Tag: sports

The love of money is the root of all evil. 70 years of success isn’t enough to prevent Europe’s biggest soccer teams from falling into the clutches of the bankers:

 A group made up of the biggest soccer clubs in Spain, England and Italy has agreed to join a breakaway league that has the potential to change the landscape of world soccer, according to The New York Times. 

So far, 12 teams have reportedly endorsed or signed up for the super league, including Real Madrid, Barcelona and Atlético Madrid from Spain; Manchester United, Liverpool, Manchester City, Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham from England; and Juventus, A.C. Milan and Inter from Italy. 

The report suggested that each permanent member of the proposed breakaway league, which would begin in 2022, has been promised €350 million ($425 million) with JPMorgan Chase & Co. in discussions to help finance the league….

Under the proposals reviewed at the time, the super league, which would play its matches in the middle of the week, sought to secure 16 top soccer franchises as permanent members and to add four qualifiers from domestic competitions. The clubs would be split into two groups of 10, with the top four teams in each group qualifying for the knockout stages, culminating in a final that would take place on a weekend.

The event would, according to the documents, generate hundreds of millions of dollars in additional revenue for the participating teams, which are already the richest clubs in the sport. (An alternative version of the plan proposed 15 permanent members and five qualification spots.) The group had entered into discussions with JPMorgan Chase & Co. to raise financing for the project, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The firm has so far declined to comment.

UEFA found a powerful ally in opposition to the plans in FIFA, soccer’s global governing body. FIFA warned that any player who took part in such an unsanctioned league would be banned from appearing in the World Cup. The statement came after UEFAs president, Aleksander Ceferin, demanded support from his FIFA counterpart, Gianni Infantino, amid mounting speculation that the breakaway would have FIFA’s backing.

European soccer leaders huddled on the telephone and in video conferences over the weekend to forge a counterattack. However, finding a solution to the potential loss of the biggest brands in soccer is not an easy task. The Premier League, for example, would lose much of its sheen — and almost certainly a lot of the commercial appeal that has turned it into the richest league in soccer — should it move to banish its top six teams.

My prediction is that severing the big teams from their domestic leagues is going to backfire, as the combination of foreign players and foreign competition, combined with the extreme convergence that will be imposed upon the new league, will cause them to be replaced by new domestic favorites.

I’m a longtime Arsenal and AC Milan supporter, but I can’t even imagine having any interest in this super league. It’s basically going to be like an All-Star game all season long. UEFA and FIFA are among the most corrupt organizations on the planet, but at least they have a genuine and substantial commitment to supporting the sport at all levels. This new league doesn’t, won’t, and can’t, it’s about nothing but TV money. Which is why kicking out every organization and player involved is the right response.

UEFA were strong in response, announcing that every club and player that takes part in the Super League will be banned from all competitions at both European and  international level – and extends to international level and competitions including the European Championship…. The new league represents the American takeover of elite European football, which will become a closed shop run by its founder members. It is bankrolled by US banking giant JP Morgan and is the brainchild of Real Madrid president Florentino Perez and the American owners of three leading English clubs. 

In addition to being proof that too much money ruins everything, it will be an interesting test of nationalism vs financial capitalism. I won’t be surprised if the top six English teams that leave for it eventually become less popular than the teams that stay in the Premier League. 

Sports journalists are less willing than alcoholics to admit they have a problem:

Almost every single sport has experienced a TV ratings erosion over the past year, and dishonest people with an agenda have liked blaming the lower ratings on sports becoming more political.

Well, the least political sport on the planet just got some depressing ratings news. This weekend’s Masters on CBS generated its lowest viewership numbers in 28 years.

I don’t follow golf closely, but to my knowledge, there have not been any golfers who have kneeled during a playing of the national anthem. There have not been many golfers who have protested anything. Courses have not featured political messages.

Yet the biggest tournament of them all just pulled its worst numbers since 1993.

Have a few people here and there stopped watching sports in some ridiculous protest because of politics? Yes. Is it a significant, game-changing number? No.

The obvious and most significant reason for any and all sports TV ratings loss is cord-cutting. People are saying goodbye to cable at a rapid rate. From 2014 to 2020, 23{3549d4179a0cbfd35266a886b325f66920645bb4445f165578a9e086cbc22d08} of households cut the cord. Approximately 6.6 million households cut the cord in 2020 after 6.3 million households cut the cord in 2019.

While we have data on cord-cutting, we don’t have numbers for how the pandemic has changed the viewing habits of sports fans. But it’s obvious people’s lives are different, their schedules have changed and their priorities have shifted. We can’t quantify any of these things, but they are absolutely a factor in sports across the board losing viewers.

Actually, it’s much more likely that there is a knock-on effect. I didn’t watch the Masters, so I have no idea if it was a big diversity fest, although the fact that a Japanese golfer won it for the first time ever does tend to indicate that it might have been.

But at this point, I suspect people are beginning to assume that televised sports are all converged, and they’re actually beginning to preemptively turn them off. I haven’t not only quit watching NFL football, but I’ve quit watching Premiership and Seria A football as well, in addition to the Champions League. I assume that they’re chock full of SJW hectoring, but I don’t actually know, because I preemptively stopped watching them. 

The NCAA is 100 percent committed to equality concerning the non-payment of all student-athletes, regardless of sex or sexual identity:

The National Collegiate Athletic Association Board of Governors said on Monday that it “firmly and unequivocally supports” transgender biological male athletes competing in women’s sports at the college level.

It comes amid an ongoing push by Republican-led states to enact measures that seek to protect female athletes, who are likely to have a biological disadvantage if forced to compete against male-born students.

“The NCAA Board of Governors firmly and unequivocally supports the opportunity for transgender student-athletes to compete in college sports,” the board wrote in their statement. “The NCAA has a long-standing policy that provides a more inclusive path for transgender participation in college sports.”

NCAA also addressed questions about how the association determines which states will host championship games.

“When determining where championships are held, NCAA policy directs that only locations where hosts can commit to providing an environment that is safe, healthy and free of discrimination should be selected,” the board wrote.

The states should respond to this by passing laws forbidding universities to charge for tickets or for television and merchandising rights to sporting events in which the players are not monetarily compensated.

From Peter King’s weekly football column:

Interesting contrast in your column [from the story about the British book heist that I posted last week] that the 1566 Latin edition of Copernicus’ world-changing theory was valued at $293,000. Meanwhile, the Tom Brady rookie card from 2000 was priced at $2.3 million.

Actually, I think this is a good sign. By the time the West hits rock bottom, the only value of the original Copernicus book in most people’s eyes would be for kindling.

And this is why you should subscribe to Castalia Library while the printing presses still function.

Okay, that’s just ridiculous. My high school didn’t just win its fourth consecutive state title in basketball last night, it demonstrated that it really should be playing in 4A.

Top-ranked Minnehaha Academy won its fourth state tournament championship in as many tries, besting Alexandria 80-29 on Saturday at the Target Center.

The Redhawks (20-1) ending the past three full seasons with Class 2A titles. They moved up to Class 3A last season and won the Section 4 title. But coronavirus canceled the state tournament. Winning Saturday makes Minnehaha the fourth program to win at least four consecutive titles.

Redhawks senior Chet Holmgren, a 7-1 matchup nightmare considered the top college recruit in the nation, made his share of plays. So did freshman Mercy Miller, who scored 15 points. Older brother Hercy poured in 24. Holmgren added 18.

The excellence of the basketball team seems utterly bizarre to me because back in my day, the only winter sport in which MA was even remotely competitive was the ski team, and Minneapolis North was the dominant basketball program. For example, if you remember when UConn won the NCAA title, they were led by a North player, Khalid El-Amin.

That being said, I’m glad that there weren’t so many different levels of competition when I was in high school, even though it prevented me from ever winning a state title. In track, I had no trouble consistently beating all the 1A state champions from Brooklyn Center and Mahtomedi in our conference, but came in third behind two North sprinters in the 2A Regional finals. And while my soccer team was unexpectedly – and unjustly – knocked out in the state semifinals in overtime, beating our archrivals at Minneapolis Washburn in the first round remains my absolute favorite out of all the hundreds of soccer games I’ve played.

Now that was a truly memorable game. It was the only time I can recall a high school soccer game making the 10 o’clock news, as the massive brawl that took place on the field immediately after the final whistle was one of the biggest disruptions to take place in Minneapolis prior to the George Floyd riots. As a result of the two games that season, there was so much bad blood between the teams that the school had to change the annual Super Soccer Day tradition where every team from the C-squads on up would play each other by replacing Washburn with Southwest.

If I’d wanted a state title, I suppose I should have stuck with tennis. The guys with whom I played JV as a freshman before switching to track won state our senior year. But I think titles are considerably less meaningful than the experience of the competition. That’s not sour grapes talking either, as I’ve won nine conference championships, both as a team member and as an individual, at the top high school and NCAA levels.

Anyhow, I think it’s always best to compete at the highest level available to you, even if that means you can’t walk away with a victory. Fortunately for the MA players of today, they’re getting the chance to play against – and even beat – the nation’s top teams outside of the state high school league.

Deshaun Watson is done:

Tuesday’s press conference caused many to view the ongoing controversy involving Deshaun Watson differently. Among the many now viewing the situation differently, apparently, is Nike.

Via CNBC.com, the sports apparel giant has suspended its endorsement deal with Watson.

“We are deeply concerned by the disturbing allegations and have suspended Deshaun Watson. We will continue to closely monitor the situation,” Nike said in a statement.

It’s simply astonishing how people, and organizations, think they can somehow bluster their way through things when they know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, what the other side knows about them.

This isn’t actually about an NFL quarterback….

It’s nice to see a former Minnehaha graduate doing well. At this point, it’s apparent that I’m no longer my high school’s most well-known alum. But I’m almost certainly still the most infamous… not that the academy is any more eager than my university is to acknowledge me as a graduate of their august halls.

He earned his first Division I offer in sixth grade, joined the varsity team at Minnehaha Academy in Minneapolis as a seventh grader, nabbed his first high-major offer a year later, and won three straight state titles in high school, missing out on a chance at an elusive four-peat after COVID-19 cut short his senior season. He won three gold medals with USA Basketball’s youth teams, and became the highest-rated recruit in Gonzaga history when he committed.

It’s a little surreal for those of us who remember Gonzaga as the ultimate Cinderella team to seriously credit the fact that they are serious contenders for the national championship. I’m not a big basketball fan, although I’ll never forget the 1983 championship when NC State upset Phi Slama Jama on the same night that my church team beat Elim Baptist, a team that had beaten us by 47 points during the season, for the Baptist League title. If I recall correctly, I even scored eight points, which may well have been a season high for me as a non-shooting shooting guard.

Anyhow, good luck to Gonzaga. Favorites or not, they’re still the sort of team you almost have to cheer for come March Madness, like Cleveland State, Richmond, and, of course, Bucknell.

Apparently seeing how the NBA ratings have cratered, Major League Baseball has decided that it needs to follow suit and go after that sweet, succulent Social Justice demographic:

Major League Baseball announced Friday that it is moving the 2021 All-Star Game and 2021 draft out of Atlanta in protest of a new Georgia law that has raised concerns about its potential to disproportionately disenfranchise minority voters.

In a statement, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said the league is “finalizing a new host city and details about these events will be announced shortly.”

A source told ESPN that the All-Star Game is still planned for Los Angeles in 2022 and won’t be moved up to fill the void this summer.

“Over the last week, we have engaged in thoughtful conversations with Clubs, former and current players, the Players Association, and The Players Alliance, among others, to listen to their views,” Manfred said as part of his statement. “I have decided that the best way to demonstrate our values as a sport is by relocating this year’s All-Star Game and MLB Draft.

I’d like to say that I’m going to boycott baseball to express my contempt for MLB’s convergence, but unfortunately, I haven’t seen a baseball game since 1991. 

The Olympics have embraced social justice too, but that’s practically redundant.

 It’s not just crazy for feminists to insist on equal pay for women’s sports, it’s literally ruinous: 

The NCAA Division I men’s basketball championship budget for the 2018-19 season was $28 million — almost twice as much as the women’s budget.

Information provided by the NCAA to ESPN on Friday shows the men’s tournament brought in a total net income of $864.6 million that season, while the women’s event lost $2.8 million — the largest loss of any NCAA championship.

The men’s tournament budget for the 2018-19 season was $28 million, while the women’s was $14.5 million.

The demand for equality is why literally hundreds of men’s college teams have been eliminated. It also demonstrates why catering to it is going to destroy any organization or institution that does, including the universities and militaries.

The point is not that women can’t produce work of superlative quality that sells very well. Castalia Library’s newest book, written by a woman about a little girl, looks as if it is going to be out of stock faster than we’d anticipated. But if we were to insist that half our books be written by female authors, more than a few of our subscribers would rightly stop subscribing due to our failure to respect their demand.

It’s informative, is it not, that the sports media will openly admit that they’d rather defend a black SJW who sexually assaults women than a white man with right-wing views:

The Deshaun Watson that we thought we knew probably does not exist. We all need to commit to that reality and act accordingly. This includes the media, which has largely (though not entirely) tiptoed around the allegations. I suspect it is in part because Watson has spoken up about social justice issues, and he has fought to get away from a dysfunctional franchise, two causes that have endeared him to many in sports media. I don’t think people are giving him a pass for the assault allegations, but if you think most people in the media will go after him as hard and fast as we would go after, say, Curt Schilling, if he faced these kinds of allegations, you are fooling yourself.

At least this one journalist is admitting the obvious. Give him credit for that, anyhow. The SSH angle of this case is particularly interesting, as it indicates that Watson will almost certainly be a failure as a team leader. Many will see Watson as a predator, but I see him more as a psychologically broken and pitiable creature, a rare Gamma in Alpha clothing.

Not that it excuses any criminal activity, only that it suggests his NFL failure was always all but inevitable even if the whole thing were to go away tomorrow.