GMEN HQ » Lockout

BREAKING NEWS:

Joe Tufaro — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 16:58:36 +0000

The GIANTS have just announced that training camp will NOT be held in Albany this year, but instead will be held at their practice facility adjacent to The New Meadowlands Stadium. This makes you believe that a deal is still not all that close to being done between the players and the owners. The Giants were scheduled to begin training camp August first, and while that date still remains firm and possible, the logistics of moving equipment and everything necessary for a complete and successful camp is just too daunting a task to be handled on short notice, and with no definite dates attached.

J.T.’s Take

Joe Tufaro — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 16:09:59 +0000

As one lockout slowly comes to an end, another one begins. The NBA owners will lock out their players tonight while they try to figure out a better system to operate under. The NBA, unlike the NFL, has as many as 22 teams losing money on an annual basis. The agreed upon number is that their are at least 12 teams operating in the red. Of course the NBA is a completely different animal from the NFL. The NBA is a star league driven by star players. Cities and therefore franchises are only successful if they can develop or acquire big name college or established players. The New York Knicks are a perfect example of a team that had lost attendance, and had become irrelevant in the league. They had no star players since Patrick Ewing left, and had disappeared from the landscape of New York and National sports. Once they were able to invest in Amare Stoudamire, and Carmelo Anthony, they were the talk of the NBA. They of course were a .500 team with both those players on the roster, and were swept in the first round of the playoffs, but they had star players and were again a topic of conversation. The NBA is not being sued by their players. This is a true lockout of the players and a complete shutdown of the league much like the NHL experienced a few years back. The NBA also has many owners that own NHL franchises, and they know first-hand the benefits they achieved by changing the way they pay players, and what they achieved by shutting down the league for a full season. The NBA and NBAPA are said to be so far apart that no deal will come quickly. The most optimistic diagnosis is the league may start up again sometime in February and play a 50 game season. The NBA will suffer from fans already sick of labor talk from the NFL. They will also suffer from the fact that November-January is prime NFL season, and no one will care what they are doing until February. The sense of urgency just won’t exist from the fans. The media will cover it sparingly as the NFL season chugs along. The NBA has real problems and this is a chance to make the changes it needs, and that won’t be a simple, or quick fix.
The NFL on the other hand is the NFL. The Shield, as the league is known, is bigger than any player. It’s nice to have big stars, but teams and franchises make the NFL successful. A tweet this morning from a former player asked the question if any fans root for owners. Of course we do. We are fans of our team. We adore certain players, but it’s the franchise, and their successes that makes us such loyal fans. This is verified by the amazing success of DirecTV’s Sunday Ticket which allows fans to watch their team no matter where they live. Fans don’t change loyalties in the NFL because free agents leave, coaches get fired, or even if they themselves move away. The League, The Franchises, and The Teams are the stars of the NFL.

Rashard Mendenhall – Osama Sympathizer or Soapbox Orator?

Wed, 04 May 2011 20:10:10 +0000

Associated Press

The ill effects of the NFL Lockout are beginning to mirror that age old saying, “Idle time is the devil’s workshop.” The clearest case of this is the recent twittery of Pittsburgh Steelers, Rashard Mendenhall. While 99.999% of America was basking in the demise of Osama bin Laden, one of the most ruthless terrorists in world history, Mendenhall exposed himself as that .000001% that wasn’t.

On Monday May 2nd, 2011, after bin Laden’s death, Rashard Mendenhall tweeted the following:

“What kind of person celebrates death? It’s amazing how people can HATE a man they have never even heard speak. We’ve only heard one side…”

Under normal circumstances I would be inclined to agree with this portion of his statement: “What kind of person celebrates death?” These are NOT normal circumstances!
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The 2011 NFL Draft – Collinsworth, Howie and Boomer Weigh In.

Thu, 21 Apr 2011 21:24:18 +0000

On Wednesday, April 20, 2011 at 1pm ET, TXN Sports and Big Lead Sports organized a conference call with NFL Analysts, Chris Collinsworth, Howie Long and Boomer Esiason. A select group of reporters were invited to join, myself included, to discuss the upcoming NFL Draft that will take place at Radio City Music Hall in New York City from April 28-30 2011.

The call was also organized to promote TXN, a newly formed website (txnsports.com) that will launch this coming Tuesday. TXN, “The Experts Network” will introduce a new way to interact with analysts such as the panel above and the launch of their site is highly anticipated. It was a round robin type of discussion with no shortage of Q & A from the media and experts alike. Click below for transcription of the key topics that we discussed.
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