The_Admiral

Frank's Red Hot or Texas-style BBQ for me.

I'm not sure that I agree with you 100% on your police work there, Lou. Oh, man. Phoenix fans got all buttshook about nice polite midwesterners perhaps wanting their team back if it wasn't any trouble. They're not going to like les Quebecois descending upon the Jobberdome by the busload, honking "OW CAN YOU AVE A TEEM DERE IF YOU NO AVE ANY HICE?!?" and rudely demanding gravy on their fries.

Yes, this is what they should do. Pursuant to a move to Quebec City, you might even say they're doing this now. Well, that's largely because a team didn't move there first. There's a difference between "we just bought a team and we're going to have the sale approved in a month, would you like three years of season tickets?" and "let's say a team were to move here and if they don't I'll give you your money back; would you buy season tickets?"

The Rockets are a minor obstacle. Here are my bigger problems with Houston: 1) it is in the Southeastern United States (well, debatably) where all levels of football are the undisputed king 2) it is a three-sport market where the other three teams are well-entrenched in the landscape 3) its urban growth patterns are automobile-based and not railroad-based and as such the metropolis covers a lot of area and not necessarily well 4) much of the potential base is located in the suburbs and not the city 5) much of the suburban population is transplanted from the north and retains its old sports allegiances 6) much of the urban population is poor and not white 7) long and stalled commutes mean the downtown arena is an inconvenient weeknight destination for suburban/exurban ticketholders who might prefer the road team anyway I just described Houston. I also described Atlanta. Finkle is Einhorn.

The union would lose their crap over what's virtually a barnstorming team and the Jobberdome lease specifies that they have to play all their games there. Besides, it's misleading if not outright unfair to judge the viability of a market this way. Any town can sell out a pair of games, and any town can blow off bald-faced pandering.

omg

Packers/Brewers seems to be about the right balance for Milwaukee, just like Cardinals/Blues is for St. Louis. I wish there was an NHL team in Milwaukee, though. Wish there was one in St. Louis, too!

What? This never happened. You're confusing the Blackhawks with the Blues, and Milwaukee with Saskatoon, and I'd rather prefer that you did neither. What happened was Lloyd Pettit, who used to do Blackhawks pbp, married into the Allen-Bradley fortune and wanted to bring an NHL team to Milwaukee. However, he was stymied by celebrated bastard Bill Wirtz, who claimed that Milwaukee was part of the Blackhawks' territory, even though the only presence they had in the market was that their radio coverage was on an AM station that reaches southern Wisconsin clearly. It was a really crappy move that salted the NHL earth in what by rights would've been a better piece of the puzzle than most of the mickey mouse operations that joined the league in the '90s. I think the Hawks played a few games at the Bradley Center, but there was never any plan for Chicago's liquor/real estate baron to move the team to another, much smaller city.

It's getting that bad up in Quebec? Can't say I blame 'em; building a sports facility on spec is a bad idea. Maybe actually knowing the team is coming would help, or maybe Quebecor could chip in more than they are. I'm not ready to 100% strike QC from the list; there are still too many positives associated with it that don't exist in, say, Hamilton or Kansas City or whatever. The others, yeah, forget it.

No, silly, this thread isn't about Doug Gilmour! It's about the Phoenix Coyotes. With the Manitobification of the old rolling thread and "Back in the Game" lost to history, we need a new one. Matt Hulsizer gave up on trying to buy the team, if he ever started in the first place, which I contend that he did not. http://www.bizjourna...bid-to-buy.html The buried lede here is that apparently Jerry Reinsdorf is poking around again. If I had to guess, it's probably to buy the team for his son. Haven't heard much from Quebecor, which is just the way the league likes it.

Legality is no concern for the big swangin' dick of THE Ohio State.

Yeah, but we're talking about, like, one of the most monolithic forces in townie goober sports fandom. For every one of you, there are ten of them. It was a stupid, stupid idea for the league to go toe-to-toe with, of all the state schools anywhere, the one that so thoroughly owns its city and state. I'm sure the Arena District or whatever (next to the Hammock District, on 3rd) is nice and all, but the whole thing is ultimately doomed if Ohio State has a virtually identical arena down the street.

The Blues are going to destroy the love of hockey in Blues fans more than the Blackhawks will if they keep this up.

Columbus is going to the East so that we don't need to do another conference flip when they're sold to Quebec City interests, unless I missed something and Columbus and/or Ohio has the money to bail Nationwide Insurance out of its failing arena.

Can't realign till we know if the death rattles of the Coyotes and Blue Jackets have concluded.

The NBA has the weakest regional rivalries. I guess the league is too hip for such tribalism.

I think we have another delicate case on our hands like with netsjazz.

Rex Ryan in an Islanders sweater is too perfect. He looks like some guy from Queens who calls the Fan twice a day.

Nice to see an NCAA banner before it gets taken down because someone finds out a player got a free sandwich five years ago.

Not for NBA prospects they're not!

Oh. Well, do you think it would be interesting if, say, the NBA drafted its players straight out of high school and then assigned them to the affiliated colleges for one to four years?

So are you positing that the corresponding schools would become dedicated developmental affiliates for their nearest NBA teams, or are you just pointing out that Memphis and Knoxville are in the same state? Oh, and I guess St. Bonnie's would be the Raptors' college counterpart.

Who knew?

I think TxRangers has said before that his realignment proposals are intentionally absurd. His avatar is that aborted Chargers mascot, so I think he likes to traffic in absurdity like I do.

Dynamite way to sell tickets to half the league in a league that relies on selling tickets, call them the opposite of contenders.