November 1, 2007
Happy Colts/Pats Sunday
A hurrah and a huzzah goes out to Raider Nation for not selling out Sunday's Raiders game. As a result, football fans throughout the area will be allowed to watch The. Biggest. Game. Ever. from the vicinity of their couch.
This whole thing has been widely entertaining because it's become a veritable issue-- we've heard it discussed on KNBR, on local news, and several blogs. The hilarious part is that it seems like everyone-- everyone-- was hoping this game wouldn't sell out-- the Merc has even been running updates on the situation.
But the issue has gone elsewhere, nation-wide, even. The station in Sacramento, which isn't affected by the blackout rules, didn't even think about showing Raiders game and a station in Fresno was all set to show the Raiders game until management told them, in essence, that they’d be idiots if they did. In fact, no affiliate in Northern California that could show the Raiders game will. In Houston, where they don't have a choice in the matter as it's an away game, people are scrambling to find ways around it.
Why the NFL didn't schedule this game for Sunday night is a mystery because anybody could have seen that this game had all the potential of being some sort of Clash of the Titans battle, complete with heroes (kindly Tony Dungy with his goofy QB side-kick Peyton Manning) and villains (douchey, score runner-upper Bill Belichik, noted Raider slacker Randy Moss, and pretty boy Bay Area conservative Tom Brady). It feels like everyone who isn't from Boston is rooting for the Colts mainly because they want good to triumph over evil. And, as somebody pointed out, if the Pats destroyed the Colts, you can pretty much write off the rest of the NFL season.
So if you're wondering where we'll be on Sunday, it'll be on our couch-- with a bag of Doritos in one hand and a six pack of Mickey's Big Mouth in the other
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Go pats..
It's a great story. A topic of office conversation from Monday morning on.
I hear the reason it wasn't a Sunday night game was because it WAS last year, and CBS which has the rights to most AFC games didn't want to lose it a second year in a row to ESPN/ABC/NBC.
Mickie's Big Mouth? This fine matchup surely requires a better beer...or, should I say, a beer.
I can't wait to watch Bellichick put the fear of the Old Testament God into Dungy and watch Brady connect with Moss on deep outs and tear the Colt's Cover 2 to shreds. Watch Brady scorch them early, Dungy turn into a turtle, and Mauroney run it to eat time off the clock in the 2nd half and keep the New England defense fresh.
I also expect either Seymour or Thomas to rip someone's head off and eat it on live TV while singing Helter Skelter backwards.
This just goes to show how big the gap is between the good and bad teams in the NFL in terms of fan interest. Even on the Raiders' home turf, I'll bet 80% of the home viewing audience would rather watch the Pats.
The gap is huge and likely to stay that way for the near term. Some teams have clearly figured out the salary cap system to their advantage and secured a semi-permanent advantage. Pats, Colts, Steelers, Eagles, etc. - its the same teams at the top of the heap year in, year out.
One of the weaknesses of the salary cap ear is the draft. The worst teams get the top draft picks, which would seem to be a fair deal. However, the costs to sign a top 10 draft pick are significantly higher that the price to sign a lower pick. Yet, we often see top 10 picks wash out and are no better guarantee to make it in the NFL than lower picks. (Tom Brady was pick #199 in the 2000 draft.)
The result; everyone is capped at around the same salary budget, but the shittiest teams get socked with picks taking up more cap space than better teams picks, yet with a success rate for their pick being no better. As a result, good teams get to stockpile picks and players and bad teams are forced to roll the dice on expensive picks.
Question about that little piece from the Chronicle. They note that the Raiders only took over ticket operations before last season.
If it wasn't the Raiders, who was in charge of selling Raiders tickets before that? MUNI?
OK, folks, Bostonist's Michael Femia will be live-blogging the game. China Nob, if someone rips anyone's head off, we are SO THERE.
raiders fans, thank you for staying home this week.
dang, i feel like i should just buy some tickets next week to make up for it, i know your pain, had a lotta blackouts back when detroit still played at the 80k seat silverdome and sold out 1 or 2 games a year after barry left.
mickey's??
what is the conservative reference to Tom Brady?
zig -- he's a registered Republican and told ESPN once that he aspires to run for office once he's retired. He'll have at least kid out of wedlock, which helps his "family values conservative" credentials.
Caroline Roberts -- you and me oughta get together and swap track suits.
Rooting for the Colts is like setting your TiVo to "Two and a Half Men" and adding "SNL: The Best of Jimmy Fallon" to your NetFlix queue.
If people are bummed about the Pats running up the score, they shouldn't have accused them of cheating, thus forcing them to turn off the cameras and turn on the pain. GO PATS!
Sammy Morris, the Pats "run it up the middle" short yardage power back has been put on IR, so he's now out for the rest of the season. Although it frees up a roster slot, its a big blow as the Pats starting RB - Laurence Mauroney - has proven fairly fragile in his last two seasons and is looking increasingly like a soft speed back and not the power back the Pats running game revolves around.
In other news, the Colts Marvin Harrison just got news from team doctors that his knee pain is going to last the rest of the season (and possibly his career). The potential fix would require surgery and minimum 6 months recovery time.