Shhhh, don’t tell the Dallas Cowboy fans!

Old Gold Post

We are reposting the following more than decade-old piece as the football season is about to get underway in a few weeks. We had no idea the Rams would move back to Los Angeles five years later, soon followed by the Chargers from San Diego.

NFL teams pool their media share and divide them equally among 32 teams, which allows small market teams to compete on a more level playing field with the large market teams.  Think Green Bay Packers.

That is socialism, folks. Not Soviet socialism but the same type of “socialism” the ignorant people and pols throw around so loosely like a pigskin to trigger and mislead the public and slander their opponents.  Bernie Sanders would be proud of the NFL;  DJT, and Ted Cruz would call it Satanic if they had a clue – about anything.

Major League Baseball (MLB)

In contrast to the NFL, the MLB is little less socialist but socialist, indeed:

Along with the TV deals, MLB teams also receive extra money through revenue sharing. Each team pools 48% of the revenue they earn, and the total amount is then split evenly (3.3% of the total) and given to each team. Teams receive more than $110 million through revenue sharing. – DodgerBlue

The percentage system still allows the large market teams to dominate the post-season almost, but not every year.  Think New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers with their massive payrolls. How ’bout a progressive percentage allocation for the bigger market teams?

Three cheers for Cleveland, who currently leads the AL Central by one game.  The other four are in the celler or a step above.  Money, the Guardians don’t make the World Series, however.

Golf And “Food Stamps”

Another ironic and seemingly contradictory twist in sports is the USGA golf handicap system.

Handicaps are also used as a measure of how ‘good’ a player is. Players with a ‘high’ handicap will be allowed a higher number of extra strokes over the course par. Players with a ‘low’ handicap are expected to take fewer additional strokes to get around the course. – FairwayApproach 

In a sport traditionally dominated by “country club” conservative Republicans, “trying to level the playing field” among golfers would seem an abomination.

I never liked country clubs and thought of them as legalized segregation, but I did join one because of their quick play and pristine pool table-like greens.  However, I do curse myself for violating my principles whenever I shank a shot.  Yes, folks, I am a hypocrite.

Golf’s Ugly History

Golf has a horrible history of discrimination.

I love this story about the late Senator Barry Goldwater, the 1964 Republican Presidential Candidate,

Arizona native Barry Goldwater once visited a golf club on the East Coast that would not allow Jewish people on its links. When he was informed that he couldn’t play the 18 holes he came for, he famously responded, “Well, my father was Jewish but my mother was Episcopalian, so can I play nine holes?” – FEE Stories

It pisses me off playing a golf match with some of my more conservative friends, who are constantly complaining how their taxes are being wasted helping the poor “who have made bad choices.”  I have to give some of these bozos two strokes or “welfare” on every hole to even the playing field so they will have a better chance of winning (on a net basis).

When we approach every tee box, I ask them,

“How many food stamps do I have to give you on this hole?”    

That’s the most excellent troll, especially to those “welfare queens ” who pad (cheat) their handicaps.

So, folks, next time you hear people spouting off, accusing somebody of being socialist, especially on the links, politely in a quiet and genteel voice, tell them to,

“STFU, you have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Then take their money.  Fore!

The 49ers take the Super Bowl this year. Bank it!

Why Los Angeles Doesn’t Have An NFL Football Team

Originally posted on January 23, 2011 by macromon

We grew up in Los Angeles watching our beloved Rams, who fled for St. Louis in 1994.  The city was also a temporary home for the  Oakland Raiders from 1982-94 as the Rams played their home games in Anaheim for almost 15 years.  It has always been a mystery to us why Los Angeles, the second largest city in the U.S., has been without an NFL team since 1994.

In his excellent piece posted on the Globe and Mail blog, Frances Wooley, a professor at Carleton University, states it all about economics. He points out something we did not know,

The NFL, however, is egalitarian. All national revenues, such as sales of television rights, are divided 32 ways. Each NFL franchise receives an equal share. It is impossible to say how important national revenues are relative to other revenues for the league as a whole, as only one NFL team — the publicly owned, small-market Green Bay Packers — makes its financial information publicly available. In 2010, three-fifths of the Packer’s income – $157- out of $258-million – came from its 1/32 share of national revenues.

The revenue sharing system means there is little incentive for a team to move from a small to a large market. Yes, if the Vikings moved to LA, the NFL could potentially gain millions of additional Southern California viewers – and millions more in revenue. Yet the Vikings would only receive 1/32, or about 3 per cent, of that revenue. That’s not enough to offset higher stadium or property tax costs…

Interesting and helps explain why two relatively small market teams are headed to the Super Bowl and why the NFL, unlike Major League Baseball, has fewer major market Yankee-like dynasties.   The piece is short, concise, and worth the read.