NFL Preseason is has finished its second week. The PGA tour has finally figured out that people are not going to watch after the football season has started. This is something that NASCAR is still struggling with. MLB even at its best is just not able to pull in the numbers. It is staying steady but will not be able to grow. NFL makes a partnership to try and save face. Mixed results at best and really just makes the rich more money. Players with feelings that are easily hurt. Sometimes you just have to realize that you are making a butt ton of cash and get over it. I know easily said. All that and more in the Week That Was.
What do we learn from NFL Preseason Games
The NFL preseason is a money making venture for the NFL money making machine. It is pretty amazing that preseason games have stronger viewership than most other sports do in their most important games. I am not sure how much we actually learn about the teams we love to root for. I am sure that the coaching staff of the teams learn a lot about who they are going to keep for the regular season. It is nice of the fans to put up the money to make those glorified practices a reality. I actually do not mind preseason games. It is some football to watch to get ready for the real thing. But to think that these games give any indication of what the team is going to be like is crazy talk. The year that the Lions were the first team to go 0 – 16 they set the preseason on fire by going 4 – 0.
The preseason is all about trying things out and see what players work and what plays work. Finding out what the teams need to work on. Most of the time since the starters play little and in many cases not at all. We really have no idea what the team is going to look like. We might have an idea but more than likely they will not look like what the team looks like in the preseason.
The most interesting thing that we have found out about in this preseason is that Ezekiel Elliott and his agent have some seriously thin skin. After the Cowboys preseason game when rookie running back Tony Pollard had a nice outing. Jerry Jones was asked about the Zeek Elliott situation to which Jones responded Zeek Who? It appears that neither Elliott or his agent Rocky Arceneaux were amused by the comment. Making it clear that they though Jones has disrespected Elliott. To that I say Zeek get over it. Jones knows that this was against backups. He also knows the value Elliott brings to the Cowboys offense. Even with the diminished impact that a running back has in the NFL. Jones knows that there are a few that will transcend the position.
I tend to side with the players in most situations. One of the situations that makes it difficult is when a player is holding out but then feels slighted. I get that any player in the NFL has a limited career. A player like Elliott is worth more to his team than what he will make on his rookie contract this year. The truth here is that Elliott has limited leverage here. The team is not doing anything that violates the CBA. The Elliott hold out is nothing like the Le’Veon Bell hold out from last year. Bell was not under contract and had already accrued the seasons he needed. Was it a smart move by Jones to say that? Debatable but it was kind of funny. At least to someone that is not a Cowboys fan and Zeek can feel disrespected all he wants. It will not change anything. I don’t know if Elliott will end up being the highest paid running back this year. More than likely he will not. What this highlights is that the NFLPA should try to get the rookie contacts changed so that the players can get their money sooner once they prove themselves.
One player I am having a difficult time siding with is Antonio Brown. The sad thing here for me is that we went to the same university. So I really want to support him. All of the other players that were using the helmet he was using have found new ones. They only one making this a huge issue is Brown. The Raiders are finding out why the Steelers were so eager to part ways with Brown. Mike Mayock is finding out that being a GM of an NFL team is not all peaches and cream. i am not so sure the tactic he is taking with Brown is correct either. Giving an ultimatum to Brown saying we need to know if you are all in or all out. Probably will not sit will with a person like Brown. When given an ultimatum like that he has the type of personality that will more than likely make him dig in deeper. Since the other players have all moved on from this I find it difficult to believe that this is all about the helmet anymore. Now it is about Brown just trying to get his way. In the end if he follows this path he will be the loser. So will the Raiders but that was a choice to trade for Brown. Sometimes the trade works. Sometimes it does not.
PGA Playoff Ending in August
I have been a never ending proponent of the PGA moving its playoff to the end of summer rather than having it in the fall. I had not paid close enough attention since they did it this year. At least by moving it there is a chance that they will get some more eyes on it. Golf is one of the few sports where I am not sure you actually need to have a year long champion. Golf and Tennis are two that with the way they are structured crowning a champion for the season does not really seem to add anything.The
With team sports you need to have that champion at the end of the season to make the season complete. With Golf being an individual sport there are other ways that success can be achieved with out having a season ending championship. With the majors the real measuring stick for these sports the playoffs seem a bit unnecessary. That is coming from an old time fan perspective. That is just the way I see it. Pretty sure that other people see it the other way. That or Golf is really reaching and do not know for sure what the fans want. Heck they my not know what they really want. With Tiger out of it. It will be very interesting to see what the ratings do here. The prize money is huge so clearly they are really tying to push the playoff. I do not know if it will work. What I do know is that they are actually trying to make some changes to bring more viewers in. Unlike some other sports out there.
NASCAR Not So Much
Golf is making changes that will give it a chance. NASCAR is still just plodding along. They are putting in the motions that make it appear like they are making some changes but really it just has the same look and feel. This past weeks race in Bristol is usually one of the most highly watched races. The track for this race was less than half full. I could not find an announced attendance but they did not even attempt to sell tickets in the turns. There are several things that are contributing to this problem. The product is way too confusing. Even hard core fans are having trouble figuring out the way the drivers get into the playoff. The product is difficult to watch on TV. All the scrolling changes that the stations have made to show car and driver positions have made it more difficult to follow than easier. NASCAR really needs to do some serious adjusting to get this figured out.
As far as the race goes it is still pretty interesting. The problem is that all the changes they have made have not made it more interesting. They really need to do something about that. Maybe NASCAR should take a look at what golf is doing and take some hints from that. Where with Golf the playoff is difficult to understand. If NASCAR could get it right it would probably be a huge draw. It also can’t happen in the height of the football season.
This weekend the biggest NASCAR news had nothing to do with the race. The crash of Dale Jr. plane took all the headlines. Thankfully Dale and his family and crew were all fine after they were able to get out of the plane.
MLB Mercy LOL
There has been some people saying that the MLB should institute a mercy rule. Taking a page from little league baseball. In my opinion that would be a really crazy thing to do. I get what some of the people that are bringing this up are trying to get at. Some of the games are really long and boring when there is a massive blow out. It takes something out of the fans and out of the players. I really just don’t see the mercy rule coming in to place. The reason that they do this in Little League or other youth sports is because sometimes the talent level of the teams do not match. While there can be a talent mismatch in the majors they are all getting paid very well to do this. I have no problem making them finish each game out no matter how bad they may be playing. If the fans are done with the game they can always leave. If they are going to quit early are the fans going to get a partial refund? No they are not. I am just throwing that in there. I do not think that is a huge part of the equation.
I was going to say something about how dumb I think the Little League World Series is at this point. But I don’t want to give it anymore attention than this.
I have heard some of the baseball purists complaining about the home run and strike out records that are being broken this year. Talking about how bad that is for baseball. For the old guard this my be correct. It remains to be seen if it will help attract new viewers. It still amazes me the way they keep track of records in baseball. It is interesting to a point but when they start trotting out stats about this is the first time some one has hit for the cycle on a Tuesday game starting at 1:05 PM. The average fan does not find that impressive or care about that stat. What they do care about it the game exciting. Two things that make the games exciting are home runs. Especially towering home runs and strike outs. Especially a strike out swinging.
One Week Till College Football
Less than a week now till the first meaningful College Football games start. This Saturday Miami will take on (8) Florida at 7 PM We will find out week one if Florida deserves to be in the top ten. It is nice to start the season with a game that matters. The preseason AP poll came out this week as well. It mostly mirrored the coaches poll. We have talked before about the meaning of preseason polls. The argument I heard this week about how important they are. Was that the selection committee looks at the polls even though they say they do not. I am sure that they do look at the polls. I am also sure that they do not go back to the preseason poll to look at where the teams started. It is possible that the teams that start in the top ten have an advantage. If they lose it is also a sure thing that they will drop in the polls. So really it evens out a bit. I am still not a fan of preseason polls and think that it would be better to have the polls wait till week two to come out. Clearly that is never going to happen so we are stuck with what we have there. One thing that would make the preseason poll mean a lot less would be to change the playoff to eight give the winners of the power five the automatic berth with three wild cards. This makes perfect sense to me so not sure why it is do difficult to get to this point. Anyway College football is here.
On the Tube TV Not You
This week on tv is just a rant about the way the powers that be handle programming. This is really old school and I know there are different ways we could watch this. Every Saturday Me.Tv shows Star Trek the Original Series at 10 PM. This week it was not on. Turns out that the local NBC channel can change the programming on Me.Tv if they choose to. So this week and next week they are going to show a rerun of Americas Got Talent. It is a popular show. I get it. The problem is that they are showing the exact same rerun on the main channel as well. So it is a rerun that is being shown on a Saturday night on two channels. That seems strange to me at best. Makes you wonder what the powers that be are thinking. Then again it is possible they are right and we are the only two people watching Star Trek at that time on a Saturday night.
You can find last weeks post here
I am looking for people that are interested in writing posts on biglakesports.net If you are interested you can send me an email at jbigalke at biglakespots.net and we can go over what I am looking for and see if you are a fit. There would be no pay at this time but you would be able to put your writing out there and could post it on other sites if you wanted to.
Loading ...
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
Recent Comments