NFL

Full Tilt

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Is it safe to say that three of the top 6-8 quarterbacks in the NFL are in the conference championship games this weekend?

We’re talking about Hurts, Burrow, and Mahomes of course.  Purdy has been a pretty good surprise, but the resume is quite light at this point.

That the AFC has two great QBs in the final two while the NFC has only one is no surprise either.  When you run down from great to not so regardless of the conference affiliation you’ll find that the AFC is stacked and the NFC is wanting.

Mahomes, Burrow, Allen, Jackson, and Herbert are a strong top five for the AFC.  Throw in Lawrence, Tagovailoa, Watson, Jones, and Pickett as emerging upside types and the top ten is relatively equally as impressive.

Notice that absent from this AFC list are Wilson and Carr.

Wilson is a Super Bowl winner and a nine-time Pro Bowl selection who has thrown for over 40k yards.  He had a bad year and might be past his prime and then some, however.

Carr is a three-time Pro Bowler and amassed 35k passing yards.  He’s done being a Raider and might be headed to the NFC.

Ah, the NFC.

Any NFC list would start with Brady and Rodgers arguably the two best in the last 15 years regardless of the conference (sorry Drew Brees).

But, is Brady done with football?  Is Rodgers done with Green Bay?  Is Green Bay done with Rodgers?  Let’s go with no, yes, and yes for the sake of the following argument.

What if Brady replaced Carr in Vegas?  Whether you view Brady’s glass as half empty or half full it’s still better than half of the quarterbacks in the entire league.

What if Rodgers went to, say, the New York J-E-T-S?  Jets, Jets, Jets.   He’s still easily a top-ten NFL quarterback.

Those what if’s would tilt the AFC position of dominance at the most important position in football to an unprecedented level.

Compare all of the above to the NFC’s Hurts, Prescott, Cousins, Stafford, and Jones and you’ll see the tilt lite light up like the old 1970s pinball machines.

Throw in the next five who throw for NFC teams.  Goff, Wilson, Murray, Marietta, and, well, and, umm Geno Smith?  Jeez.

If you want to jump deeper into the imbalance fast forward to the NFL Draft this Spring.  The Houston Texans and the Indianapolis Colts, both AFC teams with picks # 2 and #4 respectively, will almost certainly draft high Round One QBs.

Bryce Young and CJ Stoud very likely will hear Roger Goodell announce that their immediate future will be in the AFC.

Super Bowls are won far more often with great quarterbacking than with complimentary quarterbacking.

The AFC is loaded with “win because of’s.”  The NFC is loaded with “win with and win in spite of’s.”

Jalen Hurts and Philly might put a hurting on the AFC in a few weeks.

After that, it looks like the AFC will put a hurting on the NFC for a few years.

 

 

How Bout Dem Boys?

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

A known serial womanizer/assaulter squared off against a known massage parlor frequenter yesterday and the result was not a happy ending.

The NFL fall meetings took place in New York Tuesday.  And the fireworks were glorious.

The owner of the highest valued franchise, Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, exchanged a few heated words with the owner of the most historically successful franchise, New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft.

The catalyst was a motion to permit the owner’s compensation committee to begin negotiations on a new deal with commissioner Roger Goodell.

Jerry Jones was the one dissenter in the 31-1 vote in favor of beginning.  He wants Goodell’s next contract to be more performance incentive-based and less salary guaranteed.

If Jones, as President and GM of the Cowboys, was compensated that way he would be far less wealthy than he is, but we digress.

Jones told Kraft, “don’t f… with me.”  Kraft uttered, “excuse me?”  And Jones countered with “don’t mess with me.”  What started this?  Does it matter?

Boys.  Boys!  BOYS!  How bout dem boys?

Billionaires arguing about a two-three hundred million dollar compensation package is unseemly.

But wait, there’s more.

Colts owner Jim Irsay contended out loud that he believes there’s “merit” to consider the removal of Dan Snyder from the Washington Commanders’ ownership.  In an effort to oust Snyder over a series of serious internal missteps that there is now an investigation into whether Snyder was actually privately investigating the other owners so that the dirty ones would have dirt on the other dirty ones.

What’s Snyder getting the most heat for?  The heat stems from a steamy boy’s club front office that serially harassed female employees when the Commanders were the Redskins.  He should get heat for running a once proud franchise straight into the Fed Ex Field dirt, but we digress again.

It seems that DeShaun Watson’s off-of-the-field dalliances should immediately qualify him for ownership once his playing days end.  Of course, the NFL will allow none of his bad behavior to go unpunished.  It tarnishes the image of the game.

We ask once more, “how bout dem boys?”

 

Over Eight Easily in the Big Easy

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

The average gambler is always amazed at how close Vegas comes to getting betting lines so close to real outcomes. But, the reality is that they get them  wrong as well.

The smart money, as they say, recognizes the miss before the game/season.  The rest of us bet either side, mostly on emotion, and Vegas gets the juice. Lines are made to evoke that collective response.  Vegas always gets the juice.

This brings us to season-long NFL wins bets.  We’ll have three (maybe four) for you in the next month or so.  Today is our first.

The New Orleans Saints’ win total in Vegas is 8.  It was 7 1/2 when it rolled out in March.

In the last five seasons only the Kansas City Chiefs have more wins than NOLA by a count of 55-53.

So, what’s changed?  Drew Brees (in 2021) and Sean Payton(now) are no longer.  Those are two BIG changes.

But another thing changed last year.  The NFL went to a 17-game schedule.  Therefore, Vegas thinks that the Saints will have a losing record in 2022.

BBR feels strongly otherwise.  Below are a litany of reasons.

  1.  Dennis Allen is now head coach.  He’ll call the in-game defense just as he has for the last six seasons.  He’s a steady and heady guy.
  2.  And the defense was very good the last two seasons.  We expect it to be even better. Two first-round picks (Payton Turner and Marcus Davenport) missed all or a big portion of the season.
  3. The defense has a chance to be elite this year.  Cam Jordan and DeMario Davis are true leaders.  The secondary might be the deepest in the NFL.  It added Tyrann Matthieu as well.
  4. Jameus Winston must 1) stay healthy, and 2) have a strong season as one expects of a former first pick of the first-round guy.  The constant change of personnel and coordinators in his NFL life combined with his immaturity has held him back.He’s saying and doing all of the right things this offseason.  He was 5-2 as the starter last year with only two picks before the season-ending injury.
  5. He’ll have weapons.  The team has positively transformed its weak wide receiver group.  In this one off-season, Marquez Calloway drops from the #1 wideout, which he never was, to a #4 which he’s more than capable of succeeding as.   Michael Thomas returns.  They drafted Chris Olave in round one.  They signed FA Javis Landry for the slot.  A weakness became a strength.
  6. Laugh all that you want, but N.O. signed a very capable backup should Winston face plant.  Andy Dalton became a punching bag in Cincinnati.  But, he’s a nine-year starter and an 11-year veteran in this league for a reason.  Quick, name two legit weapons he had while a Bengal.  He’s thrown for over 35k NFL yards.  If he wasn’t good he’d be long gone by now.
  7. The Saints’ special teams rank in the top 10 in most categories.  They put an emphasis on it.  Will Lutz is back to health and kicking this fall.  The team missed seven extra points and eight field goals in his absence.
  8. The law of averages says that this team will be healthier than last year.  Four QB’s started and 66 players started one game or more in all.  Sixty-six!  66!  The injury bug landed in The Crescent City and stayed there all of the fall.  Covid visited too.
  9. The division should provide 4 wins at a minimum.  Stated simply, Carolina is weak.  Atlanta is awful.  And the Saints have the Buccaneers’ number.  They’ve beaten them in the last four regular-season (Brady-led) games.
  10. Take those four and you need five more to cash.  So, can the black and gold go 5-6 against the rest of the schedule?  We think so and then some.  Watch for Alvin Kamara’s pending suspension though.  Courts move slowly.  He might not be suspended until late in the season, or even 2023.   When announced, how many and when the games are played is key.

Take the Saints over eight wins.  We see their record as 10-7 or better at the finish line.

Making History This Month

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

One day after Whoppi Goldberg said that the Nazi Concentration Camps were not about race, Brian Flores filed a suit saying that the NFL is all about race.

So yesterday, 2/1/22, the first day of Black History Month, history was made all over again.

The NFL and its playoffs were flying high with the Super Bowl two weeks away.  The class-action lawsuit that Flores filed against the NFL sucked the air right out of that.  Its timing, the first day of Black History Month is purposeful.

Brian Flores was the head coach of the Miami Dolphins from 2019-to 2021.  Philosophical differences were cited by owner Stephen Ross and team management for his unexpected and abrupt firing two weeks ago.  Since then Flores has interviewed for the Denver Broncos, New York Giants, and Houston Texans HC jobs.

His class-action lawsuit against the NFL, the Giants, the Broncos, the Dolphins, and the other 29 teams alleges racial discriminatory hiring practices and abject prejudice against persons of color seeking or serving as coordinators and head coaches.

The suit goes in many directions, but the two loudest claims made by Flores are 1) that the NY Giants interviewed Flores for the HC position to be compliant with the Rooney Rule after the team had already decided to hire Brian Daboll, and 2) Dolphins owner S. Ross treated Flores with “disdain” and portrayed him as “someone who was non-compliant and difficult to work with” after Flores refused to purposely lose games to enhance their 2019 draft position.

Expectedly, the NFL and the three teams deny any wrongdoing.

A now published copy of the text exchange Flores had with Bill Belichick is the impetus for claim #1 above.  In it, Belichick texts “Sounds like you have landed-congrats!!”  Flores texts, “I interview on Thursday.”  Belichick back, ” Got it- I hear from Buffalo and NYG that you are their guy.”  Belichick thinks he’s texting Daboll (same first name Brian and same spelling).  Belichick, “Sorry I f’ed this up.  I think they are naming Daboll.  I’m sorry about that. BB”

The NY Giants claim that Flores was considered until the 11th hour.  They will also claim that what Belichick wrote is pure hearsay.  A court of law might decide on both.

The age-old argument for more minorities in the OC, DC, HC, and GM positions is “look at how many minorities are on the field and how few are in the front office.”  If one buys into “because one has plenty the other should as well,” then the question becomes “why would the same people who fill rosters with the most qualified to win, and are 70% plus minorities, not want the most qualified to coach or manage them regardless of color as well?”

In other words, is the NFL prejudiced off of the field but not on it?  And, if so, why would Ross hire Flores in the first place?

Flores interviewed for the still vacant Texans HC position last week.  The Texans fired David Culley, who is black, after one season.  Culley is 66 years old and was never an OC or DC prior to being named HC a year ago.  If they had hired a white HC who had never been an OC or DC prior would the outrage from the minority coaching community have been palpable?

Culley was terminated for multiple shortcomings (clock management, strategic management, etc.) and was paid his full buyout of $22 million for one year of work.  If you are a racist, do you hire a black guy to fire him a year later and cough up $22,000,000?

So, what is the appropriate amount or percentage of minorities that should occupy the aforementioned positions?  Is it the same as the overall population?  That would be 13% black.  Is it the same as on the field?  That would be north of 60% black.

Or should it be whoever is the most qualified?  Seventy-three percent of polled Americans would prefer Joe Biden pick whom he feels is the most qualified next SCOTUS Justice, not corner himself with a campaign promise of selecting a black female.  Even 54% of polled Democrats agree with this thinking.

Give Flores credit.  He chose principle over a lucrative livelihood in all likelihood while still considered a finalist for the Texans’ job and while meeting with the Saints’ brain trust LAST NIGHT for their vacant HC position.  Timing is everything.

He calls the Rooney Rule(teams must interview at least two minorities with every opening) a sham. And, it is.  And, it has been.  It’s kowtowing to a cause.  But, teams following the rule as it was intended prove nothing about racial discrimination.

Throw it away and just interview who you think is the most qualified for your team’s leadership needs.  The Steelers and Dan Rooney did just that when they hired Mike Tomlin 15 years ago and counting.

It is odd though that a 60-page class-action suit could be discussed, written, and filed in such a short period of time.  It’s almost like a 1k page House Bill that Nancy Pelosi pulls out of her top drawer.

Still, if he has an agenda that he believes in it’s his right to go forward with it whenever chooses.

Will Brian Flores ever work again in the NFL?  Doubtful.

Fifty percent of Americans think America is racist.  Fifty-plus percent of Americans is tired of 50% thinking it’s racist.

Will America ever work again?  Hopeful.

Will Flores’ action be looked back upon as historic?  For better, for worse, and for sure.

 

 

Football Is a Joke.

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

It’s time to lighten it up a bit.

One of our faithful readers forwarded the quotes and jokes about the game of football below.  We blatantly copied nearly all of them for you.  Enjoy as the season is but three games from being over.

First, here are the quotes.

“I make my practices real hard because if a player is a quitter, I want him to quit in practice, not in a game.”
– Bear Bryant / Alabama

“It isn’t necessary to see a good tackle, you can hear it!”
– Knute Rockne / Notre Dame

“At Georgia Southern, we don’t cheat.
That costs money, and we don’t have any.”
– Erik Russell / Georgia Southern

“The man who complains about the way the ball bounces is likely to be the one who dropped it.”
– Lou Holtz / Arkansas – Notre Dame

“When you win, nothing hurts.”
– Joe Namath / Alabama

“A school without football is in danger of deteriorating into a medieval study hall.”
– Frank Leahy / Notre Dame

“There’s nothing that cleanses your soul like getting the hell kicked out of you.”
– Woody Hayes / Ohio State

“I don’t expect to win enough games to be put on NCAA probation I just want to win enough to warrant an investigation.”
– Bob Devaney / Nebraska

“In Alabama, an atheist is someone who doesn’t believe in Bear Bryant.”
– Wally Butts / Georgia

“I never graduated from Iowa. But I was only there for two terms – Truman’s and Eisenhower’s.”
– Alex Karras / Iowa

“My advice to defensive players is to take the shortest route to the ball, and arrive in a bad humor.”
– Bowden Wyatt / Tennessee

“I could have been a Rhodes Scholar except for my grades.”
– Duffy Daugherty / Michigan State

“ Always remember Goliath was a 40-point favorite over David.”
– Shug Jordan / Auburn

“I asked Darrell Royal, the coach of the Texas Longhorns, why he didn’t recruit me “
He said, “Well, Walt, we took a look at you, and you weren’t any good.”
– Walt Garrison / Oklahoma State/Dallas Cowboys

“Football is NOT a contact sport, it is a collision sport.
Dancing IS a contact sport.” –
Duffy Daugherty / Michigan State

After USC lost 51-0 to Notre Dame, his post-game message to his team was;
“All those who need showers, take them.”
– John McKay / USC

“ If lessons are learned in defeat, our team is getting a great education.”
– Murray Warmath / Minnesota

“The only qualifications for a lineman are to be big and dumb.
To be a back, you only have to be dumb.”
– Knute Rockne / Notre Dame

“We didn’t tackle well today, but we made up for it by not blocking.”
– John McKay / USC

“I’ve found that prayers work best when you have big players.”
– Knute Rockne / Notre Dame

Ohio State’s Urban Meyer on one of his players:
“He doesn’t know the meaning of the word fear.
In fact, I just saw his grades and he doesn’t know the meaning of a lot of words.”

And, now a few jokes.

Why do Auburn fans wear orange?
So they can dress for the game on Saturday, go hunting on Sunday, and pick up trash on Monday.

What does the average Alabama player get on his SATs?
Drool.

How many Michigan State freshmen football players does it take to change a light bulb?
None. That’s a sophomore course.

How did the Auburn football player die from drinking milk?
The cow fell on him.

Two Texas A&M football players were walking in the woods.
One of them said, ” Look, a dead bird.”
The other looked up in the sky and said, “Where?”

What do you say to a Florida State University football player dressed in a three-piece suit?
“Will the defendant please rise?”

How can you tell if a Clemson football player has a girlfriend?
There’s tobacco juice on both sides of the pickup truck.

University of Michigan Coach Jim Harbaugh is only going to dress half of his players for the game this week.

The other half will have to dress themselves.

How is the Kansas football team like an opossum?
They play dead at home and get killed on the road.

How do you get a former University of Miami football player off your porch? 

Pay him for the pizza.

 

Have another good one?  Drop it in the comments!

 

 

SoFi or So Long?

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Way back in 1977, a fictitious movie titled Black Sunday hit the big screens.  But, before it hit the big screens one of the final scenes had to be shot.

That scene had the ever-present at Super Bowl games Goodyear Blimp hitting a packed Orange Bowl Stadium during Super Bowl X, and dropping a bomb that would turn lose a quarter-million steel flechettes(think mini bombs).  The terroristic plot was foiled at the last second, but not before it terrorized 80,000 fans who were actually movie stand-ins of course.  The film grossed $16 million.

Now, 45 years later, Super Bowl LVI will be the 56th Super Bowl and is scheduled to be played on February 13, 2022, at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, a city two miles from LAX and not far from the movie-making capital of the world-Hollywood.

Note we said scheduled to be played.  There’s a terror of a different kind sweeping the nation as we write.  And, last night there it was scrolling across the ever-present ESPN updates.  “The NFL is looking into alternate sites to host SB LVI.”

What the scroll didn’t say was why.  Why move?  It’s because Omicron is the 2022 version of the bomb and the ease of its transmission is the quarter-million flechettes.

The real why of course is that the NFL show must go on as Hollywood might say even if it needs to move to another state and stadium.  Super Bowl “movies” gross way more than $16 million worldwide these days.

A determined virus should never get in the way of capitalism, our economy, our freedom, and our independence many say.  The “many” who say that are few when it comes to California governance, however.

You can never be “too safe,” and even level that might not be safe enough for Cali.  Could Cali opt out of SB LVI? Will Gavin Newsom make the call from the French Laundry Restaurant for the safety of the citizens he governs?

Could LA?  The Rose Bowl was played last Saturday in Pasadena.  But. But. But, new cases are geometrically increasing.

The world is waiting because the world will be watching regardless of what patch of grass it’s played on in five weeks.

It would take some game balls to call it off and make the NFL move the game and its footballs to another state.  It would be another huge defining moment of how divided our United States are on issues big and small.

Super Bowl LVI hits the big screens in your living room in five weeks and the Goodyear Blimp, sans flechettes, will have an eye in the sky to bring it to you.

Safety first?  Or hooray, hooray for Inglewood?

 

The New Wor(l)d Police

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Psst.  Did you hear the one about the Catholic priest, the rabbi, the Irishman, and the rooster?  Of course, you didn’t.  It’s no joke anymore.

Once upon a time, people found it funny to poke fun at themselves and others with the use of stereotypical jokes.  No more.  It’s deemed racially insensitive and sometimes even more.  Don Rickles would need a different occupation today.

The free speech police, over the course of time, switched sides.  Once, its job was to protect.  Now, its job is to deem what is allowed and what is not.

And, when the utterance is divisive, uncalled for, and downright mean even greater consequences loom.  We aren’t here to judge the change in the wind, we’re here to examine its hypocrisy at times.

And, one of those times might be 2011, though we only heard about it in late 2021.  The guilty party, you ask?  Jon Gruden.

What did he say back then?  It’s actually what he wrote.

Gruden emailed then-Washington Football Team president Bruce Allen about DeMaurice Smith, back in 2011.  “Dumboriss Smith has lips the size of michellin tires,” he wrote.  That qualifies for insensitive at the very least and misspelled as well.  But, you get the picture he painted.

Gruden later told ESPN he used the term “rubber lips” to describe someone he saw as lying and that he was frustrated by the lockout at the time and failed negotiations between Smith and Goodell.

And, now here comes the word police to solve the ten-year-old crime and administer punishment as well.  Judges and juries come as a package deal these days.

Some close to Commissioner Roger Goodell believe that ultimately a hefty fine and further diversity and inclusion training will be forthcoming, with a suspension possible.  But they also suggested that there are not many comparable situations to this and that other evidence could necessarily lead to a more intense punishment.

Other evidence?  Sounds like it’s time for an investigation.  Send in Kenneth Starr.

Gruden was working for ESPN at the time, not the NFL.  But, that won’t stop the NFL, or his current employer the LA Raiders, from doing what they deem necessary.

“The email from Jon Gruden denigrating DeMaurice Smith is appalling, abhorrent, and wholly contrary to the NFL’s values,” the league office’s official statement read.

There is an irony that Gruden wrote to one of the ultimate decision-makers of a team that at that time was known as the Washington Redskins.   Public sentiment in 2011 and prior strongly suggested that the Redskins change their nickname.

Did the league consider the nickname appalling, abhorrent, and wholly contrary to its values in 2011?  Does it now?  Will the league look back to its behavior then and fine itself somehow?  No.  Maybe some additional sensitivity training?

Daniel Snyder, the owner of the now nicknamed “Football Team” wasn’t ever going to change the nickname.  But, a #metoo movement swept through America in 2017 and with it swept out an exposed “boys club” mentality in the Washington front office.  Like the nickname, sexual harassment was a part of everyday life inside the organization.

Snyder did the NFL a solid and the NFL threw Snyder a lifeline.  Really, that’s more boys club at its finest.

Did the league consider the front office behavior appalling, abhorrent, and wholly contrary to its values then?  Will the league now investigate and fine Snyder or his team now for its behavior then?  No.

Google and Facebook are companies that decided a while back to control the narrative by limiting what you can say or write on their platforms.  It’s their right. The NFL can do the same on its own turf.  But now we get the NFL reaching into a private email written when Gruden was not employed by the NFL over a decade ago.

The slope is slippery.

The bill of rights protects the act of burning an American flag as freedom of expression. You don’t have to like it, just respect it.

It also protects freedom of speech, ignorant or otherwise.  You don’t have to like it, just respect it.

Well, it used to.

 

The Spirit of St. Louis

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

In 1903 the Wright brothers’ first flight ever went about 300 yards .  Twenty-four years later Charles Lindbergh flew The Spirit of St. Louis 3600 miles nonstop across the Atlantic from New York to Paris.  America applauded and St. Louis roared.

In 1995 the NFL Los Angeles Rams relocated to St. Louis.  Twenty years later the St. Louis Rams completed the round trip relocating to Los Angeles from St. Louis.  America sighed and St. Louis cried.

St. Louis contends that once Stan Groenke fully bought out his previous partners it was all but wheels up for the franchise to head west.  And after a series of legal steps and missteps, a lawsuit hit the NFL yesterday like the Rams’ Fearsome Foursome used to hit Archie Manning.

The massive lawsuit filed by St. Louis against the NFL over the relocation of the Rams will (barring a settlement) culminate with a full-blown trial, which is due to begin just as the Rams prepare to host a Super Bowl in their new stadium.

In short, the Rams felt that they had every right to break their agreements and stadium lease in St Louis in 2015, while St. Louis did and still does not.  The Rams cited serious deficiencies in their then existing stadium, serious revenue shortages in their proposed riverfront new one, population stagnation, and lack of predicted future growth as legal and otherwise reasons to take flight.

The Rams took their case to the NFL heavyweights to ask for permission to log a flight plan.

The NFL publicly granted that permission while knowing that Groenke had purchased a massive amount of land in LA to relocate the team there and surround it with a multi-billion dollar entertainment and housing complex.

This became known in a phone call between the Rams owner, a few other owners, and none other than the Commissioner who presides over wrongdoings and punishment in NFL matters,

Roger Goodell.  During the conversation, Kroenke said, “I’m going to buy two parcels of land and build a stadium in L.A.,” and that he’s trying very hard to stay under the radar screen and keep it hidden. Goodell said, “We will respect your confidentiality.”

The judge, who made the ruling from the bench (which means the evidence pointing to it was clear), concluded that clear and convincing proof exists to support a finding that those individuals operated fraudulently.

At the heart of it, Rams COO Kevin Demoff gave Goodell talking points regarding the land purchase for his pre-Super Bowl press conference in 2014. Here’s part of what he said, “Stan is a very successful developer. He has billions of dollars of projects that are going on around the country in real estate development. So I think instead of overreacting, we should make sure we do what’s necessary to continue to support the team locally as the fans have done in St. Louis.  There are no plans to my knowledge of a stadium development.”

And, soon thereafter St. Louis’ heart was broken.

And, now the plaintiffs in the litigation shall have access to information regarding the financial worth of Commissioner Roger Goodell and five NFL owners: Rams owner Stan Kroenke, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, Patriots owner Robert Kraft, Giants owner John Mara, and former Panthers owner Jerry Richardson.

The financial info is necessary as a barometer to determine the punitive damages if the defendants are ruled guilty and restoration is to be paid.

The old saying is “money talks.”  But, old people with money don’t like others talking about their money.

The city of St. Louis, which feels like their community was harshly and unfairly criticized, won a game yesterday v. the entire NFL.

But, they should remember that the entire USFL once won an antitrust lawsuit against the NFL and got treble the damages caused by the heinous NFL actions.

The damage awarded by a jury was exactly one U.S. dollar.

The lawyers got rich.  The NFL got richer and richer.  And, the USFL got three dollars to fold into their wallet before they folded their league.

So, stay tuned.  If nothing else, one should admire the spirit of St. Louis.

Can Lightning Strike Thrice?

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Has any city ever held more than one major championship trophy in the same year?  Yes.  In fact, when you consider the four major sports (NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL) it has happened twelve times.  “It” is owning two titles at the same time.

The city of New York dominates with half(6) of these occurrences.  Los Angeles, Boston, and Detroit share the other six times with two for each city.

The most recent is actually current.  In 2020 the Lakers and the Dodgers each took home the trophy.  Six of the years were prior to 1953, or over 68 years ago when far fewer cities had professional franchises.

But has any city ever held more than two major championships in a year(note year, not concurrently)?  No.

But, could it happen in 2021?  Say hello to the Bay Area.  Nope, don’t wave at San Franciso.  It’s the Tampa Bay area.

With one down, as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Tom Brady beat Kansas City in Super Bowl LV,  the city of Tampa needs two more to get there.

Last evening the Tampa Bay Lightning skated around, through, and faster in a game one rout of the Montreal Canadiens in the Lord Stanley’s NHL Finals. Winning a hockey game by a score of 5-1 is like winning an NFL playoff game by four touchdowns.  It was a beatdown.  Ah, but one game does not fill the old beat-up trophy with champagne, at least not yet.

Enter the Tampa Bay Rays into the conversation, please.  As the MLB 2021 season is very near the halfway mark in the regular season Tampa Bay owns the second-best record in the American League while trailing division leader Boston by one game in the standings.

The Rays do it on a shoestring budget and they do it with a lot of talent and heart.  Fluke?  Hardly.  The Rays lost in the ALDS in 2019 and in the World Series last year.  They have youth, enough experience, enthusiasm, super talent, and a very game manager.

The Bucs did it.  That’s one.

The Lightning look like a really good bet to do it.  They were 3-1 favorites to win the Stanley Cup prior to the game one dismantling of the Canadiens.  They quite likely will be two.

The Rays have a ways to go.  And, the National League is loaded with good to great teams such as the Dodgers, Padres, and Giants.

Alas, the dog days of summer are here.  And, in Tampa lightning is about to strike twice.

Can the Rays light up the sky over the bay a third time come fall?

 

 

Commitment to This Space

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

One of our staff writers is feeling a bit salty today.

Maybe it’s because he (or she-not sure about their pronouns) went saltwater fishing yesterday.  Or, more likely, it’s not.

The sports world giveth, and then sometimes the sports world taketh.

On Monday, Las Vegas Raiders defensive end Carl Nassib became the first active NFL player to come out as gay.  To this, we say, no worries.

His sexual orientation is his own business and that he chose to make it our business was “no biggie.”  It’s very well known that a percentage of NFL players past and present are gay.

But, this is just another important step you say?  After all, he’s the first to announce this while an active player.

What would be an important step is if this wasn’t an important step, rather if it was just another day.   “I’m a pretty private person so I hope you guys know that I’m not doing this for attention. I just think that representation and visibility are so important. I actually hope that one day, videos like this and the whole coming out process are not necessary.”

Boom, we think he nailed it.

But, well, the timing has us a bit puzzled.  It’s smack in the middle of Pride Month.  Coincidence?  Not likely.  Still, it takes confidence, so we guess there’s that.

He also announced a $100K donation to the Trevor Project, a suicide prevention organization for LGBTQ youth.  That sounds like a very worthy cause.  The “I’m a pretty private person” comment and this public donation seem to collide a bit.  But, we’ll still give the benefit of the doubt.

Then, there’s the NFL.

The league announced Tuesday it too is donating $100,000 to The Trevor Project, which is the leading national organization centered on crisis and suicide prevention efforts among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning youth.

“The NFL is committed to year-long efforts around diversity, equity, and inclusion,” the league said in a statement. “We proudly support the LGBQT+ community and will continue to work alongside the Trevor Project and our other community partners to further enhance our collective work and commitment to this space.”

How many times do you think that the NFL PR Department and Commish Goodell read over that release before its release?  Plenty.  But, not nearly enough.

“Commitment to this space?” Good lord!  It sounds more like an investment a venture capitalist makes to the burgeoning space known as artificial intelligence or cloud computing, etc.

We submit that the NFL just can’t help itself these days.  Sure, its business model is somewhere between great and otherworldly.  But, it’s been behind and further behind the entirety of its own woke movement.  Transparency in the workplace is a desired process.  That’s a good thing for the NFL because you can see right through it.

They will “continue to work alongside the Trevor Project.”  Continue means doing what you’ve been doing before, doesn’t it?  A search of the NFL’s affiliation with the project prior to Monday came up empty.

It came up as empty as the PR release came up empty.

The 28-year-old defensive end was a third-round pick in the 2016 draft, previously played for the Cleveland Browns and Tampa Bay Buccaneers before signing a three-year, $25 million deal with Las Vegas in 2020.

His on-field performance last year fell WAY short of expectations for an $8 million a year player.  Oakland had better get their PR department working now on a release that they may need to drop if/when he becomes a training camp salary cap casualty.

But, if they’re smart they won’t ask the NFL to help with the wording.