Daily Rants | The Sports Curmudgeon

The Upside And The Downside Of Technology…

Reports say that the NFL will put computer chips in footballs to be used in Exhibition games this year and in Thursday Night Football games in the regular season. The primary purpose is to gather data to determine if the goal posts should be narrowed in order to make field goal tries and PAT kick attempts a bit less “automatic”. I do not pretend to have any codified data here, but I have advocated narrowing the goal posts in the NFL for about 20 years now and I continue to believe that would be a good idea. Let me outline my reasoning here:

Ergo, the more times teams line up and run real offensive plays as opposed to place-kick plays makes the game more exciting/interesting.

Ergo again, motivating teams to run real plays as opposed to place-kicking plays is beneficial to the game experience.

How to do that? Make the place-kicking more difficult. Increase the risk of failure without increasing the reward for success.

Currently, the goal posts are 18 feet and 6 inches wide and the crossbar is 10 feet high. In arena football the goal posts are only 9 feet wide and the crossbar is 15 feet off the ground. I would not advocate – without data in hand to justify it – changing the NFL goal post to the arena league goal post. However, narrowing the goal post and raising the crossbar should both be given serious consideration once data is compiled.

There is a downside to this data collection effort. One other thing that a ball-with-a-chip might do is to provide more accurate placement of the ball in situations where a play ends proximal to a first down marker or when a play involves “breaking the plane of the goal line”. In fact, it would be hard to argue that the ball-with-a-chip could possibly be less accurate than the current system is. Having said that – and being fully in favor of accuracy in this endeavor – please contemplate the delays in the game that will ensue from such placement technology. This will be like having a challenge flag thrown on half the plays in a game as officials seek to adjust the ball-with-a-chip exactly to a spot on the field of play. And then they will do the measurement with sticks and chains ignoring the need for the chains to be at precisely 90 degrees to the yard markers which have been place on the field without benefit of lasers to assure they are all parallel and perpendicular to the two sidelines which too must be parallel to one another. Sigh …

Switching gears here, I am not a follower of UFC or any of the MMA promotions. I have tuned in to see a few of the programs on TV and I do not particularly like them. I mention that only to make it clear that the following remarks come from someone who does not follow the sport nor has any fondness for it.

UFC had a big pay-per-view event on July 9; I did not see it; that happened in the middle of my most recent hiatus. One of the most hyped bouts on the card featured the return of Brock Lesnar to UFC. Lesnar had fought there in the past but had been participating in pro ‘rassling for the last several years. [Aside: Given the way UFC creates furious animosity between fighters before bouts, I have said before that UFC is just like WWE except that in UFC the punches land and the blood is real.] Lesnar won his fight that night.

Subsequent to the results, we now know that Brock Lesnar failed a drug test on 28 June. That means that 10 full days came and went between the time the sample was analyzed and the time of the fight. Once that information came to light after the pay-per-view event was over and the money was counted, the UFC mavens claimed that this was all news to them. Wow …

Oh, did I mention that UFC as a business has just sold itself to a new owner for a price reported to be in the range of $4B? I guess the UFC mavens were so busy handling that transaction and celebrating the closure of the deal that they never got the memo regarding the failed drug test for their pay-per-view headliner.

To be fair, there will be a confirmatory test on Lesnar’s “B-Sample” to see if that testing shows the same result that the first test did. There is indeed a chance that this is a laboratory error – but that does not explain how for 10 days the event promoters managed to avert their eyes and ears from such results. The UFC Word for Today is:

C R E D I B I L I T Y

Several weeks ago, CBSSports.com had a report about booze coming to college football stadiums in greater amounts. No, they were not talking about hip flasks smuggled in by students and used to stay warm during cold weather games. The report was about more and more NCAA institutions selling alcohol in stadiums as a revenue generator. And it is not just for football games; this year at the College World Series and at the Women’s College World Series (softball), fans could purchase wine and beer in the stadium venues. This Fall, about 40 colleges and universities will sell beer – and in some cases beer and other alcoholic beverages – in the stadia where football games happen.

I am anything but a fan of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union; I have been known to imbibe an adult beverage on more than a few occasions. Nevertheless, in college football stadium, there is a significant fraction of the attendees who are underage. On college campuses around the country, there are more than a few problems that involve underage drinking and involve over-consumption by young adults who seem to have insufficient self-restraint. And so, the institutions of higher learning who put on these events think it is a good idea to add yet one more source of alcohol to that audience.

What could possibly go wrong?

Obviously, the motivation to sell beer and such in the stadia is revenue. Here is some data from the CBSSports.com report:

Texas made $1.8M from selling beer and wine last year.

Here is a rationalization offered for selling beer in the stadium:

It will cut down on the binge drinking in the parking lots during pre-game tailgating.

Honestly, one of the college officials said that to CBSSports.com. I wonder how long it took him to be able to say that without giggling.

Finally, here is an item from Gregg Drinnan’s Keeping Score at newskamloops.com:

“On Monday, Joey Chestnut downed 70 hot dogs in 10 minutes and was treated as an American hero for winning a July 4 eating contest. In my house, I got the stink eye when I reached for a second pork chop at dinner.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

Good To Be Back …

A couple thousand years ago, Julius Caesar victoriously returned to Rome after his conquest of Gaul. Last weekend I returned to my keyboard from a river cruise in southern France. Caesar used his trip to set himself up as Emperor of Rome. I used my trip to celebrate my 50th wedding anniversary with my long-suffering wife. You have to look very carefully to see any real parallels there…

Lots of stuff happened while I was gone and I really did not pay that much attention until I got home last weekend. But I did notice that the American League won the All-Star Game meaning the AL champ will have home field advantage in the World Series. For the first time that I can remember, it might actually be appropriate. It has never made much sense to me use the All-Star Game in this way. However, this year might find the Royals in the World Series again and two of the Royals’ players hit home runs in the All-Star Game to provide the margin of victory. At least for once, the outcome of the All-Star Game can possibly have direct ties to some sort of accomplishment by members of the team in the World Series. As of this moment, I am rooting for the KC Royals to make it to the World Series for that reason alone.

[Aside: Do not take the above to mean that I think Bud Selig did a smart thing or a useful thing linking the All-Star Game outcome to the World Series. I have said that was a dumb move since the day it was announced. However, this year I can root for a serendipitous ending to the AL season by having the Royals in the World Series – and then go back to saying this is a moronic linkage.]

I also noticed – thanks to an e-mail from a reader with a link in it – that Dwayne Wade expressed feelings of remorse about having to leave Miami to sign with the Chicago Bulls because of the “business aspects” of the game. It seems that the Heat offered him 2 years and $40M to play in Miami at age 35 but “business aspects” demanded that he take the Bulls’ offer of $43M for 2 years. At least he did not sink to Latrell Spreewell levels and declare that he had a family to feed as a way to denigrate the Miami offer.

At the same time, Tim Duncan retired from the San Antonio Spurs in a most understated way for a player who will surely go into the Hall of Fame down the road. His retirement announcement is perfectly in character for him. If you listed all of the adjectives in the English language in order of relevance to Tim Duncan’s demeanor and carriage over the past 20 years, I think it would take you a week to get down to “flamboyant” on that list. He is the most understated superstar I can recall in the NBA since the league started marketing its stars.

NBA Commish, Adam Silver, expressed some concerns/reservations about the trend to form “super-teams” in the NBA. The league had a “super-team” in Golden State last year until the NBA Finals and that season produced the biggest TV ratings ever. At first, some may think that the Commish is out of touch. I think over the long haul he has reason to be concerned.

Absent crippling injuries or disasters like fatal plane crashes, there are only a half-dozen teams who have a prayer of making it to the NBA Finals let alone winning it all. That is reality…

Over the long haul, without competitive balance the league will not continue to flourish and grow. There are CBA negotiations upcoming for the NBA and the NBPA and it will behoove both sides to figure out how to keep money flowing to the enterprise so that it can be divvied up equitably between owners and players. Here is the outline of one idea to accomplish that end; clearly, it will need meat put on the bones:

2. Make that number a hard salary cap for each team for each season.

3. Get rid of the “maximum contract” concept. If the hard cap for a season is $100M (just to make math easier) and a team wants to spend 75% of that money on a superstar player, they should be allowed to do so and then fill out the team with 14 other guys who can divide up the remaining $25M.

In that system, the players get paid in aggregate the same as they would with the “max contract” in place but it would make it more difficult to assemble a 4-player “super-team” without all four of the players making the conscious decision to take tens of millions of dollars less to play together than they could make playing against each other.

Just a thought…

To give you an idea of NBA revenue streams, I ran across a report about the potential value that might accrue to teams by selling those “company logos” on their uniforms next season. Recall that the league decided that they would allow each team to sell one 6.25 square-inch patch on the uniform for next season. The Golden State Warriors have evidently let it be known that they are looking for somewhere between $15M and $20M from a sponsor for that privilege. The Warriors are going to be on national TV a lot next year; you can count on that. To some extent, the market for these company logos has been set from the lower tier of the league.

The first team to sell advertising rights on the uniforms for next year was the Philadelphia 76ers. You can be relatively certain that they will not be on many national telecasts next year unless there is some clause in the TV contracts mandating that every team must have some minimum exposure in such games. The Sixers logo for the next 3 years will be StubHub – the ticket reseller – and the revenue to the Sixers will be $5M per year. Here is a link to an espn.com report with details on this

Phil Mickelson finished second in the British Open yesterday at the age of 46. Recall that he won the British Open in 2013 at age 43. I want you to take yourself back to 2006 and think about how you would have answered this question:

Which golfer – Tiger Woods or Phil Mickelson – will be the bigger factor in major golf tournaments ten years from now?

Remember, back then, Tiger Woods was the fitness and conditioning freak and he is 6 years younger than Mickelson. Back then, the only thing anyone ever mentioned about Mickelson’s physique were his “man boobs”. Well, here we are in 2016 and Mickelson came within 3 shots of the winner, Henrik Stenson, and he was 11 shots ahead of the third place finisher. Meanwhile, Tiger Woods last win in a major was 8 years ago in 2008 and his last win in any tournament was in 2013.

Finally, here is an observation from Greg Cote in the Miami Herald:

“Bartolo Colon looks like the first runner up in a Fred Flintstone lookalike contest.

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

Here, There And Everywhere…

Today will be a clean-up of odds and ends on my clipboard. Any continuity from item to item is purely coincidental…

Kevin Durant ended what seemed to be endless speculation about where he will play basketball next season by announcing that he will sign a 2-year deal with the Golden State Warriors. This announcement raises one question in my mind:

Are there enough shots in a game to go around among Durant, Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green? We shall find out next year…

This announcement puts to rest various speculations about where Kevin Durant may have chosen to play. Let me try to explain why some of those outcomes did not happen:

Why not the Lakers?

Why not the Knicks? It is impolite to answer a question with a question but I will do so anyway. Who would want to play for that hot mess of a team?

Why not the Wizards (in his home town)? Look at the Wizards roster; there are no certified star players there. Durant could not win with Russell Westbroook and a decent frontcourt in OKC; why would anyone think he might win with John Wall as his running-buddy and a less competent front court? Ka-beesh?

I somehow missed the following comment from Brad Dickson but Gregg Drinnan caught it and put it in his Keeping Score column. It is pertinent to the recent NBA championship won by the Cavaliers:

“With people in Cleveland rushing to see a sculpture of Cavaliers leader LeBron James that is made out of dryer lint, Brad Dickson of the Omaha World-Herald wrote: ‘You have over five decades to prepare, and this is what you come up with?’”

Joey Chestnut won the Nathan’s Hot Dog eating contest downing 70 hot dogs – and their buns – in 10 minutes. Ignoring the gastric distress of the moments following that feat and the impending intestinal distress on the next day, consider the “nutritional value” of 70 Nathan’s Hot Dogs:

Why do we celebrate gluttony on Independence Day?

There was a report that a disembodied human foot washed ashore in Rio de Janeiro right near where the beach volleyball competitions will take place in the Olympics next month. Just guessing here, but if an errant shot rolls down near the water line, no one is likely to say,

“Give me a hand, here…”

Greg Cote had this comment about the upcoming Games in Rio in the Miami Herald last weekend:

“The Rio Olympics begin in one month. And, really, other than the threat of Zika virus and crime, the unfinished facilities, bacteria-riddled water, athlete withdrawals, doping suspensions and body parts washing ashore, everything is looking good.”

The 2016 Olympic Games have not yet begun but there is already sponsorship news about the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. Brad Dickson of the Omaha World-Herald had this item in a recent column:

“There is already an official toilet of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. I’m just glad sport isn’t overly commercialized.”

If for some reason you actually care enough about this to want more information, here is a link about the partnership between the Tokyo organizing committee and the toilet company.

Back in April Loyola University faced a problem on its women’s basketball team. Most of the players either quit or applied for a transfer citing harassment from their coach, Sheryl Swoopes. The university hired outside investigators and after several months of sleuthing, Loyola fired Sheryl Swoopes over the weekend. The Chicago Tribune has been on top of this story from the beginning; here is a link to their recent coverage.

Iceland’s hope of being the Cinderella of Euro 2016 ended over the weekend with a 5-2 loss to France in the tournament. The Icelandic team played hard for the entire game but France simply had better players on the pitch; the score was reflective of the game as a whole. Not to worry, however, there is a Cinderella still in the “Final Four” of Euro 2016:

The other semi-final game will match France and Germany.

Finally, since I cited a Greg Cote comment above, let me close with another of his observations here:

“Colts sign Andrew Luck to richest deal in NFL history, worth up to $140 million through 2021. Imagine if he weren’t coming off his worst season!?”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

Summer In Finland…

Canadians celebrated Canada Day last Friday; Americans celebrate Independence day today. Between those two days of celebration, Finland hosted the Wife Carrying World Championships in the town of Sonkajarvi located a couple hundred miles northeast of Helsinki. The race takes place on a 253-meter sand track with a water obstacle that is 1-meter deep. The male in the race has to carry the female – who does not have to be his wife – for the entire course. Thirty-five teams competed and the winner was a Russian team that finished in 1 minute and 2 seconds.

The rules for this competition require the female to be carried must be at least 17 years old and must weigh at least 49 kilograms (108 pounds). The rules also state that all of the contestants “must have fun”.

If you missed the opportunity to got to Sonkajarvi to take in this event – or to participate in it at your choosing – be advised that Finland will host another world championship event later this summer and you still have time to plan to go or to practice so you can participate. From 24 through 26 August in the town of Oulu, the 21st annual Air Guitar World Championships will take place. The guiding spirit for that event is summarized here:

“According to the ideology of the Air Guitar, wars would end, climate change stop and all bad things disappear, if all the people in the world played the Air Guitar. At the end of the competition, the whole universe is invited to play the Air Guitar for the world peace.”

Last night, the Marlins beat the Braves in a game played at Fort Bragg, NC. It is the first MLB game played in the state of North Carolina and it is the first MLB game played on a military base. This was one of the home games for the Braves and the crowd was clearly in favor of the Braves. That did not matter much as the Marlins won the game 5-2. From the crowd shots of the game, I believe those in attendance were all servicemen and their families and it certainly appeared as if everyone was having a good time. Obviously, this was a makeshift facility for an MLB game; there did not appear to be an empty seat in the house and the attendance was reported as 12,582. During the game, they interviewed Rob Manfred about the motivations for putting the game at Fort Bragg. Manfred said that MLB is committed to putting real baseball games in places where it has never been before and make it clear that he wanted to see things like this happen in the future. Based on the crowd response last night, it is probably worth replicating.

The Braves “lost” a home game by playing this game where they did. The Braves are clearly having attendance woes this year – in addition to their on-field woes. The team is about as bad on the field as most people thought they would be and fans are finding other things to do with their spare time instead of going out to the ballpark. The Braves are averaging only 22,724 fans per game – down 3,266 fans per game from last season. These are not “early numbers”; the Braves have already played 47 home games as of this morning which is over half of their season allotment of home games.

In an attempt to get more fans into the park, the Braves have come up with an interesting sales promotion. You can buy a monthly pass for $39. Each person can buy up to 4 of these passes but the catch is that you do not know where your seats will be. About 2 hours before game time, each monthly pass holder will get an e-mail informing them where they will be sitting for the game that day/night. The pass will automatically renew month-to-month unless the buyer cancels out of the deal prior to the arrival of the new month.

In July, the Braves will play 9 home games. If you thought you might want to see even 3 of them, the monthly pass is a pretty good deal because that would mean you would see a major-league game for $13 per game. Those are minor league prices… I think this is a good idea for a team that is struggling at the gate. For all of the details, here is a link…

There is a strange story out there concerning former Seahawks’ backup QB, Tarvaris Jackson. In June, Jackson was arrested for allegedly pulling a gun on his wife; he has been charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. There has been no trial or any pleading in the case so I am loath to fill in any details here. What is strange in this matter is that Jackson requested a public defender claiming that he is broke.

According to reports, Jackson said that he has no income and no savings or investments. He said that his assets are a car (worth $100K) and nothing else. Evidently, the judge was skeptical and denied Jackson’s request for a public defender. Jackson is correct in saying that he has no income; he is an unrestricted free agent and has not signed with any NFL team as of this moment. [Aside: This arrest and these charges will surely not make him any more attractive to NFL teams considering any addition to their QB rolls.] However, his assertion that he has no savings or investments is difficult to believe.

In 2014, his contract with the Seahawks brought him $1.25M

In 2013, his contract with the Seahawks brought him $840K

Jackson was originally drafted in 2006; so, he has made a significant amount of money over the last 10 years. Obviously, he may indeed be destitute as he claimed; but I can understand why the judge was skeptical here.

Finally, here is an item I gleaned from Dwight Perry’s column, Sideline Chatter in the Seattle Times a while back:

“New York ended its holdout last week, becoming the final state to legalize MMA fights.

“The first bout will be at Madison Square Garden on Nov. 12 or the next time someone wears a Red Sox jersey into Yankee Stadium — whichever comes first.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

NBA Stuff …

I am intrigued by one of the early NBA free agent signings. The LA Lakers signed Timofey Mozgov for 4 years and $64M; I have not looked up the exact terms of the deal so let me assume for a moment that this is a simple $16M per year contract. I think there is a huge risk for the Lakers in this signing. Consider:

Last year, Mozgov averaged 6 points per game and 4 rebounds per game. In the Finals against the Warriors, he played a total of 25 minutes in 7 games and scored a total of 15 points in those 7 games.

Mozgov will be 30 years old in 2 weeks.

Perhaps he needed that year to rehab his knee fully. In that case, the Lakers have themselves a competent center to go with three or four young and promising players who cannot play center; that would be a shrewd move by the Lakers. On the other hand, it may be that the Lakers are paying $16M per year to a guy who was essentially a bench player for all of the NBA playoffs this season. [Even before the Finals against the Warriors, Mozgov only averaged 5.8 minutes per game for the Cavs.] If his knee is damaged to the point where it will not improve significantly from where it was last season, the Lakers will have signed a $64M albatross.

While I am on the subject of the NBA – sort of – I wrote recently that Adam Silver wanted to make a rule change to eliminate the “Hack-a-Shaq” strategy and that I fundamentally disagreed with him on that point. However, I do have a suggestion for The Commish related to an issue that I think would benefit the NBA significantly. Moreover, given the large increase in revenues that the NBA has experienced – and is projected to experience in the next few years – this is the time to consider it.

The NBA is not well-served by the negotiated terms of the current CBA that creates the “one-and-done” situation in college basketball. Yes, there are some players who are physically ready to be NBA players one year out of high school; Karl Anthony Towns is the most recent example; however, please do not forget the names Kwame Brown or Eddy Curry. Yes, there are some players who are mature enough to handle the fame and riches they obtain as they sign their rookie NBA contracts; let me just say that some of them handle those assets more poorly than others. In the days when players stayed in college for 3 or 4 years before coming to the NBA, the league had access to talents that had received good coaching for a longer period of time and – generally – more mature individuals. So, how can that situation obtain once again?

I think that it is time for the NBA to make a major investment in the D-League – or to use the D-League as the basis for evolving a much more robust “minor-league system” for basketball. The NCAA used to provide this to the NBA for free; Federal courts ruled that the NBA could not prevent players from skipping directly to the NBA; the CBA legitimized – in a legal sense – the notion that a player had to be 1 year removed from high school to be NBA-eligible. I just do not think that 1 year is enough in most circumstances.

Let me review the D-League briefly here:

Eight other NBA franchises have some sort of “hybrid”/”partnership” sort of “ownership”/”affiliation” with other D-League teams.

It is not as if there are not close ties between the NBA and the D-League already.

The problem is that the public perception of the D-League is about as bad as it could be. Ask most folks about it and the response will be somewhere on a spectrum centered around “the place for players who can’t play in the NBA”. Compare that with the public perception of minor league baseball where most folks think of those teams as “places where prospects hone their skills in order to get to the majors”. The NBA can do a lot to change that perception; and if they do, they can then embark on a course whereby they can begin to develop players over time for the parent club; having draft picks spend some time in the D-League should become a normal part of player development much as happens in baseball.

There are probably CBA considerations here but my next idea might make the NBPA amenable to a change here:

I think that D-League salaries need to be increased on a scale and that contracts for players taken in the second, third and fourth rounds should be limited to 2 years. After that, the parent club has to sign the player to an NBA contract that meets some minimum standard or the player becomes a free agent.

I think that a first-round pick who is sent to the D-League for “seasoning” should continue to get his guaranteed NBA contract salary based on the slotting formula that exists and his time in the D-League counts directly toward the time when he fulfills that contract and can sign elsewhere as a restricted free agent.

I think this will make the NBA a better league with a better product to sell to the public. Yes, it will cost the league some money, but it will not bankrupt the owners by any stretch of the imagination. It complies with the law in that all of this would be codified in a CBA and it allows for the truly gifted player to go directly to the NBA after one year of college – Karl Anthony Towns as my poster child here.

Finally, since today is the day Johnny Manziel declared that he will get totally sober and serious about playing for an NFL team this year, here are two comments about Manziel from columnists:

“Johnny Manziel was indicted. My question: What with all that partying, how does he find the time for domestic assault?” [Greg Cote Miami Herald]

And …

“Last week, Johnny Manziel attended a Justin Bieber concert. In a crowd full of 16,000 11-year-olds, Manziel was still the least mature person in the room.” [Brad Dickson Omaha World-Herald]

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

The NBA free-agent season starts this weekend. Due to the huge new TV contract, the salary cap for each team has gone up by a bit more than $20M and I read somewhere that some teams like the Sixers will have to spend $50M just to get to the salary floor. [Aside: There is a floor and a cap in the NBA.] What this means is that there will be some players who will get contract offers that will make you shake your head in disbelief. However, even before the NBA’s silly-season gets underway, the NFL has a staggering contract announcement.

That is the biggest contract in NFL history with the largest guaranteed money ever.

What this means is really pretty simple. Franchise QBs are a rare commodity in the NFL and when a team has a young franchise QB, they need to dig deep into the pockets to make sure they have him locked up for a while. Andrew Luck just set the bar for contracts that young franchise QBs are going to aim at. There will likely be more of these sorts of deals down the road.

Do not weep for the NFL owners here; this contract – even if it becomes commonplace – will not send them to the poorhouse. While the financial specifics for 31 of the teams is not known outside the world of tax accountants and the IRS, there is one team that is publicly owned and therefore has to share its fanatical with the world. Here are some data points:

The revenue-sharing they got from the NFL (from the TV deals and other league-wide deals) was $222.6M. [Aside: Since teams share equally, that means the NFL revenue stream was sufficient to pass along $7.12B to the teams after the league kept a smidgen for itself to run the Front Office and pay for things like the Wells Report.]

Revenue should be up this coming year over last year as there are expanded network telecasts of Thursday Night Football games.

I wonder if there is actually a way for an NFL owner to run his team such that it loses money for a year – and I do not mean “lose money” as a result of some accounting legerdemain. It seems to me as if that would be very difficult to do.

Speaking about NFL owners and profits, there appears to be some sort of movement in Las Vegas with regard to where they might put a stadium in which the Raiders would play. Matt Youmans had a report in the Las Vegas Review-Journal recently that outlined the pros and cons for what he calls the “final four stadium sites.” In addition to the site that had been touted before right next to McCarran International Airport, there are three other possibilities. One of the alternate sites is the field where the Las Vegas 51s – the Mets’ Triple A affiliate – play their home games. The reason that site is on the radar is that the 51s are planning to move to a new park out on the western edge of Las Vegas sometime soon.

Rather than go through the pros and cons here, let me give you a link to the report in case you are interested in the details.

http://www.reviewjournal.com/sports/nfl-vegas/final-four-stadium-sites-raiders-debate

I am not sure I understand what this next item is supposed to do, but I read a report that there is a joint venture between the NFL, the NFLPA and Cirque du Soliel to put on an “NFL experience” exhibit. I do not know the common denominator among those three entities but supposedly things are moving ahead and you will never guess where they plan to put this “thing”. If you said Times Square in Manhattan, you would be correct. I would have needed at least 72 hours of guessing before I got to that site.

There will be a theater with a 360-degree multimedia “experience” for fans that will be produced by NFL Films. As is always the case when something like this is announced, there are statements made by managers that demonstrate what I like to call a “value-subtracted process”. You read the statement; you can define every word in the statement; nevertheless, when you read it as a whole, it makes little sense. Consider this statement from Dawn Hudson, the NFL chief Marketing Officer:

“The NFL and Cirque du Soleil are two iconic global brands. We are pleased to team with this industry leader to set the new standard of excellence in sports and entertainment. We are thrilled to re-imagine what it means to authentically engage with fans by providing them an immersive, innovative experience celebrating football and available year-round. We hope to bring fans of all ages and avidity into the huddle and give them an all-access pass to players and teams.”

Can someone explain to me the difference between “authentically engaging” with fans and “dubiously engaging” with fans? Someone must know all about that because the NFL is re-imagining” it here and that means they imagined it in the past and must know what the heck it means.

The President of NFL Players, Inc. was not to be outdone. Here is what Ahmad Nassar had to say about all of this:

“We are happy to facilitate an experience that brings NFL players closer to football fans from around the world. This will be a unique and innovative showcase of professional football and an example of how our business can be a unifying force.”

Now that you have read that statement do you feel you know anything more than you did 30 seconds ago?

Of course, the big cheese at Cirque du Soliel, Daniel Lamarre, had some cogent remarks to offer:

“Our new venture with the NFL signifies the next phase of Cirque du Soleil, and we see tremendous opportunity in working creatively with the League as well as other world-class brands throughout the world. No other brand in professional sports is as strong and popular as the NFL and we are thrilled to have the opportunity to showcase the NFL from a whole new perspective.”

Having heard all of those statements, I still know nothing more than the fact that there will be a multimedia presentation/experience produced by NFL Films.

Finally, Greg Cote had this comment in the Miami Herald with regard to happenings in the NHL off-season:

“Wheelin’-dealin’ Florida [Panthers] signed all-star defenseman Keith Yandle to a seven-year, $44 million deal, traded Dmitri Kuliokov, and had the 23rd and 33rd picks early in NHL Draft, according to analyst Pierre Kiper Jr. I bet big they’d draft two white teenagers you’d never heard of. How’d I do?

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

RIP Buddy Ryan

Buddy Ryan died at the age of 82 yesterday. He was more than just a defensive coordinator extraordinaire; he was a defensive innovator. To say he was a “colorful character” would demean all the colors of the spectrum. He was a no-nonsense guy who – even more than Howard Cosell – told it like it was. I remember he said about one player who was not performing the way Ryan wanted that he would trade the guy for a six-pack and he would not demand that the six-pack was cold. In terms of his defensive philosophy, here it is in his words in a nutshell:

“No quarterback has ever completed a pass while laying flat on his back.”

Rest in peace, Buddy Ryan.

The news reports leading up to the Olympic Games in Rio continue to be “less than positive”. The Olympic mavens put golf back into the Olympics after a hiatus of 112 years. The top golfer in the world at the moment, Jason Day, announced that he will not participate in the Games this summer due to “concerns about the possible transmission of the Zika virus”. The top stars of the NBA are one-by-one finding reasons to opt out of playing for the US national team. I am sure that I have missed some of the players who have opted out but here is a list of the ones I was able to cobble together:

Here are some of the players who will represent the US in Rio:

I think the “opt-out squad” is the better team. Just saying…

There should be no stigma attached to any of these athletes choosing to sit out these Olympic Games. In the case of a PGA Tour pro or an NBA player, the Olympics are not the pinnacle of his sport; nor does he need a good showing in the Olympics to break through financially. Fundamentally, the Olympics needs the starpower those players bring a lot more than the players need the Olympics.

That is not the case for athletes in swimming, sailing, gymnastics, Greco-Roman wrestling and the like. Those athletes have trained for and pointed toward Olympic participation for years; if they opt not to participate in these Games for fear of the Zika virus, they may never have another chance at the pinnacle of their sports. The motivations and pressures on athletes vary from sport to sport with regard to these questions.

Meanwhile the Acting Governor of Rio de Janeiro, Francisco Dornelles, told a Brazilian newspaper that these Games could be a “big failure” due to budget constraints that undermine security efforts and the ability to move people and equipment around from place to place in the city during the games. Rio has yet to receive a promised payment from the national government of $860M for a variety of purposes; the games begin on 5 August and you don’t even need an abacus to realize that is 5 weeks and 2 days from today.

Rio was to build a Metro line to one of the areas where competitions would happen; that was to be a main mode of transit between those venues and places like the Olympic Village. The Metro is not yet finished and one of the problems is that the national government has not yet coughed up the $290M it promised for that project. That brings the total of national money not delivered to $1.15B. Imagine the situation where the Brazilian government finds $1.15B hidden in coffee cans somewhere in the Treasury and delivers it to Rio tonight. How effectively could that money be spent in the next 5 weeks and 2 days to do things like finish the Metro?

Just in case anyone missed the point on how serious things might get, Dornelles also said that without an infusion of cash from the national government, police patrols and security efforts may have to be curtailed at the end of June due to – wait for it – insufficient gas money. Living in the DC area, I am used to politicians crying wolf and prognosticating apocalyptic consequences if they do not get their way in some struggle. Lack of money to buy gasoline to maintain police patrols goes beyond anything I have ever heard around here…

Now let me put a cherry on top of this lovely sundae… For the Rio Games, the only anti-doping lab facility in the city has been closed for economic reasons. The accommodation will be to take the samples from the athletes and fly them to other labs in other places for testing.

Somehow, I am not convinced that all those logistical handoffs will necessarily assist the anti-doping authorities in keeping things on the up-and-up.

Somehow, this pandemonium situation will have to be resolved or we may learn ex post facto that the winner of the 100-meter sprint event has been drinking cheetah urine for the last two months…

Finally, I need to end this on a lighter note. So, please consider this commentary from Brad Rock in the Deseret News recently:

“Stephen Curry’s wife Ayesha, who has a TV cooking show, tweeted last week that the NBA Finals are rigged.

“Speaking of rigged, how does she time it so her persimmons cookies come out perfectly, right after the commercial break?”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

RIP Pat Summitt

Pat Summitt died yesterday. She dominated women’s college basketball in the era before Geno Auriemma dominated women’s college basketball. Over the course of her career, her women’s teams at Tennessee won 1,098 games. Pat Summitt was 64 years old.

Rest in peace, Pat Summitt.

Yesterday, I wondered aloud about what effect Brexit might have on the EPL. While those costs and benefits are still to be known, England is in shock over another version of “Brexit” in the world of soccer. Iceland eliminated England in the first of the knockout round games in euro 2016; Iceland advances to the European equivalent of the “Elite Eight” while England will go home. I said about a week ago that Iceland was the Cinderella of the tournament simply by hanging in during the early matches in group-play; now, they are the “Official Cinderella” of Euro 2016.

The result was sufficiently shocking that the English coach, Roy Hodgson, did not wait to be fired for this stunning loss. He resigned as coach of the English National team immediately following the game in the regularly scheduled press conference. Hodgson had been under fire at home; his resignation simply preempted what was going to happen anyway.

Iceland now moves on to play France – the host nation for Euro 2016 – on July 3rd. The games for the round of 8 are set with:

(Wales has an aura of “Cinderella” too.)

Late last week, Johnny Manziel’s father, Paul Manziel, told ESPN that his son is “a druggie”. As surprising as that comment may be, he also added that jail “would be the best place for [Johnny Manziel].” That comment was part of the fiasco created when one of Johnny Manziel’s attorneys accidentally sent a text or e-mail to the Associated Press containing information about Johnny Manziel’s assault case. Part of that message said that the attorney was worried about his client’s ability to “stay clean”.

Prior to the publication of those sorts of comments from his attorney, Johnny Manziel was probably on a list of folks who are persona non grata on NFL rosters. With this new information, he probably moves from that list to a list of people who are radioactive within the NFL’s General Manager community. I do not know what it would take for an NFL team to invite him to training camp now.

Yes, I do recall that Andy Reid and the Eagles gave Michael Vick a second chance after he served his time in the dogfighting mess. However, at the time Vick had two things going for him that Manziel does not:

2. There was no reason to suspect that Michael Vick would relapse into dogfighting again. That means that if he ever regained a meaningful position on an NFL team, that team could count on his being in uniform on Sundays. If Manziel is indeed “a druggie” – and we have seen pictorial evidence that he takes a drink on a more than occasional basis – that makes him “less dependable” in the eyes of a team. So, even if a team thought he might be good on the field someday, they would also have to worry about his availability for many of their games.

I think this is the end of the line for Johnny Football as it pertains to a pro football career. I hope he gets whatever sort of help he needs and buys into that help such that he sets his life on a more positive course than being “a druggie”.

Kentucky coach, John Calipari, has a habit of saying some “off-center” things. That should not, however, lead you to believe he is unintelligent. Calipari has lots of good ideas but good ideas rarely attract a similar level of public attention as compared to off-center ideas/remarks. Several weeks ago, Calipari suggested that the SEC should not hold a conference championship tournament at the end of the basketball season. His idea is that the regular season conference champion would claim the guaranteed NCAA Tournament bid and then the Selection Committee could pick and choose from the other schools in the conference to fill out the field. He believes that late-season losses in the SEC Tournament hurt teams in the conference with regard to selection and with regard to seeding.

In its place, he suggested that the SEC hold an early-season tournament that was not a single-elimination format. With 16 teams, every team would play 4 games; there would be an early-season tournament champion and every school would get 4 games under their belts early on. He thinks that would be a way to get lots of fans to engage with their teams. Here is Calipari’s general outline for this early-season tournament:

“You have to do it in November. Play a game or two and then, out of the gate, you have a conference tournament. You know you have it for one week. Maybe you have two sites in the same city. Maybe it’s in Atlanta. You’re doing it every year. Let’s all [have] our fans go to Atlanta and everything is geared for the SEC.”

Remember, the ACC and the Big-10 have had that inter-conference challenge for a while and the games have been generally well received. Calipari’s idea might be a different take on a similar track. The one question that I would have asked Calipari if I had had the opportunity is this:

I think the games would be a lot more meaningful if the results mattered…

Finally, here is a frightening thought expressed by Brad Dickson in the Omaha World-Herald:

“John Daly turned 50 last week. The frightening thing: He’s now at an age where a lot of men begin to wear weird looking clothes.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

Brexit – In And Among These Sports Rants?

Usually when sports and politics intersect, the only meaningful issues involve the degree to which the taxpayer will have his pocket picked so that a team can get a new tax break or a new stadium/arena. Every once in a while, they will intersect as some politician pulls a grandstand play taking a stand on some social issue or principle that involves a major sports team or figure. Other than those scenarios, sports and politics tend to go their separate ways.

However, the Brexit vote in the UK last week might shove sports and politics together in a protracted mating dance. Let me review a couple possible intersections here:

The British soccer leagues – particularly the English Premier League – have plenty of players who are not British-born. One of the issues in the referendum that involved Brexit was the status of and approval of “foreign workers.” Well, those players might just become “foreign workers” and there may be new standards and new rules about their eligibility for that work. Oh, and there are foreign-born coaches in the English soccer leagues too… Here is part of a statement from the EPL regarding the Brexit referendum:

“Given the uncertain nature of what the political and regulatory landscape might be following the ‘Leave’ vote, there is little point second-guessing the implications until there is greater clarity. Clearly, we will continue to work with Government and other bodies whatever the outcome of any process.”

Here is my translation of that statement:

We have no idea how any of this will affect the EPL but we will try to stay on top of it with the folks who are in charge of working all this stuff out.

Here is one example of how this can get complicated very quickly. FIFA rules prohibit players under the age of 18 from being transferred to other countries – except in the EU because there is an EU regulation that says that no countries in the EU can restrict the movements of any person over the age of 16. So, the UK and the European clubs can transfer players around at the age of 16. So, what impact might the FIFA rule have on the UK now that they are not part of the EU – and/or will that regulation be part of whatever agreement is reached between the EU and the UK as the Brexit process moves forward?

This business is FAR from over…

No matter what happens there, I suspect that the EPL will continue to be a highly successful and profitable sports enterprise. Things may get a bit messy and may need to jiggle around a bit before it all settles in to a stable situation. But the EPL is not on the brink of implosion. Such is not the case with the entity here in the US known as Major League Football.

In case you do not recall, Major League Football (MLFB) was supposed to be a spring football league that would provide football games to football junkies in that “downtime” between the Super Bowl and the start of NFL training camps. The original idea was to put MLFB franchises in cities where there was no NFL team and no MLB team. That would give the MLFB team a chance to develop a fanbase without a major competitor in town. At the same time, that “business model” also consigns the MLFB franchises to minor cities. The consignment to minor cities does not portend good things for the MLFB when it comes to getting a TV deal with a major network. The league reported that it did reach an agreement with the American Sports Network to televise games. The American Sports Network is not part of my cable channel package…

The league was supposed to begin play in February 2016 but one of the financial backers pulled out at the last moment leaving the league to try to cobble together financing for a shortened season to start in April. That didn’t work either and the league announced that it would cancel its inaugural season and be back next year with finances in order.

The latest news regarding MLFB is not nearly so encouraging. The league is being sued for unpaid rent since March 2016 on the league headquarters in Florida. The amount of rent in arrears is less than $100K and the league contends that it has a financing deal in the works with a foreign investor for $20M. Obviously, if that financing comes through, MLFB will remain solvent and can consider a season for the Spring of 2017. Personally, as a developmental league, the model might actually work because people in the US do love football. However, the words of caution here for the folks at MLFB and any scribes and fans who really want to see the league succeed are:

Finally, here is an item from Dwight Perry in the Seattle Times from a few weeks ago:

“Former NFL punter Steve Weatherford says he got kicked out of a Planet Fitness for grunting too hard.

“On the plus side, odds makers just installed him and Maria Sharapova as the mixed-doubles favorites at Wimbledon.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

Daily Fantasy Sports Betting Approved In Nevada

Recently, I wrote about a company in Nevada who sought approval to install one of their products in Nevada casinos that would allow daily fantasy sports betting on a pari-mutuel platform. Well, according to the Las Vegas Review Journal, US Fantasy just got unanimous approval from the Nevada Gaming Commission to move forward here. According to Vic Salerno – owner of US Fantasy – the pari-mutuel platform will be available in August and will be ready to roll for this year’s football season. He hopes to have 80% of the casinos in Nevada linked in to his system. On a personal level, what this means to me is that there could be another wagering avenue available for our annual autumnal visit to Las Vegas this year.

There has been this debate regarding daily fantasy sports; is it gambling or is it a game of skill? As you know, my position is that daily fantasy sports are the same as poker; if one is a game of skill then so is the other. If one is gambling …

I thought that Vic Salerno had an interesting way to look at those questions from the report in the Las Vegas Review Journal:

“If you and I get into a free-throw shooting contest, it’s a game of skill. When we start betting money on it, it’s gambling.”

The move by the NHL to put a team in Las Vegas has put that city in the spotlight with regard to any realignments in sports leagues or any expansion plans. The Oakland Raiders are making nice with city officials in an attempt to get a stadium built there for the team; Adam Silver has thrown away the “bugaboo of gambling” as a barrier to having the NBA in Las Vegas; even MLB Commish, Rob Manfred says that is a “viable alternative” for an MLB franchise and that the casinos there would not be a barrier.

Actually, I think there are three significant barriers between now and the time when an MLB team calls Las Vegas home.

2. MLB and the MLBPA have a new collective bargaining agreement to negotiate. The other way to get a team in Las Vegas would be via expansion and my guess is that expansion would become a bargaining issue in the upcoming talks. Ideally, MLB and the MLBPA would find a way to use the new CBA as a way to accomplish assistance for the A’s and the Rays while simultaneously pointing the path to any expansion that might occur during the time allotted to the new CBA.

3. Mother Nature has a part in this opera. Baseball is played in the summer; I have spent time in the summer at Nellis Air Force Base which cannot be more than 15 – 20 miles from the heart of The Strip. [I was there for a weeklong technical conference in late July/early August.] In the 8 days I was there, the high temperature every day was in the range of 110 degrees – and one day it was 114 degrees. Do not tell me about “dry heat”; at 110-114 degrees, it is mighty uncomfortable outside. And even in the early evening – when baseball games would start – the temperatures were still in the mid-90s. All this climatological talk means to me that any baseball stadium in Las Vegas would have to be domed and air-conditioned. The cost of the stadium would not be trivial…

Speaking of new stadiums, it could be that the Buffalo Bills are next in line for some kind of upgrade/new playpen. Bills’ owner Terry Pegula told a local radio station that he has not reached a decision yet on that issue but that the NFL has asked him if he has any plans to do something about the aging Ralph Wilson Stadium venue. According to a report at ESPN.com, the Bills lease with the local government for the stadium runs through 2022 and the stadium just got $130M worth of “upgrades” in 2014. Nevertheless, Ralph Wilson Stadium is 43 years old. Based on the ESPN.com report, Pegula has heard the comments of fellow owners about modernizing his facility and he has acknowledged a chat with Roger Goodell on the subject but he is not going to roll over and play dead. His answer to all of that for now is “We’ll look into it.”

The Pittsburgh Pirates will assault your taste buds – and alimentary canal – with a new sausage concoction this year. Here is the deal:

The only thing missing here is chocolate sauce – – no?

Finally, with Derrick Rose being traded to the Knicks, his health/durability becomes a key concern for the fans and the tabloids in NYC. A while back, Brad Rock had this item in the Deseret News but it is still timely:

“Tennis star Roger Federer underwent the first surgery of his career after tearing a meniscus.

“The injury happened while filling the tub for his twin daughters’ bath.

“Note to Derrick Rose: Don’t even think about taking a shower.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………