Super Bowl XXXX Something or Other

While I've a fondness for the Colts franchise, many things Baltimorean, I'll be rooting for the New Orleans Saints.  The Colts' furtive relocation to Hoosier land, and recent big game win (2006), make the 'Aints-no-more, my feel good favorites.

The Saint franchise, christened in 1967, and playing in its first Championship game, is led by mortal-sized quarterback Drew Brees.  The Colts are captained by pleasing pitchman Peyton Manning, the likely product of genetic engineering.

While Indianapolis has been installed as the odds on choice, significant Colt injuries may be a factor.

(Images courtesy of the writer's dog-eared sports card collection.)

The NFL Playoffs

After watching the fifth and final season of The Wire, television's best urban drama, I cannot resist rooting for Baltimore's Ravens. Plus they've a good player at my favorite position, tight end (Todd Heap). The tight end has to live in two worlds, knocking heads on the line, catching balls downfield. A real estate agent has dual oeuvres as well, manning a desk, thumbing a keyboard and building files; in addition to, the field work, checking out the inventory, the opens, casing a joint.

In the NFC final, Arizona hosts Philadelphia. The Cardinals are a feel good story, long suffering franchise sparked by left-for-dead signal caller Kurt Warner. Philadelphia's a repository of great architecture and tasty hoagies; and, they've a good defensive backfield. Go Eagles!

Stadia

I watched the Yankees final home game, and I cried. I don't live and die with sports any more. I used to, before I had a kid, and this career, and a house, and a community. I even think my past investment in sports was a bit silly, a waste of time, immature.

But how can Yankee Stadium be razed?! I once wrote about the late Ambassador Hotel, 'If the Ambassador can be torn down, anything can be torn down.' That's likely a bit of an exaggeration, Los Angeles boasts landmarks that may be forever safe: the Eastern Columbia building, Capital Records, Bullocks Wilshire, and others. Still, if New York's Yankee Stadium can fall victim to the wrecking ball.....

The first generation of modern ball parks that began with Barney Dreyfuss and Forbes Field in 1909, is nearly gone. In the last two decades, the White Sox dismantled Comiskey, the Indians left Municipal Stadium, and the Tigers abandoned Tiger Stadium. Only Wrigley Field in Chicago and Fenway Park in Boston remain from that defining era.

Dodger Stadium now shockingly ranks as the majors third-oldest active facility, and in the world of professional sports that isn't an endorsement.

Football, Norte Americano

In the mornings I check my e-mail, then read the sports page, or the online equivalent. Professional team sports interest me. Currently, I'm following the divisional races in baseball. Did the Brewers win? What's happening with the Phils/Mets, Twins/ChiSox?

The pro football season, the nation's most popular sporting pursuit, is two weeks old. Yet I'm not an enthusiast. Pro football is unfriendly to realtors. Games are almost entirely played on Sundays, typically my most impacted work day.

For many the NFL serves as a Sunday backdrop, drifting in and out of halves, a companion with lunch and dinner. I'm not the type to leave a tv on unattended. As the Raymond Shaw character says in the Manchurian Candidate, "there are two kinds of people in this world: those that enter a room and turn the television set on, and those that enter a room and turn the television set off." I seem to be one of the latter.

I will leave a radio on though, maybe that makes me a baseball fan.

Hoops and Hallways

The National Basketball Association draft was held last Thursday and the Los Angeles Clippers chose Indiana freshman Eric Gordon with the #7 pick. I liked the selection of Gordon, but the player I really coveted, Texas point guard D.J. Augustin was drafted two slots later by the Charlotte Bobcats. Why Augustin? Because he's relatively small, an inch or two under six feet and probably around a buck-sixty eight; and, I think small is always underrated.

People fall in love with size, be it basketball prospects or real estate. Hey, square footage is square footage, and I wouldn't necessarily kick it out of bed; but, nothing beats a good floor plan (or floor general). Most can note the obvious waste, labyrinthian hallways, oversized landings, or bloated foyers; but, often the space kept clear to allow the passage of people is what's most limiting.

Just as some NBA teams are "going small", the AIA (American Institute of Architects) report a downsizing trend in new home construction, inspired by sustainable design principles, the housing slowdown, emerging weakness in the national economy, and a growing "Hummer house" backlash. Some municipalities have begun to impose restrictions on height and adopt tough lot coverage ratios as well.

Of course criticism of large homes isn't new, it occurred during the Gilded Age too; and now, as we stand on the edge of another cultural precipice, perhaps we'll come to appreciate the Augustins and Iversons and the T.J. Fords, as much as we do the Yao Mings and the Shaq O'Neals.

Post Season Baseball

Rooting Interests

The Rockies are compelling. The Red Sox franchise steeped in mythology. But make no mistake, I'm pulling for Cleveland. I always root for the longest suffering.

Joyously, drought sufferers the Red Sox and White Sox have captured two of the last three championships. The Angels 2002 title nearly satisfied the criteria, except it came at the expense of the Giants (whose last championship was in 1954). It isn't that I dislike a dynasty, but I prefer happiness spread around. (The economists equivalent of wealth redistribution.) The Indians haven't claimed the top spot since 1948. Only the Cubs famine is longer (1908).

I rummaged through my post card collection and I found these two Cleveland scenes. The first is a linen card, probably early 1950's, of Municipal Stadium, the Indians home before Jacobs Field. The description on the rear reads, Cleveland's Municipal Stadium from the Lake Erie side. It is an iron and concrete structure seating 78,000 persons and costing $2,500,000.


The second postcard is older and likely commemorates an industrial league playoff between either the Omaha Panhandlers and the Cleveland White Auto or the Hanna Cleaners and Telling Strollers, played in 1914 or 1915 in front of 100,000 people at Brookside Park.
Brookside Park, became one of Cleveland's first municipal parks in the 1890's, is well known for summer sporting contests and serves as the home of the Cleveland Baseball Federation, the oldest amateur baseball organization in the country (1910).

Go Tribe!

More Sports Arena

The Men's Bathroom. A latrine!

End of the Season

The Los Angeles Clippers' 2006-07 season came to a close Wednesday. Rather than disparage obstinate head coach Mike Dunleavy, or goofus pivot man Chris Kaman, I shall instead recall the beautiful intimacy of the Los Angeles Sports Arena, and one St. Patrick's day.

I am not a fan of the Los Angeles Lakers. They're the team for Westsiders, for the establishment, for stuffed shirts. I root for underdogs. I don't listen to the top 40, but I do like R & B oldies.

More Sports Arena Memories

A continuing series devoted to that great, unheralded Los Angeles landmark: The Los Angeles Sports Arena.














The last professional basketball game played at the Sports Arena was on April 5, 1999. The Seattle Supersonics nipped the Los Angeles Clippers, 107-105 on a buzzer-beating shot by UCLA alum Don MacLean. The loss capped a rotten Clipper campaign (9 wins, 41 losses), in a season shortened by a labor dispute.





After the game, long time season-ticket holders were honored. They gathered at half-court, wearing vintage warm-ups and jerseys. A highlight film was screened (on the jumbotron), mostly consisting of playoff highlights from the "Larry Brown" era. A commerative poster, celebrating the team's 15-year tenancy, was passed from bins near the exits.



Today, my wife cannot remember the date, game action, opponent, or score. She remembers only that I cried.

Sports Arena Memories

A continuing series devoted to the unappreciated, increasingly vulnerable Los Angeles Sports Arena.

One of my most satisfying seasons as a sports fan was the Los Angeles Clippers 1996-97 campaign. The Clippers, picked for cellar dwellers in pre-season, eked into the playoffs, galvanized by unsung power forward Loy Vaught, guard Malik Sealy, and the strong post-up play of combo forward Rodney Rogers.




Astonishingly, the team won late season games against playoff aspirants Sacramento (still the last time the franchise has won in Sacramento) and Golden State, behind hard-driving veteran coach Bill Fitch, to secure the West's 8th playoff seed.

Unsurprisingly, the Clippers were swept in the post-season's first round by the Western Conference's number one seed the Utah Jazz, including a 92-104 home loss (the last post-season basketball game played in the Sports Arena).




Five members of that Clippers team are still active: the ageless Bo Outlaw (Orlando), fresh-faced Brent Barry (San Antonio), UCLA's Darrick Martin (Toronto), Lorenzen Wright (Atlanta), and Eric Piatkowski, the Polish Rifle (Phoenix).

The Clippers played only two more seasons in the Sports Arena, none of which were as accomplished, before moving into the titantic, fan-unfriendly Staples Center.

The Galen Center

U.S.C.'s new on-campus events center, or adjacent-to campus events center, at Figueroa and Jefferson, strives for a retro look, part Midwestern fieldhouse, part clean-lined, Public Works Administration (PWA) Moderne.



Restricted by the confines of its single, narrow block, the Galen Center is refreshingly unlike many other contemporary arenas, ringed by acres of blacktop and parking.

The University's Eastern border make-over or build-up continues, including the "Gateway" development at Jefferson and Exposition: 421 student apartments, parking, and street level services (Quizno's, Robeks, Coffee Bean & Tea, etc).

I'd support the Galen Center utterly, even with the parking concerns, if only it didn't likely hasten the demise of the increasingly tenantless Los Angeles Sports Arena, previously spurned by the Lakers & Kings, and Clippers--and now Trojans!. Graced with a broad, distinctive crown (and slick terrazo floors on the concourse level), the arena was opened in 1959 (and ergo is not new enough to be "new", nor old enough to be "old").

Undoubtedly, the arena will now be sacrificed to the National Football League nazis, concessions to a relocating franchise.