Category: Following Sports

Who owns the rooftop seating near Wrigley Field?

Dear Sports Fan,

Who owns the rooftop seating near Wrigley Field? My partner and I were watching the playoffs last night and the television cameras were focusing on some bleachers set up on a building across the street from the stadium. We wondered if that was officially part of the stadium or not.

Thanks,
Matthew

Dear Matthew,

Those seats are cool, aren’t they? Wrigley Field is one of Major League Baseball’s last two great old historic baseball stadiums. It was built in 1914 for a baseball team called the (I kid you not) Chicago Whales, but the present tenants, the Chicago Cubs, have played there since 1916. As was true with many of the old stadiums, it’s built inside the city, instead of in a suburb with lots of room for parking like most modern stadiums. One result of this is that the stadium is surrounded by relatively normal city streets with buildings on them that are around the same height, at least on the two outfield sides. As you noticed last night, many of these neighboring houses now sport bleacher seating on their roofs, from which you can watch the game. You can actually see them on Google Maps:

The Wrigley Rooftops, as they are called, have their own Wikipedia page, which I leaned heavily on for this article. How they got there and who owns them is a surprisingly long and twisted story.

For most of Wrigley Field’s history, the neighboring rooftops were home to informal gatherings. Watching the games from them was a perk neighbors enjoyed, perhaps as a consolation for the literally hundreds of thousands of drunk people the stadium brought to their neighborhood every year. Sometime in the 1980s, some of the people who owned the buildings started bulking up their seating arrangements and charging admission. This escalated gradually to where we are today: most of the buildings are no longer residential. Their primary purpose is to support the bleachers on their roofs. Some of them even have bars and restaurants inside. They provide a stadium-like experience at stadium-like prices.

As you might suspect, the people who own the Chicago Cubs have not always been happy about the idea of others profiting off of their investment so directly and in such a similar way to how they are trying to make a profit. In 2002, the Cubs sued the owners of the Wrigley Rooftops for copyright infringement. I guess the idea was that rooftop viewers were engaged in an act analogous to pirating a TV feed. Most of the rooftop establishments eventually settled out of court and agreed to pay the Cubs 17% of their proceeds as a form of royalty. The Cubs agreed to officially endorse those roofs. That led to a detente which lasted almost a decade until the current owner of the Cubs, Thomas S. Ricketts, who had purchased the team in 2009 after the settlements, decided to renovate those sides of the stadium in ways which would obstruct the rooftop views. All hell broke loose. In a classic turn of legalistic fate, the owners of the rooftops sued the Cubs! Their argument was that the Cubs were now breaching the contract they entered into during the settlement of the last lawsuit.

Despite this antagonistic and adversarial relationship, (or maybe because of it), the era of the independent rooftop may soon be over. Frustrated with the lawsuit filed by the rooftop owners, the Cubs have decided that it would be easier and cheaper in the long-run to simply buy the neighboring buildings with their rooftop clubs. To date, Ricketts has purchased at least six of the buildings, a process made easier by the fact that some of them seemed to be in financial straits to begin with. How long the other rooftops will be able to hold out remains to be seen.

That’s the story of the unique Wrigley Rooftops. It’s a classic American story of lawsuit and counter-suit that fits America’s Pastime perfectly.

Thanks for reading,
Ezra Fischer

One line to fool them all – 10.19.15

Sports talk is frequently used as a common language but it’s far from universal. If you’re someone who doesn’t follow or even understand sports, you can find yourself at a disadvantage in common small-talk situations like in an elevator, waiting for a bus, sitting at a bar, or around the proverbial water cooler at work. Even if you are a sports fan, it’s impossible to watch everything and know everything. To help in these situations, we provide lines to use when engaged in a conversation about all of the high profile sporting events of the day, plus explanations of what they mean.

NFL Football

Sunday, October 18, 2015 1 p.m. ET

Cincinnati Bengals 34, at Buffalo Bills 21

Line: It just doesn’t look like anyone can stop the Bengals.

What it means: The Bengals have won all six of their games so far this year and they’ve scored lots of points in every one of them. In order, they’ve scored 33, 24, 28, 36, 27, and now 34 points. Although offense and defense are almost completely separate teams in football, there’s an interesting symbiosis at work. If a defense knows it can count on its offense, it plays better, and vice-versa. Right now, the Bengals are operating as a very virtuous cycle.

Denver Broncos 26, at Cleveland Browns 23

Line: At some point it stops being a fluke that Denver is winning despite Peyton Manning instead of because of him.

What it means: The story on the Broncos so far this year has been that their undefeated record is untrustworthy; that they are not as good as their record would suggest because their once great quarterback, Peyton Manning, has played so poorly. After six straight wins though, perhaps it’s time to admit that even with an average quarterback, the rest of the Broncos is good enough to win consistently. They’re unlikely to end the season without losing, but they’ll win a lot of games.

Chicago Bears 34 at Detroit Lions 37

Line: Who wrote that line about lots of noise, “signifying nothing?” Probably Shakespeare, right? Anyway — whoever it was must have watched this game.

What it means: This game had everything you’d want out of an NFL game. It was an exciting, high scoring game, with lots of drama, that went into overtime… but because neither of these teams is going to amount to anything this year, (the Bears are 2-4, the Lions 1-5), it feels meaningless.

Houston Texans 31, at Jacksonville Jaguars 20

Line: I wonder if the Texans can make a run at the Colts now that they seem to have settled on a quarterback?

What it means: The Indianapolis Colts are the favorites to win the AFC South division, with the Texans, Jaguars, and Titans trailing behind them. There are a few signs though that the Texans may be able to give them a run for their money in the standings this year. The Texans started the year with some uncertainty at quarterback, where they had two players, Ryan Mallett and Brian Hoyer, competing for the starting job. After two straight good performances, it seems clear that Hoyer has won the job. That should settle the team down on offense and on defense, it’s hard to believe they could play any worse than they have. In fact, they’re likely to get better — they have so many talented players on defense.

Kansas City Chiefs 10 at Minnesota Vikings 16

 

Line: The Vikings aren’t flashy, but is there a winning team that’s flying more under the radar than them this year? I don’t think so.

What it means: The Vikings don’t get covered as much as other teams, and other than problematic running back, Adrian Peterson, they don’t have any big name stars. Perhaps because of that, or perhaps because they were on the wrong side of a fluky week one loss to the San Francisco 49ers, no one seems to be mentioning them as a playoff contender. With four games against teams the Vikings should probably beat coming up, (Lions, Bears, Rams, Raiders), you can sound savvy and prescient by talking about the Vikings now.

Miami Dolphins 38, at Tennessee Titans 10

Line: I guess that’s why you fire your coach.

What it means: The Miami Dolphins fired their coach two weeks ago, before the team’s bye week (when they don’t play a game.) Even two weeks isn’t enough time to make real tactical changes to an NFL team. So, teams that fire a coach in the middle of a season generally do it because they want to make an emotional or attitudinal change to a team that’s lost its will or understanding of how to play hard. From the result of this game, it certainly looks like that goal was met.

Washington Redskins 20, at New York Jets 34

Line: I know it’s virtually impossible to win in the NFL without a great quarterback, but if any team could do it, it might be the Jets.

What it means:  Quarterback is the most important position in modern professional football, by such a large margin, that it seems impossible to win without a great quarterback. In order to win despite having an average quarterback, like the Jets have, you have to be nearly perfect in every other area. The Jets have excellent wide receivers, a trio of strong running backs, a decent offensive line, and an intimidating defense. So far, they’ve won four games and lost only one — giving hope to every quarterback-wanting team in the league.

Arizona Cardinals 13, at Pittsburgh Steelers 25

Line: If I were the Steelers, I’d keep Roethlisberger out for another couple weeks. The way they’re playing, there’s no reason to be aggressive and risk re-injury.

What it means: Steelers star quarterback, Ben Roethlisberger, went down during the third game of the season with what initially looked like a major knee injury. After further examination, it was “only” a bone bruise and sprained MCL which he should be able to recover from in four to six weeks. After just two weeks out, Roethlisberger was already lobbying to be let back into the game this week. Despite his wishes, with the Steelers 2-1 in their three games without their starting quarterback, it’s probably better for the team and for Roethlisberger’s long-term health to hold him out another few weeks.

Sunday, October 18, 2015 4:05 or 4:25 p.m. ET

Carolina Panthers 27, at Seattle Seahawks 23

Line: I know it looks bad, but don’t count the Seahawks out yet, they’ve lost to three undefeated teams.

What it means: The Seattle Seahawks, who were good enough over the past two years to go to the Super Bowl twice, have lost four of their first six games. That’s not good and most people are probably close to concluding that the Seahawks just aren’t a very good team this year. Caution them not to jump to conclusions prematurely. The Seahawks four losses have come to a divisional rival, the Rams, who always play them closer than their relative skill would suggest likely, and three teams that are all undefeated – the Bengals, Packers, and Panthers.

Baltimore Ravens 20, at San Francisco 49ers 25

Line: Free Steve Smith.

What it means: Steve Smith is a pint-sized dynamo who plays wide receiver for the Baltimore Ravens. This is his 15th and final season in the NFL. Even at 36, he plays football with more determination and bottled up fury than virtually anyone out there. He’s a giant crowd favorite, which is why it’s such an enormous shame that he’ll be stuck in his last year in the league, playing for a mediocre team with no chance at making a playoff run. The phrase, “Free [name of player]” has become common in sports circles over the past few years. It asks that a fun player be released from a not-so-fun situation, in this case, playing on a last place team. It’s unrealistic — trades in the NFL are not common — but it’s a nice sentiment.

San Diego Chargers 20, at Green Bay Packers 27

Line: Phillip Rivers in the game against the Packers was like the world’s best classical conductor playing with your high school marching band.

What it means: Phillip Rivers is the quarterback of the San Diego Chargers. In this game, he set franchise records for passing attempts, pass completions, and passing yards. He threw for over 500 yards (300 is generally thought of as the line between a good game and a great game) and came extremely close to tying the game in its final seconds. He accomplished all of this despite being surrounded by lackluster, inexperienced, undersized, or over-the-hill wide receivers, running backs, tight ends, and offensive linemen.

Sunday, October 18, 2015 8:30 p.m. ET

New England Patriots 34 at Indianapolis Colts 27

Line: If you put aside all the Deflategate stuff, that was just a great football game.

What it means: The lead-up to this game was all about how the Patriots wanted revenge for the Colts putting them through a season of controversy. It was the Colts who originally turned the Patriots in to the league for having improperly inflated the footballs they used on offense in a playoff game last spring against the Colts. Drama may have gotten us to watch the game with more focus than normal, but the high quality of the game was what kept us watching.

How to plan for the week of Oct 19 – 25, 2015

If you are a sports fan or if you live with a sports fan then your weekly schedule becomes inextricably linked with what sporting events are on at what times during each week. The conflict between missing a sporting event for a poorly committed to social event and missing an appealing social event to watch a game is an important balancing act in any kind of romantic, familial, or business relationship between a sports fan and a non-sports fan. To help facilitate this complicated advanced mathematics, Dear Sports Fan has put together a table showing the most important sporting events of the upcoming week. Print it out, put it on your fridge, and go through it with your scheduling partner.

For detail on the all-popular, all-powerful NFL, which groups most of its games on Sunday afternoons, see our NFL Forecast.

Download a full-size copy here.

Monday: The Toronto Blue Jays try desperately to avoid going down 3-0 to the Kansas City Royals in the American League Championship Series (the semifinals of Major League Baseball’s playoffs.) In the NFL, the Philadelphia Eagles and New York Giants try desperately not to lose to their arch-rivals. There’s a lot of desperation going around for a Monday night.

Tuesday: A playoff baseball double-header is nothing to mess with. Watch game four of the ALCS, which could be an elimination game followed by game three of the more lovable and therefore more heart wrenching NLCS between the New York Mets and Chicago Cubs. If you need a fix of soccer before the baseball starts, there’s a full afternoon of UEFA Champions League action. The only game on a channel you probably have is Arsenal vs. Bayern Munich.

Wednesday: Unless the Royals sweep the Blue Jays, we’ll get another juicy MLB playoff double-header today — likely the last of the season. In the evening, the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team continues its victory tour with a friendly game against Brazil. In addition, we’ll be doing a Dear Sports Fan Meetup to watch the Boston Bruins play the Philadelphia Flyers. If you’re in the Boston area, join us!

Thursday: The highlight of the day is a pivotal Game Five in the NLCS between the Mets and Cubs. That should overshadow the Thursday Night Football game between the Seattle Seahawks and San Francisco 49ers but thanks to gambling, fantasy football, and sheer perversity, the NFL game will still be watched by way more people. Help even the scales. Watch baseball.

Friday: Date night! If the ALCS between the Royals and Blue Jays has been settled by now, you’re free to have a non-sports date. If they’re still going, you might find a romantic bar… with a TV to be a good spot for a cozy get-together.

Saturday: It’s an oddly weak slate of college football games. You can tell by the fact that I had room to sneak my alma mater, Rutgers, onto the featured games list, even though they’re likely to be beaten by 50 points. If both MLB playoff series are still going on, they will more than make up for it. This has the potential to be a legendary afternoon and evening of baseball!

Sunday: If you want, you could watch about 15 hours in a row of NFL football today or 15 hours of soccer. It’s an incredibly versatile day. If there’s a Game Seven in the NLCS between the Cubs and the Mets, that would be a bonus of the sort that dwarfs the salary it’s augmenting.

Caveat — This forecast is optimized for the general sports fan, not a particular sports fan. As such, your mileage may vary. For instance, you or the sports fan in your life is a fan of a particular team, then a regular season MLB baseball game or MLS soccer game may be more important on a particular day than anything on the forecast above. Use the calendar as a way to facilitate conversation about scheduling, not as the last word on when there are sports to watch.

Pitch that game: NFL Week 6, 2015

Hello everyone and welcome to America’s favorite game show that… has never actually happened before and no one has heard of it… it’s Pitch That Game!

Here’s how it works. As your host, I have one minute to pitch a sporting event to someone who is not a sports fan. If, after my pitch, they’re interested in watching, I get a point! That’s it! Why would we play such a game? Well, it’s a good way to quickly learn about a set of games to see if you’re interested in following any of them. It’s also a great way for me to learn from you about what may or may not make a sport interesting to a layperson.

In this episode, I pitch you, the listener, all 14 of the NFL games this weekend, on Sunday October 18 and Monday October 19. If you want to know which games will be available on your TV this weekend, check out 506 Sports NFL. If you need help figuring out how to make sense out of what you see there, use my explanation of how to use 506 Sports NFL here.

Enjoy the show!

Sunday, October 18, 2015 1 p.m. ET

Cincinnati Bengals at Buffalo Bills

We’re in the midst of a major league baseball playoffs that guarantee a World Series winner who hasn’t won since somewhere between 1993 and 1908. No matter which of the four remaining teams wins, it’s going to be a great story. In the NFL, it’s far too early to guarantee anything, but the Cincinnati Bengals, who have never won the Super Bowl in their 46 year history are undefeated so far and playing like a run-away-train on offense and a brick wall on defense. They take their 5-0 record into Buffalo to play against a Bills team whose promising start has been hampered by injuries. The Bills and their fans are always tough at home, especially when it’s cold and windy and maybe even snowy like it’s supposed to be on Sunday.

Denver Broncos at Cleveland Browns

While we’re on the subject of weather, let’s talk about the next game, the Denver Broncos at the Cleveland Browns. Weather is usually an overrated factor in football games. Rain and snow don’t seem to have much of an impact. The only thing that can effect the game in a major way is wind. Wind makes it harder for quarterbacks, especially those like the 38-year old, nerve-damaged Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning, who don’t exactly have the strongest arms anymore. Every game Manning plays is like watching a real-life battle between mind and matter. This one will pit mind vs. matter and wind.

Chicago Bears at Detroit Lions

After three weeks, these two teams had a combined record of zero wins and six losses. From that moment, one team has continued its downward slide and the other has scrabbled up with all its might. The Chicago Bears have been rewarded for their determination with two close wins, one by two points over the Raiders and one by one point over the Chiefs. The Lions have just lost and lost. If the Bears can beat the Lions, a divisional rival, in this game, they’ll complete their climb back to .500 with three straight wins after three straight losses.

Houston Texans at Jacksonville Jaguars

The Texans and Jaguars are both in the AFC South division, which has been dominated by the Colts over the past fifteen years. The start of this year provided a glorious opportunity for the other teams in the division because the Colts have struggled with injuries and performance issues. Alas, none of the other teams could seize the day. The Texans and Jaguars are both 1-4 and looking for a win to salvage any hope of competing for the playoffs this year. I favor the Jaguars in this game. In watching the Jaguars, you can see some of the elements of a good team emerging from the muck.

Kansas City Chiefs at Minnesota Vikings

Unusual for today’s NFL, both of these teams intended to build their season around powerful rushing attacks led by two of the best running backs in the NFL, the Vikings Adrian Peterson and the Chiefs Jamaal Charles. As spectators, we’re robbed of an opportunity to see them go head-to-head this weekend because Charles tore his ACL last weekend. Instead, we’ll see two replacement running backs with great names, Knile Davis and Charcandrick West, try to step into Charles’ giant shoes. On the other side, the Vikings will continue to play the good, conservative football that’s led them to a 2-2 record so far this year.

Miami Dolphins at Tennessee Titans

The Dolphins have been the disappointment of the season. So much so, that two weeks ago they became the first team this year to fire their coach. It’s hard to replace a coach in the middle of the season because of football’s complexity. There isn’t enough time to meaningfully change what the team knows how to do. Instead, new coach and former tough-guy tight end Dan Campbell will look to make an attitudinal difference. The question on the other side is what the Titans actually have in rookie quarterback Marcus Mariota. Mariota came out of the blocks fast with a record setting performance in the Titans week one win but has been less successful since. We’re starting to hear whispers that Mariota may not be versatile enough in how he thinks and reacts during a game to win.

Washington Redskins at New York Jets

Normally when Washington travels to New Jersey to play football, they’re facing their divisional opponent and arch-enemy, the New York Giants. This week they play against the New York Jets, the team in the other conference that shares a stadium with the New York Giants. That’s a weird little tidbit that makes this game unusual. What makes it compelling is how much better both teams have played this year than they were expected to. Both teams won only four games last year. The Jets are only one win away from equalling their tally and the Redskins are already half-way there.

Arizona Cardinals at Pittsburgh Steelers

These two teams have been connected since 1944 when, due to player shortages during World War II, they merged to play a season as a single team. That joint venture went winless, leading critics to call them the “carpets” a play on Cardinals and Pittsburgh and also the household object you tread on. More recently, they played each other in the 2008 season’s Super Bowl, one of the most entertaining in recent memory. During that game, the offensive coordinator of the winning Pittsburgh team was none other than Bruce Arians, now the head coach of the Cardinals. All of this is to say that in addition to this being a matchup of two of the most talented teams in the league, and a potential preview of this year’s Super Bowl, it’s also a game with great recent and distant history.

Sunday, October 18, 2015 4:05 or 4:25 p.m. ET

Carolina Panthers at Seattle Seahawks

I don’t know if it’s been a conscious or unconscious thing on the part of the Panthers management, but it certainly seems like they’ve spent the last several years trying to model their team after the Seahawks. The Panthers are almost like the East Coast branch of the Seahawks. Built around magician quarterbacks who escape pressure to make plays, patient running games, and stifling, physical defenses, both teams try to win games in similar ways. What that means for this game, is that its winner will likely be the team who executes the plan the best, not the one with the best plan.

Baltimore Ravens at San Francisco 49ers

It’s hard to believe that these two teams met in the Super Bowl only three seasons ago. This year, both teams are only a shell of what they were during that season. Both teams’ elite defensive units have been disassembled by free agency, retirement, and injuries. Both offenses have lost many of their supporting characters. San Francisco’s offensive line is missing in action and Baltimore’s starting wide receivers actually both play for San Francisco now. Both teams are 1-4 and facing the certainty of a lost season if they fall to 1-5. Realistically, both are likely to have a lost season no matter what — it’s not a coincidence that they’ve lost four games out of the first five — but another loss will really shut the door in their faces.

San Diego Chargers at Green Bay Packers

If the pinnacle of sports is about achievement in the face of challenges, this game fits the bill to a T. Both teams have wonderful quarterbacks who have difficult tasks. In the case of the Chargers quarterback, Phillip Rivers, he’ll be up against a solid Green Bay defense without a strong offensive line — the most essential support for any quarterback. Packers quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, on the other hand, will be playing without his best receiver, Jordy Nelson, who is out for the year with a knee injury, and with his two next-best receivers hampered by shoulder and ankle injuries. I suspect both quarterbacks will be up to the challenge but only one can win.

Sunday, October 18, 2015 8:30 p.m. ET

New England Patriots at Indianapolis Colts

The Patriots have been waiting for this day ever since last Spring when the Colts started the giant shit-storm called Deflategate by reporting the Patriots to the league for having used improperly inflated footballs in the playoff game between these two teams. Although quarterback Tom Brady was eventually vindicated in court and escaped suspension, the Patriots want to beat the Colts more than Bernie Sanders wants to bring down Wall Street, more than Jeb Bush wants to be president… even more than Donald Trump wants you to pay attention to him. This game is the most highly anticipated passion play of the season. I hope it lives up to expectations.

Monday, October 19, 2015 8:30 p.m. ET

New York Giants at Philadelphia Eagles

The NFC East, which is the division the Giants and Eagles are both in, is the biggest, most popular, most watched, and most talked about division in football. That’s true even in years when the division doesn’t have any truly great teams, like it appears not to this year. The Giants are in first place right now, with a record of three wins and two losses but the other three teams are all only a game behind with two wins and three losses. The chance for all four teams remaining relatively close to one another throughout the year seems to be good, which makes every game between teams even more important.

How to plan for the week of Oct 12 – 18, 2015

If you are a sports fan or if you live with a sports fan then your weekly schedule becomes inextricably linked with what sporting events are on at what times during each week. The conflict between missing a sporting event for a poorly committed to social event and missing an appealing social event to watch a game is an important balancing act in any kind of romantic, familial, or business relationship between a sports fan and a non-sports fan. To help facilitate this complicated advanced mathematics, Dear Sports Fan has put together a table showing the most important sporting events of the upcoming week. Print it out, put it on your fridge, and go through it with your scheduling partner.

This does not include MLB baseball games. There are so many of those every day that another approach is needed. That approach is our special Daily MLB Forecast. Same deal, for the most part, with NFL football games. For those, see our NFL Forecast.

Download a full-size copy here.

Monday: Columbus Day may be of dubious value as a historic holiday but it’s of intense value as a sports holiday. Sit back and enjoy four playoff baseball games, a good European Championship qualifying soccer game, an interesting Monday Night Football game, and a handful of NHL games that couldn’t even break into our calendar.

Tuesday: The Netherlands are a proud soccer country with a long history of top-level competition but they’re struggling just to qualify for next year’s European Championships. They need a win in today’s game against the Czech Republic. Two more MLB playoff games and a modern-classic NHL matchup round out today’s sports.

Wednesday: The WNBA finals come to a conclusion today with a winner-take all fifth game between the Minnesota Lynx and Indiana Fever. That might be enough to steer at least one of your eyes away from playoff baseball or early season hockey.

Thursday: The divisional round of the baseball playoffs will come to an end today, unless all the series are over by now… it’s impossible to know on Monday morning when I’m writing this. If they are still happening, they’ll be happening in an exciting crescendo. The normal Thursday Night NFL game is a good one this week and it’s joined by a north/south California rivalry college football game: UCLA vs. Stanford.

Friday: Date night! The American League Championship Series (semifinals to the World Series) begins today and may sway you from your appointed date. Other than that, although the calendar looks full, I don’t think high school football (even though it’s a historic rivalry in Washington DC!!) or boxing is going to be much of a problem for negotiating some couple’s time.

Saturday: Two classic college football rivalries: Michigan vs. Michigan State and Florida vs. LSU highlight today’s college football games. In baseball, the National League Championship series will begin and the AL one will move to its second game. In soccer, the British Premier League returns to action after a few weeks off for international soccer.

Sunday: The NFL eclipses everything else on most Sundays during the fall. That’s true today, especially at night when the New England Patriots try to exact Deflategate related revenge on the Indianapolis Colts. Wedged into the sports schedule are some other compelling events: women’s college soccer, MLS soccer, a NASCAR race, the second game of the NLCS, and the second weekend of the NWHL’s existence!

Caveat — This forecast is optimized for the general sports fan, not a particular sports fan. As such, your mileage may vary. For instance, you or the sports fan in your life is a fan of a particular team, then a regular season MLB baseball game or MLS soccer game may be more important on a particular day than anything on the forecast above. Use the calendar as a way to facilitate conversation about scheduling, not as the last word on when there are sports to watch.

One line to fool them all – 10.12.15

Sports talk is frequently used as a common language but it’s far from universal. If you’re someone who doesn’t follow or even understand sports, you can find yourself at a disadvantage in common small-talk situations like in an elevator, waiting for a bus, sitting at a bar, or around the proverbial water cooler at work. Even if you are a sports fan, it’s impossible to watch everything and know everything. To help in these situations, we provide lines to use when engaged in a conversation about all of the high profile sporting events of the day, plus explanations of what they mean.

NFL Football

Sunday, October 11, 2015 1 p.m. ET

Buffalo Bills 14 at Tennessee Titans 13

Line: No Music City Miracle for the Titans in this one.

What it means: The Music City Miracle was a trick play the Titans used to eek out a win over the Buffalo Bills in a 2000 playoff game. These Titans didn’t have anything like that up their sleeves for this game. In fact, it was Bills quarterback Tyrod Taylor who had all the tricks. He threw for a touchdown, ran for a touchdown, and even caught a pass!

Cleveland Browns 33 at Baltimore Ravens 30

Line: Who died and made Josh McCown Johnny Unitas?

What it means: Josh McCown is the Cleveland Browns starting quarterback. He’s had a mostly pedestrian career in the NFL, and at 36 years old, no one expected this to change. We were wrong. He threw 457 yards (which is an insane number, even for a game that went to overtime, like this one did) in this game and in doing so became the first Browns quarterback ever to throw three straight 300 yard games. Part of that is due to the league becoming more friendly to passing in general and part of it is due to luck but it’s still fun to compare him to all-time great quarterbacks like Johnny Unitas.

Chicago Bears 18 at Kansas City Chiefs 17

Line: Oh no, not again for Jamaal Charles.

What it means: Jamaal Charles is the star running back of the Kansas City Chiefs and one of the most dynamic players in football. When he’s at his best, he’s truly a joy to watch, dancing around defenders and galloping to long touchdown runs. He went down with an ugly knee injury today and people suspect that he tore his ACL… again. Charles already tore an ACL in 2011, and while the injury is no longer an automatic career ender, it’s still brutal to come back from.

Seattle Seahawks 24 at Cincinnati Bengals 27

Line: Dalton is no longer playing like Dalton. It’s very confusing.

What it means: After watching a player for several years in the NFL, football fans generally figure they know what that player is capable of. Then once in a while, a player like Bengals quarterback Andy Dalton comes back in his fifth season and seems to be playing consistently better than he ever has before. It’s confusing and unbelievable at first, but by now, especially after a come-from-behind win against a good team like today’s, it’s time to simply admit that he got better.

St. Louis Rams 10 at Green Bay Packers 24

Line: Aaron Rodgers finally threw a pick at home, but his defense got his back.

What it means: Before this game, Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers had an incredible streak of having thrown over 550 passes in Green Bay without a single interception. He threw two in this game, but the Packers still won comfortably largely because their defense “picked off” or intercepted four of the Rams quarterback’s passes.

Jacksonville Jaguars 31 at Tampa Bay Buccaneers 38

Line: If there’s a shootout in the forest but no one watches, does it matter?

What it means: Sometimes the most exciting games are played between teams, like these two, that aren’t likely to make the playoffs. As a result, only people at the game, and in the home television markets of the two teams, actually get a chance to see the game. More metaphysically, very few people care about the outcome of this game, even if it was one of the more entertaining ones of the day.

New Orleans Saints 17 at Philadelphia Eagles 39

Line: The Eagles are the most confusing team this year.

What it means: Estimates of how good the Eagles are have been consistently different from the way they’ve actually looked during games. Before the season, people thought they would be good, then their first few games were terrible. So, we all switched to thinking they were going to be bad this year. Then, they go out and win a game convincingly like this one. Who knows what to expect other than the unexpected?

Washington Redskins 19 at Atlanta Falcons 25

Line: How else could an overtime game with Kirk Cousins end other than a pick-six.

What it means: Kirk Cousins is Washington’s quarterback and he’s got a history and a habit of making fatal mistakes at just the wrong time. A pick-six is when a quarterback throws a pass someone on the defense catches it (that’s the pick or interception) and runs all the way to the other side of the field for a touchdown (that’s the six, for the six points a touchdown is worth). This game ended when Atlanta’s defense got a pick-six.

Sunday, October 11, 2015 4:05 or 4:25 p.m. ET

Arizona Cardinals 42 at Detroit Lions 17

Line: The Lions couldn’t go 0-16 again, could they? Could they?

What it means: The Detroit Lions are the only franchise in NFL history to ever go a 16 game season with out winning a single game. They achieved this ignominious feat in 2008. Other teams have gone entire seasons without winning a game but only when the season was shorter. At 0-5, these Lions are beginning to elicit unfortunate comparisons to that 2008 team. As bad as they are, they’re very unlikely to end the season winless.

New England Patriots 30 at Dallas Cowboys 6

Line: I’m actually surprised this game was so close, maybe Bellichick spent the bye week plotting ways to beat the Colts next Sunday night.

What it means: Although the Patriots won this game handily, they didn’t dominate the Cowboys the way some people (myself included) expected them to. Part of the reason why we expected them to dominate so thoroughly was because the Patriots had their bye week last week. Because the Patriots play the Colts next week and because the Colts are the team that tried to turn the Patriots in last season for having deflated balls, It’s funny and a tiny bit plausible for the Patriots to have spent the extra time during their week off thinking of ways to beat the Colts, not the Cowboys.

Denver Broncos 16 at Oakland Raiders 10

Line: After 16 seasons of “Peyton Manning carries his defense” there’s some symmetry to “defense carries Peyton Manning.”

What it means: Throughout most of his long career, Peyton Manning fans have wondered how many Super Bowls their hero could have won if he had been on teams with even a league average defense. He barely ever has. Most of the time, when his teams won, it was because he scored LOTS of points. This year, at the end of his career, when he is visibly reduced, he’s playing on a team (the Broncos) that has a great defense. The defense were responsible for winning this game, despite Manning and the offense struggling.

Sunday, October 4, 2015 8:30 p.m. ET

San Francisco 49ers 27 at New York Giants 30

Line: Could this be the rare comforting brutal loss for the 49ers?

What it means: The San Francisco 49ers lost in heartbreaking fashion when Giants quarterback Eli Manning threw a touchdown to tight end Larry Donnell with only 21 second left in the game. Nonetheless, this came may have been encouraging to 49ers fans who probably thought their team didn’t have the heart or the wherewithal to score as many points as they did or keep this game as close as they did. With a 1-4 record after five games, the 49ers will almost definitely not make the playoffs, but based on last night’s showing, all might not be lost for future seasons.

Pitch that game: NFL Week 5, 2015

Hello everyone and welcome to America’s favorite game show that… has never actually happened before and no one has heard of it… it’s Pitch That Game!

Here’s how it works. As your host, I have one minute to pitch a sporting event to someone who is not a sports fan. If, after my pitch, they’re interested in watching, I get a point! That’s it! Why would we play such a game? Well, it’s a good way to quickly learn about a set of games to see if you’re interested in following any of them. It’s also a great way for me to learn from you about what may or may not make a sport interesting to a layperson.

In this episode, I pitch you, the listener, all 14 of the NFL games this weekend, on Sunday October 4 and Monday October 5. If you want to know which games will be available on your TV this weekend, check out 506 Sports NFL. If you need help figuring out how to make sense out of what you see there, use my explanation of how to use 506 Sports NFL here.

Enjoy the show!

Sunday, October 11, 2015 1 p.m. ET

Buffalo Bills at Tennessee Titans

Back in the good old days on the NFL, quarterbacks were expected to spend several years on the bench, learning from coaches and more established quarterbacks before getting their chance to start. In the past fifteen years, that practice has broken down in favor of high-profile college quarterbacks who come straight out of college and start from their first professional game. This game offers a chance to compare models. The Titans quarterback, Marcus Mariota, is one of those highly regarded rookies starting right away. The Bills quarterback, Tyrod Taylor, is a rare modern example of a quarterback who spent his first four years in the league as a backup and is only now getting a chance to start. Both players have played very well this year and I expect that to continue today.

Cleveland Browns at Baltimore Ravens

If you’ve followed the NFL even casually over the last fifteen years, you probably think of the Cleveland Browns franchise as the epitome of ineptitude and the Ravens as a model franchise. What you might not know is that the Ravens came into existence in 1996 when the then owner of the Cleveland Browns decided to move his team to Baltimore. As part of a settlement with the league, the city of Cleveland got to keep the Browns name and was promised a new expansion team to take the old Browns place within a few years. The Browns returned to Cleveland in 1999 but have seemed star-crossed ever since. It’s no wonder that fans of the new Browns love to hate the Ravens.

Chicago Bears at Kansas City Chiefs

This game features a pair of tragic figures at the quarterback position. The Chiefs quarterback, Alex Smith, has football figured out. He knows where and when to throw the ball and who to, but he often doesn’t have the arm strength to deliver the ball the way it needs to be delivered. The Bears quarterback, Jay Cutler, is the exact opposite. He once claimed to have the strongest arm in NFL history. He might, but it’s paired with a lack of awareness, both about football and his own ability, that leads him to make costly mistakes all too often.

Seattle Seahawks at Cincinnati Bengals

It’s sometimes said that the NFL stands for “not for long.” This clever backronym describes how difficult it is to maintain consistent excellence. The Seahawks have been to the last two Super Bowls and made the playoffs in all but three of the last dozen seasons. That’s an almost unprecedented stretch of success. It looks like it may finally have caught up to them this year. They’re fighting the drop-off though. After starting 0-2, they won two close games to even their record at two wins and two losses. They’ll face a tough battle in this game against the undefeated Bengals who look as unbeatable as their record would suggest.

St. Louis Rams at Green Bay Packers

The Rams traveled to Arizona last weekend and gave the then undefeated Arizona Cardinals their first loss of the year. They’ll be trying to do the same thing to the Packers in this game. The Packers are 4-0 and seemingly invincible, thanks to the quarterbacking mastery of Aaron Rodgers. The best way to neutralize a great quarterback like Rodgers is to get in his face from the very start of the game, something the Rams may be able to do thanks to their excellent defensive linemen, and to keep him off the field. The way to keep him off the field is to run the ball effectively on offense, another thing the Rams may be able to do. Todd Gurley, a rookie running back on the Rams, made his season debut last weekend and looked, no joke, like the best running back to enter the league since Adrian Peterson in 2007.

Jacksonville Jaguars at Tampa Bay Buccaneers

The Jaguars had a giant opportunity last weekend to announce themselves to the world as a respectable team by beating the Indianapolis Colts but they couldn’t do it. Now they’re 1-3 for the year and stuck in a swampy South Florida game against the Buccaneers, also 1-3 and going nowhere. That said, this could be a high scoring game – both teams are much stronger at wide receiver then they are at defensive back – the people assigned to keep the wide receivers from catching the ball. I expect both teams to be able to move the ball down the field in big, thrilling chunks.

New Orleans Saints at Philadelphia Eagles

These have been two of the most exciting offensive teams for years. They both base their play around frequent safe but crafty short passes which get athletic skilled wide receivers and running backs the ball with space to run around and make defenders look silly. It’s a good strategy but it hasn’t been working so far this year. Both teams have only won one game out of the four they’ve each played. A 2-3 record in the first five games isn’t the end of the world but 1-4 is. Therefore, the fate of the world, for both of these teams, rests on this game and this game alone.

Washington Redskins at Atlanta Falcons

The Atlanta Falcons are 4-0 so far this year, so you think everyone on the team would be thrilled. Not so. Veteran wide receiver Roddy White went public with his profanity-laced frustration about having a reduced role this year. It sounds unsporting to be upset when your team is winning, but I can understand how he feels. Imagine you spent 10 years at a job and finally, just when the company start really succeeding -maybe it’s going to go public or something – your boss decides you’re not good enough anymore and starts phasing you out. Yikes. Often, after a player goes to the media with his frustration, his team will make sure he gets the ball a bunch in the next game. If that doesn’t happen, White should think about editing his resume and brushing up on his LinkedIN game.

Sunday, October 11, 2015 4:05 or 4:25 p.m. ET

Arizona Cardinals at Detroit Lions

It’s hard to sell a matchup between a 3-1 team, the Arizona Cardinals, and a 0-4 team, the Detroit Lions, as likely to be an even or close game. What I can sell you on is that there’s a good reason to root for both of these teams. The Cardinals are a lovable group — with their coach, who wears a kangol hat and speaks more honestly about his team to the press than virtually any other coach in the league and their quarterback whose excellent career has been sidetracked by injury every time it seems like it’s about to peak. The Lions, on the other hand, are coming off one of the more brutal losses this season. Their best player had the ball and was lunging into the end-zone when an opposing defender knocked it out of his hands. That’s bad luck and a good play by the defender, but the controversy started when another defender seemed to intentionally bat the ball out of play. That’s not allowed and the Lions should have had another chance to score, but the referees seemed to momentarily forget the rules and the Lions lost the game.

New England Patriots at Dallas Cowboys

If you’re a Patriots fan, you’re either from New England, or you enjoy watching one team thoroughly out-smart another. The Patriots are coming off their bye week which means they’ve had an extra week to think of devious ways to win and, as a bonus, make the Cowboys look stupid. I can’t wait to see what they’ve cooked up.

Denver Broncos at Oakland Raiders

This was once the most hotly contested rivalry in the NFL. Then the Raiders sank into a twenty year-long slump and it lost a little of its luster. This year, for the first time in memory, the Raiders look like they may have improved enough to bring interest back to the game. On the field, the Raiders will have a tough time surviving the Broncos aggressive defense who sacked their opposition’s quarterback seven times last week.

Sunday, October 4, 2015 8:30 p.m. ET

San Francisco 49ers at New York Giants

No one expects the San Francisco 49ers to win this game on national television. They’re widely considered one of the worst teams in the league, their once promising quarterback is struggling, and their defense is missing most of its best players. They haven’t won a game since the very first weekend of the season when they were… hey, wait a minute… they were on national television, they were considered one of the worst teams in the league, their quarterback was struggling, and their defense was missing most of its best players. Hmm. Maybe this game will be closer than we think.

Monday, October 12, 2015 8:30 p.m. ET

Pittsburgh Steelers at San Diego Chargers

Football is an extremely complex game. Every player on the field is responsible for knowing and reacting to a slightly different set of data. Only the best players truly master their own positions. That’s why it’s so extraordinary for a player to have a command of their position and their teammates and act on it. That’s what Chargers quarterback Philip Rivers was doing last week. So many of his offensive linemen were injured and missing, that he was doing the seeing and reacting for the replacements. Before every play, Rivers would put himself in the lineman’s position, see what an experienced player in that position would see, and shout out the reaction they would have. Then he had to do the calculations for his own position and start the play. It was a virtuoso performance and one that had a lot to do with his team winning their game. Watch for him to do the same in this game.

Why is tonight's USA vs. Mexico men's soccer game so big?

When the United States Men’s National Soccer Team (USMNT) plays against Mexico tonight, it will be one of the biggest non-World Cup games in memory. I’ll be watching, starting at 9:30 p.m. on Fox Sports 1, and I encourage you to do the same. Of course, just saying it’s an important game shouldn’t be enough to get you interested, so I’m going to try to explain why it’s so big in this post.

The CONCACAF Gold Cup is the biggest men’s soccer tournament in North America, Central America, and the Caribbean. In it, teams from all over those regions compete every two years to determine which country is the best. It’s an important tournament for world rankings but even more so for continental bragging rights. In the 26 years (13 tournaments) since the Gold Cup began, Mexico or the United States has won the cup all but once. Mexico has won it seven times, the United States five times, and Canada surprised the world and won it in 2000. Must have been some kind of Y2K bug. In the two most recent tournaments, the United States won once (in 2013) and Mexico won once (this year). This is pertinent, because that split over the past two tournaments is why Mexico and the United States are playing tonight.

The Confederations Cup is another international soccer tournament. This one happens every four years. It’s a small tournament, only eight teams, and highly exclusive. The only way to get an invitation is to win one of FIFA’s regional championships, like the CONCACAF Gold Cup. There are six of these tournaments throughout the world. The other two teams invited are the current World Cup champions and the next country to host the World Cup. The tournament is offset from the World Cup by a year (the next World Cup is in 2018, the next Confederations Cup is in 2017) and is hosted by the host of that World Cup. It’s almost like a dress rehearsal for the World Cup. Playing in the Confederations Cup is important to countries like the United States and Mexico because it offers a rare chance to play in a World Cup-like atmosphere against the best teams in the world without quite the same unbearable pressure that the actual World Cup brings.

There have been two Gold Cups since the last Confederations Cup. The United States won one and Mexico won one. So, in order to determine which country should be invited to the Confederations Cup in Russia, the teams will play a single playoff game tonight. Win and book your tickets to Russia for the 2017 Confederations Cup. Lose and go home.

If those stakes weren’t enough on their own to make this a big game, there’s also a long-held and simmering once again rivalry between Mexico and the United States in men’s soccer. The general arc of the rivalry is this: Mexico was the undisputed power in CONCACAF forever, until around the mid 1990s when the United States started to challenge them a bit. Then, in the 2000s, the United States seemed to surpass Mexico, which was the cause of much gloating on the U.S. side and much angst on the Mexican side. Now things have settled in to a murky stalemate. Neither team is as good as they once were and both sides have a strange mixture of existential pessimism and swagger. Leading up to this game, the Mexican TV station Azteca ran a frankly hysterical advertisement with clips of Donald Trump, whose idiotic comments about Mexico are well known, interspersed with pictures of Mexican soccer players doing awesome stuff. This was pretty great — it stirred the rivalry up while also bringing soccer fans on both sides together, since even the most partisan U.S. fan should be able to see the humor and irony in the ad. Then, just a few days ago, Fox Sports 1, which is televising the match, ran their own ad featuring Trump. This pro-U.S. ad comes across as jingoistic and arrogant and has been widely criticized. It’s unlikely that Fox’s misfire will mean much to the players but it’s equally unlikely that they needed any more motivation to bring the simmering rivalry to a roiling boil tonight.

If you want to learn more about the USA vs. Mexico men’s soccer rivalry, I recommend these two oral histories from ESPN and MLS Soccer.

 

Hey! The NFL has improved its handling of concussions!

The National Football League (NFL) has long been criticized for its approach to brain injuries and concussions. I’ve covered this issue and my thoughts about solving it in great detail. The league was very, very bad on the subject for a long time. It denied that concussions were a major problem. It funded compromised scientific studies to counteract the many legitimate ones which were gradually showing just how damaging brain injury is to current and retired football players. It didn’t provide sufficient health care and other benefits to retired players suffering from the effects of brain injury until forced to by a legal settlement. And on the field, the NFL’s attempts to make the game safer were met with skepticism. How can the NFL punish players for making hits they had been taught were good for their entire lives? Was it even possible to avoid hitting someone in the head in such a chaotic environment. How could the league expect to protect players who so steadfastly refused to bow down to the danger of brain injuries? That last criticism was one that rang true to me. To make it to a professional level in football – one of the world’s most team-oriented sports – you basically have to be someone who will put the success of a team before their own success. Selfish football players do not make it to the NFL. Self-sacrifice is so selected for, that it’s insane to think an NFL player won’t try to play through a brain injury to help their team, even if they know the potential danger of doing so. It felt like an intractable problem until this year, when the NFL made some changes that actually seem to be working! Here’s what they’ve done.

During each game, there are independent certified athletic trainers who are employed to watch and look for any potential head injuries. When they see one, they are empowered to stop the game in order to assess the player. If their suspicion is confirmed and the player does seem symptomatic of having had a brain injury, that player is removed from the game and (although I’m not sure this is a rule — it is the reality) does not return to play that day. Once a player has suffered a concussion, they need to go through a five step process of assessment and escalating activity before they can return to the field. That final decision is no longer in the player or team’s hands, but is controlled by an independent neurologist. Steps like this have been taken before, but they’ve never been as dramatic nor have they ever seemed to work the way this round of changes has. Players this year are staying out longer — something which is essential because of the increased risk one has of suffering a second and more damaging concussion soon after a first.

Football is still easy to criticize when it comes to player safety. Football players, especially young ones, are still dying at unacceptable levels. None of the reforms have addressed what might be the most pernicious aspect of football on its players’ brains – the near-constant sub-concussive blows that linemen experience on every play. Still, the progress I’ve seen this year is more than I expected. Not only do I think players are better protected and cared for than they have been in the past, but it’s also great to see football as a role-model among sports for once. The National Hockey League (NHL) has followed suit and given concussion spotters the ability to stop games during the season which starts tonight. Soccer authorities, (once they are bailed out of prison), should do the same.

The good and evil of baseball's Wild Card game

Major League Baseball’s Wild Card Game is a unique way to start the playoffs. This year’s two games, the New York Yankees vs. the Houston Astros in the American League and the Chicago Cubs vs. the Pittsburgh Pirates in the National League, clearly represent what is good and what is evil about the Wild Card Game. The Yankees vs. Astros game has everything that’s good about the game, while the Cubs vs. Pirates game is everything that’s evil. I’ll explain what I mean by this, but first, here’s a quick reminder of how the playoffs are constructed and what the Wild Card Game is.

There are 30 Major League Baseball (MLB) teams. These teams are broken up into two conferences of 15 teams each, the American League (AL) and National League (NL), and three divisions of five teams each. After 162 regular season games, the team with the best record within each division is declared the division winner (said to have “won the pennant”) and automatically qualifies for the playoffs. Since the goal of the playoffs is to end up with the best team from the NL playing against the best team from the AL, three teams from each league is an awkward number to have. Four would be better, because then you could have two teams play each other, and then the winner of each of those matchups play to end up with a single team. The simple way to get from three teams to four is to add a single extra team, called a Wild Card, by selecting the team with the best record in the conference that isn’t a division winner. That’s how baseball did it from 1994 to 2011. In 2012 they added a fifth team — a second Wild Card team — by selecting the team with the second best record in the conference that isn’t a division winner. Since five is also an awkward number of teams, the playoffs are designed to quickly get back down to four. The two Wild Card teams in each league play a single elimination game to decide which of them gets to be the fourth team and play a seven game series against one of the three division winners. (If you want more detail, read my full post on how the MLB playoffs work.)

The Wild Card Game is at its best when it’s between two teams like the New York Yankees and Houston Astros. The Yankees are the winningest team in baseball history. They have won 27 World Series, a whopping 16 more than the next best team. Although they are only second in the league in payroll this year, they’re famous and infamous for spending more money on players than any other team can afford or would want to afford. They’re the bullies of the league, the royalty — Darth Vadar and his army of clones. They were the first Wild Card team and would have been the only one had the system still only taken one. Playing them are the Houston Astros. The Astros are almost the complete opposite of the Yankees. They’ve been playing in MLB since 1962 and have never won a World Series. They haven’t even made the playoffs in the past decade. They have the sixth lowest payroll in the league. As a very casual baseball fan, I literally cannot name a single player on their team. They are a surprise, a heart-warming story. The Wild Card game gives the Astros a chance when they wouldn’t have had one otherwise. It creates a wonderful and dramatic spectacle. And it provides a clear rooting interest for all non-partisan fans. Why wouldn’t you want to see the Astros knock off the Yankees and stride into the playoffs? Watching this game is all upside – if the Astros win, it will be glorious; if the Yankees win, then giving the Astros an extra game didn’t cause anyone any harm. This Wild Card game is all about opportunity.

The NL Wild Card Game between the Cubs and Pirates is bad in all the ways the AL game is good. The Cubs and Pirates are both teams that are easy for unaffiliated fans to root for. The Cubs famously have not won the World Series since 1908, the longest streak of bad fortune in the league. What you might not know is that they’ve actually played in the World Series and lost seven times since then! The Pirates have won it more recently, in 1979, but haven’t been back since. Both teams are chock-full of young, talented, exciting players, like Andrew McCutchen on the Pirates and rookie phenom Kris Bryant on the Cubs. Both teams have strong-fan bases who have stuck with them through the fallow years. There are lots of reasons for neutral fans to want both teams to advance, so while this game may actually be a better baseball game than the Yankees vs. Astros, it’s far, far more insidious. There’s simply no way you’re going to watch this game and leave without your dominant feeling being one of sadness for the eliminated team. This Wild Card Game doesn’t feel like it’s about opportunity. It feels like it’s a cruel trick to play on teams that have worked so hard during a long, grueling season.

What’s the solution? A third Wild Card team? A three game Wild Card mini-series? I’m not sure. My short term-solution is to watch the AL Wild Card Game and root for the Astros but ignore the NL Wild Card Game entirely. Just tell me which team advanced and which team got screwed. As intriguing as I find both NL teams, the inevitable heartbreak is not worth the investment.