Sodboy13

Following the New Orleans Baby Cakes model of "Don't embarrass our players by putting our stupid team name on the uniforms."

The Knicks-Knicks rivalry has been brutal and unrelenting for nearly two decades.

"Look, if they put a new rink in downtown Phoenix, there's still gonna be a perfectly good one in Glendale, right?"

5 hours ago, BeerGuyJordan said:

Milwaukee is, essentially, already a three sport city, and Chicago isn't likely to let that part of their "market" go quietly. Still, if Seattle doesn't pan out, someone willing to pony up the cash could grab the League's attention, once the Bucks' new arena is done.

1. Bill Wirtz already killed Milwaukee to spite Lloyd Pettit 30 years ago.

2. Will the new arena even have a rink? Bradley Center is a hockey-first facility, but the new building is a Bucks-exclusive scam, and the Admirals have already been booted to the Mecca.

No, there was talk of the Blues setting up their AHL shop in KC after pulling out of Rosemont. @rams80 says that may not happen now, because Tom Stillman is still meeting payroll for the Blues every week with aluminum cans and trips to the Coinstar at Schnuck's.

The Fort Wayne Komets have no interest in having their roster largely dictated by an NHL club. They once created their own league, funding several of the other teams in it, to avoid paying into the Professional Hockey Players Association, which is the minor league hockey union. Unless the family suddenly decides to sell the team to somebody else, Fort Wayne will not be an AHL city.

I've heard Reno before as a possible Vegas affiliate, but I can't remember if they have a suitable arena. It's likely Vegas will start with a short-term affiliation wherever they can get one before making arrangements for their own AHL franchise in the west.

Oh, whoopsies! Guess there's always playing at Scottrade with the upper deck and sides of the lower bowl blocked off. I hear the AHL has grown fond of that setup.

13 hours ago, Marcos Flamengo said:

The St. Louis Blues needs a new AHL affiliate because the Chicago Wolves will become affiliated with the Golden Knights. I think the most probable content would be Hamilton.

The Blues are not renewing their affiliation with the Wolves because they are putting a new AHL team in Kansas City. Nothing regarding the Wolves and Vegas has been announced, but it is expected that's where the Knights will go.

I'm not even excited about the latest chapter of "Here We Go Again." I've been teased too many times. This is just an attempt to extort money from Glendale again now that the team's other options have fallen apart.

Light another candle. Vinnie Viola just withdrew from his nomination to be Secretary of the Army.

DOUBLE BONUS: He withdrew "over financial issues in his vetting" ohhhhhhhh I am here for every moment of this

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/viola-withdraws-as-trumps-army-secretary-nominee-234641

1 hour ago, AstroBull21 said:

Is the izod center in Jersey still functional?  Maybe a stopgap if a new arena needs to be built.

It is apparently "closed," and its remaining use is as a practice hall for bands performing at other large venues in the area. So I doubt you could make ice there.

As is the case for most things regarding the Islanders.

Is Hartford "in the area"?

Who the hell's gonna build a new arena for the Islanders as a primary tenant? And they can't trudge back out to Uniondale, right? Maybe they can reach some sort of deal with the Devils that would be exactly what it sounds like from an Isles perspective. Otherwise, up to Le Colisee Nouveau they go.

As far as bad ideas go, at least this one didn't last very long.

Wolves are getting the Vegas affiliation as the Blues seek to own their own team in Kansas City, less than five years after owning their own team in Peoria was too much of a burden.

Albany's been in the attendance dumper ever since the Devils came to town, though. New Jersey's as good at tanking minor-league markets as Calgary.

On 1/17/2017 at 10:06 PM, Sodboy13 said:

Every story I've heard about Stan Mikita is a good story. Someone like him meeting a slow, withering end like this makes me sad.

Oh, look, here's a story on Stan Mikita's life with dementia, if you'd like to cry a bit.

His company makes the dipping sauce cups for Chicken McNuggets!

I'll just let the headline do all the work for me.

I'm trying to be optimistic about something, goddammit.

Yeah, Bobby Hull as team mascot is a sad and honestly shameful display. You have the right idea; just let him pickle himself in a box every night instead of constantly showing him off to an audience that never saw him skate a shift in a Hawks sweater, and 90% of which has no idea what a bad person he is/was. (There's probably another 5% willing to excuse a drunken, wife-beating Nazi sympathizer, because woo sports.)

Jay Zawaski brought this up on his podcast this week, and he also had a solution: if you need a human mascot, make it Denis Savard. He's not a drunken prick, and people remember him playing.

Every story I've heard about Stan Mikita is a good story. Someone like him meeting a slow, withering end like this makes me sad.

Embrace the Brandiosity.

8 hours ago, Needschat said:

 

The pronoun "She" is the reason why her program's NOT advertised during Monopoly's games.  Fox is skerred of upsetting their base.  

I think it's more of a case of Nolan's show being 1/2 hour of programming per week with a few hundred thousand dollars invested in talent, and the two dumbass shoutfests comprising 17-1/2 hours of programming per week with over 10 million dollars invested in talent.

You've got three people at that network trying to be respected, though. There's Katie Nolan, who gets as close to a "prestige" show as FS1 has by using words longer than two syllables once a week for 20,000 viewers. (The other nights of the week in her timeslot: TMZ Sports!) And there's Jay and Dan, who probably spend every night after their show poring over their contracts for the mystical, magical out clause. Everyone else is either one of the most fetid take artists who gets millions dumped on them to bring in fewer viewers nationwide than I get listeners in a single market, or just a workaday game-caller or scrub along for the ride and removed from the "advancing the conversation" crapfest.

Those aren't reporters. Those are access conduits through which the broadcast rights fees also flow. To expect them to be any more than shills for their assigned product is to be perpetually left wanting.

I agree with you that the tacky, overdone Brandiosity that seems to be overtaking Minor League Baseball is, on the whole, a loss for good design and branding. Yet there are some recent examples in the affiliated minors that show a competent, unique identity that eschews the kitchen sink approach can still occur in the morass of forced wackiness. I am not 100% opposed to minor league clubs copying the parent's identity, so long as some character unique to the farm team is implemented. I think the South Bend Cubs did this very well. Going to hockey, because I'm much more familiar with its lower tiers, the old Iowa Stars of the AHL tweaked a major-league identity to the point where they were dressing better than their parent club; the current Iowa Wild are a shining example of a team that couldn't be bothered to do anything but change the location name on the logos. And slapping the Rockford IceHogs' cartoon pig on the front of a Chicago Blackhawks jersey is incongruous as all get-out.

5 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

    
So I maintain that, if an observer cannot instantly tell the affilliation of a minor-league team by looking at its uniforms, then something is wrong.

 

The Lansing Lugnuts do not need to dress like the Toronto Blue Jays. The Burlington Bees do not need to ditch yellow for red to mimic the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. The Chicago Wolves do not need to dress like the St. Louis Blues. The Kane County Cougars sure as hell do not need to dress like the Arizona Diamondbacks. You would do well to refrain from speaking in absolutes on your sartorial preferences.