Angels tell Anaheim they're opting out of their lease on Angel Stadium

[OnWis97]

15 hours ago, Quillz said:

The Pistons play in Auburn Hills, not Detroit. The Giants play in East Rutherford, New Jersey, not New York. The Angels are "Los Angeles" because that was their original name and they're part of the Greater LA Metro Area.

Don't get some people started on that....

 

I agree with IceCap's statement that if Anaheim teams had always been called "Los Angeles" nobody would give it a lot of thought.  Little quirks sort of get our minds focused in one direction. For example, I am absolutely convinced that if New York City and New York State did not have the same name (e.g., if the city was called "Gotham") then people would be far less bent out of shape about the Gotham Giants and Gotham Jets not being called "New Jersey."  They're conflating the city and state.  That explains why nobody demand the Washington Redskins be called the Maryland Redskins.

 

Last September, I took a trip to LA, stayed in Rodando Beach and rented a car.  I went to, among other things, a Dodger game and an Angel game.  Driving to the Angels game, I never felt like I was leaving the LA market.  The ballpark's setting seemed to be very "general suburbia."  I know Anaheim is bigger/different than Orchard Park or Auburn Hills; if a team wants to market specifically to that part of the region, it makes some sense.  But it's not wrong to call them "LA."

[LMU]

1 hour ago, OnWis97 said:

Don't get some people started on that....

 

I agree with IceCap's statement that if Anaheim teams had always been called "Los Angeles" nobody would give it a lot of thought.  Little quirks sort of get our minds focused in one direction. For example, I am absolutely convinced that if New York City and New York State did not have the same name (e.g., if the city was called "Gotham") then people would be far less bent out of shape about the Gotham Giants and Gotham Jets not being called "New Jersey."  They're conflating the city and state.  That explains why nobody demand the Washington Redskins be called the Maryland Redskins.

 

Last September, I took a trip to LA, stayed in Rodando Beach and rented a car.  I went to, among other things, a Dodger game and an Angel game.  Driving to the Angels game, I never felt like I was leaving the LA market.  The ballpark's setting seemed to be very "general suburbia."  I know Anaheim is bigger/different than Orchard Park or Auburn Hills; if a team wants to market specifically to that part of the region, it makes some sense.  But it's not wrong to call them "LA."

REDONDO Beach.

 

Sorry, I live the next city over.  Have to correct it for the record.

[Digby]

Paging Patti Smith.

[The_Admiral]

Thanks for reminding me that Horses doesn't end after the first track after all!

[IceCap]

On 10/17/2018 at 7:58 PM, monkeypower said:

I'll start by saying I'm in favour of Anaheim being used as the geographical identifier and I think it can be after so many years of being used as one, but it is definitely a Disney creation. 

I don't have any objection to using "Anaheim" as an identifier either. I just don't think using the "Los Angeles" name in Anaheim is bad either. Both can, and have, worked.

[BBTV]

2 hours ago, Ice_Cap said:

I don't have any objection to using "Anaheim" as an identifier either. I just don't think using the "Los Angeles" name in Anaheim is bad either. Both can, and have, worked.

 

I think it's more natural to become more precise in your name than more vague.  Florida to Miami Marlins took me no time to adjust to, while Phoenix to Arizona Cardinals still seems weird to me.  The Angels have gone all directions with this.  Small (LA) to medium (CA) to small (Anaheim) back to medium (LA). For whatever reason, LAA (or LAA of A) has taken me far longer to get used to than Anaheim from California did.

[Digby]

11 hours ago, BringBackTheVet said:

 

I think it's more natural to become more precise in your name than more vague.  Florida to Miami Marlins took me no time to adjust to, while Phoenix to Arizona Cardinals still seems weird to me.  The Angels have gone all directions with this.  Small (LA) to medium (CA) to small (Anaheim) back to medium (LA). For whatever reason, LAA (or LAA of A) has taken me far longer to get used to than Anaheim from California did.

 

Could be the overall branding, too -- when they went to Anaheim the periwinkle scheme and the absurd 90s logos came with it, so it was a cleaner break. Anaheim to LAAoA was easy to miss, frankly, if you weren't paying attention beyond the field of play.

[Gothamite]

So easy to miss that Wikipedia didn't even realize it for a couple years.

[colortv]

Angel Stadium is less than 30 miles from downtown LA.

 

I don't think most people realize how big the LA metro area is, as Bill Simmons put it.

 

There are points that are well over 100 miles apart.

[BBTV]

8 minutes ago, colortv said:

There are points that are well over 100 miles apart.

 

That's difficult for many of us on the east coast to grasp.  From me in South Philadelphia, 100 miles puts me precisely at the Empire State Building... which is certainly not in the same metro.

[Quillz]

It’s not even distance. Geography, too. There’s a full blown mountain range between downtown LA and the suburbs of the valley. Want to travel 10 miles from Van Nuys to downtown? Enjoy the 405 traffic through Sepulveda Pass. 

[colortv]

28 minutes ago, BringBackTheVet said:

 

That's difficult for many of us on the east coast to grasp.  From me in South Philadelphia, 100 miles puts me precisely at the Empire State Building... which is certainly not in the same metro.

 

That's why I find this Chargers stuff in the other thread so silly.

 

They have a market from the Mexican border in the south to basically Santa Barbara in the North, stretching 230 miles North to South with 20 million people. 

 

You would have to try to fail in order to do so.

[Wings]

-

[LMU]

2 hours ago, Quillz said:

It’s not even distance. Geography, too. There’s a full blown mountain range between downtown LA and the suburbs of the valley. Want to travel 10 miles from Van Nuys to downtown? Enjoy the 405 traffic through Sepulveda Pass. 

And the Valley isn't even suburbs considering most of it is in LA proper.

[The_Admiral]

Yeah, it was only a few years ago that I learned all these place names I had known -- Northridge, Sherman Oaks, Reseda, Van Nuys -- were actually just neighborhoods of Los Angeles rather than suburbs. The Valley is a strange phenomenon, geographically speaking. Maybe the people are strange, too.

[Quillz]

3 hours ago, the admiral said:

Yeah, it was only a few years ago that I learned all these place names I had known -- Northridge, Sherman Oaks, Reseda, Van Nuys -- were actually just neighborhoods of Los Angeles rather than suburbs. The Valley is a strange phenomenon, geographically speaking. Maybe the people are strange, too.

Just avoid Canoga Park, lots of meth users. But go north to Chatsworth if you like porn. 

[The_Admiral]

6 hours ago, Quillz said:

But go north to Chatsworth if you like porn. 

I see it's next to "Box Canyon."

[goalieboy82]

6 hours ago, Quillz said:

Just avoid Canoga Park, lots of meth users. But go north to Chatsworth if you like porn. 

 

5 minutes ago, the admiral said:

I see it's next to "Box Canyon."

 

[Quillz]

44 minutes ago, the admiral said:

I see it's next to "Box Canyon."

That's just the name of a small canyon road, not an actual community. (Although the people there think they are).

 

There was probably a joke there that flew over my head.

[Gothamite]

13 hours ago, colortv said:

That's why I find this Chargers stuff in the other thread so silly.

 

They have a market from the Mexican border in the south to basically Santa Barbara in the North, stretching 230 miles North to South with 20 million people. 

 

You would have to try to fail in order to do so.

 

No, they don’t. They would have, if they hadn’t spit on San Diego on the way out of town.  Now the Rams have a better shot at the southern half of that market than the Chargers do. 

 

As for not failing in a major market, it’s shockingly easy to do.  Major markets have more competition for eyeballs, for sponsorships, for those entertainment dollars.  Especially when the product is viewed as unfavorable or inferior, as the Chargers are in danger of becoming to the Rams.

 

The Islanders are the perfect example.   They moved to the very heart of the largest metropolitan area in the country.  Twenty four million people.  And they failed to make a dent, slinking back to their original little slice of the metro area.  I can easily see the Chargers wanting to do the same.