FiddySicks

5 hours ago, FinsUp1214 said:

Yeah, the potential of the Bucs signing Baker doesn’t seem that crazy to me. Do I think it’s a good move? I’m not so sure, but the prospect of them doing so isn’t preposterous at all.
 

They clearly need a quarterback, but aren’t in a good position to draft one in the first round. They didn’t really seem urgent to go after Carr and don’t seem all that urgent to go after Garoppolo either, and have never been in the Rodgers running. That would leave signing a guy like Baker, Brissett, or even (gasp!) Wentz on a more economical deal, either to be a solid starter or somebody to hold it together until they want to give Trask or a rookie next year a shot.

 

It’s always possible they draft a guy like, say, Hendon Hooker to create a true QB competition with Trask and see which one emerges, but the cheap veteran route seems like the more likelier route to me.

It’s a pretty dismal route, but I still kinda like Baker, so

Its better than just tying to trout out with Kyle Trask. 

4 hours ago, MJWalker45 said:

There's a reason I don't talk about towns I haven't been to. Because it makes one look silly when they admit that second part. I've also been to Seattle, and it operrates like every other big city. Also, the rain year round bit is incorrect, it's just a trope that's attached to the city in general media. It's also why people don't realize that Washington state has a desert and most people aren't aware because they attach this idea of Seattle to the rest of the state. 

It does rain a lot in Seattle whenever it isn’t the summer, but I’ve never been to any city that has a more amazing summer climate than Seattle. Crystal clear and like, 75-80 degrees most days. Pretty much impossible to beat. 

4 hours ago, ManillaToad said:

I don't get why Mexico City is the only place in Mexico people talk about when it  comes to the big four. 2 weeks from everywhere and the elevation is ridiculous. There's other cities with huge populations that are a lot closer to the border. Also all of them are in Mexico which is a big problem too

I mean, two weeks if you’re riding a donkey, maybe. 
 

It’s because Mexico City is, by population, the largest city in North America. It would be adding a market that’s even larger than New York City. 

He used to do a big garage sale every year. I always wanted to go. 
 

2 hours ago, Kooky01 said:

Shot: Uh, because Seattle is just not a good city?
 

 

Chaser: Never been to the city but haven't heard good things about it. 

Maybe sit this one out, goofball. 

Pretty weird seeing team Columbia rocking the SnapBack caps. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that in a professional game. 

10 hours ago, VampyrRabbit said:

They probably would be fifth if Vegas got an MLS franchise. Hell, sixth if you take UFC into equation, which in Vegas is more or less equivalent to a major league team.

With the very likely possibility of the team racking up their second 100 loss season in a row,  why would any baseball fans in Vegas give a damn for the A's coming to their hometown? They've seen the same cheap as f*** owners sandbag since Manfred gave permission for them to explore relocation, and no guarentee that the owners aren't going to run the A's as cheaply in Vegas as they did in the East Bay.

 

This. Right here. People seem to think the A’s are going to miraculously start putting more money towards the on field product if they get this sweetheart deal in Vegas. They absolutely will not. This ownership group will just pocket any of the extra revenue like they’re doing now. The only thing that’s actually going to fix this is if the owners sell the team or they’re just contracted. 

That actually looks like a pretty good trade for the Bears. The #1 pick wasn’t really a necessity for them, and now they’ve restocked their own draft picks and brought in one helluva receiver. Add that to them already trading for Chase Claypool last season and they’re in the very least doing all they can to set Justin Fields up for success. The line is still obviously a problem, but with free agency and the draft coming up they could probably do a lot to fix that there. 
 

Seems like a lot to give up for Carolina, but they desperately need a quarterback so having a luxury like Moore is somewhat wasted anyway. 
 

I think the Bears definitely win this trade (let’s see how Stroud does, or they may even just overthink it and being in the wrong guy like Young or lol, Richardson), but I also don’t think this is much of a head scratcher for the Panthers, either. 

Imagine leaving a market like the Bay Area to play third (probably soon to be fourth once the NBA expands) fiddle in a desert wasteland filled with transients and no water. Good :censored:in luck, you clowns. 

10 minutes ago, AndrewMLind said:

I don't ever want this to happen, but I've seen some pretty nice Las Vegas Raiders concepts that added a hint of gold to the silver and black scheme. Too Saints-like for my taste when it comes to the uniforms, but it looked nice with the logos (which I can't find anywhere now).

Im pretty sure early on the Raiders used either gold or at least a very mustardy looking yellow as their second color. Very much not Raiders to my eye. Not sure how they would distinguish themselves from the Saints. Black helmet, maybe? Even then. 

I found a New Era 59Fifty with the unused logo at a thrift store behind my old house in Sacramento a few years ago. Paid maybe $15 for it. I’ve seen similar ones for $250 and up on eBay. 

17 hours ago, Bathysphere said:

Wait, they made retail versions of these jerseys? Often in my vintage searches, I come across generically-designed jerseys with the lawsuit logo slapped onto them from that period, but I have *never* seen an actual reproduction of the original leaping cat jerseys on the market, in anyones collection, anywhere. I assumed that the only ones that existed were the ones from the original unveiling, probably buried in a box deep in Wayne Weaver’s closet. If there are retail copies out there though, that would be immediate white whale status.

Yeah I was gonna say I hope that OP picked one or two of them up (At Sears, of all places!), because those are probably worth a pretty penny by now. 

2 hours ago, VampyrRabbit said:

 

The biggest issue for the Rays is the rotten lease they signed for the Trop, and it's one that St Pete refuses to let them out of so they are still in that Mausoleam.

Of course, The Rays top brass still want a s***load of public money for a new stadium, as shown with the whole TB/Montreal pipe dream.

Although the details are a bit different, it still sort of sounds similar to the A’s situation, in that the team wants the city to assume the majority/all of the risk while reaping all of the benefits. It’s probably pretty shrewd, but I don’t necessarily disagree with the city for wanting them to honor the lease they voluntarily signed. 

3 hours ago, swilson160 said:

 

 

It's kind of crazy that they added two expansion teams and their initial looks were so similar--silver helmets with cat logos, black masks and black stripes, a non-traditional lighter variant of blue for the main jersey, and black/silver accents throughout.

I get Carolina having silver but Jacksonville having it initially has always baffled me. Gold AND silver? Yikes. Very happy they corrected that before the first season. 

9 hours ago, Walk-Off said:

 1.) If the Giants deserved to survive long enough to replace the dismal, discomforting environs of Candlestick Park with a much more appealing venue in an area much closer to the heart of San Francisco, then both the A's and the Rays deserve any and every reasonable opportunity possible to secure new places to play, whether in their present respective home markets or elsewhere.  To think otherwise would be unfair, unjust, and hypocritical.

 

2.) When it comes to territorial rights situations, I have no sympathy whatsoever for either MLB team in the Bay Area.  I think that the A's were (if not still are) naïve fools for letting the Giants have exclusive territorial rights to the South Bay region without requiring the Giants to locate their permanent home ballpark in one of those South Bay counties in order to keep such rights and without demanding a compensatory swap of territorial rights (e.g. to San Francisco and San Mateo counties) if and when the Giants were to move permanently to a South Bay locale.  However, I think also that the Giants have been a bunch of selfish, greedy jerks for having been unwilling even to share those South Bay territorial rights with the A's ever since the Giants chose to waste those rights by putting their current ballpark on the opposite side of Candlestick Point.

Very well written post, but I’d like to highlight these two passages and sort of add to them. 
 

1.) The thing is, both the Rays and especially the A’s absolutely HAVE been given a fair opportunity to do just what you’re saying. I know a bit less about the Rays situation, but for the A’s, the issue has ALWAYS been the unreasonable desire for public funding. They’ve had several locations that would be suitable, but have always run into roadblocks when it comes to who’s actually going to pay for it (and for that matter, who is going to keep the profits). I don’t think anyone is being “unfair, unjust, and hypocritical” to the A’s, they’re simply always coming to the table with proposals that are borderline absurd from a funding standpoint. They always want the city/county/state to assume all of the risk while they reap all of the rewards and profits, and cities have told them no in that one, and for very good reason. That part of all of this has always been consistent, and even somewhat simple. 
 

2.) On the Giants point, I have to disagree about them being “greedy jerks” or “selfish”, because the current ownership group paid for those rights. Part of the purchase price for the Giants when they sold to the current ownership group included the territorial rights to the South Bay. Now you can argue if you want that it wasn’t the right of the old ownership group to sell those rights along with the club (legally, they were, though. As I said earlier, those rights fell to the Giants when the A’s never bothered to claim them back, which they could’ve done free of charge for many years), but either way, that’s what happened. Why should the Giants ownership group just give up those assets to their competition when they paid for those rights? Not only that, they HAVE offered the rights to the South Bay to the A’s, but expect them to pay a fair market price for them (just as you would expect of you were selling any piece of property/land), and the A’s have always balked at the price. I sort of understand the idea that they should be willing to help more because the A’s helped them, but you also have to realize just how much the demographics of the Bay Area have changed since the A’s gave those rights away. It would be like if you had some land that wasn’t of much value to you so you gave it as a gift to someone. Just because they decided to build a city center there 30 years later and the land value sky rocketed doesn’t mean you can come crawling back expecting to get that regifted to you because there’s more money in it now. That would be nice, but this is Major League Baseball we’re talking about here, not UNICEF. The A’s simply made a dumb as all deal, had the opportunity to correct it, never did, and are now whining that they’re not getting a mulligan. Nice try, but, come on now. What business sense would that make from the Giants standpoint? 

5 hours ago, Digby said:

Also worth noting Oakland has never been a big attendance draw since even before the slow destruction of the Coliseum. They had good numbers during the late 80s, and middle-of-the-pack numbers during peak Moneyball. Otherwise pretty consistently near the bottom. They’d probably never top the list but it’s still a rough history, especially compared to the same time that the Warriors and Raiders were famously well-supported in the same location. 

Yeah there’s two big things I think people are overlooking on this. I don’t think people realize just how much of a foothold the A’s have lost over the last decade due to the conglomeration of all of their issues. Like, they’ve been absolutely hemorrhaging support with all of this, and even the die hards have had enough. But that’s the other thing, as you pointed out. The A’s have NEVER really knocked your socks off when it comes to attendance and a following, even during their heyday. There was even a thought back before AT&T Park was built that maybe the Bay Area as a whole just wasn’t that great of a market for pro baseball. But then the Giants got their own park built in a perfect location on basically their own dime (which is the first fully privately funded MLB park since Dodger Stadium in the 60s) and totally flipped the script. The real big issue all of these owners are having is they’re all trying to preach the same nonsense about the importance of public funding, but then the Giants just went ahead and knocked down that nonsensical curtain and have made money hand over fist because of it. I think they paid off the loan on the park in like half of the time they had to do so it’s been so successful. The A’s chances at public funding basically died right then and there, and the only ones who haven’t caught on to that yet are the A’s themselves. People are tired of their act, and most of Northern California is ready for them to leave, if legit ANYONE else will take them. 
 

I mean, :censored:, even the Sacramento Kings, who are still the most dysfunctional pro team in California and are most certainly not in the Bay Area (therefore having none of the prestige when it comes to location) realized they would have to fund at least half of their own building. The the A’s have been asking for isn’t just absurd, it’s insulting. They’re asking for the thing to be nearly fully publicly funded, and they want to keep basically all of the revenue. Like, good luck, guys. That may have flown in the 1990s (but even for the A’s it didn’t), but it sure as isn’t going to work now. People would rather light the coliseum on fire and watch it burn than fund another billionaire’s money making toy.
 

the A’s. All of their problems are self created due to their own stupidity, lack of any foresight whatsoever (like, how the :censored: do you not forsee the South Bay growing enough to warrant the land back when you had thirty years to JUST TAKE IT BACK! That’s all they had to do. File a form. And they never did. Good :censored: this team is dumb), and just shameless greed. The minute they’re gone, the better off everyone will be. 

On 3/2/2023 at 2:07 PM, oldschoolvikings said:

Just as a quick mental impression, the Lions don't necessarily feel like a team that changes their uniforms all the time, but in reality, they absolutely are. In fact, unless I'm forgetting some other team, they are tied with Jacksonville (who definitely does feel like a team that changes uniforms constantly) with the most in the NFL in this century.  Both have four official uniform changes, and unless you count alts, color rushes, and throwbacks, no one else has more than 3. And after 2024, the Lions will have 5. That FIVE in 25 years, in a league that doesn't let you change more than once every 5 years... the math already doesn't seem possible.

 

 

I actually feel like their current uniform is entirely salvageable. I'd get rid of the lettering on both sleeves, drop all occurrences of the dark gray and the white practice pants, and get a non-italicized number font, and I'd be all set. 

 

The last one sure beats the hell out of the two with the tacked-on black trim.

 

 

I'm not sure how logical it is, but I always think of teams whose uniforms are constantly changing as poorly run, across all sports.

The only one of these that actually feels like the Lions to me is the first one, and the one that feels the least like the Lions to me is the current set. The black in either iteration wasn’t great (but the second set with black was definitely better), but both of those kept the white elements, which IMO, is sort of the most important part of the lions set. Them removing black from the current set was a good move, but the lack of white on the stripes (both helmet and jersey), numbers, and logo outline drives me up a wall. It just doesn’t look like the lions to me, but some cheap knockoff version instead. It’s like they got rid of one problem they had (the addition of black), but replaced it with an even bigger problem (the almost complete removal of the white outline and trim elements). 
 

All the Lions really need to do is slap the current logo on the set they used until 2002 and call it a day. Anything else, and them trying to get cute again, is going to be another huge swing and a miss. 

6 hours ago, tBBP said:

The Lightning brand has so much opportunity for fun and dynamism...they should defintiely lean into that more.

I still don’t think I’ll ever get over their mediocre logo. The original one wasn’t great, but the current, simplified one is worse. I still think “Team Electric Sunglasses” every time I see it, and it’s been more than a decade with the current logo. 

1 hour ago, CDCLT said:

I'm a known Southern hockey defender, but I think that honestly the only thing that makes it work long-term is long-term success. Now, the Canes, Lightning, Preds, and Stars have all accomplished that (with Vegas well on the way), while the Yotes and Panthers have not. Obviously those two are also really hurt by their awful stadium locations but I do believe that a more successful Coyotes team could (emphasis on could) have worked. Now though? Unless the team can get that Tempe plan put through I think it's time to pull the plug. I think the team has sucked for too long to build any serious support. We're starting to see the effects of the generation raised with these teams in other markets, but Arizona hasn't paid off like other Sun Belt markets have, and I think it's because they've sucked so much.

 

I think hockey can work anywhere, even in Phoenix, but I think that the mishandling of the Coyotes has poisoned the well, so to speak. Move the team to Quebec, wait a bit, and when you decide to expand again for whatever reason, try again in Arizona.

Lol, no. I get what you’re saying, but I think you’re really underestimating just how tepid of a sports market as a whole Phoenix is. It has more than five million people yet has one of the sorriest showings for their local teams of anywhere I can remember. Hockey could for sure work there, but it has to be an absolutely perfect setup (which Maricopa County and the state as a whole simply isn’t capable of, for many reasons), and even then the following probably won’t be more than a niche thing. 

2 hours ago, who do you think said:

 

So for trips from UC Berkeley to Oracle (uh-oh, another bridge) and Hillsdale Shopping Center in San Mateo to Oracle ((about the same distance in mileage as that Tampa to St. Pete drive that apparently no sane person would make), Google Maps says about a 25-40 minute drive for each trip, while BART's trip planner puts them at an hour. All times set to arrive at 7pm. So unless I'm missing something here, I'm not satisfied with public transportation being the difference between a perpetually sold out stadium and an empty one.

Then what are you satisfied with? What’s the conclusion you’re hoping to come to with this one? You say the SF peninsula is hard to access, and my question is, since when? The 1930s? I’ve made day trips to Oracle about a hundred times and my starting spot is as far away as Lake Tahoe. It’s never been unusually difficult to get to the city no matter if I drive into the city and park at the stadium (which is madness in of itself, but that’s due to SF’s small footprint and that they charge $100+ to park), or I stop at the Livermore or Castro Valley station and take BART ($8 round trip and 45 minutes to the city, tops. The return trip is much easier and quicker). I’ve been to exactly one Rays game and we stayed in Tampa proper and drove in for the game. I remember a long bridge and I remember it taking more than two hours. I also remember getting lost on the way back to the hotel. Granted, this was almost 20 years ago so my memory is a bit spotty. 
 

I think the biggest difference between the two is that with the Giants if you’re traveling from out of the area, you’re going into one of the most popular and well known downtown regions in the world, so it would stand to reason that everything is directed towards that area. Where for the Rays, everything sort of felt the opposite. It felt like you were fighting against traffic to get to where you were going. Instead of having a similar vibe to the SF Bay Area, it felt more like trying to go to a Coyotes game in Glendale. It was far, out of the way, and made you pretty much constantly wonder why they would ever put a ballpark that far away from the city center. 

21 minutes ago, who do you think said:

 

Oracle Park is stuck on an allegedly hard-to-access peninsula. The immediate population of San Francisco and Pinellas County is about the same. Why is one selling out the park for eternity while I can have an entire section to myself at the other?

Public transportation. One area has some of the best in the world, the other (I think) hardly has any. 

On 2/24/2023 at 4:17 PM, spartacat_12 said:

 

Almost all of the venues you mentioned are in other cities. If I'm a Tempe resident I'd prefer to have entertainment dollars going into my local economy as opposed to Phoenix/Glendale/etc.

Doesnt Gammage already seat like 3,500-4,000 people? 

13 hours ago, VampyrRabbit said:

Those fans deserve better than the indigity of the Republic being rebranded as Sacramento CA/City/SC/FC/United in ten or so years time and part owned by a Leicester City striker.

 

Sacramento missing out on top level soccer because of ownership and the lead investor pulling out is a travesty, and if it were my hometown team, I would be absolutely furious over how it all went down.

Yes, absolutely. And I can say with confidence that there isn’t anyone here who feels that frustration more personally than I do. That bid falling apart sort of changed the course of my life in ways I’m still trying to bounce back from. The shenanigans that happened surrounding that entire thing are infuriating, but they were self created problems. Sac Republic got what it deserved, and I can say that because I was smack dab in the middle of the whole thing. So many people want to put the entirety of the blame on Ron Burkle while ignoring the bigger, more glaring problem, which is the current ownership group who allowed this whole mess to happen in the first place. 
 

9 hours ago, WestCoastBias said:

I hope the A's stay in Oakland and Sacramento finally gets in the MLS just to see all your guys heads explode. 

This is what you don’t seem to understand. I would love nothing more than for both of those things to come to fruition. But there’s a sad reality surrounding both issues that some people simply refuse to ignore. The reality is that both ownership groups are incapable of getting what they want/need in order to get their respective projects done. They’ve both been operating in bad faith with the hopes that someone else picks up the tab on their debts, and both are now realizing that isn’t going to happen. 

On 2/22/2023 at 3:11 PM, 4_tattoos said:

Sacramento again? Need input from our Sacramento insider on this one. He's made it seem like MLS to Sacramento was completely a lost cause. 

Having seen it up close and personal, I just can’t see how they’re ever going to make it work. The cost for all of this has grown so far out of the realm of possibility for the city and club that I just think it doesn’t make sense to either side any more. There was a very small window where they probably could’ve gotten the bid done, but it wouldn’t really have been that strong of a bid long term and they just flat out missed that window because they weren’t ready. They never really got to a point where they were ready, either. Like, I have trouble really explaining to people just how much of a shoestring operation it all really was.

On 2/22/2023 at 7:20 PM, WestCoastBias said:

 

All they need is an investor

Well, yeah. But that’s like me saying the only thing between me and my dream beachside in Incline Village is an investor. 

7 hours ago, spartacat_12 said:

 

I don't see any reason why residents would vote no. It's a completely privately funded project that will create jobs, bring in world class entertainment, and provide public facilities for the community. Even if you aren't a hockey fan, that's a pretty good deal.

 

If for some reason they don't win the vote, that's when the relocation talk will go from twitter/reddit/message board hyperbole to actual reality.