schlim

Didn't want to search for a two/three year old thread, but there's a new documentary coming out about the demise of the Alliance of American Football.

Can't wait to see the Beamin' Beacons vs the Demon Deacons in the NCAA tournament someday.

I just assume by 2030 the big money making programs will figure out a way to make a 30 or 32 team mega money making league and every other program will be left out in the cold. 

Looking at the leagues 29texan put together already shows the American 16 and CUSA will have a hard time attracting viewers outside hardcore college football fans or individual fans of those programs. A team like KState is not going to amount to anything nationally  in any conference it joins. 

If two high profile schools like OU and Texas can plot this SEC move in secret and have it finished and all wrapped in a bowtie within a week, imagine what a cabal including Ohio St, Michigan, Alabama and the other high rollers can accomplish once they figure out their best road forward when they see the pot of gold they can control for themselves. Ironically, I'm not even sure OU and Texas will ever play an SEC game, instead popping into the 2025 Super Conference.

Cleveland's Al Lerner patch remains the worst owner patch ever on an NFL jersey.

ESPN announced their lineup of play by play and analysts for the NHL, Sean McDonough doing play by play and Steve Levy in the studio. It's a pretty big and ambitious lineup that even includes Spanish language play by play for ESPN Deportes. It looks like a lot of analysts will be integrated into existing shows (Get Up, etc.) throughout the regular broadcast schedule.

https://awfulannouncing.com/espn/nhl-on-espn-coverage-team-announced.html

Kenny Albert and Eddie Olczyk were previously announced as the game announcers over at TBS.

With the grey and blue cap, and those vertical white and blue stripes, it looks like somebody with a sense of humor just stuck a Rams logo on a Lions hat.

26 minutes ago, Gothamite said:

This is... not good.

It's as if they bought a bunch of old 70s Bad News Bears uniforms and heat pressed a few new  patches for the new wordmark on those.

I'm beginning to think my initial thoughts on this redesign were totally wrong.

too bad, those Scouts uniforms were amazing.

I have no idea about on air changes, but just checking in on ESPN's website and seeing so much NHL coverage over the past few weeks shows just how much exposure the league lost by jumping to the Lance Armstrong and Car Auction channels. Its also nice to see the NHL listed on the header as well, it was amazing how successfully ESPN buried the NHL over the past few years.

I can't wait to tune into Disney Princess NHL Hockey!

I remember the early 90s when it was reported beer sales were so high at Toronto's NLL games they were more profitable than Maple Leaf games. Toronto, Buffalo, Philadelphia and Rochester had solid attendance and the league at least tried plugging teams into logical spots, no matter how poorly run or marketed they were.

Now Toronto is in Hamilton, and the original Philadelphia Wings are in Albany, the original Knighthawks are in Halifax and the league is adding teams with 'Panther City' as a name.

I guess at least they outlasted ArenaFootball!

The NHL has just spent the last twenty years consolidating their control over minor league hockey and the AHL, why would they break up the party now?

I think the M mark is great, and the word mark is fine. The primary looks horrible with the feet in puddles/lakes and the piece of cardboard/piece of cheese home plate, but otherwise, I find the logo largely inoffensive and a breath of fresh air from all the minor league branding we've been force fed from that one company. 

It's miles more interesting than their previous two logos,  and if somebody found the tertiary logo on a team letterhead from 1953, half this board would be ordering t-shirts and praising its return.

While I'm expecting some doozies that could end up Canton Ice Patrol bad, I'm generally excited by the variety that this new era of minor league designs could bring, as long as the designers are getting paid properly.

A clip art beer mug complete with watermarks would work a lot better than that logo.

2 hours ago, GDAWG said:

So do we know how much money the NHL has lost due to the Pandemic?  And how much of it was recouped via the new TV deal?

At some point, doesn't it just become a loss and 'recouping' it becomes immaterial? Otherwise, are they going to take 10% of every revenue stream going forward to 'cover' their losses until its made back?

I have no idea what the union and management agreed to going forward, so maybe things are complicated with escrow accounts, lower salary caps in the near future,  etc.

From what I've read, Bettman looked at the split TV packages the NFL and NBA got and negotiated similar deals that pay them more per year going forward. Seems like that worked out decent for the league, despite having 3 Cups on cable.

1 hour ago, gothedistance said:

Those were the days.

The days NFL sleeve patterns reminded me of the tube socks I wore back then.

The NLL already had the Landsharks.

That blue uniform is a jarring mashup of Boston and New York sports. It feels like one of those quiz things where you have to read the word(orange, blue, yellow, etc) when the font is on a different color (green, red, purple) and you end up saying the color you're actually seeing instead of reading the actual word.

Maybe they'll have a Connect Four third jersey.

Looks like there could be some changes coming. The NHL's GMs got a taste of having prospects in their own systems...

The Jets' new green helmets have a very similar vibe to the teal flaked helmets, the finish has a tendency to produce very green highlights and very dark/black shadows.  I initially enjoyed the candy finish, but the dark shadows that appear get too dark. It's annoying that they took such a simple idea as bringing back their rightful lighter kelly green and just demolishing the set with unnecessary black all over, reinforced by the dark patches of black that appear on the helmets.

I'm not going to cry for Brandiose after they've been rolling out the same local flavor/unique name/snarling logo formula (with hometown research visit!!) for years now, but does this mean MLB is trying to lock out all independent designers from their minor league system now?

I wonder what cut rates MLB can offer to their new affiliates to make them change their minds or if it's clubs simply agreeing with Sodboy's thoughts above.

From the article:

“Now that the PDL system has been formalized and we are officially an affiliated team, we have the chance to collaborate directly with Major League Baseball’s branding, licensing, and apparel experts and their vast connections around the nation to bring our new team identity to life in even bigger and better ways,” the team said on its website. “We’re excited to be the first Minor League team to have the opportunity to take advantage of these resources to showcase the team identity chosen by our fans on a national stage. To allow time to take full use of these new resources, we will be unveiling the new team name following the 2021 season.”

The latest Forbes ranking of NHL team values has the Coyotes dead last at $285 million. The NHL can fold the franchise (or buy it out, whatever legally has to be done) then sell an expansion franchise in the neighborhood of Seattle's $650 million and turn a healthy profit to cover some of the losses of the pandemic. Hockey gains a (hopefully) better market, the Player's Union doesn't lose any jobs, and Bettman and the NHL gets to wash away one of its biggest mistakes under the no-fault guise of 'the pandemic' and everybody is happy, except Quebec City, because you know they'll never get an expansion team.

28 minutes ago, oldschoolvikings said:

 

No confirmation on that, yet. And if that decision had been made early enough that teams would already be making design decisions over it, I'd think we'd have heard by now.

 

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn't happen.

For everybody cheering on alt helmets for throwback white Patriots, orange Bucs, red Bills, etc, Nike is thinking sea foam green Cowboys, yellow Chiefs, neon green Seahawks, Black 49ers, grey Giants...

...and who knows what they'd do to the Rams.

On 9/20/2020 at 5:42 PM, the admiral said:

Third ownership group in seven years. When was the last time a team got passed around that quickly without involving some major scandal (e.g., John Spano)?

The moribund franchise without a fan base known as the New England Patriots saw control of the team handed off from Billy Sullivan to Victor Kiam in 1988, then to James Orthwein in 1992, then Kraft in 1994. They also almost moved to St. Louis, Hartford and rumors of Providence? and probably 74 other cities in that time as well.