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Is 49ers vrs Raiders Fan Fight a Sign of the Times?

August 24, 2011 by

By now everybody that watches pro football is aware of the debacle that occurred at last weekend’s game between the San Francisco 49ers and the Oakland Raiders; two shootings and a beating, with fan fights continually breaking out all over the stadium.

Sad to say I am not surprised. This is not an indictment on the fans of either team, but rather for one of the rare moments I am in agreement with 49er team president Jed York, who said that these are not our regular fans. The sad thing is that they may well soon become his regular fans, and the same with many other teams across the nation. ( I think KissingSuzyKolber was wrong on this one)

I was a 49er season ticket holder for 25 years starting with the first year of Bill Walsh’s head coaching career there. We eagerly went to our first preseason game as ticket holders only to find a huge fight in the section below our seats. A friend claimed that at a Rams game in the early 70’s a Ram’s fan, after constant harassment, pulled a gun and threatened the people around him.

Preseason games were always nightmares. A much ruder, coarser, drunker group of fans tended to go. I think that Friday and Saturday games, particularly when it is warm, encourages drinking. For most fans there is no work the next day. We always gave our tickets away and so did all of our friends that had season tickets, and in the teams great years everybody wanted them, but as they continued their slide to mediocrity, at best, it was hard to give them away.

Many I have talked to have simply blamed the Raider fans but while 49er fans had developed a reputation as “chardonnay drinks’, as labeled by former offensive lineman Randy Cross- who incidentally the fans took a dislike to due to his movement penalty in the Superbowl that almost cost the game- but prior to that were considered some of the worst.

Former quarterback John Brodie once wrote about warning Colt’s great Johnny Unitas about the need to wear a helmet when leaving the field due to fans throwing bottles. After the team erected chicken wire around the field entrance fans started heating coins to drop through, he said. That was at Kezar Stadium, a place literally surrounded by bars.

However I see this in some aspects as the new generation of fans. People my age now preferred top buy a big screen and a broadcast package that allows you watch games in the comfort of your home. No $12 beers, $35 parking and all of the other expenses that you get at games. At least one city last year charged to tailgate. It is younger fans that are starting to fill the parks, and they seem to have a rougher edge. NFL owners are to blame, for the most part, in my humble opinion.

Three years ago Bill Simmons wrote at ESPN a very good piece on how teams destroy the tailgating experience for their most loyal fans. As you realize how badly the team treats you, viewing you as simply an ATM there for them to tap, it just makes sense to enjoy the game elsewhere.

So while teams build new palaces with which to play the games, attendance has been declining overall in the NFL. Certainly there are a number of factors, poor economy, high ticket prices, a number of teams being perennial doormats etc.. but it is becoming clearer to the average fan that the sightlines and cost are much better at home. Last year it was estimated that attendance was at its lowest level since 1998.

However no need to worry about fights at future 49er/Raiders games- it looks like that series has been canceled for the time being.

Filed Under: NFL, Uncategorized Tagged With: , ,

ESPN Takes Shot at Creating NFL QB Rating Stat

August 16, 2011 by

ESPN has developed a new statistic called the Total Quarterback Rating that it claims will provide an accurate assessment of a NFL quarterbacks’ performance and will factor in a range of variables including strength of opposition.

The QBR program will use a scale of 0-100 with 50 being league average and will have a weighted scale to determine how well important and difficult a pass was in a game, as well as a number of other variables including touchdowns, sacks and QB fumbles, to arrive at a total.

The QBR will also use a host of historical data points such as historical outcomes for teams facing the same down, distance, field position and time remaining. There will also be a Critical Index included that looks at when it happens in a game. Here is how ESPN lays out the calculations for QBR.

ESPN has walked down the path of creating its own statistic at least once before, with its Productive Out in baseball, which it debuted in 2004. This showed how many times a team used a sacrifice or a bunt to move a runner over and purported to show that teams with the most were doing a better job. It fell apart rather quickly as other, better thought out stats were much more indicative of success, and I believe that many of the last place teams led the league in productive outs. Here is ESPN’s explanation as well as a good take down by The Hardball Times. Nowadays productive outs are just a running joke on some baseball web sites.

Does this mean that QBR is fated for the same demise? Probably not, and it does look easier to understand than the somewhat bizarre NFL Quarterback ratings. It uses many of the same factors that other homegrown rating systems use, and simply weights them differently. For instance Football Outsiders’ has its DVOA for quarterbacks and Advanced NFL Stats has several rating systems used for slightly different purposes.

TheBigLeads’ excellent football analyst Jason Lisk has a good piece on why this is probably a good thing for the NFL, and shows who it is aimed at, much more a casual fan rather than one that wants to delve down into the complex statistics of the game. He also compares how the different rating systems reveal slightly different results.

It will be interesting to follow this over the course of the season and see if it remains relevant and how much the WWL touts its own invention. Stay tuned.

Filed Under: ESPN, NFL Tagged With: , , , ,

Sony brings PlayStation capabilities to Mobile Phones

June 11, 2011 by

So you are in the market for a new phone and with the ever growing variety you are having a tough time making a decision. Of course the first step is to narrow down what you are looking for in a phone-is it the underlying operating system, the form factor, perhaps you want a specific carrier or the flip side of that, are seeking to avoid a specific carrier.

For those looking for a strong gaming experience then PlayStation manufacturer Sony along with joint partner Ericsson might have just the product for you, the Xperia Play. The product is designed to appeal specifically to gamers seeking a solution that enables portable play that mirrors, more or less, their home console experience coupled with all of the features of a more traditional smartphone.

Powered by the Android operating system the Xperia Play design features a panel that slides out from under the keyboard. The panel contains a layout that is pretty familiar to gamers, with directional buttons on the left and the usual four PlayStation buttons that have the triangle on the right. An extended section in the middle features a pair of pressure sensitive plates that operate as the device’s two joysticks. The phone is capable of playing both PlayStation-specific games as well as more traditional games that cell phone users have become accustomed to playing.

It will ship with seven preloaded games, one of great interest to sports fans — EA Sports’ Madden NFL 11 — including one of the oldie but goodie PlayStation program, Crash Bandicoot. More titles are available at Verizon’s VCast store, but ones written specifically for the PlayStation settings are still very limited.

While the play is obviously for the serious gamer that might not want to carry multiple devices it is easy to see how this might appeal to a less hard core crowd. While some smartphone users are satisfied with a level of simplification for their gaming use, it is nice to have something that is a step up in degree of difficulty. However for sports fans looking for popular games, theer looks to be an iitial shortage in the near term if you want apps that are tailored to the devices advanced gfeatures, but expect that to change as developers get moving.

The Play is powered by a Qualcomm 1GHz Snapdragon II processor with an Adreno 205 graphics processor. It has a 4-inch multi-touch display as well as forward and reward facing cameras. The Sony Ericsson Play started hitting stores at the end of May and is available for $199.99 with a two year plan with Verizon Wireless as well as a smartphone data package.

Filed Under: Android, Apps, NFL Tagged With: ,

NFL Seeks More Dollars for Mobile Access

May 2, 2011 by

There’s a big battle brewing in the professional football world but it has nothing to do with players and owners. Instead, it’s all about figuring out who pays how much to let mobile consumers watch football games on their new powerful portable devices, like the iPad or Android-based tablets.

A report today in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) says the NFL and its NFL Network is “in talks” with pay-TV operators in an attempt to find a way to allow mobile customers more ways to watch America’s favorite sport. The money line (literally) from the story is an easy one to understand: Basically, the NFL wants more dough for mobile access.

The NFL is seeking extra fees from those carriers to expand their offerings to tablets and computers, a person familiar with the matter said.

It should be an interesting dance to watch this summer, as the various cable, satellite and cellular “partners” of the NFL try to give their users what they want without giving too much back to the league. For many customers, the idea of paying anything more for mobile access seems a bit absurd, given the high fees for cable or satellite access already being paid. It will be interesting also to see if there is a resurgence in use of the Slingbox, the device that truly lets you see what you already paid for, wherever you want it.

Hidden in the back of all these discussions will be the fees that mobile operators are sure to charge their customers for the cellular airtime needed to watch live NFL action. Stay tuned here at Mobile Sports Report as we will endeavor to cover as much of this topic as we possibly can, to help guide you to the most economical way to get access to all the mobile action your devices can handle.

Filed Under: Apps, NFL, Tablets, Top News
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