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“The NFL-It’s Their World”

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I can just hear Peyton Manning yelling at the line of scrimmage.

“Omaha-Omaha….Covid 19…Covid 19…Hut-Hut”

And just like that the National Football League is preparing for next season, even while New York City remains in the Virus-Crisis death grip.  As this explodes into Maryland, New Jersey, Michigan.  New Orleans is under siege, maybe worse than Hurricane Katrina.  Texas and California’s population bases on waiting for the Tsunami of the virus to reach its borders.

No problem says Roger Goodell.

The NFL will go ahead with its college draft on April 23rd, in what will be a studio show.  No fans in Las Vegas.  Likely a draft headquarters at the NFL Network studios in New Jersey and Los Angeles.

All the draft experts, the Kipers, McShays, Jeremiah’s of the world will all be in different studios, apart from the anchors.

The war rooms will be reduced to just groups of five, separated by a lot of space.  No Jerry Jones and his band of 25-in the Cowboys war room.  Scouts will be in other rooms, on the phones to their GMs and head coaches.

They will use Zoom or Skype to show the War Rooms and hook up that way for possible interviews.  You know ‘I can’t believe he was there’.

There will be cut-in to each War room and maybe an interview with a key exec.

The NFL will likely have Skype interviews set up with the top picks at their homes where they will be watching the draft off sight.

All this will have a very different technical feel compared to drafts of decades gone by.    Technology will make all this possible, and somehow society will get thru it all.  The NFL believes the fans will suck it up.

Some of us remember when the draft was a 1-day affair, with Howard Balzer, Paul Zimmerman and Bob Ley sitting at one table ad-libbing about the picks, back in the early days of ESPN.  You’ve forgotten the draft was held on a Tuesday in the spring, that’s all.

Goodell’s memo, sent out Friday, to club owners, dripped of all the syrupy things you’d expect from the NFL.  Giving fans a distraction from the death and economic destruction our country is in.  A respite from what is on our mind, for a couple of hours at least.  Serving the public.

But this is really about the historical NFL, planting its flag in the middle of death spiral across America, saying ‘not us’, we will go to work and we will give the fans what they want.

This is the NFL trying to corner the sports market, TV dollars, network contract extensions, while baseball, the NBA, the NHL, and maybe even the NCAA are reeling with the fallout of what happened to their seasons and their playoffs.

The money grab never ends on Park Avenue in the NFL League office, regardless of how they want to spin everything.

The CDC says the apex of the corona crisis will hit most cities between April 15th thru May 5th.  Guess Goodell did not get that memo.

What happens if someone in Jacksonville’s or Buffalo’s war room gets sick and spreads it around the building?  What if five days after the draft, positive tests showed up in the Patriots or Seahawks offices?

It seems needless to do this draft on April 23rd.  Why not May 23rd, why not in June?

The NFL has indicated facilities will remain closed for an indefinite period.  There will be no OTAs in early and mid spring.  Maybe late June minicamps for rookies for a week, then veteran’s minicamp, then the opening of preseason camp in late July.

GMs and Coaches are flying blind into this draft.  Yes they have a lot of video on players, and tapes don’t lie about talent.  But they have had no access to physical exams since the Indy combine, and no rechecks of those coming off surgeries or extended rehab.

You can do Skype meetings for just 1-hour with a top pick, but can you do whiteboard play designs and learn about football IQ?  Can you really delve into a players background?

Teams will be investing a lot of money into the Joe Burrow’s of the world, but what about the likes of Tua Tagovailoa, coming off his surgery on his hip.  Worth the gamble, taking the word of a player, an agent, even the team surgeon?

But this is the NFL and you know how they operate.  The virus be damned.  Death tolls be damned.  Who are you taking with your top draft pick.  Serving the fans now, so you can take their money later.

The NFL game becoming bigger than life?  That is really sad.

If this situation gets worse, and it appears to have no end, maybe Goodell will reconsider.  Make the draft date fluid.  Rethink it.  Push it farther back.  Help your teams make the right decision.  Don’t risk your own peoples health.

As it sits now, Donald Trump’s daily stupid press conference statements, are now being challenged by what is coming out of Roger Goodell’s mouth.

The NFL-it’s their world.  Aren’t you lucky you’re in it.  Hope you don’t get sick.  Hope what they are doing doesn’t make you sick.

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“Sports-Closed for Business”

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Sports is closed for business, but is now open for ideas….how to save-salvage-start back up their seasons.

So what has it been like for you?  You know, not to have games to watch, sporting events to attend, even people to talk to you about your team?

It has been weird for Joe Sixpack, to sit at home, with no games on TV.  To see your newspaper reduced to a page and a half, with hardly any stories or interesting comments.  To listen to sports-talk radio babble on about your favorite memory, player, first game you saw etc.etc.

People have tried.  The UT put together the March Movie madness bracket of 64.  Very novel.

ESPN had the best 64-college mascots in a showdown.

The standard jokes bouncing around twitter…”so that’s what a black TV screen looks like”…..or “I sat next to this woman for an hour in the living room-had a nice chat-oh she’s my wife”.

And it goes on and on.

But sports has real issues.  Games to be played, schedules needed to be worked, TV contracts to be renegotitated.  And where oh were do you put these events on the calendar if you are going to start up the season.

Here’s a scorecard of cancellations.

NFL DRAFT…The league will make it a TV studio event and says it will go on with teams making selections via video conference, with cut ins from all team War rooms, and interviews with draft picks from their homes.  Not audience (fans) in attendance.

NFL MINI CAMPS…Growing concern there should be no OTA workouts, the would span 7-weeks.  Maybe a long mini-camp, then training camps that open in July.  Maybe they push this further back, and dump a couple of preseason games.

MARCH MADNESS…The NCAA tourney makes 350M for the NCAA-gone just like that.  The trickle down effect terribly damaging for all types of University athletic programs, big and small.

BASEBALL..Delayed opening day, with the hope now of a 142-game schedule on June 1st, the would push the season farther back into October.  Now a sales pitch, postseason games in warm weather cities and domed stadiums in November.

BASKETBALL..The push to restart in June and play out the schedule, then get to the playoffs.  This time, you might be playing into August.  The NBA draft will likely be pushed back too, to late summer.  But this means very short off season to get to full schedule for start of next season in fall.

HOCKEY…Forget the rest of the regular season, and go directly into the playoffs.  The NHL has already inquired about arena dates in July and August.  About the ice conditions that time of year?  They have already postponed the NHL draft for June 26th, and can push the back into late July.

KENTUCKY DERBY…Cancelled but will be rescheduled Labor Day weekend in Louisville for that Saturday, going head to head with college football.

MASTERS…Deleted from it spring slot, but you know fall in Augusta can be nice.  Where do you slot it into the Fed Ex playoff series.

PGA-LPGA GOLF….Have cancelled a combined 14-tourneys we won’t see makeup dates for.

TOKYO OLYMPICS…It took two weeks of criticism but the IOC cancelled it and moved it to 2021…same spot…same location.  The financial ruin is catastrophic.  10B-dollars in corporate advertising sponsors, billions in global TV contracts, all to be delayed for a full 12-months.

INDY 500…Now postponed and will be rescheduled August 23rd-easily done because Indy car racing has so many open weekends.

NASCAR…Big trouble because they have already wiped out 7-races, and how do you reschedule 7-events in a schedule that seldom has weekends off in its 36-event schedule.  Maybe you back-end load makeup dates and push the final Chase for the Championship race into December.  They ran the Daytona 500, but may have lost the Talladega 500.

FORMULA 1…Enormous geography problems, in that they have now taken 8-races off the books, and you might not want to, probably cannot, go back to places like China, Korea, India and Viet Nam to make up cancelled races.

BOSTON MARATHON…Just celebrate Patriots Day in the fall, and they will September 14th.

FRENCH OPEN..Where on the tennis calendar can you place this two week event.  Bigger concern, what is to become of Wimbledon?  Will the US Open be impacted late summer?

MLS SOCCER….They could solve this all, if they reschedule and make everybody play two games a week, but you have to worry about the Virus hot spots like New York and Seattle.

ENGLISH PREMEIR LEAGUE…Soccer has already deleted the Champions Leaue and the EUROPA CUP…so there are late season dates and just extend the schedule.  Ditto for all the European and Asiatic leagues, but how can you ever consider starting up again in Italy and Spain this year?

You might be good at Rubic’s cube games or crossword puzzles.  If so, call a league nearby you, for this will be a huge global challenge to get sports back up on line.

In the meantime, enjoy taking to the wife, looking at vacation pictures, or lifetime CNN shows, tweeting, instagramming, or surfing the internet for something good to read..

Sports-closed for business.  Who knows how, when, what shape it will be in when they reopen.

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“Baseball-Welcome Back”

 

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Thursday was supposed to be Opening Day at the ballpark.

 

The Padres were to host the Rockies.

The Dodgers historic rivalry with the Giants .

The Angels would meet the Astros in Houston amid the hate to be directed at the cheats.

 

It won’t be and we won’t know for how long it will be away.

But if it had, this was what I was going to write in my 1-Man’s Opinion Column.  We love baseball history so much, so think back to your favorite team, opening days, and days gone by.

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Baseball is back. It is the green grass, blue sky, baseball under the sun, domed stadiums and designated hitters. Remembering all the history and records of the games, the stars and years gone by.

Baseball is the personality on the field: Teddy Ballgame (Williams), Stan the Man (Musial), Duke of Flatbush (Snider). It’s the M & M Boys, (Mantle and Maris), Sey Hey (Mays), Jackie (Robinson) and Charley Hustle (Rose). It’s the Bambino (Ruth) and the Iron Man (Gehrig), the Georgia Peach (Cobb), Reggie Bar (Jackson) and the Wild Horse of the Osage (Pepper Martin).

Baseball is all about the teams: Murderer’s Row (Yankees), the Gashouse Gang (Cardinals), the Gints (Giants) and Dem Bums (Dodgers). It’s the Lumber Company (Pirates), the Big Red Machine (Cincinnati), the Running Redbirds (Cardinals) and those Fightin’ Phils (Phillies). It’s First in War, First in Peace, Last in the American League (Senators), the Bronx Bombers (Yankees) and the Amazings (Mets).

Baseball is places, too: The House that Ruth Built (Yankees Stadium), the Green Monster (Fenway), the Eighth Wonder of the World (Astrodome), the Stick (San Francisco), Coogan’s Bluff (Polo Grounds), ivy-covered walls (Wrigley Field) and the Fans in Flatbush (Ebbets Field).

Baseball is also about owners: The Boss (Steinbrenner), Charley O (Finley), The Mahatma (Branch Rickey) Veeck — as in Wreck (Bill Veeck) and Cornelius McGillicuddy (Connie Mack).

Baseball is about managers: The Major (Ralph Houk), Smokey (Walter Alston), Casey at the Bat (Stengel), Billy-the-Kid (Martin).

Baseball is about the broadcasters too: Vin Scully, Mel Allen, Jerry Coleman, Jack Buck and Harry Caray.

Baseball is about opening day, when Bob Feller of the Indians threw a no-hitter; Ted Williams hit .446 in career opening days and they threw snowballs, not fastballs at CNE Stadium in Toronto.

Baseball is about the teams of days gone by: the St. Louis Browns, the Washington Senators, Montreal Expos, Philadelphia and Kansas City A’s, the Boston Braves and Seattle Pilots.

Baseball is numbers: 60 (Ruth-HRs), 61 (Maris-HRs), 714 (Aaron-HRs), 254 (Hack Wilson-RBIs), 76 (Barry Bonds HRs), .401 (Ted Williams batting average), 4,256 (Pete Rose’s hit total).

Baseball is bubble gum and trading cards. Father’s taking sons to their first game.

Foul balls, hot dogs and autographs.

Rain outs and bean-balls and out-of-town scoreboards.

It’s lying under the covers late at night listening on a transistor radio.

It’s learning to keep score.

Playing catch with your dad, granddad or uncle.

It’s the smell of the ball park, the crack of the bat, the cheering of the crowd.

Baseball is back and every team, every fan, starts on Opening Day, feeling good.

Angels, Dodgers, Padres — great to see you!

Baseball is back. Welcome back, old friend.

 

It would have been a feel good day….if it were a normal day.

 

It’s not right now, but better days are coming.

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“Star QB–Goes the Way Others Gone”

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Good for a short time.
Now gone because he is hurt.

Short shelf life.

The plight of so many quarterbacks who want to run the football, and get run out of the game with injuries.

Cam Newton is done with the Carolina Panthers, released on Tuesday morning, because of salary cap issues, because of surgeries, because he never got better.

From a (15-1)..MVP-season to MIA to unemployed.

The Panthers, in the wake of a massive rebuild, lost one of the last components of the team that had that great 2015-season.

Tight end Greg Olsen left as a free agent.  Star linebacker Luke Kuechly walked away into retirement because of concussions.  Pick a name, there’s no one left.

Newton exits with some sparkling stats from early in his career.  He did at Carolina, what he did at Auburn, for a couple of years, till he got battered.  He couldn’t change his game, didn’t improve, and kept getting hurt.

Unable to become a complete pocket passer, even with the help of QB-icon coach Norv Turner, when he could no longer run, he became just a marginal quarterback.

Carolina, and no one else, will pay him the 18M he was supposed to earn this season.  No one wanted him when he was put on the trade block.  He may get an offer but who knows if it will be as a starter or a backup, and no one knows how long he holds up.

He exits Carolina with a (68-55-1) record, but since his Super Bowl season, that (15-1) mark, he is just a (23-23) signal caller.  He has just an 80-QB rating since 2016, ranked 30th in the NFL in that time span of 4-years.

The career ledger shows (182TD-108Int)…291-sacks….59% completions and just an 86-rating.

Done in by a torn labrum surgery, then a Lis’franc foot surgery.  In between, fractured ribs and a back.  In all likelihood, this from a running QB style.

His footwork mechanics never improved.  His arm slot to throw the ball was different game to game.  He was late with passes, put balls into coverages, and struggled with playbooks and coordinators.

What is his value now?  Even Ron Rivera, his longtime head coach, now at Washington, didn’t want to trade for him, choosing instead to take a mistake prone Kyle Allen from Carolina instead in a deal.

New England needs a veteran quarterback, the Chargers may need one, Jacksonville wants an experienced quarterback too.

But with a plethora of quality young arms on the NFL draft board, Newton will have a hard time finding a starting job, much less one that pays him what he thinks his value might be.

Hard to believe, Newton-Jameis Winston-Robert Griffin III-Colin Kaeperneck, all unemployed at this hour, for a wide variety of reasons.

Cam Newton out of a job right now-going the way of so many others at that position.  Who would have thought we’d see a day like this?

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“Great Unknown–How To Deal With This”

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This should have been an exciting time, the opening of the baseball season, and now it is the great unknown.

Players have been scattered to all parts of the country, and to parts of the globe this morning, all in the grip of the Virus-Crisis–Covid 19.

Questions abound and remain unanswered, as owners, the MLB Commissioner, and the Union Chief try to find some common ground.

Here are my answers to what you are asking:

WHEN MIGHT THE SEASON START?..Target date could be June 1st if the country is able to get control of the virus and the reporting numbers of positive tests and deaths, makes a drive downward.  If we see a spike, and this continues out of control, then the season is in jeopardy.

HOW MANY GAMES WILL THEY PLAY?…It won’t be 162.  Now with at least another month of delays, it might not be 154.  But baseball has played limited schedules in the past because of work stoppages.

WHAT DO THEY DO WITH THE SCHEDULE? .. Likely to rework the schedule and have more divisional games, less travel, less expense and everyone playing the same number of games.  Maybe for one year, no East Coast trips or limitations on how many out of division series you play?

WHAT ABOUT SPRING TRAINING?… Players will stay in shape by working out on their own.  The general consensus is a minimum 2-week restarted spring training camp, but possibly as long as four weeks to ramp up pitching.

WHAT ABOUT ROSTER SIZE?..They were supposed to start the 26-man roster this season.  Maybe they open with 28-with the mandate the additional two slots have to be pitchers to avoid over-working of staffs to start the season for at least the first month.

WHAT ABOUT THE ALL STAR GAME?..It could be in jeopardy at Dodgers Stadium, if baseball decides to use what would be a week off and slot makeup games there.

WHAT ABOUT THE CALENDAR?…Some sources say games could be played into mid-October then start the playoffs.  One theory is to move the ALCS-NLCS-World Series games to a neutral sight, a warm weather city or a Domed Stadium, and play those games into late November.

WHAT ABOUT THE RULES?…They stay in effect, the expansion of rosters, the insertion of the 15-day injured list, the new rules about optioning pitchers, the three batter minimum.  All that was going into effect, will be in-effect.

WHAT ABOUT THE MINOR LEAGUES?..Their livelihood in jeopardy and not just because MLB wants to contract 42-teams and fold at least 4-leagues a year from now.  Minor league teams need to have their expenses picked up by major league teams.  Lack of cash flow from a reduction of their 144-game schedules becomes a real problem for local ownership.  This could be a devastating season, unless baseball decides to make every league a ‘short season’ league, June 1st to September 1st.

WHAT IS HAPPENING TO MINOR LEAGUE PLAYERS?…They were ordered out of camps a week ago. MLB decided to give each minor leaguer a stipend of pay that runs till April 9th, when their season would have started.  Minor leaguers don’t make a lot of money.  Add to that the woes of some of the countries they live in, Venezuela, most notably, and players not wanting to return home.  The lowers minor leaguers will have the hardest time financially, having to take jobs, and how do they stay in shape.

DO MAJOR LEAGUERS GET PAID?…It is still being negotiated with the Union.  MLB does not have an ‘Act of God’ clause, which would allow them to stop pay of players if games were permanently cancelled.  It has to be negotiated thru the Union.  A Stephen Strasburg can live on past earnings for months.  What about the lower minor leaguers in the Washington farm system.

WHAT HAPPENS TO FREE AGENCY?…A big debate, the Union is asking that all players be given a full year service time towards free agency, even if only 90-games are played instead of the 162-slate.  Owners may want to pro-rate service time based on games played.  Maybe the owners give the players the full year, but get concessions of many other things they need to jump start a shortened season.

WHAT HAPPENS TO THE RADIO-TV NETWORKS?…They take a massive hits in advertising revenue streams, from ESPN’s TV package, to your local broadcasters like Fox Sports-San Diego and the radio flagship ‘Fan 97.3’.  FSSD and the Fan’s revenue from broadcasting games, pays the bills for the operation of the rest of the station.  This is a huge dent that impacts day to day operations.  Look for the radio station to ask for an extra year to be tacked on their broadcast deal to make up the money lost this year.  Think of Entercom, owner of the Fan, and which has the play-by-play rights to at least 23-other major league stations.  That is a lot of revenue they won’t see, and they still have to pay a lot to operate the sports-talk formats of all those stations, a very expensive format to be in.

There won’t be any opening days for the Padres-Dodgers-Angels as we expected this weekend.  No one has put a dollar value on what this crisis will cost teams, but it has to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars if baseball sits dark till June 1st.

Waiting for the grand old game to get back.  Think we will miss opening day and what we might not have for the next couple of months.

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