Tag: Los Angeles

Rams and Chargers Combined Attendance Still Lower than USC Last Week

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Yahoo – The Rams, playing in the cavernous L.A. Coliseum, drew just 56,612 people to their game against Washington. The Chargers meanwhile, playing in the 27,000-seat StubHub Center in nearby Carson, had a measly 25,381 patrons watch their loss against Miami. The combined attendance for the Rams and Chargers was 81,993. These numbers are especially low considering that on Saturday night, the USC-Texas game – also played in the Coliseum – had 84,714 fans.

The famously sports crazed and empathetic city of Los Angeles cannot support two NFL franchises, let alone one. Color me shocked.

When you see it side by side like though its got to be startling for the owners. The Rams are bad, but still they are 1/32, an elite group, and they can’t even fill half the stadium. Sure the Coliseum is 100k seats, but jesus christ just give some tickets away to avoid a picture like this:

Bad optics man. Perception is reality. And the perception here is that no one is showing up to watch the NFL in LA. And granted the Chargers are playing in a goddamn MLS stadium that only holds 27,000 fans, but even that they couldn’t sell out. People should be lining up to watch a game there, if for nothing else than the novelty of seeing a real, live NFL team in a tiny stadium that was designed to host soccer players making $100K a year.

I understand the want and maybe the need for the NFL to be in one of, if not the, biggest TV markets in the country, but sometimes you need to step back and see a bad idea for what it is. I’m sure the owners and the league will make their money back on Super Bowls, concerts, bowl games, and everything else that new LA stadium will hold, but I seriously doubt either team will ever have a ravenous fan base.

Maybe if the team is GREAT, which both are far from being, then the fans will come out. But that is the No. 1 problem with LA as a fan base for a franchise; the majority of the city is transplants. So if the team sucks, then why should I come out and spend my money? Its not really *my* team. Being from Boston obviously the teams are usually pretty good, but even when they’re bad we still show up. Its in our blood. We don’t have any other choice and its what we were raised on. Thats what helps build passion. Not shiny new stadiums.

Philip Rivers Commutes to LA from San Diego in His $200K SUV. Wait, What?

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Yahoo – Rivers and his wife, Tiffany, decided not to uproot their family (they have eight children, ranging in age from 2 years old to high school freshman), for at least the Chargers’ first year in Los Angeles, with Rivers deciding to see how he could handle the ride. Enter his man cave on wheels. In a story by the San Diego Union-Tribune’s Kevin Acee, we learn that Rivers has invested in a custom SUV – a rolling film room, if you will – that will make his drive to and from work productive.

Hooold the fucking phone, wait a minute, the San Diego Chargers moved to Los Angeles this season, but apparently Philip Rivers did not move with them?

So this dude is making a 2-3 hour commute EACH WAY every day so he can continue to live in San Diego? My uncle’s girlfriend used to commute to Manhattan from fucking Pennsylvania taking planes, trains and buses to get there, but she wasn’t making $14 million per year. I’m pretty sure Phil could find a suitable home a little bit closer to his place of employment.

I guess if you’re a stubborn dude and just want to left alone at your house like we all do, might as well make the most of your commute. And creating an entertainment center to watch “game film” in the backseat ain’t a bad way to spend $200K.

I would love to get taxied to and from work every day, but I’m a poor person so I have to drive myself. But if I could sit in the back and ride along can you imagine the amount of time that would free up for me? I sure as shit wouldn’t be working from the backseat though, I’ll tell ya that. Really putting his ear to the grindstone during rush hour traffic. Phil’s prob just crushing episodes of Narcos back there. LOL celebrities, they really are just like us.

Something I Didn’t Expect to Write Back in 2013; It Must Suck to Be Doc Rivers Right Now

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This is not something I expected to write back in 2013. We all knew it was time for the Celtics to break up the band when they did, but I’ll never forget drinking a $3 PBR at White Horse as I somberly watched the ESPN news of the trade light up the flat screens around the bar. I knew it was time, but it still sucked to see the best Celtics team of my lifetime finally break up.

Back in 2013 the Celtics were at the end of an era and it was clear. The Big 3 of Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, and Ray Allen had dominated from their first tipoff together, starting the 2007-08 season by going 27-2 on the way to an NBA Championship. They were always in the hunt for a title over the course of the next 5 seasons and were a ton of fun to watch as they morphed from the dominant top dog into the aging, wily veterans making one last stand.

Once that all came to an end though, Doc Rivers, who infamously said how he wanted to be a part of the Celtics rebuild, almost immediately changed his mind on being part of said rebuild. With 3 years and $21 million left on Doc’s contract he wanted out. So Danny Ainge made a deal with the Clippers to send Doc out west and got a first round pick in exchange.

Shitty move by Doc, but I don’t hold some massive grudge over it like a lot of fans still do. Doc wanted to leave for greener pastures (and more power) in LA so why pay a coach $7 million dollars a year on a lottery bound team? Doesn’t make sense.

Back then though the Clippers were the place to be with young studs like Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan and Chris Paul to bring it all together. They looked like a team poised to do big things while the Celtics looked to be on the brink of a long, slow, and painful rebuild. Except four years later the Celtics are the reigning No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference with have the best young coach in the league in Brad Stevens, having recently added three All-Stars (Hayward, Horford, Irving), and picked up a couple of lottery picks to boot in Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum.

Meanwhile the Clippers are legitimately falling apart. Doc has been stripped of his role as President of Basketball Operations and is back to just writing “Coach” on his LinkedIn profile. Chris Paul is gone. DeAndre Jordan is suddenly 29 and Blake Griffin is now a 28 year old on bad knees who is aging in dog years.

Ask any executive in the NBA and I would bet the house that I don’t own that every single one of them would rather be the Celtics right now. Who the hell would have guessed that would be the case just 4 years ago? That would have been absurd to suggest, yet here we are.

The best part? The Celtics aren’t done. They still have a potential top 5 pick again next year with the Lakers pick and are only going to get better with Kyrie and Hayward on the team with the young guys continuing to develop.

I wonder if Doc looks back and says, welp I really fucked that one up. Not something I thought I would write just 4 years later from that Allston barstool.

I Ruined Rich Hill’s No-Hitter Last Night

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So you know how whenever a pitcher has a no-hitter going and the TV cameras show him by himself on the bench? None of his teammates will talk to him because they’re afraid of jinxing the no-no. Hell they even say fans and broadcasters shouldn’t talk about it because you’ll jinx it. Welp, I fired off a tweet about his no-hitter last night and 47 seconds later Hill gave up a walk-off home run in the 10th inning. So that ones on me, sorry Rich. I’ll strive to be better next time.

Why the Celtics Won the Trade of Isaiah Thomas for Kyrie Irving

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Wow. Last night the Celtics traded Isaiah Thomas, Jae Crowder, Ante Zizic and the 2018 Nets pick for Kyrie Irving. As I said at 7:30 last night, I go off the grid to workout for ONE hour and I come back to find Trader Danny has fundamentally changed the structure of the Celtics with another blockbuster trade. Seriously, sleep with one eye open around this guy.

First things first, it sucks to see Isaiah Thomas go as he was absolutely integral in putting the Celtics back on the map the past couple of years and vice versa. Celtics went from a middling team to the No. 1 seed in the East. Isaiah went from a third string point guard in Phoenix to Boston finishing in the Top 5 for MVP. He had 40 and 50 point games while getting his teeth knocked out and even putting on dazzling performances after suffering tragic family losses. IT seemed like a genuinely good dude with a massive chip on his shoulder who just wanted to prove the world wrong. And he’s done that. IT, the last pick in the 2011 NBA Draft just got traded for Kyrie, the first overall pick in the 2011 NBA Draft.

While IT has been hands down my favorite Celtics player since KG and it sucks to see him go, Kyrie is so, so, so good that its hard to not like this deal. The Celtics upgraded at PG getting one of the best scorers in the entire NBA. Kyrie isn’t exactly a defensive savant either but he’s 6 inches taller than IT, which alone will allow him to more effectively cover the positon defensively. Kyrie is also going to create even more space for the Celtics on offense, especially in the playoffs, as other teams won’t be able to smother and trap Kyrie as they were prone to do with IT. Teams will have to account for his one-on-on play and continuously have help defenders and double teams waiting for Kyrie, which will open up even more opportunities for guys like Al Horford and Gordon Hayward.

The Detractors:

  • “Kyrie is not that much of an upgrade over Isaiah.”
    • He’s 3 years younger, healthier, bigger and has one more year left on his contract than Isaiah. At just 25 years old Kyrie can grow with the Celtics core of Jaylen Brown and Jason Tatum and be right in his prime as the other two are coming into theirs. As much as I love Isaiah, the core probably would not have been good enough quick enough as he and Horford would be in their 30s by the time Brown and Tatum enter their prime.
  • “The Celtics have just wrecked their team chemistry.”
    • This I admit could be an issue as the Celtics now only return 4 players from the 2016 team that reached the Eastern Conference Finals and only 1 out of 5 starters. That is CRAZY. However, one of the reason’s I’m not higher on the NBA in general is because, more than any other sport, talent wins above all else. It doesn’t matter how great your chemistry is if you don’t have 2 or 3 of the best players in the league. The NBA is built around a core of hypertalented superstars and if you don’t have at least a couple of them you’re porked.
  • “I hate to trade Jae Crowder and Ante Zizic.”
    • Always loved Crowder and he was a key guy off the bench. Again this is why I’m not a GM, but if we’re going to look at this emotionlessly, thats what Crowder was; a guy off the bench. You do not turn down trades for 25-year old 4x All-Stars over bench players. And for anyone crying about trading Ante Zizic I ask you this; Have you ever even seen Zizic play? Granted I’m not a scout, but this is a guy who was so good that he couldn’t get on an NBA roster and got stashed overseas his rookie year. I’m not sweating over trading a guy with exactly 0 minutes played in the NBA. Plus, we still have the Dancing Bear.
  • “Who is going to rebound for us?”
    • WHO HAS REBOUNDED FOR US THE LAST FOUR YEARS?! The Celtics as an organization have effectively punted on rebounding. Last year the Celtics were 22nd in Offensive Rebounds per game and 22nd in Defensive Rebounds per game. Not exactly world beaters to begin with.
  • “I hate trading the 2018 Nets pick.”
    • It sucks to trade one of our treasured assets, but thats exactly why Danny got them. He’s been trying to trade these things for years, he just has never found a deal he wanted to pull the trigger on. Plus how many of these things are you going to keep? The Celtics have already drafted No. 3 overall the past 2 years and still have a potential Top 5 pick next year (more on that below.)

How about Danny Ainge though? This guy has effectively turned a 36-year old Paul Pierce and a 37-year old Kevin Garnett directly or indirectly into: Kyrie Irving, Jaylen Brown, Jason Tatum, Al Horford, Gordon Hayward and the 2018 Lakers potential No. 2-5 pick.

And if Kyrie re-signs with the Celtics then Danny looks like an even bigger genius for the Jayson Tatum move, trading down from the No. 1 overall pick to No. 3 while also scooping up the 2018 Lakers pick from Philly. This is HUGE looking back because without that Lakers pick in his back pocket I highly doubt Danny makes the Kyrie trade, having to surrender the Nets pick. He basically, as many said at the time, got the guy he wanted in Tatum while also picking up an additional draft pick. And while many people laughed at Danny for trading the No. 1 overall pick for another one of his coveted draft picks, the fact of the matter is he got a great player while also adding a back up lottery pick, which allowed him to more aggressively shop the Nets 2018 pick.

For those of you that are mourning the end of the “Pierce/KG Nets Trade” well fear not, because its not over, not really. The Celtics got that 2018 Lakers pick by trading the No. 1 overall pick, which was the Nets pick. So we still have one more year to live off of the Nets misery if we’re getting technical. One more asset/player to build off of, while the Nets continue to send Billy King hate mail.

PS – This Isaiah trade just reinforces my longstanding personal policy of never buying a player’s jersey unless they’ve recently signed a contract extension. I’ll never forget buying a Sergei Samsonov jersey in 2006, only to see the Bruins trade him A WEEK LATER. Which is why the next Bruins jersey I bought was a Patrice Bergeron jersey, fresh off his 8-year contract extension.

Paul George Now Says He May Not Sign With Lakers Next Year

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Yahoo – “I grew up a Lakers and a Clippers fan,” George says. “I idolized Kobe. There will always be a tie here, a connection here. People saying I want to come here, who doesn’t want to play for their hometown? That’s a dream come true, if you’re a kid growing up on the outskirts of L.A., to be the man in your city. But it’s definitely been overstated. For me, it’s all about winning. I want to be in a good system, a good team. I want a shot to win it. I’m not a stats guy. I’m playing this game to win and build a legacy of winning. I’ve yet to do that. I’m searching for it. If we get a killer season in Oklahoma, we make the conference finals or upset the Warriors or do something crazy, I’d be dumb to want to leave that.” “It’s too early for L.A.,” he says. “It would have to be a situation where the ball gets rolling and guys are hopping on. This guy commits, that guy commits. ‘Oh s—, now there’s a team forming.’ It has to be like that.”
“I’m in OKC, so hopefully me and Russ do a good enough job and make it to the conference finals and love the situation, why not recruit someone to come build it with us? I’m open in this whole process.”

Live look at every Celtics fan who didn’t want to trade for Paul George without an extension first.

Now I’m sure Paul George is just being smart by not burning his bridges in OKC before he even gets there. Just letting the fans know that if all goes well then who knows, maybe he does stay. So maybe he’s just playing politics here.

But if he’s not…Then this make Danny Ainge look like an asshole. If the Thunder have a good season and George decides to stay because the Lakers are, ya know, still a dumpster fire of a team, then that is a disaster.

Now I wasn’t exactly clamoring for Danny to give up the farm for a guy on a 1-year rental, but man people will have a field day roasting Ainge for that one. I can understand Paul George wanting to go play for his hometown team, but if they’re still a lottery team and if LeBron stays in Cleveland, then why would he want to go there? Go play for your hometown team just to get waxed and not even make the playoffs? Fuck that. Get out of Indy, link up with a new team that actually has a shot of winning and stay there and try and build there. You can always live in LA the other half of the year when you’re not playing basketball. So I guess we’ll see, but if PG13 doesn’t sign with LA next year then the Celtics will have missed a huge opportunity.

Todd Marinovich is Back in Football!

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USA Today – It’s hard not to root for a successful Todd Marinovich turnaround. The former USC and Los Angeles Raiders quarterback prodigy, whose football career and life has famously been derailed by substance abuse on multiple occasions, was in Indian Wells on Friday for a news conference to announce that he is returning to competitive football. The former NFL and college star who just turned 48 on July 4, has joined the desert’s developmental football team the SoCal Coyotes after serving as an assistant coach last season.

Remember the kid you grew up with who played sports year round then went to camps and played travel ball all summer long without any time to be a kid because his dad was a psycho living variously through his kid? Yea thats Todd Marinovich times 1,000.

For anyone who’s not familiar Marinovich was basically bred to be a quarterback by his insane father. Marinovich’s dad is essentially Tim McGraw from Friday Night Lights, an absolute maniac who couldn’t let go of the glory days and drilled his kid into the ground to try and make him a better football player.

Seriously, look at this description of the dad from Wikipedia:

“His father, Marv Marinovich, an openly abusive parent, had been a lineman and a captain for the University of Southern California Trojans during the 1962 national championship season, and played in the 1963 Rose Bowl…After harming his own National Football League lineman career by overtraining and focusing too much on weight and bulk, Marv studied Eastern Bloc training methods and was hired by Oakland Raiders owner Al Davis as the NFL’s first strength-and-conditioning coach. Marv later opened his own athletic research center and applied the techniques to his young son, introducing athletic training before Marinovich could leave the crib and continuing it throughout his childhood and adolescence.”

The dad even had the mother in on it, basically feeding the kid like an olympic athlete.

“During her pregnancy, Trudi used no salt, sugar, alcohol, or tobacco; as a baby, Marinovich was fed only fresh vegetables, fruits, and raw milk…The question I asked myself was, How well could a kid develop if you provided him with the perfect environment?”

That shit is child abuse. This is how serial killers are born, let the kid have a McChicken every once in a while. So no wonder Marinovich is a little loopy himself. Now hopefully he’s getting back into football at the age of 48 because he loves the game and wants to play and not because he wants some side cash to buy some dope. But for anyone who saw his 30 for 30, Marinovich did NOT look like a guy who missed two-a-days.

But ya know thats why the Sandlot is one of the most popular sports movies of all time. Because organized sports and practice and conditioning camp and coaches yelling in your face is not fun. It sucks actually. The fun part is playing ball with your boys. So maybe getting on the High School field and slinging the ball around will be good for the guy. Who knows maybe even Brett Favre will make an appearance in his Wranglers, NOBODY likes backyard ball more than that guy.

The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim Are Now Just the Los Angeles Angels

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SportsLogos – The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim still the butt of jokes on social media and elsewhere due to their clumsy name have officially changed their name to just “Los Angeles Angels” finally dropping the “of Anaheim” part.

Apparently the Angels quietly made this change awhile ago, but didn’t make any grand announcements about it because, well, its always been a ridiculous name. Los Angeles is a cool 40 mins from Anaheim, which if you’ve ever driven around LA you know is more like 2+ hours.

That would be like Charlie Baker deciding to put a team deep on the South Shore. Might as well be the goddamn Cape League at that point.

This is the FIFTH time the Angels have changed their name and the teams only been around since 1961. Thats fucking bananas. Not to mention they’re going back to a name they already used with LA Angels. They’ve also been the Anaheim Angels and the California Angels, but its hard to top Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

I still hold out hope that MLB commissioner Rob Manfred will get drunk and green light an NL expansion team in Boston. Then we could really get wild with some team names. Lets just say the Minutemen for now. The Boston Minutemen of New England. The Seaport District Minutemen of Boston. My personal favorite? The Allston Minutemen of Brighton.

The Falcons Just Cucked Jerry Jones and the Cowboys With Their New Halo Scoreboard

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Tweeted about this the other day, but I’d be remiss to not at least give it a quick shout out on the blog. Yes the Patriots destroyed the hopes and spirits of every Falcons fan there ever was and ever will be, but MY GAWD this is a stadium. The Atlanta Falcons just cucked Jerry Jones with this absolute dynamite Halo scoreboard.

Jerry’s World was famous for its absurdly “everything is bigger in Texas” 50 yard long scoreboard. That was top notch when it came out. Now compared to the Atlanta Halo scoreboard? Trash. Total garbage, might as well shut the place down like the old AstroDome.

NFL stadiums are like goddamn iPhones. They are shiny and amazing and cutting edge technology for like 12 months then the next version comes out and everyone is scrambling to sell their old piece of shit on ebay for pennies on the dollar. The Falcons may never recover from SuperBowl XLI, but they sure as shit are gonna have a baller ass stadium this year.

That is at least until the Rams open their new stadium in LA.

The Celtics Free Agency Plans are Crashing and Burning and Free Agency Hasn’t Even Started Yet

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I swear to christ, Celtics fans need their own personal J. Walter Weatherman. Blake Griffin re-signs with the Clippers, Paul George gets traded to the Thunder, and now the Celtics free agency plans are spiraling out of control.

We are now BANKING on Gordon Hayward signing with the Celtics or we are all fucked. I forgot my own rule to never get excited about rumored #WycFireworks until the pen was put to paper. This could all have been avoided if Danny Ainge had only left a note.