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TheOldRoman

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Posts posted by TheOldRoman

  1. I've always thought of Los Angeles pizza as being very fresh and experimental. I've had New York pizza and it was just greasy and floppy. Chicago-style thin crust is the muhfuggin' truth.

    Also true: the Rams should be free to move to Los Angeles.

    Experimental? Meh. That just means niche. If they want to claim BBQ chicken pizza as their own, that's fine. It's a great pizza, although I think to most people it's not their "primary" pizza, but one they have once in a blue moon. But if your calling card is throwing random crap on pizza, it's not that impressive. My dad was making taco pizzas with ground beef, Pace salsa and sour cream 20 years ago. And they were surely disgusting, but they were different.

    Also, maybe it's Chicago-style thin which I love. I just said thin crust generally, but now that I think of it, I've never eaten thin-crust pizza in other areas. Off the top of my head I believe all my pizza consuming has occurred within the boundaries of Illinois. I should eat pizza more on vacation.

  2. I would normally dismiss the New York pizza thing as the expected smugness, but I'm not all that crazy about Chicago-style pizza myself. It's good, but I generally prefer thin crust. I'll try NY-style pizza when I eventually go to NY, but I'm expecting it's just normal pizza except larger and pie-cut. Essentially, something we wouldn't know about if not for it being from New York.

  3. The Chicago White Sox and San Francisco Giants each were tentatively sold to buyers who would have moved them to Tampa, but in each case MLB stepped in to prevent it.

    That's not true relating to the White Sox. The current ownership group purchased the team from Bill Veeck in 1981, and they were threatening to move to Tampa before Illinois built them a new park. They never intended on selling.

    An interesting fact - the city of Seattle sued the American League when it allowed to Pilots to leave after one season. The owner of the White Sox was broke and needed to sell the team in 1975. To settle the suit, the AL was pushing to sell the White Sox to Seattle ownership and let the team move. Denver ownership was among the bidders, I believe, but the only bidder willing to keep the team in Chicago was Bill Veeck, who had previously owned the team and sold is to the then-owners 13 years earlier. Despite most of the AL owners disliking Veeck, they approved the sale to allow the team to stay in Chicago. Seattle got the expansion Mariners two years later.

    Maybe more interestingly, if the White Sox would have moved to Seattle, Charlie Finley was planning on moving the Athletics into Comiskey Park.

  4. I genuinely think that at this point we're looking at the Rams staying in St. Louis and the Chargers and Raiders moving to LA. That just seems to be how things are coming together.

    But there's still months before a decision and variables yet to be determined, so I'm not making a prediction. Just feels like that's the way it's going.

    That makes sense for the NFL, Chargers and Raiders (although they're inconsequential). I could see the NFL telling the Rams to stay put because they don't want any teams to turn down a free or largely paid-for stadium. However, if Kronke owns land in LA and wants to put the team there, I don't think Goddell telling him to do it for the good of the league would suffice. From the bit I've followed of this story, it doesn't look like Kronke really wants to stay in StL much. If the Chargers truly are moving to LA, this is going to get really messy in the courts between the league and the Rams.

    I don't think Kroenke wants to stay in STL at all. And I think he might be willing to file a lawsuit. But I question whether he'd still desire to go to LA if the Chargers and Raiders are already on their way.

    I think in that scenario Kroenke would have to break ground and reach an agreement with a temporary stadium and just move overnight if he wants to be the first to LA.

    And he might do that. But I'm not sure he would or not.

    This Chargers-Raiders stadium issue popped up a few months back, so them actually making it official would not catch anybody off guard. If Kroenke is planning on moving to LA, he's already got the deal with the Coliseum done. I can't imagine anybody beating him to LA.

    And what was the deal with the Rose Bowl? Was it that they announced they wouldn't be considered for any NFL teams? Crazy thought, but maybe they publically said no to the Raiders and Chargers because they already have a secret deal with the Rams.

  5. I genuinely think that at this point we're looking at the Rams staying in St. Louis and the Chargers and Raiders moving to LA. That just seems to be how things are coming together.

    But there's still months before a decision and variables yet to be determined, so I'm not making a prediction. Just feels like that's the way it's going.

    That makes sense for the NFL, Chargers and Raiders (although they're inconsequential). I could see the NFL telling the Rams to stay put because they don't want any teams to turn down a free or largely paid-for stadium. However, if Kronke owns land in LA and wants to put the team there, I don't think Goddell telling him to do it for the good of the league would suffice. From the bit I've followed of this story, it doesn't look like Kronke really wants to stay in StL much. If the Chargers truly are moving to LA, this is going to get really messy in the courts between the league and the Rams.

  6. I have listened to WLUP on and off my whole life. I like a lot of classic rock, but disliked the few times when the Loop went to a classic rock format and stopped playing anything made after the '80s. I mean, the Beatles are great, but I don't want to hear them (or Buffalo Springfield) on the Loop. I really liked Rock 103.5, and the Loop became my default radio station for a while after they changed formats. I dislike a lot of what they played on Q101, at least the softer stuff which they wouldn't have played on 103.5. And plenty of cynical people dislike Van Halen and claim their music is devoid of substance.

    I always listened to either WLUP or The Drive. When I was a youngin' it was Wiil Rock out of Waukesha. Mandatory Metallica Mondays was my thing.

    WIIL Rock is out of Kenosha and sucks. Music for high school weight rooms.

    So you basically don't like any hard rock.

  7. I have listened to WLUP on and off my whole life. I like a lot of classic rock, but disliked the few times when the Loop went to a classic rock format and stopped playing anything made after the '80s. I mean, the Beatles are great, but I don't want to hear them (or Buffalo Springfield) on the Loop. I really liked Rock 103.5, and the Loop became my default radio station for a while after they changed formats. I dislike a lot of what they played on Q101, at least the softer stuff which they wouldn't have played on 103.5. And plenty of cynical people dislike Van Halen and claim their music is devoid of substance.

  8. Another one about the NFL:

    I like the old Chargers jerseys better than the new ones. Something about how that lightning bolt looks on a darker background. I just think it's cool.

    It is cool. I don't think it's unpopular to like the navy blue Chargers. The powder blue is really great, but the navy blue is still great, too. It's like Van Halen and Van Hagar.

    Incredible analogy, though I'm surprised to hear that you like Van Halen. I would have figured you'd consider them too mainstream or pop-ish.

  9. "Our purpose, in initiating the expansion process in the manner we did, was not only to explore the possibility of admitting new members to the NHL but also, at the outset, to set realistic guideposts to distinguish between bona fide expressions of interest (i.e., those which have at least substantial ownership capabilities and an arena or the realistic possibility of an arena) from those indications of potential interest which were, at best, merely hopes or aspirations. Apparently, only Mr. Foley and Quebecor have the confidence in their ability to secure an arena and suitable ownership capability to move forward with this process.

    Thread for when Gary Bettman gets a little salty.

    Other leagues hire public relations agencies to write press releases like these. The NHL just has Gary Bettman write whatever comes to mind immediately after ragequitting expansion.

    I hope it happens. I really do. Just to see the NHL sheepishly backtrack on the whole "expansion" thing with two seemingly viable applications on the table. It'll really expose the whole "anyone but Quebec" mindset.

    Even working from a mindset that anything the NHL does is wrong, dropping expansion now would make sense. If three cities applied, it would be good - two expansion teams and a new home for the Coyotes. But everybody knows that the Coyotes are on borrowed time in Glendale, and the NHL needs to keep a market for them (likely Vegas). I don't think they want to expand to 31 teams, so we'll just end up with the coming disaster in Las Vegas and wait for the Panthers to eventually fold up tents and move to QC.

  10. Yeah, but swapping the Cardinals and Buccaneers would have been easy and impacted no other teams, and it would have made geographical sense.

    And I didn't even think of how messed-up the NFC West was at that time. Although I wasn't pleased with the Seahawks leaving the AFC in 2002, it now seems like a perfect fit, geographically and otherwise. Their dominance and rivalry with the 49ers did a lot to entrench them in the NFC. The NFC West would be even more perfect if and when the Rams move back to LA. The only team which is currently "misplaced" geographically is the Cowboys, but that'll never change because of their rivalries. And ultimately it doesn't mean much because the teams only play at times that are easily viewable to the entire nation, and they only play in their rivals' stadium once per year.

  11. I'm sure it was a typo, but Tampa never was in the North. They were in the old Central (with all the North teams) until they moved to the South with the new four division format in 2002. I wonder if ColorWerx has any ideas on why the Cardinals were kept in the East. Maybe the Bidwills were close friends with other owners in that division?

    Here's an idea. They had the Buccaneers and Seahawks swap conferences after year 1, as was planned before expansion. The Bucs played the first year in the AFC West. Maybe the NFL put the Seahawks in the NFC Central the first year because it would be less travel for them? Then they just sapped the teams in left everything the same until 1995. But it was clearly inconveniencing the Bucs (relatively), and they could have always swapped the Cars and Bucs in 1977.

  12. Agreed. That's one division that should be untouchable, like the NFL East has always been.

    Except for the STL/PHO/ARI Cardinals getting expelled from the east, yes. But they weren't part of the big rivals, anyway.

    On that note, why did the Cardinals end up in the NFC East while the Buccaneers were in the Central? Even when the Cards were in St. Louis it made no sense. The geographic divisions don't mean much, as shown by the Cowboys, but it's still crazy to say "let's keep this team in a division with three teams 2,500 miles away." Both teams were historically bad, so I don't think it was a matter of any teams lobbying for one to be in their division. Still, I imagine there was some politics behind the decision.

  13. I agree. In theory, I should hate Dallas's mismatched blues but in practice I prefer it. The concepts never look as good as I'd think they would.

    I think it's because, like he said, everyone seems to start with their navy jerseys and go from there, either putting those colors on the current white jerseys or actually color-swapping the navys to white. The navy jerseys suck. They're really, really bad. They shouldn't make the jerseys they wear 95% of the time worse just to match the crappy navy alternates. And the Cowboys shouldn't be in navy to begin with. The Cowboys need to go back to what they wore in the '70s (although they can drop the serifed font if they prefer) - dark royal blue with bluish-silver. They can even keep the black stripe outlines on both jerseys are their little quirk. I'd also like if they changed their helmet to the greenish-silver of the pants, but bluish-silver is preferred. Of course, they helmet needs to match the pants, but that goes without saying.

  14. But if not, leagues do bad alignments all the time ... when they have leverage ... so making Quebec pay $500 million to play in the West for "a while" isn't out of the question.

    Right, which is how Bud Selig and assorted dumb:censored:s went about switching the Astros into the AL and having constant interleague play just to placate the freaking Texas Rangers. They forced it upon the new Astros owner as part of the sale. We might see Quebec in the Pacific Division.

  15. The NHL is going gimmicky because they've heard from the media and fans alike: We hate the shootout! The league doesn't want to return to ties.

    Easy way to fix it, go soccer table scoring: 3 pts for a win, 1 pt for a tie. Overtime win is still 3 pts, no sharing of points!

    They should do nothing like soccer. Soccer is horrible. Ties are equally horrible. And I'm not a fan of shootouts, but they beat the hell out of watching hockey for two and a half hours and leaving with an outcome as if no game had occurred (to butcher an Admiral line). Sorry. People can call it "stupid American machismo" or whatever the hell, but games need a winner and a loser. I'm fine with 3 points for a regulation win, but they'd then need to go to 2 for an OT win and 1 for OTL.

  16. The debate between relocation fee vs. expansion fee is irrelevant. If the NHL was smart (which it's not, but still) their rules on relocation would be similar to those of the NFL. The NFL can change the fees depending on the size of the market (and it makes sense since an owner in Los Angeles would stand to make a lot more money than one in Houston). With the NHL, it's not about the size of the market, but how badly said market wants a pro team. If Quebecor wants hockey badly enough, it'll gladly pay $400 million in relocation fees on top of the $100 mil or so it would have to pay for the moribund Coyotes.

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