I shouldn’t put this here.

It has no relevance whatsoever, and…well, it’s a Posting Crime, actually. But the school year is over in three days, so I’ll do whatever I want.

I like the lists here.

I will add Sean Mannion.

And the equipment manager. I think he can be elite.

Who said PEDs?

Could be heroin.

I find that quote interesting.

I have wondered about that kind of thing a lot.

I look at a guy like Tom Hanks who wins an Oscar for Forrest Gump, and…he was great. He was.

But I have to think that there’s a thousand actors out there who could have given a performance as good as that. Maybe not better. But as good. 1,000 actors you never heard of.

Kurt Vonnegut once said something along the lines of, “It’s a great tragedy we have mass media because it makes the pool of ‘greatness’ so much smaller. If we didn’t have recordings, the best singer in your village would be the equivalent of Elvis Presley. But because we have recordings and video, one person serves as Elvis Presley for the whole country. So instead of 2 million singers highly revered, each in their communities, we get one guy revered by all the communities, and all those other people live their lives not mattering.”

That is a verrrrry loose paraphrase of what he said. But, you know, I think about that a lot.

wv wrote:

I’d have put the Legion of Boom at the top of the list,
myself.

Pats won the Ring,
and have no ‘scary units’ ?
Really?

w
v

Their film unit. And their equipment managers.

wv wrote:

Shouldn’t we burn sage,
or light candles,
or somethin.

“No new Injuries” — I dunno.
Is that the Patriots battle-cry?
Seattle?

I hope Fisher knows what
he’s a-doin.

w
v

I will not know what to say if the Rams do not become a serious team in the next two years.

The drafts have all looked good. The RGIII trade got us a bounty.

There is Fisher, and a staff of highly rated coaches.

They have been the youngest team two years in a row (or close to it), and it’s time they started maturing. There is consistency now in philosophy. It is time to move up the ladder.

Listen, I know this is going to be difficult for you guys to hear, but I’m afraid I just have to say this. The Lakers are the only team that matters. Other teams can win a championship once every 50 years, or whatever, but the Lakers have won 1 out of every 3 championships over the past 35 years, and with all the cap space in the world, and the #2 pick overall, they are a couple of years away from reasserting their Lakerdom.

So…enjoy it while you can.

InvaderRam wrote:

goldman sachs somehow finances it. don’t ask me how. there’s a rumor floating around that spanos with the help of goldman sachs would be able to do the move himself. but then why include oakland in the first place? sounds fishy.

What I gather from those articles is that the Goldman Sachs route has considerably more muscle than the hurriedly-unveiled nebulous project the Chargers originally announced. They have got some real money on board now (though it does not appear to be finalized yet), and the stadium renderings are a step up from the ugly cruise ship they originally unveiled. So they are gaining momentum it would appear. A better stadium, and proven financing once it gets all worked out.

As for why the Raiders, I can only speculate.

The one market survey I read had the Rams, then the Chargers, and in a distant third the Raiders, as the most desirable team in Los Angeles. So the Chargers would presumably be better off with the Raiders as a co-tenant in LA. The Rams would be team 1A, the Chargers team 1B. If it is Chargers and Raiders, the Chargers are likely to emerge as team 1A.

You know – Lakers, Dodgers, Kings.

As opposed to the other tenants – Clippers, Angels, Ducks. Those teams are profitable and doing well, but they aren’t the Lakers, Dodgers, and Kings.

Spanos wants badly to be in LA. He would be better off with the Raiders than the Rams. If Kroenke rolls in and builds Inglewoodland, he’s the man.

It could also be that Spanos – originally lacking financing – needed a partner, and the Raiders were the natural fit for a couple of reasons. Could have been a desperation move. Nevertheless, if there are going to be two teams there, the Carson project is better for him for the reasons I mentioned above.

Happy birthday, PA.

It has been estimated that the relocation fee for a Rams move back to LA could be in excess of $500 million for team owner Stan Kroenke.

So…JT is using the passive voice here because he doesn’t know WHO made the $500 million estimate.

That number is insane. That is more than half the value of the Rams, Raiders, and probably Chargers. And there is no way that the Raiders or Chargers could afford anything like that number. Kroenke has that kind of money, but that doesn’t make the number sensible.

I don’t know how they can fairly ask more of the Rams than of the other two teams, and clearly that number shuts out Davis and Spanos from the market. Hell, they don’t even have enough money yet to go halvsies on a stadium, never mind a relocation fee of any size at all. I just don’t see how Spanos and Davis come out on top, in spite of what JT wrote.

When it comes to decision time, Kroenke’s project is more glamorous, it’s ready to go right now, and he’s got the money. If money is the language of the NFL, Kroenke is the one who speaks that language best.

InvaderRam wrote:

somewhat misleading. all zelasko and johnson do is throw out some rumor that there was an 8 to 10 vote in favor of a rams move, but they make it clear they don’t know where this vote came from. they only suppose it’s from the finance committee because of the ten total votes. they also throw out a rumor that mayor butts supposedly said gave a cryptic answer when someone asked if there would be an announcement in August about the rams moving to los angeles, which he completely denied saying later.

so no real information here other than rumor mongering.

Yes, there are some articles out there about Mayor Butts. Some reporter from KTLA said he had a text from an extremely reliable source that said the Rams are moving to LA for sure, and the announcement is coming in August. He claimed to have spoken with Butts at some event with 500 people, with the fire chief and police chief of Inglewood also in the conversation, during which Butts allegedly confirmed the story.

Skeptics point out that the story is unbelievable because – among other things – the window to file for relocation isn’t even open, and furthermore, making an announcement in August would be terrible timing for the NFL because it would cost millions of dollars in lost revenue.

It’s possible the finance committee approved Kroenke’s project FROM A FINANCIAL STANDPOINT, and that got “telephoned” from one person to another as a vote to approve the move.

sdram wrote:

We’re surrounded by native American sites here in SD and if anything is unearthed while digging anything – construction stops until it gets sorted out. How long depends on the significance of what was unearthed and how big it is.

Apparently Missouri does not have those protective laws.

It is private land, and they can do whatever they want as long as they do not take any federal money for the project. I have no idea how they would get federal money anyway, or if that was part of their planning.

But it seems to me that this is – at best – a PR snag Peacock cannot afford, since the need to have everything nailed down is urgent. At worst, there could be litigation, though I don’t know what grounds anyone would have to sue over it.

Kroenke is opening a bottle of his finest tonight, methinks.

Well, I wish I could fast forward to the part about the Rams, especially since I accidentally refreshed the page and have to start again at the beginning of a 43 minute piece.

But my reaction without hearing it is this: the NFL Finance Committee’s approval was a foregone conclusion, I would think. It doesn’t mean approval of the move. All it means is that the committee believes that the financing to back the plan is reliable, and they verify that the project is financially sound. That’s all it means, though, and everybody already knew that. So Kroenke is in the lead at that particular post again, but – again – that was already known. Carson and St. Louis are still assembling financing, and San Diego and Oakland don’t have anything to finance yet.

If Carson or St. Louis gets financing together, they can pull even with Kroenke instantly. Then they move on to the other considerations. If they don’t get financing together, they are out anyway. So this is not game-changing information.

zn wrote:

Zooey wrote:

And three rookies?

Well to be annoyingly exact, it’s not 3 rookies. The center will be Barnes, Jones, or Rhaney, none of whom of course are rookies.

AND this team likes its placeholders. They have several candidates to hold down the guard spot until Brown is ready. Or, ready-er. That’s anyone from Washinton to Bond to Reynolds to Unknown Player to be Named Later. I mean think of who they have used at guard so far since 2012—Turner, Smith, Williams. Is there someone on the roster at least as good as them? Could be, sure.

Now granted I did not just describe the 70s or 80s Rams OL.

But it is at least better than “3 rookies.”

Technically. OK.

But they are redshirted, basically.

If Barnes starts, it’s a bad sign, and if it’s Jones or Rhaney, it’s a rookie. Basically.

At center, no less.

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/writer/jason-la-canfora/25191640/chargers-raiders-stadium-co-op-fast-tracks-nfls-la-return-but-rams-may-fight

LaCanfora thinks Carson has the advantage.

JASON LA CANFORA
CBS Sports NFL Insider

Chargers-Raiders stadium co-op leads NFL’s LA return, but Rams may fight

The joint stadium project between the Chargers and Raiders in Carson, Calif., continues to gain momentum and there was strong positive buzz about their plan coming out owners meeting in San Francisco this week, according to several high-ranking ownership sources. Meanwhile, concerns linger as to whether Rams owner Stan Kroenke can force his way out of St. Louis without a protracted fight.

Chargers owner Dean Spanos, among the league’s more respected owners, has exhibited great patience in navigating his franchise through an uncertain stadium situation in San Diego and continued to earn kudos from other ownership groups at the meeting. The NFL intent to be in Los Angeles by 2016 cannot be understated and several sources maintained they would have to consider the Chargers/Raiders project in Carson as the early favorite.

There is a certain political element to this process, in securing necessary votes for franchise relocation — in this case a dual relocation — and Spanos has moved expertly, sources said. And Raiders owners Mark Davis is a highly-motivated wingman willing to let Spanos take the lead when required. The Raiders are mostly willing to do what the league wants, and go along for the ride to Southern California and plentiful revenue streams that come from a new facility. The willingness to collaborate with the Chargers, their longtime rivals, speaks to the potential potency of this project and it continues to curry favor with other important owners at a critical.

Meanwhile, Kroenke has shown willingness to go rogue and faces more of an uphill climb with his Inglewood project, at least in lining up support from owners on the powerful stadium and finance committees, sources said. With his full-speed-ahead approach regarding LA, he’s seen as more of an outsider than Spanos and has rubbed the league office the wrong way. So all things being equal, people very close to some of the NFL’s most respected ownership groups believe the Carson project has the best chance of winning this race.

That’s not to say Kroenke will go easily, and this scenario could be a precursor to an ugly legal fight. The NFL could well deem St. Louis has a formidable ongoing stadium project and the Chargers and Raiders are in greater need of a new immediate home. But with Kroenke procuring the land and a finance deal on his own, and his St. Louis lease up again at the end of the season, he just might — ironically — take a page from Al Davis’ book and go to court to fight for his right to party every Sunday in Los Angeles rather than stay in St. Louis, where he clearly has no plans of staying.

Don’t discount for an instant Kroenke’s desire to get to California, but he’s failed to curry favor the same way others have and the NFL will flex its muscles to maintain control of the process. Telling any uber-successful magnate what he can or can’t do with his business and land is always a good way to prompt a significant response, and that’s just what we might get in this case.

As for the Chargers and Raiders, if they merely stay in course, things could be lining up their way. It’s clear the municipalities around Carson are on board. Certainly a hurdle or two could come their way — AEG will try to obfuscate the process, I’m sure — and there could be environmental issues down the road (there often are, especially in California) but this thing is coming to a head by the winter and the support behind this project is strengthening at the league’s highest reaches.

Could well be the Chargers and Raiders both move in 2016. It would take two game-day facilities to do so — sources at The Rose Bowl have continued to tell me they cannot support two teams at the same time — and it could be both teams would use their current training facilities for practices for the first season in LA. Some in the know have speculated the Chargers, in exchange for getting the keys to LA, end up moving to the NFC, with perhaps the Cardinals going to the AFC West, which would maintain the Raiders’ rivalries with the Chiefs and Broncos, for as much as that is worth.

Bottom line is if it gets to that stage, the issue of realignment would be no hindrance. There are plenty of parties more than motivated to shuffle around their current division to complete this complicated deal, and the right people continue to have a positive enough view of the Carson solution to make me believe that’s likely where this thing is headed, barring unforeseen roadblocks forming. And all that could well lead to a lot of very rich lawyers getting even richer should Kroenke take the nuclear route to getting what he wants.