Sodboy13

If your gate receipts are declining and your TV ratings are flat in year three, where is your money coming from, outside of hoping that Dwayne's charisma can coerce Fox Sports executives into fronting them the cash for a few seasons? At some point your business actually has to be in business, even in Silicon Valley's edgiest cases of dullards throwing venture capital at whatever is new.

Honestly, forget Birmingham and Arlington, maybe they should have headquartered spring football in St. Louis from the jump.

I am reminded of the final sketch of the terrible teenage garage band from Kids in the Hall:

"We were so close. We had sixty people at a gig."

"Yeah, sixty people!"

"That's a salad bar."

I am not exaggerating when I say, outside of the fan seating, our kids have a better setup for indoor flag football at the local rec center.

If anyone want to set a line on how many teams finish the season I'm all ears. Right now I'm seeing two in Salem and Louisiana that I'm not sure will even start it.

We haven't seen the 1983 White Sox Sunday throwbacks, though I did see an unconfirmed tweet that they've been flat-out dropped. Also not sure if their City Connects have been worn or not, because that would require watching White Sox baseball, and I've got enough problems right now.

Alex Meruelo and Gary Bettman paired up for an Arizona Q & A this afternoon, and judging from the clips, Meruelo was a lot better off when he was invisible and silent. But this must be part of his earning the purchase price.

54 minutes ago, BBTV said:

 (fauxblack?) 

Rachel Dolezal, or Shaun King?

If you'd like your own Mets City Connect jersey, but don't want to shell out the big bucks to Fanatics or wait 8 weeks for shipping out of China, simply go to the sports store in your neighborhood that's renowned for "lifestyle apparel" and bootleg Jordans. They've been selling this jersey for twenty years.

Lions: Solid B and way better than what they've been wearing. Lack of striping on the blue and black pants is disappointing. Worse is the retention of the ICY and CLEAN plain white pants that we're going to see in every road game.

Broncos: It's... Fine? Average? Acceptable? Unremarkable? The helmet and pants are going to make or break this. I can't believe the last set, when was seen as certifiably insane at its release, lasted 27 dang seasons.

Texans: Oh good God who cares. Yeah this was focus-grouped straight into a toilet. There are no improvements here on what was previously an unremarkable but solid and enduring set. The new font is over-quirked, the navy primary with its absence of striping and primary sleeve logos is now a downmarket Walmart jersey that costs $130, and everything about the "H-Town" alternate reeks of desperation to catch a fad too late. Congratulations on being like the eleventh team to do it.

If Wide Latin shows up for real I'm disavowing this whole league.

38 minutes ago, The_Admiral said:

 

EDIT: also, the Whalers moved out of Hartford without an official destination in place (what an indignity), and Karmanos still managed to draw the Flushing Toilet on a napkin somewhere in Michigan in time for the next season.

With an absolute banger of a uniform to boot.

You know, the more I think about it, the more I wonder if this is less of an issue from the Utah ownership and/or the NHL, and more of a case of Fanatics going "You want us to do what in how long of a timeframe? Have you ever ordered, like, anything from us?"

1 minute ago, BottomlessPitt said:

Delta Center holds 14,000 for hockey. 

Okay, that's more tolerable then. Survivable in the short term. Like America West Arena. Oh.

Look, I get that the Winnipeg owners had the advantage of two names, one of which already had a full identity, at the ready. But that sale happened a month later in the calendar than this one and they were still suited up and ready to sell all types of merch by October. This is asinine.

And it's official. NHL approves moving the Coyotes to a nice farm upstate where they can run around with Chivas USA and come back to the league someday, honest, and welcomes its brand new franchise in Utah that will just happen to be stocked with every player and hockey ops staffer from Arizona.

Quote

“I agree with Commissioner Gary Bettman and the National Hockey League, that it is simply unfair to continue to have our Players, coaches, hockey front office, and the NHL teams they compete against, spend several more years playing in an arena that is not suited for NHL hockey,” said Arizona Coyotes Chairman & Governor Alex Meruelo. “But this is not the end for NHL hockey in Arizona. I have negotiated the right to reactivate the team within the next five years, and have retained ownership of the beloved Coyotes name, brand and logo. I remain committed to this community and to building a first-class sports arena and entertainment district without seeking financial support from the public.”

There are far too many examples in American society of people failing upward to the point of immunity from consequence, but this dude ran a hockey team so badly that his fellow owners just paid him a billion dollars to go away forever, with the full knowledge that no one could build a suitable arena in a good location in 25 years, and this twerp sure ain't about to do it in five.

Also apparently the Delta Center only holds 11,000 for hockey, so I wouldn't declare us out of the woods on this just yet.

That's it. It's over. It's all over.

"Watch party? Get the hell off our property, why would you want to watch this?"

https://bsky.app/profile/five4howling.bsky.social/post/3kqesacyr2k2q

Watching the broadcast from the start and this is all so stupid, and not just in the usual way of Tyson Nash attempting to produce words. Everything's being presented in "if" and "maybe" because the only people who refuse to admit this team is hauling ass north to Salt Lake tomorrow are its current owner and the people in charge of the league.

At least Whalers fans got their Sunday wake. This time they've assembled all the mourners and are pretending there's not a body on display.

We're approaching an all-time ignominious end here. We're in Cleveland Barons territory.

Yeah, I'm sure this is the guy who's going to close the magical arena deal in Scottsdale that no one else was able to for a quarter-century.

Diamondbacks' City Connects are certifiably banana yellow.

On 4/15/2024 at 5:43 PM, CaliforniaGlowin said:

That's pretty much the same uniform as the desert hawks come on y'all

Looks more like the Orlando Predators with royal blue swapped in for black.

We'll know for sure if the Texans promise "more music mornings with less talk" at their uniform unveiling.

40 minutes ago, Walk-Off said:

 

 

Over the last few years, some people here in the CCSLC have accused Major League Soccer of adding teams mainly to prop itself up financially through expansion fees.

 

Is it possible, then, that the NHL and its teams — even with a very different relationship from what MLS has with its clubs — have run into a troublesome monetary situation that is causing a compulsion, or at least a temptation, to get quick and easy funds by expanding to a shockingly gargantuan number of franchises?

First off, MLS is totally doing that, and secondly, I don't think it's just them and it's certainly not just sports. A lot of our nation's Big Business Thinkers are getting doompilled by nonsense inside their bubbles and think the end is nigh, so they're in Get Mine Now Mode even more than they have been previously, and this is not a group renowned for their ability to look past their own noses to next quarter. Claw it all in from the suckers now, because any day now that AI which can't reliably tell you what two plus five divided by four is will become Skynet somehow and they'll have to be at the ready with their bunkers in New Zealand and/or on Mars, where they can eventually get down to the important business of repopulating humanity in their own images.

53 minutes ago, HOOVER said:

Too many cooks in the kitchen.

Well, it takes a lot to make a stew.

1 hour ago, Sec19Row53 said:

Devil's advocate - what do fans know about design? Do you end up throwing too much at the wall because of so much input?

When you do that much focus grouping on anything, it is far more likely that either the groups keep telling the group paying for them what they don't want to hear, or that the group paying for them has no idea what they want to hear, or can recognize good ideas when they hear them.

Please refrain from tasting the knob.

10 minutes ago, oldschoolvikings said:

 

Here you go...

 

"This bold reinvention of a classic logo reflects the consistent organizational direction over the last half-century, and our commitment to it in the future."

You all like the Jets' new uniforms now. Come back to me after the sixth consecutive week of them wearing the black pants and black socks.

The uniform tops out at "acceptable," the devotion to accuracy on the fonts is nice but the fonts themselves are nothing to write home about, the finish on the helmet seems way out of place on a straight retro look, and the alternate is more BFBS than ever now that the black trim has been stripped out of the primaries.

The Keyshawn/Kotite era is the best the Jets have ever dressed, but everything outside of the aesthetics is why we'll never see that revived.

10 hours ago, BottomlessPitt said:

 

Seattle should've joined in the early 90's, but Sonics owner Barry Ackerley walked out on the other investors, on purpose mind you, so the Seattle bid would fail. Dick.

He also intentionally renovated Key Arena so it held only 11,000 of the worst-placed seats possible for hockey, as a means of keeping out any would-be "competition." It was passable for the Thunderbirds and that was about the limit, which is why the Seattle Supersonics continue thriving in the Emerald City to this very day.

6 hours ago, Red Comet said:

And overall for Week 3:

 

Attendance really isn’t a huge deal IMO. TV ratings and the NFL potentially investing into this league are the real long-term areas of concern. 

Based on some recent reminiscing in another thread, I shall note that this was basically the Arena League's plan circa 2003.

If attendance was not a concern, they could have just run all the games out of Birmingham and/or Arlington.