The Man in Blak

We can put those teams into two categories. One, teams that recently saw new stadiums. Cleveland, Seattle, Toronto. All three saw attendance booms when those new stadiums mixed with franchise-best win/loss records. Second are the expansion clubs, Florida, Tampa Bay, Colorado. And to nip something here before I go on, Florida saw their best attendance last year since 1997, Toronto their best since 1999. Seattle's attendance dropped to ONLY 2.7 million, fourth in the league. Cleveland built such a high drawing club that it was impossible for their attendance to remain that high. They sold out practically every game in the late 90s thanks to a new park and the first period of good Indians baseball since the 1950s. The expansion clubs drew high numbers because expansion clubs are fresh products. Just look at the Oklahoma City Hornets for a similar example of these effects. Second, people forget that baseball experienced a surge in attendance just before the baseball strike. The Colorado Rockies drawing over 4 million inflated these numbers. And for the record, baseball attendance is up 8,458 fans PER GAME from 20 years ago. That's a net increase. How much of that +8,458/game comes from the 5 biggest markets though? The argument is that baseball is a regional game and nothing you've said has proven that statement to be false. The top 10 teams draw as many fans as the bottom 20. 6 of the top 8 teams attendance wise come from 2 states (Cali & NY). Those 6 teams alone accounted for 20 of the 69 million fans (29%) that went to ballgames. Add in Oakland and that number swells to 32% of all attendance coming from 2 states. Since '86 the Yankees are drawing almost 2 million MORE per year which is about 25,000 more per game just from one team. A handful of markets are solely responsible for baseball's popularity. Outside of those markets most fans are relatively apathetic. How is baseball not a regional game? Let's pin down by what we mean for a "regional game." Football seems to be the popular contrast in this argument - how do its attendance figures compare to baseball's performance? Do the lower-tier teams in the NFL draw numbers that are more comparable to the upper-tier teams? I suspect that you're going to see a similar divide as you've illustrated in baseball, but I think that it's worth double checking the numbers. Also, one thing to consider about the attendance figures for baseball - the market size and climate may be a stronger indicator for those attendance numbers than the vitality of baseball in that region itself. For instance, Kansas City is never going to out draw New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, or Boston, just because the amount of potential customers and disposable income is lower. I suspect that some (not all) of those lower markets will be lesser markets in every sports.

Only if you're a baseball fan. I personally couldn't tell you a single baseball moment that I'd consider "great". And I was at the ALCS game 4 between the Sox & Yankees a few years ago. Was it a memorable game/moment? Yeah. But would I call it a "great" moment? No, because I don't really care for baseball. Vinatieri's Snow Bowl field goal (and subsequent Super Bowl winner) were both greater in my eyes & mind. EDIT: And I just remembered ... the homerun by Boone that people will allegedly tell their kids about ... I left the hotel room bar to go to my room and watch a regular season game between the Bruins & Stars on ESPN. Just because one person loves baseball doesn't mean we all do. Can we just put this argument in a drawer somewhere and forget about it? Arguing that a sport is better because it has more "great moments" is an entirely subjective practice and, thus, a very flimsy premise to stand on.

I'm reluctant to trust a lot of what information that ESPN has on their site, given that they rarely update the baseball statistics (I think Tony Graffanino is still the on the second base depth chart for the Royals), but I understand what you're saying. Baseball has had issues with marketing itself, but it's slowly getting better. The World Baseball Classic, as ballyhooed as it may be, is a step towards furthering baseball's place in the international consciousness. Recent commercials, like the Pepsi one with Vladdy and A-Rod, have done a fair job of marketing the players themselves. The next step that baseball needs to take is to market the game itself. Football (and even NASCAR, to a certain extent) is its own culture - tailgating, coming to the game all painted up, and scantily clad cheerleaders are all indicative of the "experience" behind being at the game. Baseball hasn't lost that feel - I'd still maintain that there's nothing quite like experiencing a baseball game live and in person - but they haven't done a good job of selling that experience to fans on a national basis. Marketing seems to be focused on playing catchup, and trumpeting regional feuds (Boston-New York, for example) as some kind of national event when, in reality, they should be selling all of the stars of the game, from all areas around the country.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't there a recent article that showed that the sales for Blue Jays tickets were up? The only team that would concern me from naiwf's list would be Cleveland, but they've been in the middle of a youth movement - I'd be interested to see how their 2005 attendance compared to their 2004 and 2003 numbers. Most of the teams that you've mentioned are some of the worst teams in the league. Tampa Bay and Colorado have been perennial losers in recent years, Seattle had a HUGE fall from grace and have seemed to crater out at the cellar of the AL West. Toronto is only now starting to make a climb back into contention. Florida's the only exception, but the fanbase there (which is already in an oversaturated market) has been completely raped of all optimism by the business practices of the Marlins ownership. People didn't show up for the '03 World Series team because the last time they invested time and money in a Marlins World Championship team, the whole franchise might as well have been sold off for pennies on the dollar.

If it was a four or five year extension, I'd have more reservations about the deal. As it is, Winn has a very good combination of power of speed, which historically indicates that the player is going to age a little more gracefully than your typical MLB veteran. Winn may not be a 20/20 candidate over the last two years of the deal, but I think he'll still provide more than enough value as a centerfielder to justify the contract.

And the reason that Boston is still dominated by Sox-talk is because the Red Sox have existed for over a century, far more years than the Patriots have had on the New England sports scene, which goes to my other point.

He's not going to replicate his otherworldly September for the duration of his contract, but Randy Winn is actually a very valuable player. He gets on base at a respectable clip, runs the bases very well, is a decent defensive center fielder, and has a little bit of power to round out his game. It's a lengthy extension, but it's justified - there's no center fielders coming through the Giant prospect pipeline anytime soon and, in the meantime, Winn could be one of the five best centerfielders in the league. Also, from what I understand, Winn is from the San Francisco area, which makes the signing a decent PR move as well.

Yeah, but that thread devolved into an argument about whether the Washington Redskins were going to spend $100 billion on their team this year. Let's start fresh and try again.

Not really the fairest example, though, is it? For starters, Elway and the Broncos might as well own the whole city of Denver for their back-to-back Super Bowl wins in the late 90's. Secondly, the team as it stands right now is a complete joke; when the Rockies were making playoff runs early on in their history, they were among the league leaders in attendance. Finally, the Rockies could still be considered a recent expansion team - they haven't been around long enough to build enough history to create a diehard fanbase that will stay with the team through the valleys of the success cycle.

That's a little bit of a stretch. The NCAA game was licensed as such out of necessity, rather than any growing popularity for college baseball. EA Sports needed to have some kind of a license on their baseball game, which was already into development, but the MLB license exclusivity had already been snatched up by another competing company. The MVP series was too successful for EA to completely close up shop for a year, so they slapped the NCAA trademark on it and ran.

And, to top it all off, ESPN was celebrating the fact that Kenny Williams was "being honest" about Frank. Are you serious? Can we dig up the "Reasons why ESPN is terrible" thread again? The reason other GMs don't make comments like that is because it's childish and completely unprofessional. Between these comments and Ozzie Guillen's existence, it's like Chicago White Sox: The High School Years.

That's a pretty large "if", given that his ankle is held together by a couple of staples and some chewing gum. There could also be some significant impact for Thomas in moving from a hitter's haven in Chicago to Oakland, on top of the fact that he's a year older. But the real concern is health - I think Oakland would be very fortunate to get 250 at-bats and 10-12 homers from the Big Hurt this year. Thanks for the correction. I meant to have an "almost" in there, for "almost" winning 95, but I missed putting it in there. And yeah, I agree with you on the Yankees. They're not going to win 100 games and just walk away with the division lead, but I would still consider them the favorite. Boston did not improve appreciably with their offseason moves; Crisp may outperform Damon in center field, and Beckett (along with a healthy Schilling) will undoubtedly bolster their rotation, but I have no idea what they're getting from the corner infield positions and there's virtually no outfield depth, should one of the starters get hurt. Toronto will probably do enough damage to both Boston and New York to make themselves a factor in the race, but I don't see them having enough offense to break through.

The Brewers are going to cause problems for the Central teams, but I think they're probably one year away. St. Louis, Chicago, and Houston are all still very strong in the division, and there's still more than a few unknowns on their team. Does Turnbow hold up over another year? How badly does Capuano regress, if at all? Will Prince Fielder be an offensive factor? As for "everybody blowing the Yankees", they won 100 games last year with Bernie and Womack playing in the outfield and plenty of injuries on the pitching staff. I don't think they'll win 100 this year, but they will still be very competitive: Damon is an improvement, and Cano may continue to get better. And yeah, the A's look great on paper, but there's plenty of questions there as well. Does Huston Street keep performing at such a spectacular level? Do Milton Bradley and Frank Thomas hold up through the whole year? I think they'll have a real race on their hands in the West and, while I think they're good to enough to win, I'm not sure that they're really stacked enough to make a full push to the World Series.

AL East: New York Yankees AL Central: Chicago White Sox AL West: Oakland Athletics AL Wildcard: Boston Red Sox Yankees over White Sox Athletics over Red Sox Yankees over Athletics ________________________________ NL East: New York Mets NL Central: St. Louis Cardinals NL West: San Diego Padres NL Wildcard: Chicago Cubs Cardinals over Padres Mets over Cubs Mets over Cardinals ____________________________ World Series Champs: New York Yankees

Murder simulators.

I think you've got to make a distinction between the artform and the artists itself. The music itself is most assuredly an artform, as has been asserted more than a few times in the thread itself. And the medium provides the opportunity for very complex lyrical deliveries (which are a big draw for the genre on their own). The problem is that a great majority of the artists in rap squander that opportunity. Like Banky mentioned, there's so much watered-down sixth-grade shit out there that it completely dwarfs the entire field. Shit that caters to the lowest possible denominator, with juvenile fantasies giftwrapped in enough obscenity and profanity to make it rebellious and profitable. I don't know what Czech's comments were about Kanye West, but I'll tell you that he's one of the only mainstream rappers that appreciate because he'll actually go outside of the overplayed gangsta bullshit, with top-notch production no less. That's the kind of stuff I'm looking for, inventive tracks like the Grey Album where Danger Mouse hit some old Beatles tunes and put Jay-Z in a new and interesting context. Stuff like Prefuse 73, where there's a whirlwind of samples and cuts of all kinds of different music, from old jazz records to electronic glitches. And I'm undoubtedly missing others as well. The fact that rap is a musical artform does excuse or elevate "Make 'Em Say Uhh!" to some kind of grand artistic statement. The dominance of gangsta culture in mainstream hip-hop doesn't mean that the entire genre is garbage, though.

Yeah, the guy's way out there... ...but do you really send him flowers? Flowers? Thompson is a maniac, but I can see how he would interpret that gesture as a mockery of his campaign against video game violence. Especially considering the insults that have preceded it.

Ah, I didn't realize it was still written by the Stones. Mea culpa. Though, as Rando alluded to, it brings into question what exactly constitutes a cover of a song. Should the Gram Parsons and the FBB version be considered a cover, since the original authors recorded their version of the song after the "first" one?

Plenty of people seem to like "Wild Horses", so it probably should be mentioned here, since it's a Flying Burrito Brothers original. I kid you not.

Despite recordings that span three decades, I'm still not sure that anybody's really knocked "You Keep Me Hangin' On" out of the park. Of course, the most famous version is the first one, sang by the Supremes. But, despite the surprisingly decent lyrics that touch on unrequited love, the original Motown recording seems like a cold performance; there's a faint hint of emotion when Diana Ross sings "Go on, get out - get out of my life / and let me sleep at night", but the rest of the vocals are bouncy, almost playful, and they don't strike the right tone. Despite the new maturity (this certainly isn't "Where Did Our Love Go"), the song still seems very businesslike, as though the Supremes and the Motown folks went into the studio, kicked it out in an hour, and then moved on to the next Top 20 hit. This is probably the best overall version of the three, but it still misses the mark in my opinion because it's overproduced, with more sheen and polish than legitimate emotion. The Vanilla Fudge version is a stark contrast to the Supremes recording, going much slower and eschewing the big Motown band song for a slow crunch. The opening is an unremarkable march with organs, drums, and cymbals blazing, but once the vocals come in, you immediately feel the desperation that the Supremes version was lacking, complete with harmonies that I can't possibly believe that a vocal trio like the Supremes wouldn't have used. Of course, once it hits the verse, the song regrettably morphs into fucking clown music, with an unwieldy guitar crunch/fart carrying a verse that sounds terribly out of place. It's like they nailed the first part of the song, then remembered that they're fucking Vanilla Fudge and immediately crapped atop the verse with their overblown psychedelia, like there was some contractual obligation to sound like the rest of the other shitty psychedelic rock bands out there. But despite being less appealing than the original, Vanilla Fudge's cover manages to capture more of the emotion behind the music and lyrics. Then there's Kim Wilde's 80's redux...and there's no way I'm even touching that in extensive detail. You could have told me that this was another one of Tiffany's covers, and I would probably have believed you. At least it had the harmonies in the chorus. I really, really want to like this song. The chord progressions and melody are both tremendous, and the lyrics carry a surprising amount of desperation for a 60's pop song. But it doesn't seem like anybody can really pin them both down in the same song. Or maybe I'm just insane. But how about you? Any songs out there that you think are just begging for a better take?

Technically, El Bruj0 (or however you spell his name) started it.

At least you didn't recount the whole history of the word. Christ.

Good to hear. Sorry for standing you up last night, I got paged to some supposedly urgent matter at work that ended up being nothing. The roses are in the mail.

Just a little over the top. Like bondage rope.

You can always split the difference and listen to Faust - a little bit of the German proto-post-rock stuff from Can, a little bit of the electric weirdness from the Residents. Okay, maybe very little of the latter. (All I can think of, right off hand, is the "Picnic on a Frozen River" / "Me Lack Space" sequence on So Far.) At the very least, all three are obscure groups from the 70's that are worth a listen.