PA Ram wrote:

Zooey, you done good…real good.

Now how about giving me the Power ball numbers so I can finally become “Hawaii Ram”?

The especially cool part is that I made up ballots for those six awards, and passed them out to my drama class. Everybody got to predict the winners with a prize promised to the person who got the most right. Nobody got more than 3 correct. Of course, kids marked the ones that they liked personally, but the academy voters are not 16 years old, so…

I got them all right, and everybody was very impressed.

And the best part is…I didn’t see any of the films in question. Not one of them.

I just went to a British online betting site and chose all the favorites according to the betting line.

So, I can’t really help you with Power Ball.

Kroenke’s obstacle to moving is a medley of competing projects which, in the right constellation, can stop him.

Peacock’s stadium alone can’t stop him. But Peacock’s stadium combined with a fix for both San Diego and Oakland might be enough to stop him. From the NFL perspective, that could be the best overall solution to 3 stadium issues.

And prospects for the Rams staying in St. Louis have improved significantly, I would say.

But that constellation is made of two stadium sites, and two municipalities, and two teams. Those projects are behind Kroenke’s, and have more things that can go wrong with them than Kroenke’s plan does.

InvaderRam wrote:

what i don’t understand is spanos complaining about not wanting the rams to take away potential revenue from the chargers. and then he goes and agrees to go half on a stadium with his own division rival.

what’s that about?

anyway. for a long time i didn’t think it’d be possible for the rams to st. louis until i read this. st louis does seem to have a viable stadium plan when compared to oakland and san diego.

I was thinking the same thing. It weakens his argument considerably. He came out and said, “Both the Rams and Raiders left LA, so it’s mine, and the Rams can’t have it, but the Raiders can.”

It will be interesting to see if either Oakland or San Diego can come up with something now. They haven’t got much time. One thing is certain, Kroenke just pushed the boulder off the top of the hill, and things are moving.

Agamemnon wrote:

<span class=”d4pbbc-font-color” style=”color: blue”>Nobody has to change conferences. They just can’t schedule both teams to play a home game on the same date.</span>

I will repeat what I said elsewhere. If there are two teams in LA, TV is going to want one in each conference.

The Raiders/Chargers plan would seem to be more fragile because there are more variables in it. If either one of those teams gets into serious talks with their home cities, it blows the other team up. And, as I said earlier, I think some realignment will be in order if both those teams move to LA. That’s just another layer of junk to work out. I don’t know anything about the Carson site – other than that the NFL has looked at it before – but I read somewhere that the cleanup on the site was costly. It’s a former dump, I think. In any event, fwiw, it seems like these are strange bedfellows, and it smacks of desperation a bit. (But desperation – even if present – isn’t a disqualifier in itself). This plan, apparently, started back in November, and I’m guessing the NFL has known about IT all along, as well.

Sitting on that committee will be interesting.

Again…I don’t think Stan will go rogue.

Browsing around this morning, I found a slide show of the most disappointing Heismann winners in history. The Top 20.

Bradford was at 19. I was rather stunned.

But, then, you consider that all anybody knows about Bradford is that he got the biggest rookie contract in history, and he hasn’t made the playoffs, and sat on the bench the last 22 games, or whatever.

That someone with no real knowledge of the Rams and Bradford would think a 2nd would get him isn’t all that surprising to me. I think we saw that Eagles fans thought they could get him for an end-of-the-day, yardsale discount price, too.

But the fact that a lot of people probably think that’s about right doesn’t make it any less preposterous.

rfl wrote:

I don’t see the division rivalry issue as a problem.

The Clips and Lakers share a building (I think) but remain competitors in the NBA West (I think).

But what will the television executives think?

If I’m FOX, I think I want one of those LA teams to be in the NFC.

Chargers, Raiders will jointly pursue an NFL
stadium in Carson
By SAM FARMER
FEBRUARY 20, 2015, 3:00 AM

On the field, the San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders have had as bitter a rivalry
as any in the NFL but in a sense, they’re now partners.

The teams will officially announce Friday that, while they work on stadium deals in their current
cities, they will jointly pursue a shared, $1.7 ­billion NFL stadium in Carson as an alternative.

While theirs might seem to be an unlikely pairing ­­ the Silver & Black and the Powder Blue ­­ the
Raiders and Chargers have actually been closer over the years than many people might think.
“Al is also a big reason for the strong rivalry between the Raiders and the Chargers and its
popularity among both teams’ fans,” Chargers President Dean Spanos said, referring to the late Al
Davis, legendary owner of the Raiders. “He personified the image and mystique of the Raiders,
and that image has helped build the strength of our rivalries and the popularity of our game.
There has been no one in the NFL like Al Davis.”

But the cantankerous Davis might never have believed this.

The Chargers and Raiders will continue to seek public subsidies for new stadiums in their home
markets, but they are developing a detailed proposal for a privately financed Los Angeles venue in
the event they can’t get deals done in San Diego and Oakland by the end of this year, according to
the teams.

In a statement given to The Times on Thursday, the Chargers and Raiders said: “We are pursuing
this stadium option in Carson for one straightforward reason: If we cannot find a permanent
solution in our home markets, we have no alternative but to preserve other options to guarantee
the future economic viability of our franchises.”

The teams are working with “Carson2gether,” a group of business and labor leaders. The coalition
will announce the project Friday at a news conference near the 168 ­acre site, a parcel at the
southwest quadrant of the intersection of the 405 Freeway and Del Amo Boulevard.

They plan to immediately launch a petition drive for a ballot initiative to get voter approval to
build the stadium.

This latest high ­stakes move was precipitated by St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke, who
announced in January his plan to build an 80,000­ seat stadium on the land that used to be
Hollywood Park.

That put pressure on the Chargers, who say 25% of their fan base is in Los Angeles and Orange
counties. The Raiders, among the most financially strapped NFL teams, joined forces with the
Chargers because they don’t have the money build a stadium on their own.

The Jets and the Giants, who both play in East Rutherford, N.J., are the only NFL teams playing
in the same stadium.

L.A., which has been without the NFL for two decades, now finds itself with three teams that could
relocate here and four stadium proposals, including the Farmers Field concept downtown and
developer Ed Roski’s plan in the City of Industry.

Even skeptics have to concede the city has never been in a better position to have the country’s No.
1 sport return, though none of the three teams has yet to commit to moving here.

Like the Rams, the Chargers and Raiders are on year ­to ­year leases in older stadiums. Prospects
for new venues in San Diego and Oakland are bleak and, as is in L.A., there is no appetite to
commit public money to build a stadium. The Carson proposal calls for the teams to be equal, as
opposed to one’s acting as landlord to the other.

The long ­vacant Carson Marketplace site is part of an old municipal landfill and has been the
subject of significant cleanup efforts in recent years. The NFL has looked into buying the site at
least three times.

In the late 1990s, entertainment executive Michael Ovitz wanted to build on that site and bring in
an expansion franchise. In 1999, Houston oilman Bob McNair outbid two competing L.A. groups,
paying $750 million for the team that would become the Texans.

The Chargers and Raiders bought the land from Starwood Capital Group. Barry Sternlicht, its
chairman, said of the project: “This is a great opportunity to return professional football to Los
Angeles, and we are going to do everything we can to make it happen.”

Whereas Kroenke and his partners have expansive plans for retail space, housing and a 6,000­
seat theater — along with the 80,000 ­seat stadium — on the 298 ­acre Hollywood Park site, the
Carson concept calls only for a football stadium, with room for more than 18,000 parking spaces
as well as tailgating.

“We’re thinking about the project as a 21st century, next­ generation stadium,” said architect David
Manica, noting that the venue and renderings are still in the early conceptual stages. “We want it
to be the ultimate outdoor event experience, which includes both sports and entertainment. And
we want it to be uniquely L.A.”

The projected capacity for the stadium is about 68,000, expandable to more than 72,000.
Manica, president of Manica Architecture, was formerly at HOK Sport, where he led the design of
the Texans’ stadium, the renovation of the Miami Dolphins’ stadium, and the seating bowl of
Wembley Stadium in London.

One early concept for Carson is clear seats that reflect the color of the lights shining on them — the
seats could be silver and black for Raiders games, and powder blue for Chargers games.

More pressing are the steps developers would need to take, including working with the coalition to
support a ballot measure that would allow the venue to be built. If the clubs can gather the
required signatures to place the stadium initiative on the ballot, approval can be attained either
through a public election or by a vote of the Carson City Council.

Kroenke is further along in that regard, having already collected the signatures for a ballot
initiative. Inglewood’s mayor has said that rather than holding a public election, the council would
vote on the initiative, perhaps as early as Tuesday.

The NFL long has contended that it will control the process of any return to L.A., including which
team or teams will be allowed to relocate, and which stadium proposal will get the green light.
How much control the league actually has is up for debate, as it does not have a strong track
record of stopping teams that are determined to move. League rules stipulate that any such
decision requires a three ­quarters majority vote of the 32 teams.

The Chargers and Raiders said they have kept the league’s new Committee on Los Angeles
Opportunities, and the commissioner, fully informed about their joint effort, and that they intend
to strictly adhere to the relocation procedures.

The Chargers have been seeking a stadium solution in the San Diego area for nearly 14 years, a
period spanning seven mayors and nine proposals. The relationship between the club and the city
has grown especially strained in recent days, as the Chargers have pushed the city to contribute to
a new stadium.

The Raiders have been working on a stadium solution with Oakland and Alameda County for about six years but have not made much progress. The club, which has said that remaining in the
Oakland market is a priority, has venue concepts but no taxpayer money has been committed. The
Inglewood and Carson proposals do not involve any public money.

The reason the franchises would be able to privately finance a stadium in Carson, as opposed to
their own cities, is that the L.A. market could better support the sale of hundreds of millions of
dollars of preferred seat licenses, one ­time payments for the right to buy a season ticket. The teams
would also get revenues from naming rights; sponsorship and advertising would be far more
lucrative than in smaller markets.

It’s widely speculated in NFL circles that a franchise that moves from a smaller market to L.A.
could end up being worth 150% of its current value. Franchises would probably have to pay a hefty
relocation fee, although the league has never specified an amount.

The three teams all previously played in L.A., with the Raiders and Rams leaving Southern
California after the 1994 season, and the Chargers, then in the old American Football League,
calling the Coliseum home in 1960, their inaugural season.

All signs point to the Chargers and Raiders — like the Rams — targeting the 2016 season for
relocation, should those teams not get acceptable deals to remain in their current cities. The NFL
has long held that L.A. is a two ­team market, and it’s almost inconceivable that the league would
allow three teams in such close proximity.

The NFL has ruled out any teams’ relocating this season, and is strongly opposed to a franchise’s
enduring more than one lame ­duck season in a market about to be vacated. A team or teams
moving to L.A. would play for at least two seasons in a temporary home — most likely the
Coliseum, Rose Bowl or possibly Dodger Stadium — while a new stadium was under construction.

Twitter: @LATimesfarmer

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-nfl-stadium-20150220-story.html#page=1

zn wrote:

I would think they would keep it to a simple divisional alignment and just swap one NFC west team for one afc west team.

But what if tampa bay shares a stadium with indianapolis? Then what?

That is what I said. Rams and one of those teams swap. My syntax was a bit labored, I’ll admit.

One of those teams moves to the NFC West, and the Rams move to the NFC East – stay in St. Louis – and enjoy a divisional rivalry with the Chiefs.

wv wrote:

That ‘theory’ is just totally absurd.

For starters a 1 Yard TD or a 1 Yard Run is
not gonna be significant in who gets the MVP.

But aside from that, there is no way Pete C
is gonna be thinking about anything other
than — just score.

w
v

Sure, but a little loss of faith and trust in the Seattle locker room is not a bad thing.

wv wrote:

Yeah, but
what about the cinematography

Anywayz — what interests ‘me’ is that Pa
likes it. Pa knows the politics and history
and he still likes it. So…people are different.
Thats all i got.

w
v

And I like and respect PA, so it wasn’t easy to say what I said. And I respect the fact that a lot of the military personnel are voluntarily putting their lives on the line for their countrymen. That’s a pretty big deal. It’s complicated, of course, like everything in life because some people are in the military because they have dead-end lives; some are there because they actually love the idea of violence (not many, I’m guessing, but mercenaries must, and I bet most of them are vets). Some are there for career training or free education afterwards. A lot of them are there because they want to defend some noble ideals (regardless of the cold politics that manipulate those ideals).

So I can imagine a film in which I WOULD feel compassion for Kyle, but it would have to be a narrative which evoked compassion for all the ragheads who became notches on his belt as well. Anything else is a lie, imo. A dangerous fucking lie. And as long as we go about telling stories that cast our team as noble heroes – tragic or otherwise – and other humans as vermin, we continue to foster a blind spot that allows this shit to continue.

It’s not okay.

This movie is not okay.

It isn’t “just a movie.” What happens in the media shapes our reality as a culture, and the stories we tell both reflect and direct our values.

I haven’t seen the movie, and never will. The trailer itself turned me off. Just seeing that it was directed by Eastwood was a turnoff because that suggested to me that it would be revisionist history wrapped up in glorified patriotism (which it turned out to be). I had no idea how BAD the revisionism was until I read this thread, but I can’t say I’m surprised.

But I wouldn’t have watched this film even if it had been set in Imaginaryland and directed by someone else.

The trailer itself painted a story line that disgusted me. It’s the story of a guy who is proud of killing hundreds of people, and the strain of performing those killings and of the explosions all around him gets to him, and he starts to buckle under the pressure.

So I’m being asked to feel all sorry for the poor guy because it’s so stressful to kill hundreds of people. I’m supposed to feel compassion for HIM!

Meanwhile, he has killed hundreds of people I am supposed to understand are worthless at best, but mostly just outright evil, and – really – the world is better off now that they’re dead.

Yeah, I don’t think so. I’m not going to waste my time on a movie that is going to reinforce racial stereotypes and teach me contempt for brown people, and try to make me feel sorry for their executioner.

And that this kind of storyline is swallowed without question by so many people in the world just makes me despair, frankly.