“Big League Becomes Bush League”

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Have you ever seen anything as sad as the Chargers ownership attempts to make a ‘splash’ into the #2-market in the country, Los Angeles.

The so-called Pep Rally to welcome the Chargers to LA, was held inside the 17,000-seat Forum, the former home of the Lakers.

All of 200-showed up. 200 in a market of 8-million, and yet there was the owner of the team praising the fan support they have received in the five days or so since the move was announced.

Then there was an angry Chargers, standing up and screaming at Spanos, as the owner was attempting to address the crowd in a 3-minute typed in advance speech.

When the fan was done, he committed the ultimate insult, throwing his Chargers jersey onto the floor, where all the rich people were supposed to sit, but was filled with empty seats. He exited by giving the Chargers owner the finger, on both hands.

And that was Dean Spanos who also turned his back and walked away when approached by the San Diego media.

There was the senior son, AG Spanos, known as Mama’s boy to employees who don’t like him, being unable to link a noun and a verb when questioned by the media about season ticket plans, PSL’s and more. His claim to fame, he cut ticket prices, designed the uniforms, and saw team revenues go from 15th place to 28th place, since Dad gave him the job.

John Spanos, the President of Football Operations, was the only one with the brass to stand and hold an intelligent conversation with the media, talking about the excitement of playing in a compact stadium, and talking about the future of a pretty good young team, if they can get it all healthy.

Commissioner Roger Goodell spent 3-minutes talking to the media, admitting he knows San Diego fans are hurting and angry, and admitting the NFL, as an entity is hurting too. And just like that, he was gone before any more hostile questions could be asked. More empty rhetoric from an NFL league office that cares more about profits, than product and relationships.

So much for football and family ads.

All this on the heels of the rather uncomfortable press conferences, where Philip Rivers was peppered with questions about these ‘trade rumors’, or Jason Verrett sounding uneducated about what Chargers football meant to San Diego fans, but how excited he was to be in LA..

Of course, the nationwide mocking of the Chargers, changing their logo four times in six days, and the way the exit strategy from San Diego was held by an owner, who acted like a coward.

And now all the rumblings from people within, that Spanos gave real lukewarm support to Measure C, and that this move was planned for an entire calendar year.

Off to the side was Fred Maas, the point man in San Diego, the one who mocked John Moores for all he did on behalf of the Padres, and who then left town. Maas told CW-6 how he had come to know and respect Dean Spanos, the same guy, who now is taking the money and running to the bigger market in Los Angeles.

I guess when you are rich, like the 1st family of football is, you can do anything you want, treat anybody anyway you want, because you are a Spanos, you own an NFL team.

You pick the word to describe the first week of the Los Angeles Chargers.

Sick. Shabby. Shameful. All starts with the letter “S”, just like the Spanos last name.

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