Crashes continue
There is a great exchange between Daniel Caffey and Col. Nathan Jessup in the courtroom scene of "A Few Good Men."
"Are your men in danger Colonel?"
"Yes."
"Grave danger?"
"Is there another kind?"
NASCAR's version of that back forth is simple.
"Do we have the TV news from last week's race?"
"Yes."
"Is it bad TV news?"
"Is there another kind?"
Wow, last Sunday's race at Fontana was the lowest on record for Fox. It was the lowest rated Fontana race ever. Three of the eight lowest-rated raced ever on Fox - which started airing NASCAR's top circuit in 2001 - have come this year.
The numbers - 2.4 ratings share and 4 million viewers - were down 25 and 22 percent respectively from last year.
Yes, if you want to say the return of Tiger Woods to contention and the monster increases of folks watching golf, you would be correct. But do not gloss over the plummeting interest in NASCAR, considering the Fontana race numbers from as recently as 2016 were 40 percent better rated and had 41 percent more viewers.
In fact, see if you notice this trend:
Here are the number of viewers (in millions) for each of the first five races in 2015 compared to this season:
Daytona: 13.36/9.3
Atlanta: 9.5/5.61
Las Vegas: 7.74/4.73
Phoenix 7.0/4.58
Fontana: 7.3 /4.03
We'll all again, "Is there another kind" of news for NASCAR right now than bad news?
Ownership has its privileges
Couple of stories circulating out there this morning that put the exclamation point on the well-known fact that being a sports owner is a kick-tail gig if you can find it.
First, there's this little tidbit.
Want to know what it would take to get in on the bidding to buy the Carolina Panthers?
Let's remember that Charlotte is a not a top-10 market and while the stadium is not bad it's not on anyone's top-10 or even top-15 lists.
Well, the starting point is a tidy $2.5 billion. Yes Billion with a 'B.' Now know that Jerry Richardson, a former NFL player who played all of two seasons and used his $4,700 bonus check from winning the 1959 NFL championship to open the first Hardee's in these United States.
Of course Hardee's exploded and it became Flagstaff Foods, a company that Richardson was the CEO of for a longtime before he won the bidding and the landed the expansion Panthers in 1993.
The price? It was $206 million in cash, mostly out of Richardson's private account.
Yeah, we think anyone who can double their money almost four times over in less than 25 years would qualify as a good investment.
In another sport but with the same theme of ownership has its privileges, if/when President Trump signs the massive spending bill part of the bill would make minor league baseball players part of an exempt class of workers that are not eligible for minimum wage or overtime.
Here's more from Forbes.
The part of the spending bill is called "Save America's Pastime Act" which seems laughably ironic considering the following:
' A vast majority of minor leaguers are making peanuts, and the change to the law could allow baseball owners to pay minor league players as little as $1,100 a month;
' MLB as a whole, knowing this was in play upped their lobbying budget in terms of trying to sway Congress from a little more than $300,000 in 2015 to more than $1.3 million each of the last two years;
' MLB - not the owners of the minor league teams - pay minor leaguers, and since minor league players are not unionized, they are at the mercy of the big-league bosses;
' Know this: Major League Baseball generated at least $10 billion in revenue, and some believe closer to $12 billion in 2017.
Here's the quote from the president of Minor League Baseball, Pat O'Conner:
"We're not saying that [pay to the players] shouldn't go up. We're just saying that the formula of minimum wage and overtime is so incalculable. I would hate to think that a prospect is told, 'You got to go home because you're out of hours, you can't have any extra batting practice.' It's those kinds of things. It's not like factory work. It's not like work where you can punch a time clock and management can project how many hours they're going to have to pay for."
And there's some truth in that, especially about the overtime stuff, but do we really think that owners are going to significantly raise wages on minor-league players?
Know this as well: If the major league owners gave each of the current 4,500 or so minor leaguers about $1,000 more a month, that would be roughly $25 million for the season.
That's also what the Atlanta Braves are paying Adrian Gonzalez to play first base for the New York Mets this season.
In the end, the monster value in this wrinkle in the spending bill for MLB as a whole is that it would render several pending lawsuits from former minor leaguers invalid before they could be heard in court.
It's good to be the kings.
Lies, Dang Liars and his statistics
OK, we talked earlier this week about Ronald Acuna being sent to the minors.
We were remiss about not seeing him start the season in the majors. Remember the fun it was to have Jason Hayward in the opening day lineup and the thrill of that three-run rocket shot he hit several years ago?
We even wondered if the rules in the collective bargaining agreement would change after the next negotiations process.
No where did we say we didn't understand the reasoning for the move. It was a business decision and getting Acuna for an extra season of team contract control by having him in the minors until April 13 is sound logic.
Physically, there's no doubting Acuna's ready. Fiscally, is what generated the demotion.
Dude was the minor league player of the year has he better than .320 with 21 homers and 44 steals across A-AA-and-AAA levels. He was the Arizona Fall League MVP, and was leading the Grapefruit leading in hitting at .432 with an on-base percentage of better than .500 and had team-leading numbers in homers and steals and shared the team lead in runs and RBIs.
So, when AJC Braves beat ace Dave O'Brien reports that the new GM believes Acuna needs to go down because he needs some more work, well. all we can say to that is Bull Snitker.
Here's O'Brien's exact words from this story:
"Braves general manager Alex Anthopoulos insisted the move was for developmental purposes, that the team wanted to make sure they do the right thing for the consensus No. 1 prospect in baseball after he climbed from high Single-A to Triple-A in matter of months in 2017."
So there's that.
This and that
- Wow, that may be one of the best games LeBron James has ever played, and when you have a catalog like his, that is saying something. In a come-from-behind 132-129 win over Toronto, James went 35-seven-17, and those 17 assists were against zero turnovers, which is an NBA record. Still, in some ways for King James fan boys like yours truly, last night's numbers do not portray for the best scenarios for the postseason, considering the Cavs needed a historic performance from James (who was also 11-of-19 from the floor and 12-of-14 from the line) as well as an other-worldly showing from George Hill (10-of-11 shooting for 22 points) as well as shooting better than 60 percent from the floor and better than 62 percent from 3 to win by three. At home.
- Speaking of other-worldly, Dwight Howard went 32 points and 30 rebounds last night.
- Congrats to TFP coworker Clay Bennett for receiving yet another prestigious award. Here are more details. (Stewwie, we'll tell Clay to hold his breath while waiting for the congrats email from you.)
- Here's CBS president Harold Bryant's response to the building - and in my view somewhat overblown - backlash of TV cameras showing crying kids after their teams lost in the NCAA tournament.
- Man, Sam Darnold looked the part of NFL franchise quarterback during his pro day on Wednesday. Throwing the ball with good accuracy and impressive velocity even as heavy rain fell during the workout. One of the more interesting photos from the event was the shot of Browns owner Jim Haslam sitting with Darold's parents. He was either talking about potentially making Darnold the top-overall choice or sharing some less-than-PC jokes he heard around the Pilot/Flying J offices.
- Here's Phil Steele doing Phil Steele-like things. This is the teams with the worst 2018 football schedules in terms of opposing winning percentage. FSU is 1, followed by Nebraska, Michigan, Auburn and Texas A&M.
- You know the drill. Weeds writes on college hoops. We read what Weeds writes on college hoops. Here's today's offering on UK super frosh and former Hamilton Heights star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
Today's questions
If the Panthers and their short history with no titles and a middle-of-the pack stadium are worth $2.5 billion - and heck, the Hoston bleepin' Rockets are worth $2.2 billion - what could Jerry Jones sell the Dallas Cowboys for? At least $5 billion right?
Also which Sweet 16 game are you most excited to watch? Discuss.
As for today, March 22, well, let's see what we got.
On this day 55 years ago, the Beatles released their first album, Please, Please Me.
William Shatner is 87 today. Reese Witherspoon in 41.
Marcel Marceau, the GOAT of mimes, would have been 95 today. Man, that's something you don't see a lot of these days. When was the last time you saw a mime?
Since Bob Costas is 66 today, let's go with the Rushmore of sports TV personalities (can be announcers, studio folks, analysts, you name it).
Go, be creative and remember the mailbag.