Uhh…could it be that having R. Budd as gorified award presenter makes dullen’ Bill Cullen look like a regular Asadata Dafora on stage?
So, this year, for the first time, they tried to make the First Year Player Draft a television spectacular. They broadcast it in prime time. Commissioner Bud Selig came out to the lectern every few minutes to make a dramatic reading of a name he clearly had never seen before. Then, some baseball analysts talked for a few minutes about that name, and how great that name would become, how that name had 60-power or three-plus pitches—scout talk—and everyone came to the inevitable conclusion that the name would really help the team in the future. Yes, it’s a familiar formula.
Only ... the whole production didn’t work at all, at least for me. To be fair, this isn’t anyone’s fault—not even Bud Selig’s. The baseball draft simply doesn’t make any sense as an event because:...
...And that might be the biggest reason all this new hype for the baseball draft is probably doomed. The baseball draft is more about disappointment than triumph, more about failure than success. If the averages hold up, maybe five of the players taken in the first round will have reasonable big league careers, play in 1,200 games or so. Maybe one or two pitchers will win 100 games in the show. A couple might become big stars. Maybe.
In other words: It’s risky to hype ANY baseball draft pick, much less do a big show about the whole thing. It reminded me that a few years ago, the Kansas City Royals took a fast and promising outfielder named Chris Lubanski with the fifth overall pick in the draft. And after he signed, he took a little batting practice at Kauffman Stadium, and our dear friend Art Stewart—one of the great baseball men ever—walked around gushing: “You will remember this day for the rest of your life.”
It’s six years later, and Lubanski has not yet had a single big league at-bat. He’s hitting .308 in Omaha, and maybe he will get a chance. Maybe not. Either way, Art Stewart was right: I haven’t forgotten that day.
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I don't think they need to do a big show or produce a lot of hype. I'm perfectly happy with a low key presentation with Keith Law or Jim Callis or both giving commentary with a few clips of each player. The baseball draft is really just for baseball junkies and they should keep that in mind. It's never going to be the circus the NFL draft or NBA draft is, but that doesn't mean it's not worth televising. I happen to like that MLB isn't the NFL. The NFL can go #### itself. (I'm just preparing mentally for the day Michael Vick gets another contract and I am forced to pretend the NFL doesn't exist anymore. I'm already sorting out which soccer clubs I should support. My girl is a Spurs fan and I was leaning that way, but I'm not sure I want to jump on a bandwagon of perpetual suck. This is going to be tricky...)
Word of advice. Imagine if you were a foreigner looking at MLB from the outside. You'd probably gravitate to one of the big clubs, unless you had a personal connection to a particular place. Do the same. It's highly frustrating otherwise, because in most leagues only two or three clubs realistically have a shot at the championship for the foreseeable future. You end up getting excited about a fourth-place finish and a place in the playoffs for the Champions' League.
You've been to Scotland? Rangers if you're Protestant, Celtic if you're Catholic. But don't anticipate much in the way of European honours.
For England, it's very different, and can be quite complicated (and, in the 1970s-1980s, dangerous). Liverpool if you've Irish Catholic antecedents, or Arsenal. Everton if you're a non-Catholic white. Arsenal is the North London club (North London for these purposes stretches out to places outside London, like Hemel Hempstead), unless you live in Woolwich. Tottenham Hotspur is 'the Jewish club', but it also attracts locals from that part of London, and media people of a certain age. West Ham is the East Enders' club. Chelsea for bandwagon South Londoners who can't bear the risk of supporting a real local club like Crystal Palace or Charlton Athletic. Manchester United is for bandwagon fans everywhere. Yorkshire used to have some top-flight clubs attracting fans across the country, but they've all been mismanaged into the lower divisions. Most other clubs just have local followings. (BTW, in Ireland, everybody seems to follow English teams - one of Liverpool, Arsenal or Manchester United. Note that these are 'red' teams. Kit colours in England are quite important signifiers. Blue teams tend to be Protestant. Red teams often have links to Irish Catholics.)
Having said all this, nice upper-middle-class people, and grammar-school boys, used not to be supposed to like football, but to enjoy rugby and cricket instead. This changed at the start of the 1990s, when well-spoken secret football fans emerged blinking from their Match of the Day burrows into the sun of public visibility. People like Chelsea fan, and government minister, David Mellor and the East End 'barrow boys' whose demotic tones flooded the boardrooms in the late 1980s made it more respectable. It was also part of the satellite TV boom. I've more of the snobby older attitudes, so backing an EPL team would be like getting pebble dash and a satellite dish on the front of my house. We hide our football interests abroad. And so...
For Italy, you back the local side unless it's never been higher than Serie C1. Or, if that doesn't appeal, you choose Juventus, unless you are actually from Turin, in which case you support Torino. AC Milan has acquired something of a national following from all those Italians who admire Berlusconi's entrepreneurial genius. Inter attracts a few people outside Milano who don't like FIAT's dominance of Italian politics, and don't like Berlusconi either. (The choice of Inter or Milan if you are actually from Milan follows no pattern I've discerned, and seems to be largely hereditary.) Lazio if you're a fascist.
Spain - local option, unless you're a nationalist (Real Madrid) or a Catalan (Barcelona) or a Basque (Bilbao). My knowledge of Spanish football is a bit sketchy, and I defer to anyone who knows more.
I can't speak about anywhere else. Football wasn't all that important in France until the 1990s, from what I could tell. Germany and the Netherlands are really terra incognita to me.
Hmm. No Celtic or Rangers for me. The fans are ######## from what I saw. I like the Dutch style of football a lot. Maybe Ajax would be a good team? Maybe I should go off the rails and look to Argentina or Brazil? I really don't want to support a team caught up in any sectarianism. I'm grateful American sport isn't caught up in that crap. I've also thought about just finding a player whose style I like and adopting their team. That would probably lead me to Barca. Zidane was my nascent favorite player, but he's retired so that doesn't help. There's also the MLS, but I think I'll adopt an MLS team to supplement fandom of a better club outside the US. Actually, this may be a fun process.
And yet Mike Leach can't be bothered to take 3 hours of his life to teach his own QBs that. Now that's arrogance. Beano, is there anything about the NFL that you like? Seems to me you really enjoy talking about how stupid you think the NFL is.
I assure you, all British football fans are much the same. Once I spent a weekend in a little town called Mansfield, in Derbyshire. It has a football team. I got a lift from a fan of that team. He was no different than the fans of Spurs I have seen on match days.
I'm grateful American sport isn't caught up in that crap.
There's more around than people think (eg, Notre Dame's grip on people of the Catholic persuasion), but very little relative to Europe.
I really don't want to support a team caught up in any sectarianism.
Good luck. My advice - stay away from football in Europe or South America, in that case.
I like the Dutch style of football a lot. Maybe Ajax would be a good team? Maybe I should go off the rails and look to Argentina or Brazil?
Dutch fans are fun, but they have a nasty problem with crowd trouble at the club level. I can speak a little bit of Argentina, Chile and Colombia. South American football generally is quite localized, and sometimes has a real class stratification. Boca Juniors is very much a 'blue collar' side, while River Plate is for the better bred of Buenos Aires. If you were a well-off Boanarense(?), and took up Boca, you'd get ostracized. It would be like becoming a communist. It gets a further complicated because you have to know who founded the club. For example, Rosario Central was founded by British railway workers, while Racing Club de Avellaneda was founded by Frenchmen who'd come to Argentina in search of work. So if you had French ancestry, even if you lived in Rosario you might support Racing Club. And in Avellaneda, you might avoid Racing Club if you were British. (I think the other club in Avellaneda is Independiente, and I don't know much about them.)
I've spent a decent amount of time in England, and can confirm the above - football fans are the same everywhere, and all teams have that core of supporters who do everything they can to make the experience of rooting for a team as unpleasant as possible.
But the MLS is boring!
I may have a connection to that county myself. Someone whose surname was 'Bush'! But mostly my family is from the South - Somerset, London, Kent.
Like Yorkshire football, Nottingham football has fallen on hard times. When I moved over to England, Nottingham Forest was one of the top sides, and their descent occurred quite rapidly, IIRC. Notts County is the other club. I don't know much about it, but I could tell you all about which team between Southampton and Portsmouth you could pick if you lived in Hampshire.
Living in the US, it doesn't make sense to choose anyone outside of England, as you can see 3-4 live games a week on FSC, and 1-2 taped ones. Italy would be in second, I suppose, with 1-3 live games a week. Gol TV shows La Liga games, but the production value is absolutely terrible and the guys in the booth are unlistenable. I'm not aware of any Dutch games being televised in the US. Does Setanta show them?
A quick google search informs me that a membership with Setanta sports will allow me to watch just about any professional game in any professional soccer league all over the world. I'm assuming that's hyperbolic but it's worth an investigation.
I saw that. I'm surprised Man U would let him go. He's irreplaceable, no?
I had a look at that book, and was tempted too. I think it looks quite sound, unless you already know a lot about game tactics. I can't remember why I didn't buy it, it may be because I just don't have much time to read and not a lot of money.
There is a real dearth of what one might call 'basic' texts along those lines for soccer/football wannabes.
Hmm, interesting. This makes me angry, as I can't get Setanta without Direct TV, and I don't want Direct TV. Dammit.
It looks like you can get a membership to watch all the games online, ala MLB.
Indeed. I've read books about the biz side of it and the cultural significance, but sometimes feel like the Springfieldians when Mexico and Portugal show up to play a game.
The craziest thing about the 1983 team, to me, is that when they need a play... when it was 4th and 7 with a minute to go... when they were 25 yards from the end zone... That they knew they were so dominant rushing that they went with an option right and scored a touchdown (before failing the 2-point conversion). I mean, who calls a rushing play in that situation!
Because it apparently would only take him 3 hours to do so. College and pro coaches routinely get together in the offseason and share ideas, so there's opportunity and time for him to do it. And if I'm not mistaken there's nothing preventing him from picking up a few bucks to do so too.
I enjoyed one simple aspect of the Callahan offense. If there was a shítload of movement prior to the snap amongst the skill players shifting positions, then the play would be a running play. If they lined up and snapped the ball, then it was a pass. That formula held true on about 95% of offensive snaps and if someone like me could figure it out, then I guaran-#######-tee that the other Big 12 coaches could.
The reason, in my mind, was simple. Callahan had to bring in his west-coast offense so he stopped relying on the big, power lineup and had to use deception to try and run the ball rather than strength.
I watched the Iowa-PSU game on the BTN last night. The finish is still great. :)
I love this reaction to that down and distance. If you recall moments earlier, Irving Fryar dropped a ball while wide open, and would've scored easily. The option on 4th and 7 Gill pitching to Jeff Smith, filling in for the injured Mike Rozier, to me it was the only play to run, but that was my mindset growing up watching option football.
The thing about '95, among about 100 different things, was how complex and varied Nebraska's playbook had become over the years. The press meme pre-Fiesta Bowl, was how complicated and sophisticated Spurrier's offense was, and repeatedly Spurrier tried to quell this by saying 'wait a second, have you seen their offense.'
Nebraska's (Milt Tenopir's) rather simple zone blocking scheme made it possible for Nebraska (Osborne) to run power, trap, and option plays from so many different formations it removed defenses ability to detect any strong tendencies.
Nobody was within 20 points of Nebraska at the start of the 4th quarter during that season.
I happened to see Ole Miss play Florida that year in Florida and Ole Miss ran the ball at will agaisnt the Gators. They even tried a running play on a 4th and 6. I knew UF had no chance against Nebraska in that title game. I have never been more sure of the outcome of a big game in my life.
The MLB draft does not provide that as easily because of the longer development period for baseball players. However, in place of the draft hype, you get the ancient religion of prospect watching that is fairly unique to baseball. The NBA and NFL don't have anything like that. You don't really have any players who might be stars on the team some day but aren't playing for the team yet, while still being controlled by the team. You watch the draft and then those guys are playing on the team next year. Before the draft, all the future stars are in college and could wind up with anybody.
In baseball, I may not know much about who the Braves drafted yesterday and today, but Tommy Hanson came up last week, and I've been hearing about him for at least two years. It's a much different relationship between the player and the fans. When a baseball prospect comes up and is great and meets the hype, they can become much more important to the fans of a team than most players, even stars, in the NFL because they've been expecting him and waiting on him for years. How do Mets fans feel about David Wright? Probably the same way I do and did about Chipper. You can also have lows that are much lower if a prospect bombs horribly, or if a favorite prospect gets traded, as Mets fans are also aware. It's a longer, but in some ways more intense process for baseball fans.
You can't leave that part out when talking about the differences in the drafts between the major sports leagues. Of course, Joe Pos is absolutely right that it doesn't make for good TV.
I guess it saved me money, as I haven't donated a nickel since Solich was canned.
My Dad was visiting relatives in Omaha after the transition and was at a bar where he saw a fist fight breakout over an argument related to Solich/Callahan. It was nasty. Nebraska football is extremely personal, and save for a couple moments, it was the biggest drama to the program since Bill Jennings used to punt on 3rd down and long in the 50s.
I felt the same way, after watching Nebraska in person ten times that season, they were ruthless on defense, demoralizing on offense, and great special teams to boot.
However, UF wasn't chopped liver, virtually the same team did win the MNC in 1996. They did hang 62 on #3 Tennessee, and offensively were a powerhouse and really weren't seriously challenged during the season.
UF was good, no doubt, but they matched up horribly with that Nebraska team. Nebraska's strengths perfectly aligned with Florida's weaknesses. I imagine that was a rough month of film work for Spurrier and his coaches.
They had a heinous D. We put 38 out on them. Unfortunately, that was back in the days of Buster Brown, so we allowed Danny Woeful to put 49 back on us.
Nebraska played man to man 100% of the time and with guys like Terrell Farley and Jamel Williams blitzing on the corners, Wuerffel had no chance. UF actually did lead 7-0, and 10-6 in that game, early into the 2nd quarter. Only the 2nd time all year that Nebraska trailed for any portion of a football game.
Saying Steve Spurrier did something awful to Tennessee is like saying the sun rose in the east this morning. There is no surprise, drama, or accolade. This is particularly true if you are talking about the Fat Phil Volunteers, and beyond any measure of doubt if you are talking the Rocky Top days of Peyton Manning.
My biggest complaint was that the QBs under Callahan, esp. Keller, would check off three or four times on every pass play and then, it seemed, dump it off to Lucky for a two yard gain. It looked to me as though they were asked to make too many reads every time.
I wouldn't say it's a bust yet, it's just never going to be popular among the average fan for all the reasons mentioned.
That's more a product of our ADD than anything else.
Everton have a fair amount of Catholic fans, and were even considered a Catholic team at one point. There isn't really any division between the two, just a matter of preference. which is why at one point it was known as the friendly derby, because supporters of each team could come from the same family - brothers, even.
Also Internazionale has a more upper-class fanbase than AC Milan, whose fans tend to come more predominantly from the working class and emigrants to Milan.
I had heard during the 1980s that Everton was the Protestant team, but I don't claim to have researched the matter, so I'll yield to superior knowledge. I suspect it's probably a metropolitan media mistake. Getting the facts right about scousers is, shall we say, not a high priority for Londoners.
AC Milan, whose fans tend to come more predominantly from the working class and emigrants to Milan.
As the name indicates, it was founded by Englishmen, and Inter split away because Milan didn't encourage Italians to play. During the Fascist regime Internazionale had to change its name, which is identical with the Communist hymn's title, and became Ambrosiana. Genoa, who had a surprising season this year, are another club with English origins.
Exhibit A: Eric Crouch. Didn't deserve the Heisman, bombed in the NFL.
He completely deserved the Heisman, and he didn't bomb in the NFL at all. He decided he didn't want to play a different position than he played in college, and therefore stopped playing.
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