Category: Sports

The cancer that began propagating in the NFL last year by currently unemployed San Francisco Forty-niner Colin Kaepernick has become a plague upon the nation because the National Football League failed to act in a proper manner. Sorry but when an employee is at work and wearing the uniform of his company, he is not free to say and do whatever he wants.  This myth of an unrestricted right to free speech is a bald-faced lie.

Examples:

• Can a theater worker (we are limiting this discussion to speech by employees) shout “Fire” in the middle of the movie?
• Can you call the White House and say “I want to kill the President” and nothing will happen to you?
• Can you call your local school and threaten to shoot all the dumb (insert racial or ethnic group here) and not get paid a visit by the SWAT Team?
• Can your doctor tell you that you have six months to live and you aren’t really sick?
• While at work can I call a retired person and tell them to pay their bill or we will garnish their bank account and retirement because they owe us money? (FYI we can’t do either.)
• Can an NFL player celebrate in the end zone by mooning the crowd and not be fined?

Clearly, a right of speech is not unlimited. When you—as an employee or representative of a group—say or do something, it reflects not just upon your conduct but that of your employer.

Don’t believe me, try it. I doubt any of the above examples would be defended by an employer anywhere. However, even if the employee lost their job as a result, the employer would likely still be writing a check to someone once the lawyers got done with him.

So why is it OK to have a stupid protest during the National Anthem to defend the rights of people that say it’s ok to kill policemen because they are bad and only want to kill people?

Kaepernick started to protest the National Anthem for this very reason. He wants black people to have a special right to not have to obey policemen when police have drawn their weapons in the performance of their duties. Sorry, Kap but that’s what lawyers are for. If you won’t obey an order from a policeman, especially when their weapon is drawn, then you deserve to be shot like a mad dog.

This isn’t a racial issue, its common sense that law abiding people are expected to behave this way; period.

On Friday, President Trump said what most of us feel about this issue,
“Wouldn’t you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, ‘get that son of a bitch off the field now. Out. Out. He’s fired!’”
Link: Trump SOB quote

My answer is “hell yes” that should have happened to Kaepernick a year and a half ago.

Because the NFL failed to act responsibly, this has been politicized by the Left as another front of their “Operation Chaos” to try to bring down Trump. Sorry dudes but Trump is right.

The movement is now spreading to other sports venues.

In the spirit of the times and not content to keep their mouths shut or do the right thing, the Elk Grove Join Unified School District has waded into the fray as well. This email was sent to employees of the District earlier today.

The purpose of this communication is twofold. First, thank you for all you do to support our students and your fellow colleagues. Your efforts are recognized and appreciated. Second, given recent events, I would expect that some students and staff members will elect to exercise their right to freedom of expression in a variety of manners. Such expressions could include sitting or kneeling during patriotic observances, including the Pledge of Allegiance or the National Anthem. While these are two of the most common ways people express themselves, I always marvel at the creativity of our students and staff and would not be surprised if they came up with other methods to express themselves.

Please do not overact or take disciplinary actions in response to such expressions. Site leaders should confirm this with staff, including off campus coaches, to ensure all staff understand that no punitive actions are to be taken against students or staff participating in an act of expression that does not interfere with the safe and orderly running of our schools or school sponsored events.

Related Press Release is Here

Please note what a crock of crap this is. What the District should have said was:

We respect our country and what it stands for. Our nation is not perfect but it’s the best country on the planet. When a student is representing our school at any activity, they shall not politicize the event by disrespecting our flag or anthem. Many millions have fought and died so that you could be here today. The things that united us are bigger that those issues that divide us. Lasting change is made by working thru the system not advocating its overthrow. We do not condone any course of action that advocates the murder of law enforcement in the performance of their duties. We have a zero tolerance for interjecting politics into patriotic expressions. School activities—including athletic events—are political free zones.

Please note that the District employs their own police force, I could argue that the District’s position endangers both staff and students in an effort to score cheap political points.  This is the second time in recent months that the District has waded into high profile political issues to score cheap points to prove they are politically correct enough for California.

Hey EGUSD, just so you know, I now have a reason not to give money to any of your schools for fundraisers—especially for the support of athletic teams.

Laura Ingraham wrote a book that fits this situation; “Shut up and sing”.

Or if you rather, Tim Hawkins did a version of Imagine:

Imagine all the actors
the musicians too
would stick to acting and singing
with no political views.

Bottom line is athletes should shut up and play ball. If America is so bad try moving to Iraq (or some other third world cesspool) and being on their soccer team. In the good ole days, their players were tortured when they lost.

Footballers who paid the penalty for failure: How Uday’s terror made the game a matter of life or death

Saddam’s son tortured defeated footballers

I’m sure North Korea is no different so I checked:
North Korea to Olympians: No Medals Means Labor Camp

Our guys get paid millions for playing a stupid game. The ungrateful snowflakes should respect the opportunity given to them just because they live in this country. If they want to do something meaningful how about cancelling a practice and going to Texas, Florida, or Puerto Rico and helping folks that appreciate it? Try uniting us and not dividing, you might be surprised how many folks will support you.

John M Slamkowski—A Special Correspondent

First of all I would like to thank William for the opportunity to write in this space about a couple issues; entitlement, and the sissifying of America.  Aaron Hernandez—specifically his actions in college and in the pros leading to his arrest—will lay out my argument that our entire education and athletics system is broken and in bad need of repair.  We can all agree that in our current scholastic system, everyone gets a participation trophy, and there are no clear winners or losers.  This goes for everything; science fairs, baseball, soccer, etc.  This sets up our youth to fail badly as they approach, high school, college and then the real world.  Failing badly has to do with being unprepared but only to an extent, mostly it has to do with being coddled, and sheltered from any consequences.  Without further ado let’s look at the plight of one Aaron Hernandez as told by ESPN.

Aaron Hernandez lost his dad at age 16 from complications from hernia surgery.  So right here the liberal elite set the stage for a “rough upbringing.” I can say I have no idea what it is like to lose a father at a young age, but his father was most definitely not a thug.  The story goes on to say that Aaron began showing rebel behavior and ignoring authority.  I again find this hard to believe since he was offered a scholarship and signed with the University Florida Gators.  Let me be clear, signing a scholarship doesn’t imply an athlete is a saint, but the amount of due diligence done by the university and coaching staff tells me there could not be too much smoke with Mr. Hernandez.  Rebellious behavior?  I think that is a pre-requisite for all high school age students?  Am I wrong?  The real issues with Hernandez didn’t start until he entered college, then he was coddled and babied by world class football coach Urban Meyer.  This is where society really did in Hernandez; he always had an adult figure and a very powerful one at that, cover up drug tests and make excuses for young Aaron.

In 2007 as a 17 year old freshman, Hernandez after drinking two adult beverages, attempted to leave a bar without paying. When confronted by the bouncer, Hernandez punched him so hard it ruptured his eardrum.  Police recommended charging Hernandez, but Meyer convinced them to allow internal punishment to suffice.  Let’s take a look at something here, a 17 YEAR OLD, at a BAR, having DRANK 2 DRINKS, then committing battery, yet Urban Meyer thought nothing was wrong here?  Maybe because Tim Tebow was on the team all of this would go away, maybe reading the Bible daily as Urban Meyer claimed Hernandez did, would help him find guidance.  This cover-up was also aided when the local District Attorney decided not to press any charges opting instead for “deferred prosecution.”  Let me be clear, numerous people had an opportunity to nip this in the bud, however they all passed or enabled. Then almost 6 months later…..

September 2007, Aaron Hernandez was identified as the shooter in a shooting that injured 3 people.  Even with witnesses identifying him as the shooter, Hernandez walked free with no charges filed.  Notice a pattern here?  Each time the athlete gets into trouble someone—either a coach or law official—gets in the way to avoid negative consequences.  Nothing much was heard from Hernandez over the next two seasons, his draft stock rose and after his junior season, he declared for the NFL draft and was selected in round four, guaranteeing him around $700,000.  Strange, as a big fan of college sports, I had Hernandez pegged as a first round talent. He fell pretty drastically for a player as lauded as he was in college.  He won the award for best college tight-end, a very prestigious award given out once a year.  Then details about his college and personal life began to trickle out. He admitted to smoking copious amounts of weed.  Strangely enough, he never failed a drug test at Florida, or did he?  University of Florida hides behind HIPPA laws regarding drug tests but even Hernandez admits he failed at least one.  Hernandez was never punished for any of these crimes he committed, actually worse yet, authority figures hid him from reality.

Fast forward a couple years in the NFL. Hernandez—as one of the game’s best tight-ends—lands a five year, 40 million dollar extension!  Not only making him one of the highest paid at his position, but making him an extremely wealthy man. This was in 2012; remember that year.

In June of 2013 he was named a person of interest and later arrested in connection with the murder of his friend and the husband of his fiancés sister, Odin Lloyd.  Lloyd was a friend of Hernandez.  Hernandez would be convicted of murder in April of 2015, sentenced to life with no chance of parole.

Then came more allegations; suddenly he was being questioned about that double shooting at the University of Florida again.  Worse yet he was “arrested” on charges of double murder in Boston in July of 2012, after he signed the extension!  It was alleged he killed the two victims because one of them spilled a drink on him, and the other shot him a dirty look.  Don’t get me wrong he was acquitted by expert legal help, and prosecutorial missteps, in this case, but Hernandez was not innocent.  He was never tried in the shooting that occurred in Florida.  He was accused of shooting his friend Alexander Bradley while he was in the same car as Hernandez after a late night trip to a strip club, again, no charges filed.  Hernandez committed suicide in prison on April 19th 2017; he may or may not have had synthetic marijuana in his system, and apparently—according to TMZ and other sources—had a boyfriend in jail and didn’t want the word to get out.

The Patriots football team sued to recover all the bonus money paid to Hernandez and it appears his fiancé will get very little or none of that money.  Good, it doesn’t belong to her.  His lawyers are trying to get his conviction thrown out by some loophole in the Massachusetts legal system; America is great if you can afford great lawyers.

The point of my writing is this, Hernandez and other athletes are getting coddled and babied by our new politically correct, “my son would never do that” culture that has poisoned our education system.  Lost a parent early in life, congrats you had a rough upbringing, thereby justifying your actions.  Fail a drug test?  Well a little weed never hurt that much, we should legalize it anyways.  Underage drinking, everyone does that right?  Shoot someone?  May have been an accident and hey we’ve got a big game this weekend, I will take care of this I’m the coach after all.  The football game or basketball game on Friday night takes precedence over the classroom.  Discipline that could have been instilled never happened and as a result a high school in Connecticut, a University in Florida, and an NFL team aided and abetted a murderer.  Make no mistake about it, Hernandez is not a troubled youth or a product of a broken system, and definitely not a good kid.  He is a murderer, who ran around killing people with his Glock.  Three people were murdered and at least two others were shot by this thug, so enough with the politically correct BS.

Memo to the baby boomers and Gen X, the coddling and excuse making needs to stop, start holding people accountable.  No more safe places or spaces and let’s allow the police to do their job.

After a two week hiatus, most faithful readers of this blog were wondering where I was. I heard several reports from the Blog Father.  Was I in rehab? Did I rejoin the CRA?  Was I the one who spied on Donald Trump?  Was I arrested for my shenanigans at a local Mexican restaurant a few months ago?  No on all accounts.

During my absence, X was forwarded an email that almost made him burst into rage!

Dateline: San Diego.

It has come to my attention that since the San Diego Chargers have re-located to Los Angeles, the city had nothing to do with it’s largely taxpayer financed stadium.  So it got a great idea, sell it for $10K, to a soccer team that may or may not ever come.  Kinda sound like a situation in Elk Grove?  Qualcomm Stadium—to be honest was very dated and located in the middle of a canyon—not a desirable place to play or commute too.  However if the answer is selling an 80 acre stadium and land for just $10K, I don’t think I want to know the question!  Yep, they sold 80 acres including the former NFL stadium for less than you’ll pay for a used Toyota.

It gets better. The group of investors “I love that term, give me something for literally pennies on the dollar” want to build 4,200 houses and over 1 million square feet of commercial development; think strip malls, malls, and office buildings.  While details were not released, very likely the deal would exclude the “investors” there’s that term again, from property taxes.  You are probably asking, which far left communist is leader of the republic of San Diego?  That would be CRA endorsed liberal Republican Kevin Faulconer.  Yup, the stadium initially built with taxpayer money, is now being given away for pennies on the dollar, since—well I guess—no professional team is a tenant now!

San Diego suffered from a cardinal sin; never give in to a billionaire owner and the temptation of a sports team to “rejuvenate” downtown.  However, maybe in the long run San Diego may not be that bad off, check out these other two cities facing crazy stadium repercussions over the next few years!

Let’s examine Sacramento and Oakland, the former keeping its basketball team and pulling out all the stops, the latter losing its NFL team.

Let’s start with Oakland. This city pulled out all the stops to get the Oakland Raiders to move back to Oakland from Los Angeles back in 1995.  Keep in mind; the Raiders have had a very nomadic nature during their years in the NFL shuffling from Oakland, to Los Angeles, back to Oakland, now on to Las Vegas in 2020.  What Al and Mark Davis did to the City of Oakland is criminal.  Upon moving back to the Coliseum in 1995, major renovations were required to add luxury boxes, etc. Again the city and in this case the county of Alameda gave in to a billionaire, as they bore almost all the costs.  They both fell for Davis’ push for a personal seat license, this so called “fan tax” on season ticket holders would pay back the loan on the stadium improvements pronto.  The City and County took out 200 million in bonds for stadium improvements, backed by Personal Seat Licenses (PSL’s).  These licenses were to help pay down the bond debt quicker, because if you bought a PSL you got the first right of refusal to buy tickets for any event that took place in the coliseum, sitting in the seat which you would “own.”  This was a well-conceived idea but far ahead of its time, as seat licenses are very popular now.  What the city and county didn’t count on was a number of people not buying the seat license, but buying tickets on the day of a game or through scalpers and thus avoiding the fee the PSL would levy on them.  The PSL’s were scrapped two years later. By the way, the team is leaving and the debt owed on the renovations won’t be paid off for another eight years at the earliest!  Also at a cost of roughly $350 million, almost double the initial bond amount.

Now the economics of the City of Oakland will be examined.  Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf reports that the city will have an eight figure deficit this year, mostly due to debt service on the coliseum. This doesn’t take in to consideration the improvements made to Oracle Arena, home of the soon to be San Francisco Warriors basketball team, totaling roughly 68 million.  Further, the least team standing of the trifecta, the Oakland Athletics Baseball Club, is moving to a new venue that was 100% privately financed by their owner….wow what a concept!

The city of Oakland is now left with two decaying buildings and their accompanying notes not yet paid for dreams gone bye; sounds like California accounting at its finest.  Remember the argument about how stadiums revitalize the area around them?  Have you been to the coliseum lately?  Yeah, don’t go unless you absolutely must, it’s still a drug filled cesspool.  The second argument about job creation, well if you consider part-time seasonal employees part of a hiring boom, I guess check off that box as an accomplishment as most front office jobs are filled by former players and lifelong employees.

Now let’s talk about income from the stadium itself, the items sold in the stadium such as concessions and memorabilia go 100% to the owner less any sales tax is owed to the municipality.  Parking revenue generally all goes to the owner as well.  The teams usually pay “rent” to the city for the use of the stadiums and in the case of the Raiders, they paid roughly $938k last year, a number that will rise to 3.5 million this season.  A large sum until you realize most corporations pay more in rent/property tax a year than the Raiders would have over the course of several years!  Not such a great deal at all now is it?

Rest easy Las Vegas Raiders fans, the team will be paying 1 whole dollar in rent a year in Vegas, because apparently if they pay more it could jeopardize the tax status of the bonds Las Vegas is issuing to buy the stadium.  Lastly a new revelation has come out regarding how much money the city and county was spending on maintenance of the stadium, they are actually losing 1 million on the Raiders annually due to the fact the baseball and football seasons overlap and heavy maintenance is needed to change the field over from baseball to football.  Sounds like a deal I wish I could get in on, but trust me Oakland you are much better off, pay off the debt and get some additional police on the streets, clean your city up and watch property values continue to skyrocket!

Looking at Sacramento, this process is still playing out as the city council, mayor and ownership groups have “passed the stadium bill to know what’s in it.”  We did get a very nice shiny arena in the middle of downtown, and hosted a few top tier concerts, and the NCAA March Madness games, so I guess there is that.  Yes there have been some new bars/restaurants going in downtown, however when people say the area has turned around, remember the area used to be a run-down mall sold for pennies on the dollar to the ownership group.  The fact that the team is lousy and just traded their star player does not bother me even one iota.  Neither does the fact the two local CRA units actually endorsed the idea of the arena without even bothering to ask questions or taking a principled “no” stance.  What bothers me is Sacramento caved and agreed to a deal brokered by former Mayor and NBA athlete Kevin Johnson and former State Senate President and current Mayor Darrell Steinberg.  The problem…no one really knows what is in this complicated deal; it was drawn up as a land swap, but no one really knows what land was involved.

Further additional details keep coming out that are flat out astonishing!  Sacramento State University—the flagship school in the Sacramento area and a fixture to locals—just found out they can no longer have their graduation ceremonies at the old Sleep Train Arena (former home of the Kings) and must have it at state-of-the-art Golden 1 Arena.  What is the problem X? Well the problem is rent at Sleep Train was $50K to have the event there, now the taxpayers are on the hook for $150K.

My overall point of this long blog is that these stadium deals generally include quite a big payoff up front for the owners and very little benefit for the taxpayers that get stuck with the tab for years to come.  Owners are always angling for the next big pay-off and in this case I believe the residents of San Diego and Oakland are the winners in the long run with the residents of Sacramento due quite a few more surprises along the way.  We already know that the new Kings Arena is financed over a period of 35 years and no one—including Kevin Johnson and Darrell Steinberg—is claiming that the arena will last that long. It will need to be replaced within 20 years.

I will leave you with a few quotes from the current Oakland city council president Larry Reid, the former chief of staff to Oakland Mayor Elihu Harris in the 1990’s who worked on the agreement to pay for stadium renovations; “It was a bad deal.”  Congrats President Reid for your wonderful revisionist thought.  Here is a more damning quote from Reid “The projections were off, but everyone was caught up in the emotion of having the Raiders return.”  Yup, be careful, very careful to what you agree to.

Til next time,

X

Yesterday’s Super Bowl was a great game on the field but the rest of the show (i.e. the commercials) were lame unless the soundtrack featured Johnny Cash. More on that in a minute.

At my house we skip the half time show and always have. As soon as the teams head to the locker room we hit the Mute button on the remote and pause the DVR so we can fast forward to the beginning of the second half. However, I did tell somebody prior to the game that we didn’t care which team won, we were only watching the game to see which cut of meat that Lady Gaga was going to wear for the half time show.

Now for the commercials, hands down the winner was the promo for The Walking Dead .

Much of the rest of the field was attacks on Conservatives, President Trump, or middleclass American values.

The commercials that I recall because of their in-you-face attacks on our way of life were three:
• The 84 Lumber commercial. Their unabashed defense and ever praise for illegal immigration was a clear attack on the President for trying to keep us safe and enforce existing law.
• Audi—portrayed women as chattel (property for those readers residing in Rio Linda) because of the income disparity between men and women. Sorry ladies but bearing children—especially out of wedlock—is bad for your earning power. This is why feminists embrace the sacrament of abortion instead of the Christian institution of marriage. Motherhood should always be before career. Also, in this category, you might want to add the promos for The Handmaiden’s Tale from Hulu. This show is based on a novel about a dystopian society where women are property.
• Anheuser Busch—also got into the immigration dust-up with their supposed origin story. For those that missed it, this beer conglomeration is no longer American owned, it was sold to a European company several years ago.  Any connection to Trump supporting Brexit? Makes you wonder.

For readers that may not know, my view of immigration is that we should welcome people that want to come here to be Americans and respect our way of life. If they want to keep their third-world values, live in some ethnic ghetto, and refuse to learn English then go somewhere else. We don’t need more people draining the resources of hardworking taxpayers and living on the dole. We have more than our fair share of home grown slackers living off of other people’s money. If folks want to come here, work hard, and play by the rules then “ya’ll come”.

The best spot during the broadcast was actually in the pregame show. The Ragged Old Flag segment featuring a 1974 song by Johnny Cash was great if you were willing to be charitable about a few things.
1. If you pretend that you don’t know the political allegiances of people in the segment like Harry Belafonte and take them at their word when praising American and the Constitution.

(By the way, does Harry look a bit like Voldemort?)

2. Why does the Fox announcer think we are divided? Only a few well paid malcontents are causing trouble by following the lead of a recently unemployed community organizer.
3. Cash wrote the song during the height of Watergate and thus it can be interpreted as saying the country will survive despite this out-of-control-guy in the White House.
4. The video tries too hard to be inclusive and politically correct instead of just following the story told in the song.

If you can look past these four things the video is moving.
Link: Johnny Cash Video

I was surprised that it was actually produced by Fox Sports and wasn’t tied to a Super Bowl sponsor. The back story to the spot can be found here and it’s worth the read.

Link: Super Bowl: Fox Sports Addresses Political Division, Patriotism With ‘Ragged Old Flag’ Spot

ESPN reportedly lost over one million viewers in a two month span.
Link: ESPN losses 1,176,000 viewers in two months

Like ESPN, the National Football League (NFL) is bleeding viewers. Like me, many have “cut the cable” and these wizards of entertainment can’t understand why. Well, I’m here to explain it to you. I will use simple words and offend people on both Coasts just by telling the truth.

Today, I want to discuss the NFL’s loss of viewers. Does anybody in the front office ever watch their broadcasts live or just using their DVR? The NFL people have given-up on anything except short term profit, and much to their detriment. Here are some reasons why:

Many NFL games are not even available via broadcast television. They are exclusively carried by ESPN and the NFL Network. As such people like me don’t even have the option to watch Monday Night Football (or its sibling on Thursday). I really miss Howard Cosell, Frank Gifford, Don Meredith and the rest.

Many commercials during the broadcast are NC-17 and as such my son doesn’t get to watch the games. The NFL has created barriers between youth and professional football. No wonder soccer is more popular than football.

Who at CBS thinks the Zale’s commercial is ok?  You know—the one with two women walking down the aisle after being wed; let alone the barrage of Cialis and Viagra commercials. I want to be entertained when I watch a game on television not constantly embarrassed by what is spewing forth from the New York Studios. I’ve gotten to the point that when this stuff comes on, I have to see who else is in my livingroom and hope it’s not the children. (The Mute button on my remote gets utilized excessively during commercial breaks even when I’m by myself.) Those of us in “fly-over country” don’t need to be exposed to this crap and forced to endure small snippets of societal erosion of our values and attacks on our way of life. It makes me so angry.

Then there is the Colin Kaepernick hatred of America movement. The NFL shouldn’t tolerate this behavior for a millisecond.  Kaepernick and his socialist brethren should be fined and benched. PERIOD.
If life here is really so bad—because we don’t have any problem paying black men like you millions of dollars to play a stupid game every winter—then spend some of your millions and find another country because we don’t want you here if you insist acting like a petulant child. I live in the heart of 49er Country but it will be a cold day in Hell before I will root for that team as long as this jerk is in uniform. In fact, I’m still trying to get over being angry at the NFL for the way they treated Tim Tebow.

In Part II, I hope to discuss the hijacking of family programming.

If Beyoncé did a Doritos ad for the Super Bowl would the controversy be “Unborn Black Lives Matter?”