If You Ask Me, Vol. 3: MLS Edition
Posted on
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
by Gary A. Ballard
It's time again for another installment of "If You Ask Me," my semi-regular column in which I expound on a subject no one asked me about, but they really really should have. In today's edition, I talk about Major League Soccer, the US Soccer Federation's attempt at putting soccer (what the rest of the world knows as football) on the sports entertainment map in America. I've only been following football since the 2006 World Cup, having previously taken the pigheaded American notion that real football is played with shoulder pads. Don't get me wrong, I still love American football (GO PACK!) but I have also grown to love the sport everyone else in the world plays with a feverish passion. It's only this season I've begun paying attention to the MLS, because I believe that soccer in this country should be supported at every level possible, if only to provide a credible team to the World Cup every four years. But if you ask me, the MLS needs to tweak a few things if they really want to present the best product.
I'm not naive enough to think that the MLS could ever overtake the NFL, NBA or even Major League Baseball in the hearts and minds of American sports fans. At best, they could hope to be on a level playing field with the NHL, who seems dead set on shooting themselves in the foot every few years. They could even manage to achieve the level of NASCAR or the PGA's success, which while smaller than the above mentioned sports, still makes a decent profit for all participants. The fact that youth soccer has reached such a critical mass of popularity that the term "soccer mom" is part of the cultural lexicon means that a generation of kids has been raised to be interested in the game, maybe even passionate about it, instead of derisive and dismissive like my generation. MLS needs to bide its time, continue to support the youth leagues and colleges, and most importantly, work the kinks out of the current presentation of the on-field product. That's why If You Ask Me, the MLS needs to make a few changes.
If You Ask Me #1: ESPN's 30 at 30
The first piece of a successful major sport is the television contract. Getting weekly broadcasts on ESPN, even if it is ESPN2, is a huge win for the league. But, it's of vital importance that the broadcasts be top-notch. While Thursday night's games are good, there are a few problems with the broadcasts. The first problem is ESPN's insistence on the 30 at 30 update. These are interruptions in the game every 30 minutes, giving news from around the world of sports. And therein lies the problem. Of the games I've watched this season, I've seen interruptions with baseball scores, NASCAR, NBA news, but precious little about soccer. If I wanted to know about other sports besides soccer, I wouldn't be watching soccer. If I really must know the latest news, I can always flip over one channel to ESPNNews. You might as well just have a commercial break where these things show up, because the presentation is atrocious. Using a split screen effect, the game is shrunk to about 1/3 of the screen, while the rest of the real estate is taken up with the update, which mostly consists of a talking head sportscaster blathering on about things that are not soccer. It's distracting, making the game unwatchable for those 30 seconds. Perhaps this was a mandate of the contract, but I would hope the MLS would renegotiate that mandate when the renewal talks begin.
If You Ask Me #2: Onscreen Graphics
Screen real estate is a pet peeve of mine. I've bitched about it before. And yet broadcasters still feel the need to trash up my screen with things I don't give a fuck about. ESPN's MLS broadcasts are as guilty of this as Fox. The bottom tenth of the screen is full of flashing, changing, animated scoreboards, news tickers and other distractions. If I'm going to be subjected to a 30 at 30 Update, why the fuck do I need this eyesore at the bottom of the screen? At the top of the screen is the current game's scoreboard, taking up another tenth. Yes, the score needs to be displayed, but it takes up the entire width of the screen, half of which is just color bars with nothing on them. Shrink it. Look to the English broadcasts, which are generally minimalist, with only the score, clock and maybe a small network logo. No lens flares, no whooshes, just the bare minimum. Also, the rest of the world displays the home team's name and score first, then the visitors, but ESPN follows the American way which reverses that. It's fine for other sports, but not soccer. In this case, the rest of the world knows what it's doing.
If You Ask Me #3: Camera Positions
The ESPN broadcasts suffer from one other annoying trend, that of poor camera positioning. I'm not sure if the problem lies in the stadiums being visited, or in a lack of proper experience broadcasting soccer, but most of the angles used are ill-suited to the game. Again, I compare the EPSN broadcasts to the European ones, but the Euros have it right. Instead of trying to encapsulate the entire width of the pitch in every shot, the Euro broadcasts tend to focus on the ball, zooming in on the action so that only about half the width of the pitch is shown most of the time. While a 60" HDTV screen might make ESPN's focus on the action easy to follow, regular people on regular-sized TV's like myself have to squint to follow the flow of the game. Don't be afraid to zoom in on the ball, especially in the final third and on corners. ESPN's camera angles on corners are just awful. Lest it seem I'm completely negative about ESPN's broadcasts, I will pause to say that the collegial relationships of the three broadcasters in the booth is entertaining. Unlike ESPN's NFL broadcasts, there is no one in the booth whose teeth I feel the urge to kick in. There is no Kornhole to hate.
If You Ask Me #4: Diversity of Matchups
While it is early in the season, I have to caution both ESPN and Fox Soccer Channel's teams. The scheduling of televised matches may be out of their control, but if they have any say in the decision, this is a vital task. Make damn sure that "big market" teams are not overly represented on the schedule. One of the biggest failings of the NHL's television contracts both before and after their disastrous strike was that certain teams were ALWAYS shown. Tuning into an NHL broadcast on ESPN or Versus or NBC will usually mean you have to watch Colorado, Detroit, the New York Rangers, Philadelphia Flyers or Boston Bruins. The MLS has not been quite as bad as that this season, but they must put more teams like Columbus, Kansas City or Real Salt Lake on the schedule early in the season. I've seen New England, Colorado, DC United, New York and Houston more than twice in the first month of the season, while the three teams above have only been televised once. Later in the season, when teams have been eliminated from the playoff races, the league should focus their attention on the best teams, but early on there needs to be TV dollars for all.
If You Ask Me #5: Formations
While this isn't really something to be handled at the league level, it is something which twists my nipples. There are 13 teams in the league, and at least 3 teams insist on playing that disastrous 3-5-2 formation, with 3 backs and two "defensive" midfielders, including my team, the Chicago Fire. I hate this formation. I've only seen one team play this formation for a full game and play it well, and that was Barcelona. They can pull it off because there aren't really many weak links in that entire starting 11, but even when they've played it, they've suffered for it. It's a formation which requires your defensive backs to be top-class, as well as your wingers to be great players on both sides of the ball. But the MLS, while a good league, does not yet have the caliber of defensive backs who can consistently defend in this formation. They just don't. I've seen good teams like New England and DC United get decimated by pacy wingers who just blow through and around their midfield, overwhelming their defensive backfields time and time again. It's the soccer version of the old run and shoot offense, relying on outscoring opponents rather than playing solid, fundamental football. Yes, the MLS needs an exciting offensive product, but this is not the way to do it.
With the arrival this summer of David Beckham, the MLS has a ready-made star to promote the league. They have decent television contracts providing good exposure. If you ask me, the league is poised for a good run, with just a few tweaks.
I'm not naive enough to think that the MLS could ever overtake the NFL, NBA or even Major League Baseball in the hearts and minds of American sports fans. At best, they could hope to be on a level playing field with the NHL, who seems dead set on shooting themselves in the foot every few years. They could even manage to achieve the level of NASCAR or the PGA's success, which while smaller than the above mentioned sports, still makes a decent profit for all participants. The fact that youth soccer has reached such a critical mass of popularity that the term "soccer mom" is part of the cultural lexicon means that a generation of kids has been raised to be interested in the game, maybe even passionate about it, instead of derisive and dismissive like my generation. MLS needs to bide its time, continue to support the youth leagues and colleges, and most importantly, work the kinks out of the current presentation of the on-field product. That's why If You Ask Me, the MLS needs to make a few changes.
The first piece of a successful major sport is the television contract. Getting weekly broadcasts on ESPN, even if it is ESPN2, is a huge win for the league. But, it's of vital importance that the broadcasts be top-notch. While Thursday night's games are good, there are a few problems with the broadcasts. The first problem is ESPN's insistence on the 30 at 30 update. These are interruptions in the game every 30 minutes, giving news from around the world of sports. And therein lies the problem. Of the games I've watched this season, I've seen interruptions with baseball scores, NASCAR, NBA news, but precious little about soccer. If I wanted to know about other sports besides soccer, I wouldn't be watching soccer. If I really must know the latest news, I can always flip over one channel to ESPNNews. You might as well just have a commercial break where these things show up, because the presentation is atrocious. Using a split screen effect, the game is shrunk to about 1/3 of the screen, while the rest of the real estate is taken up with the update, which mostly consists of a talking head sportscaster blathering on about things that are not soccer. It's distracting, making the game unwatchable for those 30 seconds. Perhaps this was a mandate of the contract, but I would hope the MLS would renegotiate that mandate when the renewal talks begin.
If You Ask Me #2: Onscreen Graphics
Screen real estate is a pet peeve of mine. I've bitched about it before. And yet broadcasters still feel the need to trash up my screen with things I don't give a fuck about. ESPN's MLS broadcasts are as guilty of this as Fox. The bottom tenth of the screen is full of flashing, changing, animated scoreboards, news tickers and other distractions. If I'm going to be subjected to a 30 at 30 Update, why the fuck do I need this eyesore at the bottom of the screen? At the top of the screen is the current game's scoreboard, taking up another tenth. Yes, the score needs to be displayed, but it takes up the entire width of the screen, half of which is just color bars with nothing on them. Shrink it. Look to the English broadcasts, which are generally minimalist, with only the score, clock and maybe a small network logo. No lens flares, no whooshes, just the bare minimum. Also, the rest of the world displays the home team's name and score first, then the visitors, but ESPN follows the American way which reverses that. It's fine for other sports, but not soccer. In this case, the rest of the world knows what it's doing.
The ESPN broadcasts suffer from one other annoying trend, that of poor camera positioning. I'm not sure if the problem lies in the stadiums being visited, or in a lack of proper experience broadcasting soccer, but most of the angles used are ill-suited to the game. Again, I compare the EPSN broadcasts to the European ones, but the Euros have it right. Instead of trying to encapsulate the entire width of the pitch in every shot, the Euro broadcasts tend to focus on the ball, zooming in on the action so that only about half the width of the pitch is shown most of the time. While a 60" HDTV screen might make ESPN's focus on the action easy to follow, regular people on regular-sized TV's like myself have to squint to follow the flow of the game. Don't be afraid to zoom in on the ball, especially in the final third and on corners. ESPN's camera angles on corners are just awful. Lest it seem I'm completely negative about ESPN's broadcasts, I will pause to say that the collegial relationships of the three broadcasters in the booth is entertaining. Unlike ESPN's NFL broadcasts, there is no one in the booth whose teeth I feel the urge to kick in. There is no Kornhole to hate.
If You Ask Me #4: Diversity of Matchups
While it is early in the season, I have to caution both ESPN and Fox Soccer Channel's teams. The scheduling of televised matches may be out of their control, but if they have any say in the decision, this is a vital task. Make damn sure that "big market" teams are not overly represented on the schedule. One of the biggest failings of the NHL's television contracts both before and after their disastrous strike was that certain teams were ALWAYS shown. Tuning into an NHL broadcast on ESPN or Versus or NBC will usually mean you have to watch Colorado, Detroit, the New York Rangers, Philadelphia Flyers or Boston Bruins. The MLS has not been quite as bad as that this season, but they must put more teams like Columbus, Kansas City or Real Salt Lake on the schedule early in the season. I've seen New England, Colorado, DC United, New York and Houston more than twice in the first month of the season, while the three teams above have only been televised once. Later in the season, when teams have been eliminated from the playoff races, the league should focus their attention on the best teams, but early on there needs to be TV dollars for all.
If You Ask Me #5: Formations
While this isn't really something to be handled at the league level, it is something which twists my nipples. There are 13 teams in the league, and at least 3 teams insist on playing that disastrous 3-5-2 formation, with 3 backs and two "defensive" midfielders, including my team, the Chicago Fire. I hate this formation. I've only seen one team play this formation for a full game and play it well, and that was Barcelona. They can pull it off because there aren't really many weak links in that entire starting 11, but even when they've played it, they've suffered for it. It's a formation which requires your defensive backs to be top-class, as well as your wingers to be great players on both sides of the ball. But the MLS, while a good league, does not yet have the caliber of defensive backs who can consistently defend in this formation. They just don't. I've seen good teams like New England and DC United get decimated by pacy wingers who just blow through and around their midfield, overwhelming their defensive backfields time and time again. It's the soccer version of the old run and shoot offense, relying on outscoring opponents rather than playing solid, fundamental football. Yes, the MLS needs an exciting offensive product, but this is not the way to do it.
With the arrival this summer of David Beckham, the MLS has a ready-made star to promote the league. They have decent television contracts providing good exposure. If you ask me, the league is poised for a good run, with just a few tweaks.
Labels: If You Ask Me, MLS, Soccer, Sports
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If You Ask Me, Vol. 2: Privatization
Posted on
Friday, March 16, 2007
by Gary A. Ballard
One of the oft-repeated political platforms I've heard in my life has been that the US government has become so inefficient that only privatizing certain government operations can allow those operations to provide their benefits effectively again. Over and over the neocon and conservative agenda has tried to hammer the point home, over and over again suggesting various governmental functions would be better performed by outsourcing those functions to the private sector, or even worse, allowing the private sector to provide those services in a competitive, free-market environment. We've heard this shrill meme about health care, utility deregulation, Social Security, military logistics, education, disaster relief, you name it, the neocons under Bush have probably suggested everything except their own jobs would be better served by privately-owned businesses. If you ask me, that's total horseshit, and here's why.
Now, I'm hardly going to trumpet the track record of government organizations with regards to efficiency. About the only department that even comes consistently close is the Internal Revenue Service, and that's just because they are taking our money. I've had plenty of professional dealings with government agencies, either as a beneficiary of their services or as an employee at a company that has won a government bid. Those government agencies are masters of bureaucracy and political infighting, lethargy and inertia. But I've also worked in corporate environments from retail to advertising to the media.
It ain't just the government.
In fact, corporations are just as susceptible to inefficient, idiotic courses of action. The only difference between corporate and government efficiency is that corporations focus on turning a profit, while the government focuses more on meeting a set of legal and bureaucratic criteria within their allotted budget before the next budget appropriations are decided. It's as important to the government employee that their budget be spent, because if the money isn't spent, they might not have a job during the next budget cycle, whether the money is spent well or not. Corporate employees should be focused on profit, spending the least amount of money budgeted to achieve the most profitable results.
Sounds simple, right? Corporations do things more efficiently, getting more done for less money. Such things are not so simple, because human beings are involved. If you ask me, there is nothing inherent in either corporate or government structures which makes one more efficient than the other, because those structures are only as good as the person running them. It's the old computer saying "Garbage in, garbage out." If you put a functional, incompetent moron in charge, say someone like Mike Brown, you get a complete cockup in operations the agency has handled thousands of times before. I'm quite sure Pets.com couldn't be lauded as a model of corporate efficiency anymore than Bush, Jr.'s FEMA. So what good is trumpeting privatization as the savior of effective government when such outsourcing is only as good as the company outsourced to? How would one explain the eagerness with which the neocon movement embraces privatization?
If You Ask Me #1: Accountability
The word accountability is an important one, and it's one that's been almost completely absent from the government since Bush, Jr. was installed into his imperial office. Whether public or private, no organization will operate efficiently without accountability, because without accountability, leaders will not know who to fire when the inevitable fuckup results. Trimming the stupid from an organization is vital for establishing and maintaining efficiency and efficacy, which means firing the people directly and indirectly responsible for such demonstrable fuckups as Katrina relief, the theft of Iraqi Reconstruction funds, or the Walter Reed scandal. We're not talking screwups that result in a few dollars being lost, we're talking about monumental cluster fucks that were either deliberately achieved or the result of awe-inspiring incompetence on levels heretofore unimaginable.
Trimming the fat from a government budget isn't just about cutting dollars, but cutting dollars being used badly. How is it that a company like IAP was given the job of administering Walter Reed hospital for $120 million AFTER they'd failed to provide ice to Katrina victims in their previous government contract? Was Jerry Lewis not available that week? And why, after seeing the deplorable fuckup that IAP has achieved at Walter Reed, why is this company not being fined, their contract torn up and their administrative people being arrested? There may be no law against existing as an idiot, but there's got to be laws against taking government money and doing fuckall with it.
If You Ask Me #2: Snuggling with the Vice-President
I should call this the Haliburton principle. If the #2 man in the government was an executive in a company within the last decade, that company shouldn't be allowed no-bid contracts. It doesn't matter if Dick Cheney had something or nothing at all to do with Haliburton getting such sweetheart no-bid contracts in Iraq. Government needs transparency, and even the hint of impropriety on such a large expenditure of government money smells like corruption.
The smell worsens when one sees the number of fuckups and improprieties performed by a company like Haliburton. Overcharging for soda, providing US soldiers with contaminated water and then covering up the knowledge of said water supply, failing to provide food to the troops at the front lines because it's too dangerous, running empty supply trucks so that gas can be charged (or I should say overcharged) and other illegalities have run rampant throughout Haliburton's government contract work and yet no one is on the dock for it. The Vice-President hasn't been called to Congress to clear the stink of corruption surrounding the whole affair. And #1 above hasn't even been approached, as Haliburton still has those contracts and are not barred from future government contract work.
If You Ask Me #3: Guaranteed Money is the Cash Cow
At the grunt level of corporate life, government contracts are what I lovingly refer to as "a ginormous, wasteful pain in the ass." Working for a government agency is a nightmare of paperwork, arcane regulations, and over-demanding louts. Invariably, half the agency you work for is competent at their job and willing to help, while the other half can barely chew gum while answering their email. Often, political dick-waving between mini-fiefdoms within the agency can derail a project for months while feathers are unruffled and petty prejudices are catered to. So as a grunt, I often wonder why the fuck a company wants to put itself through that hell for government work which is often not overly profitable due to the amount of extra work involved?
Government work is the ultimate corporate cash cow. See, consumers and private clients are fickle, as likely to buy your competitor's produce as your own based on price, performance or just a fit of pique. But government work is guaranteed money. Once you sign that contract, corporate CFO's know that revenue is coming within a certain time frame. You can put it on the books as certain as the sun will rise in the morning. And based on what I've seen in the last six years with groups like IAP or MWI or Haliburton, that's a truism at all levels of government, regardless of performance, competence or efficiency. The money is spent and the job may or may not get delivered on time, on budget or on goal, but by damn the corporation will get its money. Barring an act of Congress, the money is already theirs. Congress being what it is, the chances of losing the contract, or losing any of the money from the contract are slim and none. If Haliburton execs can't be brought up on charges before they move their HQ to Dubai, if the IAP boardroom can count most of that $120 million on the books after the fines have been levied, and MWI gets paid the full $26 million for non-functioning pumps in New Orleans as well as an additional $4 million for portable pumps to help the non-functioning pumps, how could anyone expect that private businesses will do any better at a government function than the 30-year government veteran with the gum-chewing problem?
If you ask me, guaranteeing money is a really bad idea. Paying companies even after their fuckups are public is an even worse idea. Not only should the corporation who performs such egregious mistakes have all the money from the contract confiscated, they should be barred from government contracts for a decade at least. If there exists no other corporation who can perform the job, the government should do it for its damn self. All of it goes back to #1, corporations with government contracts have to be held more accountable for their actions.
But that's really the fly in the entire government ointment, isn't it? The overriding theme for the Bush administration's term has been dodging accountability. If Cheney and Bush can't be held accountable for the mistakes and deceptions of the Iraq War, why should private contractors be held accountable either? Privatization is a great buzz word, but what it really means is corporate welfare. The neocon movement's driving motivation for privatization isn't effective government, it's enlarging the government tit so that big money can get more big money, directly from the taxpayer's breast. Poor people have been enjoying a free ride for too long. It's time for corporate executives who are also campaign contributors to get some of that easy, guaranteed money. They are rich, so they deserve it. These vomitous leeches on the underbelly of America have convinced themselves that they are the new nobility, the chosen few born with the divine right of kings to plunder and pillage the serfs.
You might think I'm exaggerating, but look closer. There are kernels of truth in even the most grandiose hyperbole, and the truth is there if you look hard enough. If you ask me, we don't need more privatization, we need more accountability. That's something which has been rarer than oxygen in space these last few years.
Now, I'm hardly going to trumpet the track record of government organizations with regards to efficiency. About the only department that even comes consistently close is the Internal Revenue Service, and that's just because they are taking our money. I've had plenty of professional dealings with government agencies, either as a beneficiary of their services or as an employee at a company that has won a government bid. Those government agencies are masters of bureaucracy and political infighting, lethargy and inertia. But I've also worked in corporate environments from retail to advertising to the media.
It ain't just the government.
In fact, corporations are just as susceptible to inefficient, idiotic courses of action. The only difference between corporate and government efficiency is that corporations focus on turning a profit, while the government focuses more on meeting a set of legal and bureaucratic criteria within their allotted budget before the next budget appropriations are decided. It's as important to the government employee that their budget be spent, because if the money isn't spent, they might not have a job during the next budget cycle, whether the money is spent well or not. Corporate employees should be focused on profit, spending the least amount of money budgeted to achieve the most profitable results.
Sounds simple, right? Corporations do things more efficiently, getting more done for less money. Such things are not so simple, because human beings are involved. If you ask me, there is nothing inherent in either corporate or government structures which makes one more efficient than the other, because those structures are only as good as the person running them. It's the old computer saying "Garbage in, garbage out." If you put a functional, incompetent moron in charge, say someone like Mike Brown, you get a complete cockup in operations the agency has handled thousands of times before. I'm quite sure Pets.com couldn't be lauded as a model of corporate efficiency anymore than Bush, Jr.'s FEMA. So what good is trumpeting privatization as the savior of effective government when such outsourcing is only as good as the company outsourced to? How would one explain the eagerness with which the neocon movement embraces privatization?
If You Ask Me #1: Accountability
The word accountability is an important one, and it's one that's been almost completely absent from the government since Bush, Jr. was installed into his imperial office. Whether public or private, no organization will operate efficiently without accountability, because without accountability, leaders will not know who to fire when the inevitable fuckup results. Trimming the stupid from an organization is vital for establishing and maintaining efficiency and efficacy, which means firing the people directly and indirectly responsible for such demonstrable fuckups as Katrina relief, the theft of Iraqi Reconstruction funds, or the Walter Reed scandal. We're not talking screwups that result in a few dollars being lost, we're talking about monumental cluster fucks that were either deliberately achieved or the result of awe-inspiring incompetence on levels heretofore unimaginable.
Trimming the fat from a government budget isn't just about cutting dollars, but cutting dollars being used badly. How is it that a company like IAP was given the job of administering Walter Reed hospital for $120 million AFTER they'd failed to provide ice to Katrina victims in their previous government contract? Was Jerry Lewis not available that week? And why, after seeing the deplorable fuckup that IAP has achieved at Walter Reed, why is this company not being fined, their contract torn up and their administrative people being arrested? There may be no law against existing as an idiot, but there's got to be laws against taking government money and doing fuckall with it.
If You Ask Me #2: Snuggling with the Vice-President
I should call this the Haliburton principle. If the #2 man in the government was an executive in a company within the last decade, that company shouldn't be allowed no-bid contracts. It doesn't matter if Dick Cheney had something or nothing at all to do with Haliburton getting such sweetheart no-bid contracts in Iraq. Government needs transparency, and even the hint of impropriety on such a large expenditure of government money smells like corruption.
The smell worsens when one sees the number of fuckups and improprieties performed by a company like Haliburton. Overcharging for soda, providing US soldiers with contaminated water and then covering up the knowledge of said water supply, failing to provide food to the troops at the front lines because it's too dangerous, running empty supply trucks so that gas can be charged (or I should say overcharged) and other illegalities have run rampant throughout Haliburton's government contract work and yet no one is on the dock for it. The Vice-President hasn't been called to Congress to clear the stink of corruption surrounding the whole affair. And #1 above hasn't even been approached, as Haliburton still has those contracts and are not barred from future government contract work.
If You Ask Me #3: Guaranteed Money is the Cash Cow
At the grunt level of corporate life, government contracts are what I lovingly refer to as "a ginormous, wasteful pain in the ass." Working for a government agency is a nightmare of paperwork, arcane regulations, and over-demanding louts. Invariably, half the agency you work for is competent at their job and willing to help, while the other half can barely chew gum while answering their email. Often, political dick-waving between mini-fiefdoms within the agency can derail a project for months while feathers are unruffled and petty prejudices are catered to. So as a grunt, I often wonder why the fuck a company wants to put itself through that hell for government work which is often not overly profitable due to the amount of extra work involved?
Government work is the ultimate corporate cash cow. See, consumers and private clients are fickle, as likely to buy your competitor's produce as your own based on price, performance or just a fit of pique. But government work is guaranteed money. Once you sign that contract, corporate CFO's know that revenue is coming within a certain time frame. You can put it on the books as certain as the sun will rise in the morning. And based on what I've seen in the last six years with groups like IAP or MWI or Haliburton, that's a truism at all levels of government, regardless of performance, competence or efficiency. The money is spent and the job may or may not get delivered on time, on budget or on goal, but by damn the corporation will get its money. Barring an act of Congress, the money is already theirs. Congress being what it is, the chances of losing the contract, or losing any of the money from the contract are slim and none. If Haliburton execs can't be brought up on charges before they move their HQ to Dubai, if the IAP boardroom can count most of that $120 million on the books after the fines have been levied, and MWI gets paid the full $26 million for non-functioning pumps in New Orleans as well as an additional $4 million for portable pumps to help the non-functioning pumps, how could anyone expect that private businesses will do any better at a government function than the 30-year government veteran with the gum-chewing problem?
If you ask me, guaranteeing money is a really bad idea. Paying companies even after their fuckups are public is an even worse idea. Not only should the corporation who performs such egregious mistakes have all the money from the contract confiscated, they should be barred from government contracts for a decade at least. If there exists no other corporation who can perform the job, the government should do it for its damn self. All of it goes back to #1, corporations with government contracts have to be held more accountable for their actions.
But that's really the fly in the entire government ointment, isn't it? The overriding theme for the Bush administration's term has been dodging accountability. If Cheney and Bush can't be held accountable for the mistakes and deceptions of the Iraq War, why should private contractors be held accountable either? Privatization is a great buzz word, but what it really means is corporate welfare. The neocon movement's driving motivation for privatization isn't effective government, it's enlarging the government tit so that big money can get more big money, directly from the taxpayer's breast. Poor people have been enjoying a free ride for too long. It's time for corporate executives who are also campaign contributors to get some of that easy, guaranteed money. They are rich, so they deserve it. These vomitous leeches on the underbelly of America have convinced themselves that they are the new nobility, the chosen few born with the divine right of kings to plunder and pillage the serfs.
You might think I'm exaggerating, but look closer. There are kernels of truth in even the most grandiose hyperbole, and the truth is there if you look hard enough. If you ask me, we don't need more privatization, we need more accountability. That's something which has been rarer than oxygen in space these last few years.
Labels: Government Corruption, If You Ask Me, Privatization
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posted by Gary A. Ballard @ 9:14 AM
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If You Ask Me, Vol. 1: NFL Edition
Posted on
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
by Gary A. Ballard
This article marks the start of what I hope to be a regular feature here on the Game of Angst, called If You Ask Me. Its title comes from something my mother always used to say about just about anything. "If you ask me," she'd begin, before going off on some diatribe about how whoever was doing whatever wrong. Whether it was the placement of a pond in someone's front yard, the arrangement of colors on some stranger's house or the way I lived my life, my mother has always had an opinion and no reluctance to share said opinion whether others want to hear it or not. I have inherited this genetic defect, this inability to just keep my yap shut about things that I have precious little to do with. As such, a blog is the perfect spot from which to unload my almost informed opinions about anything. With that in mind, I bring you the first ever installment of If You Ask Me®, the NFL edition.
I'm an American football fan with a Tivo. For the last two seasons, I've Tivoed at least 2 NFL games each Sunday if not 3 or 4 as well as the Monday Night games, any good Saturday or Thursday games, and every game of the playoffs. As such, I'm fairly well-versed with the game as it is presented on television and have strong opinions about the game. If you ask me, the game is great, but needs some changes to take it to another level.
If You Ask Me #1: Penalties on Kickoffs and Punts
The kicking game of any team, as important as it is, is one boring piece of work. Out of every game I watch over the course of a season, I'd say maybe 5 or 6 kickoffs and punts combined are worth watching. The rest are fast-forward fodder. I don't want to see them, because they are boring as dirt. They net few extra yards, and outside of a muffed catch or a spectacular hit, nothing interesting happens. They tend to interrupt the flow of the game a great deal but I can accept that.
But what really kills the flow of the game is when one of these somnambulistic ballets gets called back on a penalty. And the penalty most often used to interrupt and irritate me is the illegal block in the back penalty. When I played football in junior high, the only penalty ever called on a punt return or kickoff was holding or clipping. Clipping was a man's penalty. Clipping was the act of blocking someone below the belt when their back was turned and by God it was a serious penalty, netting 15 yards. It needed to be serious, because that kind of block could end someone's career.
The illegal block in the back, however, is a penalty for pansies. It's a 10-yard penalty for merely touching a player in the back, above or below the waist. Now, I'm sure it's meant to be for actually blocking a player hard in the back where the blocked player is supposed to be defenseless and unable to brace for the impact. But I have literally seen the penalty be given for putting your hands on a guy's jersey when their back is to you. And unlike clipping, it isn't given at most once a game, it's given on almost every single goddamn punt in the game. It's given so much the refs should just tack on an extra 10-yards to every single goddamn punt on general principle.
If you ask me, that rule needs to get tossed on its ear, or it needs to be called only when the block could be considered dangerous. These are guys wearing modern, cutting-edge armor, they can take a swipe at the back of their jersey.
If You Ask Me #2: Commercial Timeouts
Now, I realize the networks who broadcast the NFL games want to get paid. It's an expensive proposition to take a traveling road show of camera man, producers, broadcasters and stats guys to 32 different cities each week. John Madden's trailer alone must cost them millions in refrigerator restocks. I want the networks to make their investment back and a little profit besides, because they entertain me for months.
But can we all agree that there are too many commercials breaking up the flow of the game? Do we really need to enter a commercial break both before a kickoff AND after? Did I not just see that annoying fucker say "Can you hear me now?" 30 seconds ago, you have to show him to me again? The Geico cavemen are not THAT funny. I understand it takes a little time to move the offense onto the field after a change in possession, but not two minutes of commercial time. If you ask me, there needs to be one commercial break after changes in possession and that's it.
And what's more, we really do not need The VISA HALFTIME SHOW. It's just the goddamn halftime show. I don't care who paid for it. If the NFL must make that much money on commercial endorsements, just do it like the English football clubs do. Make the uniforms one big fucking billboard for the team's sponsor, plaster a metric fuckton of corporate logos all over every empty surface in the stadiums and get on with your lives. The Green Bay Packers brought to you with a gigantic Johnsonville Brats logo on their chests bothers me much less than the Michelin Scoreboard.
If You Ask Me #3: Halftime Shows for Speed Freaks
As a kid watching football, I loved the halftime studio shows. They were informative, updating all the scores around the league, dousing me with highlights and maybe the studio talking heads would wax poetic about some of the action for thirty seconds before sending the feed back out to the games. Somewhere, that all changed. Somehow, the halftime show became a blipvert for speed freaks, the barely-slowed down dolphin speech of functional illiterates trying to cram as much actual information into the space of thirty seconds, before assaulting me with 8 minutes of commercials. Didn't I just talk about too many commercials in the above paragraphs? It's back.
I want highlights, people, not seizure-inducing images flashed in a meth-fueled slideshow with a voiceover by hyped-up gorilla unable to keep up with the feed. Whether it's Terry Bradshaw or Shannon Sharpe, these guys' mouths are not physically able to keep up with all the action being shown and yet they try to stumble through. Hearing Bradshaw choke on T.J. Houshmandzadeh's name before the video switches to the next game is painful. It's just impossible to mouth the syllables before two other games have flashed by. What's worse is how hard it makes to follow the other games while watching, almost forcing one to the Internet for real information. Yet somehow, the studios have enough time for commercials, as well as 2 or 3 minutes of the studio talking heads to smack-talk each other in some dick-waving contest that offers no real insight into the strategies the teams are using.
If you ask me, the networks should either just play highlights and scores with no voiceovers, or just play commercials and let me fast-forward them. I've better things to do with my time, like artificially inseminating beavers.
If You Ask Me #4: Graphics for the Blind
Every network clothes their broadcasts in different graphic treatments, showing off the scoreboard, clock, down indicator and some stats with varying degrees of usefulness. But somewhere along the way, those graphics got way out of hand. Not only do some of the networks use graphics with horribly ugly, unreadable fonts (Fox), most of them take up so much screen real estate they turn a 27" inch TV into a 14" squintbox. And what do they do with all that screen real estate besides piss me off?
Nothing. FoxSports, the NFL Network and NBC's Monday Night Football broadcasts all use horizontal bars at the top or bottom of the screen, covering the entire width of the display. Even when parts of the display have no information whatsoever, they still sit there, obscuring my view of the field. And these areas are empty a good deal of the time. ESPN's display is better, but still entirely too large for what it displays. Of all the networks, only CBS does an admirable job with their graphics. The fonts are crisp, clean and readable even on non-HD displays, the scoreboard is minimal with no honking big team logos taking up unneeded space. Between plays, they flash fantasy stats on the player who was just involved in the last play. Their ticker for other games in progress does take up the entire width of the bottom of the screen, but is tinier than the bars on Fox, NFL or NBC.
If you ask me, the graphics teams for these networks need to be sent back to school. All they do is piss me off.
If You Ask Me #5: Celebrities, Personalities and the Jackass Factor
I'm looking at you, ESPN's Monday Night Football. Is there really any good goddamn reason Sly Stallone was sitting in the booth hawking his new movie during an Eagles game? Did I really need to hear him being interviewed by Theismann and Kornhole? This is a fucking football game, not a trip through the stands at a Lakers game by Pat Fucking O'Brien. I tuned in to see a good football game and you give me Entertainment Tonight as hosted by Brickhead and the Twat. Stop it.
As for the broadcasters, Mike Tirico does a game job of the booth duties on the game, but if it were me, I'd be ready to go postal on the rest of the booth by the mid-point of the season. Joe Theismann was a good quarterback, but he's abrasive as an announcer and always has been. But at least he knows football. Tony Kornheiser, on the other hand, cannot possibly have as much football knowledge. If Theismann is abrasive, Kornhole is steel wool on genitals irritating. He comes off as arrogant and combative. There are times when I expect Theismann to stand up, pull off his dangling broken leg off of his body and beat Kornhole to death with it. I know I'd watch that. Theismann has always had a somewhat contentious tone with other members of the booth team, but he and Kornheiser seem to clash like Thunder and Lightning. It makes me want to watch the game on mute.
If you ask me, the ESPN crew needs to focus less on the showbiz and more on the football. I'm sure the ratings were good for them this year, but the show needs help to be a must-watch again. As it is, I can stomach Madden-Michaels more and Madden has really started to irritate me over the years. Bring back Pat Summerall, bitches!
Life would be a whole lot brighter if these people would just ask me.
I'm an American football fan with a Tivo. For the last two seasons, I've Tivoed at least 2 NFL games each Sunday if not 3 or 4 as well as the Monday Night games, any good Saturday or Thursday games, and every game of the playoffs. As such, I'm fairly well-versed with the game as it is presented on television and have strong opinions about the game. If you ask me, the game is great, but needs some changes to take it to another level.
If You Ask Me #1: Penalties on Kickoffs and Punts
The kicking game of any team, as important as it is, is one boring piece of work. Out of every game I watch over the course of a season, I'd say maybe 5 or 6 kickoffs and punts combined are worth watching. The rest are fast-forward fodder. I don't want to see them, because they are boring as dirt. They net few extra yards, and outside of a muffed catch or a spectacular hit, nothing interesting happens. They tend to interrupt the flow of the game a great deal but I can accept that.
But what really kills the flow of the game is when one of these somnambulistic ballets gets called back on a penalty. And the penalty most often used to interrupt and irritate me is the illegal block in the back penalty. When I played football in junior high, the only penalty ever called on a punt return or kickoff was holding or clipping. Clipping was a man's penalty. Clipping was the act of blocking someone below the belt when their back was turned and by God it was a serious penalty, netting 15 yards. It needed to be serious, because that kind of block could end someone's career.
The illegal block in the back, however, is a penalty for pansies. It's a 10-yard penalty for merely touching a player in the back, above or below the waist. Now, I'm sure it's meant to be for actually blocking a player hard in the back where the blocked player is supposed to be defenseless and unable to brace for the impact. But I have literally seen the penalty be given for putting your hands on a guy's jersey when their back is to you. And unlike clipping, it isn't given at most once a game, it's given on almost every single goddamn punt in the game. It's given so much the refs should just tack on an extra 10-yards to every single goddamn punt on general principle.
If you ask me, that rule needs to get tossed on its ear, or it needs to be called only when the block could be considered dangerous. These are guys wearing modern, cutting-edge armor, they can take a swipe at the back of their jersey.
If You Ask Me #2: Commercial Timeouts
Now, I realize the networks who broadcast the NFL games want to get paid. It's an expensive proposition to take a traveling road show of camera man, producers, broadcasters and stats guys to 32 different cities each week. John Madden's trailer alone must cost them millions in refrigerator restocks. I want the networks to make their investment back and a little profit besides, because they entertain me for months.
But can we all agree that there are too many commercials breaking up the flow of the game? Do we really need to enter a commercial break both before a kickoff AND after? Did I not just see that annoying fucker say "Can you hear me now?" 30 seconds ago, you have to show him to me again? The Geico cavemen are not THAT funny. I understand it takes a little time to move the offense onto the field after a change in possession, but not two minutes of commercial time. If you ask me, there needs to be one commercial break after changes in possession and that's it.
And what's more, we really do not need The VISA HALFTIME SHOW. It's just the goddamn halftime show. I don't care who paid for it. If the NFL must make that much money on commercial endorsements, just do it like the English football clubs do. Make the uniforms one big fucking billboard for the team's sponsor, plaster a metric fuckton of corporate logos all over every empty surface in the stadiums and get on with your lives. The Green Bay Packers brought to you with a gigantic Johnsonville Brats logo on their chests bothers me much less than the Michelin Scoreboard.
If You Ask Me #3: Halftime Shows for Speed Freaks
As a kid watching football, I loved the halftime studio shows. They were informative, updating all the scores around the league, dousing me with highlights and maybe the studio talking heads would wax poetic about some of the action for thirty seconds before sending the feed back out to the games. Somewhere, that all changed. Somehow, the halftime show became a blipvert for speed freaks, the barely-slowed down dolphin speech of functional illiterates trying to cram as much actual information into the space of thirty seconds, before assaulting me with 8 minutes of commercials. Didn't I just talk about too many commercials in the above paragraphs? It's back.
I want highlights, people, not seizure-inducing images flashed in a meth-fueled slideshow with a voiceover by hyped-up gorilla unable to keep up with the feed. Whether it's Terry Bradshaw or Shannon Sharpe, these guys' mouths are not physically able to keep up with all the action being shown and yet they try to stumble through. Hearing Bradshaw choke on T.J. Houshmandzadeh's name before the video switches to the next game is painful. It's just impossible to mouth the syllables before two other games have flashed by. What's worse is how hard it makes to follow the other games while watching, almost forcing one to the Internet for real information. Yet somehow, the studios have enough time for commercials, as well as 2 or 3 minutes of the studio talking heads to smack-talk each other in some dick-waving contest that offers no real insight into the strategies the teams are using.
If you ask me, the networks should either just play highlights and scores with no voiceovers, or just play commercials and let me fast-forward them. I've better things to do with my time, like artificially inseminating beavers.
If You Ask Me #4: Graphics for the Blind
Every network clothes their broadcasts in different graphic treatments, showing off the scoreboard, clock, down indicator and some stats with varying degrees of usefulness. But somewhere along the way, those graphics got way out of hand. Not only do some of the networks use graphics with horribly ugly, unreadable fonts (Fox), most of them take up so much screen real estate they turn a 27" inch TV into a 14" squintbox. And what do they do with all that screen real estate besides piss me off?
Nothing. FoxSports, the NFL Network and NBC's Monday Night Football broadcasts all use horizontal bars at the top or bottom of the screen, covering the entire width of the display. Even when parts of the display have no information whatsoever, they still sit there, obscuring my view of the field. And these areas are empty a good deal of the time. ESPN's display is better, but still entirely too large for what it displays. Of all the networks, only CBS does an admirable job with their graphics. The fonts are crisp, clean and readable even on non-HD displays, the scoreboard is minimal with no honking big team logos taking up unneeded space. Between plays, they flash fantasy stats on the player who was just involved in the last play. Their ticker for other games in progress does take up the entire width of the bottom of the screen, but is tinier than the bars on Fox, NFL or NBC.
If you ask me, the graphics teams for these networks need to be sent back to school. All they do is piss me off.
If You Ask Me #5: Celebrities, Personalities and the Jackass Factor
I'm looking at you, ESPN's Monday Night Football. Is there really any good goddamn reason Sly Stallone was sitting in the booth hawking his new movie during an Eagles game? Did I really need to hear him being interviewed by Theismann and Kornhole? This is a fucking football game, not a trip through the stands at a Lakers game by Pat Fucking O'Brien. I tuned in to see a good football game and you give me Entertainment Tonight as hosted by Brickhead and the Twat. Stop it.
As for the broadcasters, Mike Tirico does a game job of the booth duties on the game, but if it were me, I'd be ready to go postal on the rest of the booth by the mid-point of the season. Joe Theismann was a good quarterback, but he's abrasive as an announcer and always has been. But at least he knows football. Tony Kornheiser, on the other hand, cannot possibly have as much football knowledge. If Theismann is abrasive, Kornhole is steel wool on genitals irritating. He comes off as arrogant and combative. There are times when I expect Theismann to stand up, pull off his dangling broken leg off of his body and beat Kornhole to death with it. I know I'd watch that. Theismann has always had a somewhat contentious tone with other members of the booth team, but he and Kornheiser seem to clash like Thunder and Lightning. It makes me want to watch the game on mute.
If you ask me, the ESPN crew needs to focus less on the showbiz and more on the football. I'm sure the ratings were good for them this year, but the show needs help to be a must-watch again. As it is, I can stomach Madden-Michaels more and Madden has really started to irritate me over the years. Bring back Pat Summerall, bitches!
Life would be a whole lot brighter if these people would just ask me.
Labels: Football, If You Ask Me, NFL, Sports
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posted by Gary A. Ballard @ 10:42 AM
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