The_Admiral

Oh, I also like the Nashville Predators having to pay Shea Weber like an $18 million signing bonus because the Flyers double-dared them to. Best way to pay that is apparently to shut down your business. #oitgdnhl WE SHOULD GET THIS TRENDING ON THE TWITTER

Second-best part is the NHL central office giving $21 million and a $2 million signing bonus to a poor man's Doug Weight, and the next day locking out the players' union because salaries are out of control.

This is the dumbest crap.

Don't you got a fedora to buy?

I already own one so there!

This is the dumbest crap.

The Canucks are already at a critical mass of cheap shots, bitching, and sanctimony. You couldn't add Shane Doan to that.

Unless the new CBA takes the 35+ rule away, Doan can retire and leave the team with his cap hit. Nice.

All the talk today is about whether Shane Doan will sign with the Coyotes or the Canucks. I always wondered what it would be like if ESPN did The Decision for Zydrunas Ilgauskas. Now, I think I kinda know!

If they had used a variation on the traditionally arched version they have now, the pee-pee uniforms wouldn't have been nearly as bad. They don't look as yellow in that photo as they did sometimes, now that I mention it.

Why the hell does the name of this thread keep changing?

Something has to happen in this story.

http://www.theglobea...article4525357/

Jamison, who could not be reached for comment, has been trying to buy the Coyotes for more than a year. It's understood that one stumbling block has been his inability to find financial backers, which could be resolved with Ice Edge.

I dunno, let me check my fax machine.

Arizona Supreme Court just said they won't hear the city's appeal that they should be able to throw out a petition on a technicality. No time for such follies; they must be busy thinking of ways to make being Mexican illegal or something.

So now the voters can take away the sales tax increase meant to fund the Coyotes purchase. Away we go!

A Petition for Review was filed by Appellees City of Glendale and Pam Hanna on August 28, 2012.

After consideration of the Petition and Appendix, Amended Response, and Amicus brief, by a panel composed of Chief Justice Berch, Vice Chief Justice Bales, and Justice Pelander, IT IS ORDERED denying the Petition for Review.

bosrs1, confirm that this is legalese for "gtfo."

Using a high school band rendition of Fucik for the Ice Edge revelation makes it all the better.

A small thought: many people, in defending why the team has to stay, have invoked the "bad optics" (ugh: that "looks bad" was somehow intellectualized into "bad optics" just makes my blood boil) of a team abandoning a publicly-financed facility, which makes it harder for teams to pitch (or, more accurately, demand) publicly-financed facilities of their own. Maybe so, but let's look at those pitches a bit more. Anyone who's been through these things knows that the claim, from the NFL down to indy baseball (and I got to watch the latter up close), is that building an arena Creates Jobs. Of course, they're mostly seasonal, low-paying jobs, but jobs nevertheless. Until, of course, they're not, like when a cartel of billionaires decides they're not making enough money and voluntarily shuts down their business to break the will of their workers, who would prefer on the whole that they not give up 25% of their salaries in an era of record-setting revenues. Not the workers whose Jobs were Created, mind you. Then there are no games, which means no one selling popcorn, no one working security, no one converting the rink, no one doing much of anything at the blue-collar level of the pro hockey industry. And not Predators Marketing Scheme "blue-collar," the actual kind. Which is why I get a little rankled when people lazily reduce this to "just millionaires against billionaires" with no regard for the laborers who aren't at the bargaining table but still stand to lose big if the arenas don't replace those hockey dates. And Glendale's is one that probably will not. Let's take a look at their events calendar:

http://jobingarena.com/events.aspx

basically you have a job fair for an outlet mall, a gymnastics exhibition, THE BIEBZ, and hockey that probably won't be played. Truly, the NHL is earning that $25 million Arena Management Fee.

So, my question, in short: how do you sell the public financing of arenas as Job Creators For The Community when the community's jobs are routinely taken away at the caprices of a sports league's ownership? Bad optics!

http://www.lapresse.ca/le-soleil/dossiers/vers-un-nouveau-colisee/201209/03/01-4570561-une-premiere-pelletee-de-terre-pour-lamphitheatre.php?utm_categorieinterne=trafficdrivers&utm_contenuinterne=cyberpresse_B13b_la-capitale_577_section_POS1

Groundbreaking ceremony in Quebec City today. Michel Goulet, the Stastnys, and 20,000 people on hand to watch the silliness inherent to any groundbreaking ceremony. You're really on the clock now, Precious Roy.

Meh, let Notre Dame look like Notre Dame. The Packers' uniform is a classic. Too many teams have faded/metallicized their gold and/or darkened their other color (Brewers, Rams, Penguins), why add the Packers to a list of not-very-good changes to very good uniforms?

IMO only professional athletes should have their names on the back of their uniforms. I don't care how much money a university makes off it's athletes. Or how much many boosters give college players under the table. They are still amateur athletes.

haha no they're not.

Oh, I agree with you. It's not something to be done at every turn, lest you turn into California. Eventually they're going to pass a proposition that votes themselves out of existence.

Something happened again:

http://www.azcentral...al-in-flux.html

Phoenix Coyotes suitor Greg Jamison says he's ready to move forward with his bid for the team, but now Glendale says it wants to rework its 20-year, $324 million deal with him.

The city was expected to send Jamison an updated draft on Wednesday night.

So because the Supreme Court probably isn't going to take their side that you can throw out an soundly endorsed petition because someone misplaced a serial number, they're not going to pass a sales tax increase at the polls, which means now they can't raise taxpayer money to give to billionaires, which means they're changing the stupid lease agreement they wrote. So even though he claimed he had the money, if they're not giving him all that money, we're back to "he doesn't have the money." But don't worry:

Jamison said he is working closely with the city and has admired the tough decisions that have been made.

"I really respect Glendale's council," he said. "They've shown a lot of courage."

That's one word for it, I suppose, but it should be reserved for things that are courageous. Signing away something like $425 million dollars in tax money for so a corporation can do a really crappy job of doing business in your city isn't courageous. I'd say they have chutzpah, maybe, but I'd rather go with "they're unethical and stupid." Of course Jamison respects that they're walking the line of the law to hand him hundreds of millions of dollars. What courage. That old white-haired bastard can go get f-cked.

Hahaha. Of course. They don't even manage it! How many events do they have that aren't Coyotes games?

A not-so-quick note on the sales tax initiative rearing its head again, if I may. Something I've noticed the remaining Coyotes loyalists saying is that the people of Glendale voted in their city council to make these decisions for them, and so whatever those decisions are, like, say, authorizing almost half a billion dollars in corporate subsidies over three years and raising taxes to do so, those decisions have to be respected and upheld to preserve the integrity and authority of government. In short, you got what you voted for, so shut up and let me have my hockey team. Well, let me have your hockey team, if for the sake of argument I live in Scottsdale and it ain't my dime.

Okay, all well and good, but this strange sort of anti-populist rabblerousing (bring up the government!) neglects the fact that Glendale, like so many medium-sized American cities, operates under council-manager government, wherein the amateur mayor and aldermen delegate the actual business of running a city to a professional--and unelected--public administrator (in this case, at least till his timely retirement, the execrable Ed Beasley), whose decisions are more or less rubber-stamped by the elected body. So what you're really doing is electing someone to appoint someone to make decisions on your behalf. It's not quite local representative democracy the way they first drew it up, but some people along the way got the not-altogether-wrong idea that perhaps the actual levers of government should be protected from the untrained hands of the insurance agents, high school civics teachers, and retired busybodies who traditionally make up small-town legislatures. Everyone's had a lot of fun unleashing vitriol on dumb old Joyce Clark for her unwavering support of this plan, but it's not like she drew it up herself. She wouldn't know where to start. I'm not even sure Glendale's unelected professional administrators knew where to start. The NHL is preying on people who are fantastically in over their heads.

And that's why this plebiscite is so necessary. Someone needs to step in and save these dopes from themselves, because they're being bamboozled by people who are richer, smarter, and better at this game than they are. It might as well be the ordinary folks who live there, since they're the ones being led down this wayward path by full-time lawyers, part-time councilors, and city officials they didn't vote for and couldn't name. You can't hide behind "you voted for them and now you have to accept their decision" just because you like the Coyotes. I highly doubt that anyone successfully ran on a "disproportionately subsidize professional hockey" platform, and only now are voters trying to walk it back. And even if they did, why shouldn't you be able to intervene when you feel your elected officials haven't represented you the way you thought they would represent you? I don't want to get too political because we're not allowed to anymore, but I think it was awesome that Wisconsin at least tried to get Scott Walker out when they thought he was no longer acting in the best interests of the electorate. As long as people are people and thus vulnerable to making fast, careless, and dangerous decisions, a population needs to have that option behind the break-in-case glass. I'm sure if the tables were turned, the Coyotes diehards would want the right to circulate petitions and get their wishes on a ballot against the wishes of City Hall if it meant activating the mechanisms necessary to retain their team. They might even write their serial number somewhere other than where it says "Serial Number ___," too!

http://www.azcentral...uling-0824.html but you have to zoom your browser in a lot just to read it

The superiorcourt agreed with the Clerk that the description of the proposedmeasure contained in the petitions was misleading and, thus,denied SGN relief.

¶2

We disagree with the superior court and hold thesummary was not misleading.

See infra

¶¶ 6-11. We also holdSGN substantially complied with other statutory requirements,

see infra

¶¶ 12-13, and timely filed the petitions with theClerk.

See infra

¶¶ 14-19. We thus direct the Clerk to fileand process the petitions in accordance with applicablestatutes, reverse the superior court's denial of relief, andremand for further proceedings consistent with this order.

So basically "no, dumbass, you can't throw it out because they didn't write a serial number on it." Also seems to say that the city clerk can't be trusted as the arbiter of what is and isn't valid. Looks like this will go to a ballot.

bosrs, you're a law-talkin' guy, right? Can you laymanize any of that for us?

EDIT: ooh, this is good too

Here, two factors cause us to conclude SGNsubstantially complied with A.R.S. § 16-902.01(F). First, theserial number was recorded on one portion of SGN’s statement oforganization, as amended, although SGN did not include it in thename block on the statement.

"You get a zero for not writing your name on your worksheet."

"Yes I did."

"But not where it says Name __________________"

3rdgradedale.

I guess the court ruled in favor of Glendale on the petitions against the sales tax increase, too. When you have this many instances of the government "unexpectedly" siding with the government, it's no wonder Arizonans get so ornery and paranoid about everything.

Word trickling out that this was overturned in the appellate court. This could be bad news for the Precious Roy Investment Group.

Legacy

The Spano fiasco was highly embarrassing to the NHL, which was still reeling from revelations that former NHLPA head Alan Eagleson had lied to his clients and enriched himself by skimming off the union's pension fund.

The NHL was particularly shaken after it was revealed that it spent well under $1,000 evaluating Spano's credentials (estimates range from $525[3] to $750[2]); most leagues spend well over $30,000 to evaluate prospective team owners. When Spano bid for the Stars, the team was satisfied by a letter supposedly from Comerica attesting to his net worth. Prospective NHL owners are now vetted by Ernst and Young and a New York City law firm.

These safeguards were not enough, however, to prevent John Rigas from buying the Buffalo Sabres, only to have the league take over the franchise after his arrest for fraud. Seven years later, the Nashville Predators were sold to a group that included William Del Biaggio who was later revealed to have fraudulently obtained $110 million in loans from two NHL owners and eight banks in order to purchase a stake in the Predators, a crime for which he was sentenced to eight years in prison on September 8, 2009 and ordered to sell his share of the team.[9][10]

the beat goes on

No, the involvement of Precious Roy is obviously the key to opening new broadcasting revenue streams.

Jamison's partners could be a sock puppet and a crack addicted hooker and Bettman would still try to pass it through.

Now that's insulting to the sock puppet and hooker!

Jamison's mystery partners DISCOVERED

SUCKERS

Yeah, and nobody can ever seem to find the guy, either, to say nothing of his "partners" whose identities he will not disclose. I mean, with Hulsizer, he was going around running his mouth and sending faxes from time machines for a while before ultimately disappearing. And that was fun! Jamison just popped up once or twice a few months ago, said he would buy the team and save the arena by staging American Idol concerts, and then went into hiding.

https://twitter.com/...237638628167682

Bill Daly m'assure que la vente des #Coyotes n'est pas retardée par le possible lock-out. #Jamison semble encore avoir des problèmes...

Bill Daly assures me that the sale of the Coyotes is not slowed by a possible lockout. Jamison seems again to have problems...

Sounds like it means that Jamison's failure to close isn't that he's ready but simply waiting out the labor negotiations. Oh, if it's not one thing, it's another!

I write right-handed (and if you've dropped in on "Do You Slash Your Sevens?", you'd see that perhaps I shouldn't), but do almost everything else left-handed. I brush my teeth left-handed, for instance. I also stand on one foot when I brush my teeth, but I can't explain that.