring is very much in the air, and with thoughts of spring come thoughts of baseball. A few Twins links to get you going: Jesse Lund at Twinkie Town details this spring's Twins position battles; Parker Hageman, this time at the brand-spanking new Star Tribune TwinsCentric blog, makes the case for statistics; and the great John Bonnes not only figures out Minnesota's biggest baseball rival, he marks the passing of the Hormel Row of Fame with the story of the greatest Row of Fame jingle ever.

*And finally: regular reader Super Rookie thinks that we need a mascot for our new Minnesota soccer team -- and has precedent on his side.

That'll do it for me - but of course, for more RandBall, tune into AM 1500 KSTP at 3pm today. Our man takes to the airwaves, and will use the allotted time to discuss the back catalogs of Lifter Puller and Pavement (if Stu gets his way).

In all seriousness, I'm quite excited for today's show. Will Linnemann be on? I hope Linnemann's on.