Each week, The Reporters put their thumbs out to the good and the bad in the world of sports. This week they discuss their best of the year. Bruce Arthur, National Post: My thumb is up to the end of the NHL lockout. After months of labour war, wed spent a week freezing on some of the finest sidewalks New York had to offer, staking out meetings that produced nothing much. And then on Jan. 5 the NHL walked to the players hotel for what was described as an informal meeting, starting at one in the afternoon. It didnt stop. Midnight arrived, and the meeting kept going. At 4am I closed my eyes for 15 seconds and Aaron Ward took a picture. And finally, at five in the morning the news broke: Labour peace was at hand, and a voice exiting the room bellowed out, this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship. For ending something thats the opposite of sports, thats my moment of the year. Steve Simmons, SUN Media: My thumb is up to the least natural sporting emotion of 2013 - caring about the Davis Cup. Most of us couldnt tell you when the Davis Cup begins, when it ends, how the schedule works or who plays who, but Milos Raonic and Canadian tennis changed all that this past year. Suddenly we were pulled in by possibility, by Raonics huge first serve, by the fortitude of Vasek Pospisil, by the stoic veteran Daniel Nestor, all of them coming together in red and white as a team. Our team. They didnt win the Davis Cup but did what no Canadians had ever done before. They made the semi-finals. In a way it was the perfect Canadian ending: We played hard, we played great, we inspired, we just didnt win. Michael Farber, Sports Illustrated: My thumb is up to the Iron Bowl, proof that one second can last for eternity. The improbable finish started with that single tick Alabama coach Nick Saban lobbied to have put back on the scoreboard. Rather than take his chances in overtime, Saban sent out a back-up kicker to attempt a quixotic 57-yard game-winning field goal. Auburns Chris Davis took the failed kick deep in the end zone and juked and then sprinted more than 100 yards - straight into the hard drive of memory. In-state rival Auburn deprived Alabama of a third straight national championship with Davis return while reminding us that sport is the grand unscripted drama of our lives. Dave Hodge, TSN: Well if that defied belief, my thumb is up to the current NFL season, which has done that… right from the start when Peyton Manning tossed seven touchdown passes, only to have Nick Foles of the Eagles do the same thing later on. Matt Prater broke a record with a 64-yard field goal at the end of the first half, but Justin Tuckers 61-yarder might have been more amazing, because it came at the end of the game. One week, the NFL set a record with 90 touchdowns. The next week, it set a record for one-day scoring with 763 points. Phillys LeSean McCoy rushed for 217 yards in the snow, and Kansas Citys Jamaal Charles, another running back, caught four passes for touchdowns. NFL stadiums have scoreboards, and the busier they are, the better the games tend to be - never truer than in 2013. China Jerseys Wholesale . The announcement was made by the hall on Friday, March 14. She joins Switzerlands Denise Biellmann as this years inductees to the Hall, based in Colorado Springs, CO. Cheap Jerseys From China . The defending champions sent their preliminary list to FIFA on Tuesday, with coach Vicente del Bosque to announce the final 23-man squad on May 25. Costa is set to lead the attack in his native Brazil, with Atletico Madrid teammate David Villa and Chelseas Fernando Torres also included, while David de Gea replaces injured goalkeeper Victor Valdes. https://www.chinajerseyscheap.us/. Rinne had surgery on his left hip May 9 and recovered in time to start the season. He then had arthroscopic surgery on Oct. 24 because of a bacterial infection in his hip. China Jerseys Cheap . However, it wasnt a problem on Monday night. Evgeni Nabokov made 23 saves for his 56th career shutout in the New York Islanders 3-0 win over the Detroit Red Wings on Monday night. China Jerseys Stitched . Despite Arsenals financial firepower, the 31-year-old midfielder was the only arrival in the January transfer window. Signed until the end of the season as injury cover, Kallstrom might not be fit until mid-March after arriving Friday at Arsenal having injured his back earlier in the week while training with Spartak Moscow. NEW YORK -- NFL owners likely will consider expanding the playoffs by two teams, beginning in 2015, when they hold their spring meetings in Orlando next week, but a vote on the subject is uncertain. A groundswell for raising the number of playoff qualifiers to seven in each conference figures to get plenty of support from the 32 owners. Most notably, Arizonas Bill Bidwill, who saw his Cardinals go 10-6 and not get in, while Green Bay (8-7-1) qualified by winning the NFC North. The current format of four division winners and two wild-card teams has existed since 2002, when Houston joined the league as an expansion team, bringing the membership to 32. "There will be a report on the potential of expanded playoffs," NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said Wednesday. "We dont know if there will be any vote at this meeting." Also on the agenda will be alterations to extra points, changing who oversees video replay reviews, and further clamping down on the use of racial slurs by players during games. A change in the playoff structure would be needed if 14 teams qualify, with the top seed in each conference still getting a first-round bye. The next six teams would play in what is now the wild-card round, with the second seed facing No. 7, the third seed taking on No. 6 and the fourth and fifth seeds playing each other. But the NFLs influential competition committee is not presenting a proposal to the owners. One reason the league is looking at more playoff teams is a stalemate in talks with the players union about expanding the regular season from 16 games. Another is the added revenue stream two more post-season games would provide, with those matches up for bidding among the current network partners -- Fox, NBC, ESPN and CBS, which just grabbed an eight-week Thursday night package -- and potential new broadcasters such as Turner Sports. Scheduling of the extra wild-card games also would be dicey, although Monday night would seem logical for one of them. Of course, adding two more playoff teamss enhances the chances for teams with .dddddddddddd.500 or losing records to get in. Commissioner Roger Goodell has suggested a change to the one-point kick on extra points might be needed because they have become so automatic. New England has proposed moving the line of scrimmage to the 25 for a one-point try, but leaving it at the 2-yard line for a 2-point conversion. "There are a lot of different views in respect to the extra point," said Falcons President Rich McKay, co-chairman of the competition committee. "There were 1,267 tried and 1,262 made (in 2013), and so there is that thought with the extra point maybe we need to add little more skill, and one of the ways to do it might be the way New England proposed." But its a long shot that anything will be done next week, except perhaps experimenting with longer kicks for one week of the preseason. The Patriots also proposed extending the height of the goal posts 5 feet to make it easier to determine whether a kick is good. New England also suggested allowing coaches challenges on everything except scoring plays, which are automatically reviewed. Replay as an officiating tool always is in the news, and owners are expected to discuss having the NFLs director of officiating, Dean Blandino and his staff at the league offices be involved in some review decisions. The league saw several inexplicable replay decisions made by referees last season, although McKay and Rams coach Jeff Fisher, the committees other co-chairman, praised the overall quality of officiating. As for the use of racial slurs and verbal abuse, there already are rules on the books to deal with the issue. But an emphasis on stronger discipline will be discussed by the owners, and McKay noted that taunting fouls went up significantly from 2012 to 2013. "We are going beyond the field of play, we are going to the workplace," Fisher said of trying to eliminate such language. "This is going to be a very significant point of emphasis." ' ' '