Dragging out the NFL draft

I'm not a fan of the extended 3-day NFL draft. I didn't watch any of the draft coverage last night. I understand it went on past midnight.

The first round always took too long, but who cared on a Saturday afternoon. But if the choice is watching Berman and Kiper talk for 15 minutes between picks or watching Community, The Office, Parks & Rec and 30 Rock, the NFL draft loses every time.

For those of you who chose to waste time watching the draft instead - here are the NBC shows update -SPOILER ALERT - if you're waiting to watch them on your DVR

Community - Shirley had her baby - it was Andre's not Chang's

The Office - Michael's last episode - he was telling everyone he had one more day, but left a day early to head out to Boulder (he had to call Holly to find out where they were going to live)

Parks & Rec - Jerry's painting for the Pawnee govt art project showed Leslie as a topless centaur and Tom as a cherub. The townspeople were not happy with the nudity - but Leslie and Jerry tricked them in the end

30 Rock - Jack's wife Avery was arrested in North Korea. Liz was empowered by realizing she fixes all the problems on TGS, she should be able to do the same in her life. A plastic bag stuck in a tree becomes her white whale.

Meanwhile - Fairly seems like a nice get for the Lions!

I'm not sure how much of the later rounds I'll watch over the next couple days, probably not as much as I used to when the Draft first came to weekend television, that's for sure.

Nicknames after franchise move

There was a discussion on the comments section of the Uniwatch blog that touched on teams changing or keeping nicknames when they move to a new city.

I started to compile the various moves I could think of in the major sports.

In MLB by my count there have been 9 teams that have moved a total of 11 times. Five have changed the nickname (Brewers, Nationals, Orioles, Twins and Rangers) and 4 (6) have retained (Braves, Dodgers, Giants and Athletics) the previous name.

Looking at the individual changes:

• Seattle Pilots became the Milwaukee Brewers - The Pilots only existed one season, why not change the name to something more fitting in Milwaukee - Good Choice
• Montreal Expos to Washington Nationals - Expos drew their name from the 1967 World Exposition; there is already too much to expose in DC so the name change is good.
• St. Louis Browns to Baltimore Orioles - The Browns we almost always the worst team in the AL; Although Baltimore Browns would have kept alliteration, I think the change to the aesthetically pleasing Oriole is a good choice.
• Washington Senators to the Minnesota Twins and the 2nd creation of the Senators to the Texas Rangers - Senators really only makes sense for DC, so change makes sense. Twins is a compromise to St. Paul to so they aren't just Minneapolis's team. Rangers works for Texas - Interesting that these two both took regional names instead of city names.

Keepers

• Brooklyn (Trolley) Dodgers to LA (Traffic) Dodgers? Would have been an opportunity to change
• NY Giants to SF Giants - No problem with me here
• Phily to KC to Oakland Athletics - Love the Elephant on the baseball - great keep
• Boston to Milwaukee to Atlanta Braves - Alliteration in Boston to ?? in Milwaukee and Atlanta - maybe should have been a change?

In the NFL I counted 11 teams (14 total) moving cities. Six (Rams, Redskins, Cardinals, Chargers, Raiders and Colts) kept the nickname, four (Lions, Chiefs, Ravens and Titans) changed immediately and one kept the previous name for a short time then changed (Bears).

• Rams make just a little sense in LA and St. Louis as they made in Cleveland - so I think this would have been a chance to change.
• Redskins - equally offensive in Boston and DC - good chance for a change
• Cardinals - Were the original Chicago Cardinals taking advantage of a C-C naming? It worked in St. Louis to match the baseball team, really doesn't make sense in Arizona, especially when they were the Phoenix Cardinals.
• Chargers and Raiders were moves just up and down the coast of California, and since they both have great logos, I can't blame them for keeping them.
• Colts - see below

Changes

• Portsmouth Spartans to Detroit Lions (probably some other nicknames in between too) - Obviously they don;t want to be Spartans - even though the Aggies were long from changing their name - Great move
• Dallas Texans to KC Chiefs - well KC Texans wouldn't work at all so Win
• Houston Oilers to Tennessee Titans - I think a change was needed no Oilers in Tennesse
• Decatur Staleys to Chicago Staleys to Chicago Bears - It's Papa Bear not Papa Staley - Win

Colts/Ravens/Browns - I think if they had known Baltimore was going to steal the Browns from Cleveland in a few years, it would have been great to keep the Colts in Baltimore, Keep the Browns in Cleveland and let Indianapolis become the Ravens -although that makes no sense there. How about the Indy Racers?

NHL

Six total moves. (I'm not sure what happened with SF Seals/Cleveland Barons - did the NHL contract?) Four changes (Avalanche, Coyotes, Devils and Hurricanes) one keeper (Flames) and one almost keeper (Stars)

• Quebec Nordiques to Colorado Avalanche - obvious need for change
• Winnipeg Jets to Phoenix Coyotes - not really needing a change, but Coyotes works in the desert SW
• Colorado Rockies to NJ Devils - again NJ Rockies makes no sense, so good change
• Hartford Whalers to Carolina Hurricanes - Not much Whaling in the Carolinas - Win
• Atlanta to Calgary Flames - Atlanta Flames - great name, Calgary Flames? Maybe there was a big fire there I don't know about? Should have changed to Roughriders.
• Minnesota North Stars to Dallas Stars - Obviously needed to drop the North, ties into Cowboys Iconic logo - Win

NBA has lots of changes. Fourteen teams making eighteenish moves. 5 names changes in the bunch (some on the 2nd move).

• Syracuse Nationals to Phily 76ers - I like it
• Cincinnati Royals to KC-Omaha/KC/Sacramento Kings - Kept the royalty of the name, not sure why they changed, especially when you consider the MLB team became the KC Royals. Maybe their was a minor league baseball presence they wanted to avoid?
• Seattle SuperSonics to OK City Thunder. Seattle the home of Boeing, OK City the home of storms? Win
• Buffalo Braves to SD/LA Clippers - Love the original SD Clippers logo so win
• Ft Wayne to Detroit Pistons - originally the Zollner Pistons (Brand Name?) but certainly the auto industry works in Detroit.
• Minneapolis to LA Lakers - fail! From the land of 10,000 lakes to the land that drains lakes in other states.
• Baltimore to Washington Bullets (then Wizards) - should have thought long ago about dropping the violent name, although the "ll" looking like arms grabbing a rebound in the logo is tough to drop.
• NY to NJ Nets - who cares?
• St. Louis to Atlanta Hawks - fine
• Vancouver to Memphis Grizzles - Awful see below
• New Orleans to Utah Jazz - Awful see below
• Philadelphia to SF/GS Warriors - Fine
• SD to Houston Rockets - Makes much more sense in Houston, why were they the Rockets in SD?
• Charlotte to New Orleans Hornets - fine except, why not let Utah be the Grizzles and have New Orleans and Memphis fight is out for the name Jazz with the loser becoming the Hornets? Although maybe Memphis could just be the Blues and NO the Jazz.

New NFL overtime rule

I heard someone mention this on the radio yesterday, but I'm not sure I heard what they answer was.

What happens if the team kicking off in overtime successfully executes an onside kick. Can they win with just a field goal, or do they need to kick off again?

It sounded like they "experts" thought the game would be over that the rule was for the opportunity of possession, not actual possession.

Green Bay in the NFL

I hate to admit stealing the base of this idea from Colin Blowhard, but I did...

Green Bay WI is the 261 most populace city in the US and has a successful NFL team. Cities with greater population include: South Bend (# 243), Billings (#255), Ann Arbor, Lansing and Flint (#214-216).
The second lowest city with a big 3 professional sports franchise is Orlando (#83) with over twice the population - I would assume it would be much higher if we were looking at surrounding area.
It is impressive that the city was able to maintain the team before the NFL became what it is today. The other legendary teams from small town - Canton Bulldogs, Portsmouth Spartans etc. got gobbled up by bigger cities or went out of business. It is not surprising they are able to maintain business today, with the protections offered by revenue sharing of the massive NFL TV contract. But I would assume that had they not been the dominant team of the 1960s - there would be no team in Green Bay today.

Cowherd

I am fortunate that I don't listen to him.

As far as the OL theory, you could probably do that with any other position. Especially if you combined positions to make 5 players (like an OL). You can measure a team's success on # of starts their DBs and the strong side LB have. I bet the numbers would be similar.

And you're absolutely right about his examples. That is selective sampling at its finest. Pick 5 teams that did well. See if they fit your theory. Use them as an example.

I don't get the NFL theory. Just that good teams have good picks so they trade them, and bad teams don't?

cause and effect

I'm stuck listening to Colin Cowherd (Blowhard) on espn radio. Two days in a row he has made statements as fact that I would argue need a little more investigation.
Yesterday - you can anticipate the number of wins for a college football team based on the #of starts the offensive linemen have coming into the season. He sighted examples of USC, Oklahoma, Alabama etc as having OL with >65 starts coming into the season. Some disappointing teams like Missouri (I don't remember the others) had inexperience OLs and that explains their relatively poor seasons. He was using this to say that Notre Dame will win 10+ games this year because they have 80+ starts in their OL. Hello Mr. Blowhard welcome to anecdotal evidence. I have no data to back it up but I would guess one could state an equal number of teams that had relatively few OL starts that were winners and teams with many OL starts that weren't. I'm not saying that OL experience isn't important, but there a many other things especially in college, that determine the teams ultimate record. ND might win 10 games because they have a pretty easy schedule. OSU could have a totally new line and I would still pick them to win the BigTen this season. USC might have complete turnover but I'm guessing they're going to have a chance to win the Pac10...
Today it is - good teams trade down in the draft, bad teams trade up. In the last X years the Patriots, Steelers, Giants etc have traded down and the Lions, Bengals and Raiders have traded up. Well guess what the Patriots, Steelers and Giants are good teams and likely don't to take a chance with as many rookies, where as the bad teams need a lot of help and might try to jump up to get someone they think they really need. You don't think the Lions want to trade down? No one wants to give them anything of "value". No one wants a top 5 pick this year...