Ferdinand Cesarano

Also, this guy could have agreed to sell the A's to Joe Lacob, who was willing to buy the team. Then he could have taken his one billion dollars of profit as compared to his purchase price, and could have used that to get an expansion team for Las Vegas.

The awfulness of the Ravens' and Lions' numbers and of their overall uniform designs more than cancels out the beauty of those teams' colours.

The best the Nationals ever looked is this: That right there is a baseball uniform. It's a classic Tigers-level design that should have remained in place forever. The unique front number location on the home set made that dignified uniform very distinctive. That look was satisfying particularly because the team had overcome a very bad initial look with the bevels. Every change since this point — including the use of the script wordmark at home — has been a downgrade. The new set drastically accelerates the downward trend.

Ah! I confess to my very wide ignorance in the realm of movies. Dankon pro la klarigo.

Two people with opposing viewpoints each think the other is wrong. That's natural — and healthy. I greatly appreciate the attempt at Esperanto, the world's most beautiful language! I'd rather be denounced in Esperanto than praised in any other language. Please let me point out the distinction between the suffixes -ig and -iĝ. The suffix -ig carries the meaning "to make", and so creates a transitive verb; whereas the suffix -iĝ carries the meaning "to become", and so creates an intransitive verb. Both can be placed on an adjective, as you did with the adjective "malpeza", meaning "light". Clearly you were going for "lighten up"; the correct form for that would be "malpeziĝu" (where -u is the imperative mood ending, for a command). By contrast, "malpezigu" would be a command to make some other thing lighter. Finally, the Esperanto version of Ferdinand is just Ferdinando. Also, just as English has a convention for shortened nicknames in -y or -ie (Jimmy, Billy, Tommy, Ronnie; I myself often go by Freddie), in Esperanto we add -ĉjo to the first few letters of a masculine name. Hence "Feĉjo" for me, spelt as "Fechjo" when the Esperanto letters such as Ĉ are not available. (This also obliquely invokes the similar-sounding word "feĉo", which means "muck" or "dregs", like a Muddy Waters sort of thing. Esperanto humour.) Aaanyway . . . where were we? Ah, yes; the Yankees' new road uniform. Tre malbonaspekta, laŭ mi.

I think it's pretty clear that one of us doesn't grasp that. Please remember that everyone here is expressing opinions (albeit in prose of widely varying degrees of beauty).

Well, of course it's an aesthetic preference. But when we're talking about the aesthetics of uniform of the Yankees, it becomes a big f-ing deal. The Yankees' uniforms reached absolute perfection in 1973 with the change in the number font and the livening up of the road set; thus any change is by necessity a downgrade. (This includes the running together of the two words of the road wordmark, such that that mark now reads "Newyork".) Note that the Yankees are not alone in the tier of untouchable uniforms. The same outrage is appropriate for desacrations of the uniforms of the Cardinals (hence the pullover and the powder blue uniforms being such abominations for that team), of the Tigers (the alteration of the uniform D was a very bad move), and even of the Mets (the tail on the 1994 uniforms was most unwelcome, and the presence of a black jersey is downright offensive). Egad! I take umbrage!

... only to replace them with a road uniform design they wore for all but 7 of their 27 World Series titles. The previous road uniform was always terrible. The white outline and the sleeve trim in the 1973 upgrade made the lettering stronger and more vibrant, and turned the road uniform from featureless and drab to dignified and simple. It is impossible to understand what's going on in the minds of people who deny that this represented a huge improvement.

Wrong. This is the best the Dodgers have ever looked on the road.

Note that the improvement to the Yankees' road uniforms with the beautiful white outlines (along with the conversion to the strong varsity numbers) took place in 1973, before the renovation of the Stadium. It's sad to see this unsightly downgrade of uniforms with a proud 50-year history.

Absolutely terrible. These look like wet paper bags. The Yankees' road look would go from near the top to near the bottom.

Well this sure is a "good news / bad news" situation. That's the right wordmark for the team, but definitely the wrong style. That Angels uniform reached its peak in its buttondown version. I'm from the 1970s. I dig the 1970s. But pullovers are just bad. There were exactly three teams that looked good in pullovers: the A's and the Pirates in regular-cut pullovers, and the White Sox in their collared shirts (though the collar should have gone all the way around). For every other team, the pullover style was at best ugly, and at worst, on the traditional teams (Red Sox, Cardinals, Giants, Reds), an affront to history. That style should be left in the dustbin of history (alongside powder blue road uniforms).

I remember this! The AL East had been won by six different teams in the six previous seasons. To think that Cleveland was going to make it a full 7-for-7 was seductive.

My favourite Sports Illustrated cover: (The sad part is that, on account of treachery on the part of the Knicks and complicity on the part of the league, Dr. J never actually played for the Nets in the NBA.)

They also did a good job by getting rid of the gradient in the old wordmark. And nice continuity in keeping the same shapes of the letters A and U. I'll have to sport my New York Empire hat in celebration of the league's logo change. This must mean that the league has licenced the "frisbee" trademark from Wham-O, right? Semi-related point: I honestly believe that ultimate is the world's greatest spectator sport. The speed at which the frisbee moves makes the game eminently watchable; in this respect it's the anti-hockey. Also, the balletic catches and defensive plays are consistently thrilling.

That's hilarious. If having a favourite player is creepy, then I am perfectly content to be creepy! Also, my infatuation with Perez is nothing compared to what I have written about Rick Cerone, the Magnificent Mustachioed Mediterranean Marvel. (Ah, how nostalgic I now am for the good old days of playing What If Sports, when Cerone led a band of swarthy Italians known as I Paesani to consistent approaches to near-medocrity, while looking super-cool doing it.)

Ahh, so that's what you think my "bias" is! I definitely wanted Arlington to win because of Luis Perez, who is my favourite player. And when Perez was with Vegas, I wanted Vegas to win, just as I wanted Birmingham to win in the AAF. (I got lucky for a couple of years when Perez was first with the New York Guardians and then with the Generals.) If Arlington sends Perez to another team, then that's the team I will be rooting for this season. But please believe me that my expressions of support of playoffs by conferences is not some retroactive justification for Arlington's win (which, incidentally, was the most inspirational underdog run in recent memory, and which puts Perez in the class of Namath). It's something I would always have favoured. The CFL's "crossover" striles me as completely ridiculous; fortunately, no crossover team has made it to the Grey Cup. Alas, MLS is not so lucky. When the Red Bulls played Columbus for the MLS Cup, there was in reality no Western Conference champion that year. (Officially it was the Red Bulls, who aren't part of the Western Conference. No one can justify that.) As I mentioned in a previous post, if I were king, the playoffs in all leagues would consist only of divisional champions; so the XFL would have gone straight to a championship game between D.C. and Houston, without Arlington even qualifying.

"Odious"?! Please. There are quite a few books that I own that I just can't get around to starting, simply because of the hassle of carrying them. Also, I have bought e-books of books whose paper copies I already have just for the ease and pleasure of reading them on my phone, tablet, and laptop. Give me an e-book 100 times out of 100. (And I say this as an old guy who grew up with normal printed books.)

Again with this "bias" thing. I have no idea what that's supposed to mean. As I mentioned once before, the bias that I have (and that I openly proclaim) is for a playoff system that is sensible and interesting, and that produces a final between two champions. For that reason, I favour a system that sticks strictly to divisions/conferences in any league (but particularly in this league, whose conferences have identities before the league even starts).

The idea of these leagues lasting indefinitely is not unrealistic, if things are done right. This means, mainly, if the owners are willing to lose money in the short term. If not for the original USFL's disastrous decision to move to the fall (which resulted in a lawsuit that the USFL techincally won, but that didn't help them on account of judicial incompetence), it probably would be preparing for its 32nd spring season right now. Also, the first version of the XFL would have gone on after NBC pulled out if McMahon had been willing to lose money on it while it gained a foothold. Even the AAF, which made a very positive impression in 2019, would have continued if Ebersol had actually had the capitalisation that he had claimed to have. While it's easy to scoff at this by saying that if my grandmother had wheels she'd be a bicycle, the point is that there are key errors that might well have been avoided with better planning and/or better strategising. Someone's eventually going to get it right. Having northern and southern divisions is no stranger than having eastern and western divisions. This evens out over time. In any league, one conference or division is stronger some years and weaker in other years. The good thing about the XFL's (and the USFL's) playoff system was not that anyone can win, but, rather, that each place is rewarded differently. The ideal playoff system would allow only division winners (which is to say, the winners of the first round of the overall championship competition, the regular season). This best possible playoff system was in place in Major League Baseball from 1969 through 1993. If non-winners are allowed, then their path should be harder than that of divisional champs. That was the system in place in the NFL when there were two wild cards per conference, as the divisional champs all had a bye week while the wild cards played each other. The NFL has lost that advantage with three wild cards, as one divisional champion is effectively demoted to the level of wild card. In the XFL, the disadvantage was that the second-place team had to play on the road. (If you want to argue that that's too small a disadvantage, I'll agree; the fix for that is to have a postseason consisting of only one game: the matchup between the two division winners.) If you're going to have a single table, then there's no doubt as to which team is best; that team should be the champion. Here the European football leagues get it right. Whereas, if you have the top four teams out of eight make the playoffs, then there is no meaningful difference between finishing first and finishing second, a terrible format which robs the regular season of meaning. (Evidence for this is the NBA.) Playoffs came into being because of the impracticality of a single table, hence divisions/conferences. When you have divisions or conferences, each one of those units is going to produce a champion. The final should always be between those two champions; indeed, for this reason alone (the producing of two champions to meet in the final) divisions/conferences are desireable. But in the UFL's case, where the two conferences start with established identities, having the conferences determine the playoffs is just so obvious.

Wow. But this raises the question: how could non-existent people have been awarded Emmys? Does this mean that the Emmy people do not actually review the work that is under consideration?

Wow, I am surprised by this. I was thinking that the XFL kickoff rule, which prioritises safety while still encouraging returns, would be the one that survives. That rule was so good that there were several people saying that the NFL should consider it.

I sure don't like that the Renegades picked a quarterback. You don't pick a guy first in order to have him be the backup. So the inspirational leader Luis Perez will have a battle on his hands.

Logic dictates that, if you're going to have conferences, then the playoff system should follow those conferences. Also very logical is the 3-at-2 / winner-at-1 format, which diffferently rewards each place in a very satisfying manner. Common sense tells us that what is good for this new league is a guaranteed final featuring a former USFL team versus a former XFL team (understanding that what will be called the Roughnecks is really the renamed Gamblers). What's more, the experience of the two leagues demonstrates the value of the playoff system. In one league the favourite went right through; and in the other league an underdog upended two favourites on the road, in the process writing one of the all-time great sports stories. Anyway, it is advisable to recognise that everyone is here expressing opinions, and to refrain from personal attacks (which, incidentally, reek badly of projection).

My bias is for a sensible playoff system that builds conference identity. And I should hope that it is showing. If two teams from the same division/conference meet in the final, that's cheesy. The CFL degrades its image every time it employs the silly "crossover"; and the New York Red Bulls' "Western Conference Champions" banner is embarrassing. Given that this new league starts with divisions each representing a different origin (like a mini-NFL), the use of a strictly conference-based playoff system would be a natural.