Sodboy13

So we have two instances of the NHL attempting to enforce this mess of their own, then pissing down their own leg within hours and doing nothing because it would be monumentally stupid PR, even by NHL standards.

If I'm a player, and especially if I'm a player agent, I'm definitely pushing the edges of any other of the league's softer rules/dumber traditions and daring them to do something about it. They've proven themselves idiots and cowards twice.

In related news, taking a full swing with a windup at your opponent and cracking against his skull with your stick carries a maximum allowable punishment of $5,000, apparently. Todd Bertuzzi must be quite surprised.

Checking the league Twitter accounts over the past couple weeks, the USFL seems to only be active for Michigan, Memphis, and Birmingham, which would align with the speculation of keeping the hub home teams and ditching the rest. All the XFL teams seem to still be active, so who knows from that half.

Either way, tick-tick-tick.

1 hour ago, panthers_2012 said:

Frontier League newest team

Could be interesting

 

And here, on the opposite end of the spectrum from the Rome Emperors...

Quote

Our research shows the company has failed to deliver on even the most basic aspects of its business plan, including features it claimed were completed months ago.

I dunno, sounds like an ideal partner for this iteration of the AFL to me.

Maybe all their games can be streamed on Ozy Media.

An absolute delight with wonderful and thoroughly professional execution. They will probably get some money out of me. Studio Simon continues to lay down bangers only.

The over/under on seasons this thing lasts is officially set at 1.0. Ten-week season, one of your biggest announced markets is a travel team, zero home playoff games, and the 1980s USFL model of "We'll cover our losses by bringing in fresh suckers and expanding the league by 50% in season two." Oh, and your marquee events will be played at the venue where the commissioner's wife owns a franchise. Woof.

On 11/14/2023 at 4:35 PM, Jezus_Ghoti said:

The way the lettering stretches the sweater (and it's not just these pics, it's like this in all the unveiling videos even when the sweaters are hanging loosely) looks extremely cheap.

 

 

 

The jersey material looks like rec league-grade stuff with all the colors sublimated. Lightweight jerseys like that and sewn-on tackle twill do not play well together.

On 11/14/2023 at 11:43 AM, Dilbert said:

Why do I have the feeling that they are just gonna play with no team name or logos this season?

Welp!

This league is allegedly starting play in January. It's mid-November and there is still no schedule, and no announced game venues. But the league website will let you put down $50 as a non-refundable deposit for season tickets to see your team play at an undisclosed place at an undisclosed time.

The league has confirmed practice sites for all six teams. Maybe those also turn out to be the home arenas. If they do, then it's hilarious, because two of the sites (Tria in Minnesota and Chelsea Piers in Stamford, CT) are former home rinks of NWHL/PHF teams, which this league will not hesitate to let you know it is so much bigger and better and smarter than.

Dilbert, I think you've followed enough minor/rival/startup leagues like I have to see red lights going off all over the place on this one, and it ain't because goals are being scored.

I hope the people in charge here can pull their act together. But hope and five dollars will get you a puck.

7 hours ago, MJWalker45 said:

Minnesota Myth?

This is like the point in cryptocurrency fever where someone would mint something called like "ScamCoin" and buyers would line up around the block for it. They are trying to tell you and seeing if you are willing to not listen.

5 minutes ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

 

With the Dragons not being in the league, it seems silly to do a big press event in New York.  Better to do it in Philadelphia, where the league just announced the revival of the Soul.

Maybe the Philadelphia team is playing out of NYC. Geography is a state of mind in this operation.

May they remain untouched by the Curse of the Coyotes.

@Skycast 

Hell, I love baseball as much, if not more, than when I was a kid, and I've only owned one Tori Amos album.

I was wondering where Madison, WI was in this, so I looked it up. Turns out they're in a different league, League One Volleyball, which is set to begin play in November 2024 and will have franchises in markets including... uh, Atlanta and Omaha. Ah jeez, this isn't gonna go well.

2 hours ago, Sec19Row53 said:

The title of this thread threw me off. Isn't it the Business/Emotion of Baseball, not the Business of Emotion/Baseball?

It's an offhand reference to "The Business of Emotion," an old song by Big Data I happen to like.

2 hours ago, Sec19Row53 said:

Rockford Rush was a semipro team that became the Rockton Rush, then went bellyup.

 

Fitting.

Shame they didn't have it in them to move once more and become the Roscoe Rush.

Always a good sign when the announcement of the team botches the name of the home venue. The decently-sized Sudduth Coliseum at the Lake Charles Civic Center holds 7,500, but from the pics on the site I'm guessing that's for events that take up less floor space than an arena football field. Metro area's just over 200,000.

All the new logos based on old AFL identities have been downgrades.

56 minutes ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

 

The point is to be more attractive to advertisers, and also to have the listing look better on a TV schedule.

 

 

This is a league with teams in Montana and five-figure cities in Kansas.

Also any TV exposure is going to require cash up front from the league, which I will believe they have as soon as they show it.

54 minutes ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

 

Which is to say that there's nothing wrong with this. A major city has a sphere of influence that encompasses many neighbouring municipalities, so naming a team that is based in one of those smaller municipalities after the region's primary city is sensible.

 

Please look at Rockford on a map and its location relative to Chicago. Then look at Rosemont, IL, and understand that some people both local and out-of-market get twitchy about teams in that town labeling themselves "Chicago." (I am not one of those people.)

"Rockford Rush" is a perfectly cromulent name for a market with its own well-established minor league sports scene. You aren't going to win over Stateliners by pretending you're Chicago, and you're not going to get Chicagoans coming 70 miles out on I-90 to see you because of it, either. So what's the point?

Welcome to "Whose League Is It Anyway?," the game where the finances are made up and the home markets don't matter.

Lest you think that 4/27 game is some sort of commemorative one-off, the Rush account lists its location as Rockford, IL. So yes, we are apparently doing that again, and if you can call Rockford "Chicago," you can call Everett "Seattle," Council Bluffs "Omaha," and Dodge City, Kansas "Los Angeles." Now you're a big-time football league!

2 hours ago, infrared41 said:

 

 this match up had almost zero appeal outside Dallas and Phoenix.

 

And this is part of the problem, right? The seeming lack of interest on MLB's part to develop a national fanbase outside of NYY/BOS/CHC/LAD, and instead be content with a bunch of fans who aren't interested unless it's their team that's playing. (And if it is their team playing, blackout restrictions may apply, but that's another part of the decline to address.) Put it this way, no one's going to look at the numbers and spot loads for, like, a Kings-Bucks Final and say, "Well, you can't expect that to draw and sell, it's Sacramento and Milwaukee."

19 minutes ago, infrared41 said:

 

Did they actually whittle down the available ad space or was the studio stuff simply filler like the PSAs are?

 

It was almost certainly whittled down. They'd start it up with the theme music stinger, run the bed underneath it, Kevin Monster Energy would toss it to the booth, and the booth would acknowledge Kevin and anyone else who was with him as the bed music faded. There was no cut or beat to indicate it as optional spot space, and there may have even been crosstalk at times. I mean, it could have served as filler, but it would have been an extremely awkward return to programming with Boog Sciambi saying "Thank you, Kevin" or whatever.

I don't think the TV breaks were locals, because there were other breaks that popped some local ads and news promos. Also, in the case of the Fox station in Chicago, it's an O&O, so different slice, same pie.

It is entirely possible that the radio breaks I mentioned were built for local and there simply was not any inventory for it. But again, they whittled down those breaks to a minute of available ad space from the 2-ish that would normally be available.

Starting a topic for MLB in the vein of the long-standing NHL Best Business Practices Thread.

I've watched a lot more baseball over the past couple of years, both in person and on TV, in no small part because our boys have really gotten into the sport. And I really think the game itself is pretty good, in fact, better than what was on offer pre-COVID at the major league level. You're seeing less of the three true outcome consultant garbage, the pitch clock and batter minimums have helped with pacing, the disengagement rules have brought back stealing, and shift restrictions are encouraging strategic hitting instead of constant swings for the seats.

But the World Series just ended, and everyone's gonna bemoan the ratings. (I remember this from 2005, where there seemed to be an inference that the White Sox's win didn't count as much because not enough people watched it happen.)

For me, the ratings aren't the big concern: Broadcast ratings for everything that isn't football are either stagnating or declining, and that's just how it is in the 5,000-channel universe. But what does concern me is what I saw between innings this postseason. To wit: This is the biggest event programming of the year for MLB, and Fox, its biggest broadcast partner, seemed to have profound difficulty selling the advertising space in it. I started noticing a shortage of true ads during the playoffs, and it stunned me that the shortage only seemed to grow during the World Series, which should be the biggest sell. There were a ton of Public Service Announcement/charitable-type ads (which the broadcaster may get some money out of, but definitely not at full market rate,) and plenty of promos for Fox programming. In fact, during Game 4, there was at least one break that led off with a PSA about storing one's gun away in a safe to reduce the risk of committing an impulsive murder-suicide, and then nothing but promos for the NFL on Fox and other network programming for the remaining 90 seconds. This is during prime time.

I also listened to a good bit of the playoffs on ESPN Radio, as the boys wanted to listen to the games as they went to bed. ESPN actually went as far as to shorten their between-innings breaks, filling up to a minute of each one with studio content from some over-caffeinated Kevin. As for what was in those breaks, well, one from Game 5 had back-to-back "donate your car for the tax write-off" ads from Heritage For the Blind and some vaguely shady "stop our children from getting abducted outfit." Another was a 30-second promo for an ESPN podcast, then a :30 promo for the MLB Postseason, not even with a title sponsor or anything that might be revenue adjacent. No money was made on a national scale for that break, in the dang World Series.

Combine this with the popping of the regional sports network cable free money bubble, and the news from this week that the Padres had to go loan-sharking for $50 million during one point in the season to make payroll. The canaries are still flying and chirping down in that coal mine, but man, you don't send them down there without a reason.