Commissioner of Sports: November Decrees

Ah, November Baseball

On the NFL's new tackling controversy:

Many NFL players and alumni were upset recently when Commissioner Goodell said that helmet-to-helmet and other illegal hits would result in increased fines and even suspensions.  The common defense of these hits was that "football is a violent game," "that's how we've been taught to tackle since pee-wee football," and "they're interfering with my ability to do my job." 

Each of these points is stupid because the hits that Goodell is cracking down on were already illegal.  Yes, it is a violent game, but there is no need to intentionally inflict injury, and James Harrison infamously said is his intent when he hits someone.  Intentionally attacking someone physically is a crime and as we have seen in the NHL, especially cheap shots on the field can be prosecuted off of it.  No pee-wee football player was taught to dive into another player headfirst - you are taught to keep your head up so you can see if the guy makes a move and you are taught to wrap him up with your arms, not bounce off and hope you hit him hard enough to knock him down. 

On the MLB schedule and playoff expansion:
Major League Baseball's season is unnecessarily long, causing the World Series to tumble in November.  There are two reasons why this has never been remedied: cutting games means cutting revenue and would destroy baseball sacred statistics.  Both are reasonable.  But not enough.

MLB should change to a 140 game schedule, cutting interleague out of the regular season schedule.  The season could start later and this would also allow more time for the World Baseball Classic and the Olympics.  The shorter season would still provide ample time to determine the best playoff teams.  The risk is that owners would raise ticket prices fractionally to make up for the 11-lost home games, but I will address that later. 

Additionally, the playoffs should not be expanded beyond the current 8-team format.  If after 162 (or 140) games, you still can't get yourself into a better position than third place, you are clearly not the best team and shouldn't get to be in the playoffs.  And no World Series game should ever be scheduled to be played in November.  The divisional series should be expanded to best-of-7 series, which will require a tightening of the playoff schedule.  This year teams played 162 games in 182 days (including a 3 day break for the All-Star game).  That means they play a game every 27 hours for six months - 20 rest days.  If a team had played all 19 scheduled playoff games (5+7+7), they would have played a game every 35 hours - 9 rest days.  There is no need for so much time off.  One travel day could be eliminated from each of the three playoff rounds (still leaving two rainout makeup days per round), two games could be added to the LDS round, and the whole 21-game tournament could be completed in fewer days than the current system is - and in October, where it belongs. 

On ticket prices at sporting events:
On one level, sports is a business and business owners have the right to charge whatever they want for their products.  If the price is too high, consumers won't buy and they'll have to drop prices.  Hurray America.  But as any sports fan will tell you, sports is not just a business.  When a deli has a good month, the owner takes home a little extra cash.  That's a business.  When a sports franchise has a good month, millions of fans are taken along for the ride.  When a business succeeds in some huge way, there's a blip on the ticker on your TV.  When a sports teams succeeds in a huge way, there are parades through downtown. 

So since sports is more than a business, it is a part of people's families, it cannot only be controlled by the free market.  From season to season, ticket prices cannot be raised beyond the rise in inflation plus a percentage increase equal to the increase in value for the seats (new HD jumbotron?  That's worth a percentage per seat per game).  Additionally, while it is reasonable to have premier pricing for premier opponents, it is not reasonable to increase pricing based on expected weather or other factors that the team cannot control. 

The San Francisco Giants charge more for a Dodgers series than a Marlins series.  That's reasonable.  But they and others have reportedly considered having pricing increase based on other factors, such as weather forecasts and specific player matchups.  That's not reasonable because they cannot guarantee the thing they are charging more for.  If my seat is in the shade and I am a little cool, I might want a refund.  Or it is too sunny and I get a sunburn.  Or it's a little windier in my section.  Or the forecast is wrong completely.  Or on gameday Roy Halladay decides his shoulder is sore and he wants a few days to rest it.  Or the manager decides to give Albert Pujols the day off.  Or Pujols gets hurt in the first and comes out of the game.  Or he goes 0-4.  In any of these (very reasonable) situations, the fans aren't getting what they paid for and should be entitled to a refund.

On college sports rankings:
Is there anyone left who still thinks the BCS is a good idea or that it is working properly?  During its reign, how many times has it come up with a #1 vs. #2 matchup that was unassailable?  Once?  Twice?  The previous system did not work either, of course, which is what necessitated the change in the first place.  But we now have a pretty good sample size and this experiment doesn't work.  You know what does work for basically every other league at every level of basically every sport in the world?  Playoffs.  Bad for business?  I don't think so.  Will you watch the BCS title game this year?  Sure.  How many of the next best 15 bowls will you watch?  Three?  Four?  How many of the 15 games would you watch in a 16-team tournament?  Twelve?  Thirteen?  Tell advertisers that viewership will be roughly 3-4 times what it is currently and see how bad for business a playoff would be.

The AP recently named their preseason All-America team and for the first time in a long time, the men's team included a freshman.  That sound you hear is the death-knell of such pre-season voting.  I officially bad pre-season All-Conference and All-American voting.  This is even more of a complete guess than Mel Kiper's 2011 Mock Draft that he published in April of 2010.  At least Kiper had seen the kids play before.

On the NFL's various expansion plans:

No American sports league shall expand to include European-based teams until travel from the west coast of North America takes as long to get to the eastern edge of Europe as it does to get to the east coast of North America today, and until the world stops using time zones.  So don't hold your breath. 

Currently the NFL absurdly forces two teams to play one game per season in London.  The schedule is set so that these teams have their bye week after the trip.  How would it work if we had teams playing in Europe regularly?  Byes would have to be scheduled throughout the season for such travel.  And European teams would have to have multiple byes to make up for all the games they have to travel to America for. 

Another thought is that the NFL would have a third conference based in Europe.  Not only would this not eliminate the constant travel problems, it also creates a talent-pool problem.  Teams in the current NFC and AFC play inter-conference games each week.  Would they continue to play these while the 16 new European teams only play one another all season?  Certainly that would be a competitive imbalance, not to mention that adding many more teams would destroy the talent level in the league as whole. 

Additionally, the NFL tried this before.  NFL-Europe failed miserably.  Why would this do any better?

Finally, the NFL will not expand to an 18-game regular season.  Goodell parades around with a stern look on his face and a quick trigger for suspensions and fines when it comes to issues of player safety, but if he had to choose between player safety and more revenue, he'd double the ticket prices and have players play without pads and allow each team to have a sniper on the sidelines.

Yes, players could get injured in Week 1 just as likely as in Week 18, but that's not a good argument.  Russian roulette is dangerous.  Maybe you'll find the bullet on the first try, or maybe on the sixth.  But why not negotiate for more chances to pull the trigger?  By the end of an NFL season, teams are quite lucky to have the key players in tact.  So lucky that the top seeds are even given an extra week just to try and recover a little.  So why make them all beat themselves up for two more weeks when they already barely make it out standing up?

On professional sports labor standoffs:
Basically every time a labor agreement is set to end in any professional sport, both sides accuse the other of unfair negotiation tactics.  Often there is a lockout or strike.  And neither side really needs to budge because they're all millionaires (or billionaires) anyway.  But the fans get screwed.  We miss out on games, playoffs, and even entire seasons.  So from now on, if the two sides cannot negotiate a new deal by the time the current one expires, all the issues being haggled over will be posted on the league's website.  Each side will be given a paragraph per issue to make their case.  Fan will then vote.  The options will be A: Players get their way. B: 50/50. D: Owners get their way.  No other options to confuse it.  Find some fancy way to prevent ballot stuffing and post it online. 

Commissioner of Sports on Jets Locker Room Controversy

Recently a huge national story was made out of a complete non-story (I know, be more specific).  In this case, it was a female reporter apparently feeling harrassed by athletes and coaches in the Jets' locker room.  Never mind that this reporter was scantilly clad and markets herself as the sexiest woman in sports, so it is surprising that she is allegedly upset by getting the exact reaction she is aiming for.  The issue for me is that a female reporter was in the locker room in the first place.

A few years ago, this debate reached its peak and female reporters were allowed to work in men's locker rooms despite all of the naked and half-naked men there.  The thinking was that not allowing them in the locker room would create an unfair advantage for their male-reporter-competition.  There is some logic to that.  However, even as a news and sports producer for CBS, I think I would have been arrested had I entered the women's locker room at a WNBA game, tennis tournament, or other women's event.  Rightfully so!

So we shouldn't have reporters in the opposite sex's locker rooms, but we have to allow reporters equal access to the athletes and coaches.  Hmm.  If only there was a room where the press could conduct interviews after a sporting event.  An interview room, perhaps.  What's that?  There are interview rooms in basically every professional stadium in the world and the athletes and coaches go there after leaving the locker room every time anyway?

Well then, how about we just don't allow the press into locker rooms at all.  Allow the players to celebrate or punch holes in the walls in private.  Allow in-fighting and coaches' talks in private.  Allow them time to take care of their personal hygiene, physical therapy, and dressing in private.  Then interview them in the interview room.

Click here for previous issues tackled by the Commissioner of Sports.

What He Really Said: Reggie Bush

Painfully out-of-character statements of apology can sometimes seem as insulting as the offense for which they are issued.  Are we really to believe that a kid who can't spell his own name, but whose ability to dunk a ball in 7th grade got him C's on report cards for the next seven years until he was eligible for the draft, really wrote out prose so clear, precise and erudite and that it would make Hemingway blush?

What if the handlers wrote these statements in character?  Or what if they didn't write them at all?  What if the one apologizing actually did the apologizing?

Worn down by months of media attention, today Reggie Bush forfeited his 2005 Heisman Trophy and released the following statement:

"One of the greatest honors of my life was winning the Heisman Trophy in 2005.  For me, it was a dream come true. But I know that the Heisman is not mine alone. Far from it. I know that my victory was made possible by the discipline and hard work of my teammates, the steady guidance of my coaches, the inspiration of the fans, and the unconditional love of my family and friends. And I know that any young man fortunate enough to win the Heisman enters into a family of sorts. Each individual carries the legacy of the award and each one is entrusted with its good name.

“It is for these reasons that I have made the difficult decision to forfeit my title as Heisman winner of 2005."

What he really said:

"One of the greatest tricks to hooking up with chicks in my life was winning the Heisman Trophy in 2005. I mean, I did alright before because I was pretty much the shit in high school and then I went to USC and we ruled that place.  I didn't go to class...I didn't have to pay for anything...  I pretty much just worked out, studied film, practiced, hooked up, and made dudes look stupid like that guy from Oregon that I juked out that they keep showing on ESPN.  But then when I won the Heisman, man the women I started hooking up with were on another level.  Have you seen Kim Kardassian's ass? And any dude that wins the Heisman gets the same kinda women.  I mean Chris Weinke was a nasty looking dude and he was getting Heisman action.  Actually, not "any dude" because Ty Detmer was supposedly like a monk or something.  But even Tebow got down.  You saw that picture with that girl.  Sure, you're "just friends," Tim.  I'm just friends with Mayra Veronica, too.  And I have tons of sex with my friend, too. 

"But let's face it.  I cheated my ass off at USC.  We got a house, man.  Those fools at Oklahoma got busted for getting paid to work at a car dealership that they didn't work at.  I got a house.  So anyway, everyone's freaking out about it, and the Heisman groupies move on pretty quickly anyway, so I am just gonna give that shit back.  Hell, I don't need it anymore.  I won a Super Bowl.  Plus, I don't think Mayra even knows what the Heisman is.  And let's face it, that little dude got me hooked into the Kardassians and those chicks are psycho.  Huh, that's funny.  You win the Heisman, you get the hot, crazy sister in a family of groupies.  You win the NBA title like Odom, and you get the ugly, chubby, crazy sister.  And then the Super Bowl gets you whatever the hell you want, although I think I need to upgrade.

"It is for these reasons that I have made the "difficult" decision to forfeit my title as Heisman winner of 2005.  Plus, I was 'roided up the whole time, so it doesn't really count anyway.  Also, I am sorry that I got caught."