NFL - Are You Ready For Some Football?! - 08/09 Season

[SlowwHand]

On 3rd and 2 they should have play-action passed.

[-Jrabbit]

Tough loss after an inspired effort from an undermanned 49ers team. Nice to see them play well for Singletary. Damn shame they choked at the end. Gore stumbling with a clear path to the end zone was kind of heartbreaking.

Fun game to watch.

[SlowwHand]

With Singletary, they know they have someone that knows his stuff, both sides of the ball.

[-Jrabbit]

They could sure use some work on their clock management and goal line offense.

But yeah, if the team buys in, they'll get a lot more out of their limited resources. I wonder how long Martz will stick around.

[Lord Avalon]

Retirees win suit against union

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- A federal jury on Monday ordered the NFL Players Association to pay $28.1 million to retired players after finding the union failed to properly market their images.

The jury said the union owed the retirees $7.1 million in actual damages for failing to include them in lucrative marketing deals with Electronic Arts Inc., the maker of the popular "Madden NFL" video games, sporting card companies and other sponsorship agreements. (The other $21M is for punitive damages.)

Hall of Fame cornerback Herb Adderley filed the lawsuit last year on behalf of 2,056 retired players who contend the union failed to actively pursue marketing deals on their behalf with video games, trading cards and others sports products.

The lawyers and judge still must decide how to divvy up the jury's award, some of which will go to attorneys' fees.

Adderley, 69, played cornerback for the Green Bay Packers and Dallas Cowboys and appeared in four of the first six Super Bowls. He appeared every day in court wearing his yellow "NFL Alumni" sports jacket and wept when the jury's verdict was read.

"I won three Super Bowls and this feels better than all of them combined," Adderley said immediately after the verdict was announced. "I always felt I had one big play left."

Several retired players either testified during the trial or appeared in the court to lend support, including retired Green Bay Packers quarterback Bart Starr, who attended the last day of testimony on Friday.

Richard Berthelsen, the union's acting executive director, said outside court that the NFLPA would ask the trial judge, U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup, to toss out the verdict. If that fails, it intends to appeal.

"It's an unjust verdict and we are confident it will be overturned," union lawyer Jeffrey Kessler said.

Lawyers representing Adderley and the retired players told the jury during the three-week trial that the union actively sought to cut them out of licensing deals so active players could receive bigger royalty payments. As proof, the retirees pointed to a 2001 letter from an NFLPA executive telling Electronic Arts Inc. executives to scramble the images of retired players in the company's popular Madden video game, otherwise the company would have to pay them.

EA's Madden game contains 143 "vintage" teams populated with no-name players that closely resemble Adderley and other retirees. Yet only active players received a cut of the EA deal, the union's largest, which surpassed $35 million for 2008.

Ronald Katz, a lawyer representing the retirees, told jurors that longtime union chief Gene Upshaw and other union leaders "betrayed the trust of their members" by neglecting the retired players, who pay $50 a year to keep their union membership. Upshaw died of cancer in August.

Kessler unsuccessfully urged the jury to award far less, arguing the union could suffer economic harm if it had to pay a large amount.

"It was the only sports union that tried to do retired players' licensing deals," Kessler said.

The union's primary defense during trial was that EA, trading card companies such as Topps and Upper Deck and other companies paid licensing fees exclusively for active players.

But the retirees represented at trial all signed "group licensing agreements" that promised the union would do its best to market their images. The jury found otherwise.

"We felt we had to send a message that the union needs to represent and protect all its members," said Susan Smith, part of the 10-person jury that voted unanimously in favor of the retirees. "We felt the players' union didn't do that."

The jury's verdict is the latest salvo in an increasingly rancorous relationship between the NFLPA and many retired players, who have complained that the union has forgotten what past players have contributed to building the NFL into a highly profitable industry that richly compensates owners and players alike.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/football/nfl/11/10/union.must.pay.retirees.ap/index.html

[snoopy369]

The NFLPA "suffer economic harm"? That's got to be one of the richest unions out there per person represented...

It would be nice to have real retired players in the game (ie, play the read 1985 Bears, instead of playing with someone who looks vaguely like walter payton...).

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


Shouldn't have even been that close. Chargers should have won 20-13, without the bogus PI call.

I'm happy because the Chargers finally won a game because of their defense. I would rather have seen them blow out the Chiefs, but they showed that they could shut down the Chiefs.

Pittsburgh is going to be the same thing. If the Chargers offense can score enough to win, and the defense can stop the Steelers' anemic offense, then the Chargers can get back up to 5-5.

Good one, Ben. The Charger's D managed to hold the second or third worst offense in football starting its third string running back and third string quarterback to a mere three touchdowns (and don't whine about blown calls, that's part of the game both ways). Congratulations. KC has not scored more than three touchdowns all year, you know ... and the two times they did on offense, one was against Oakland with their first stringers. So congrats, your defense is slightly better than Oakland.

[Ben Kenobi]

Good one, Ben. The Charger's D managed to hold the second or third worst offense in football starting its third string running back and third string quarterback to a mere three touchdowns (and don't whine about blown calls, that's part of the game both ways).

Two touchdowns, both in the first half. 0 points in the last half of the game.

Congratulations. KC has not scored more than three touchdowns all year, you know ... and the two times they did on offense, one was against Oakland with their first stringers. So congrats, your defense is slightly better than Oakland.

Think Indy without Bob Sanders, and that is what we are dealing with right now.

[-Jrabbit]

Um, that last TD was in the 4th quarter, and you don't get to disallow it because of a ref's call. It was a 60-yd, 14 play drive in which the Bolts failed to stop them numerous times, including a 4th and 8. The truth is, San Diego actually won on the strength of the missed PAT in Q2.

Last year, that was a pretty fierce unit. Hard to believe that losing one guy -- Merriman -- drops them to 26th in the defensive standings.

[snoopy369]

Hard to believe indeed. Merriman was a pass rusher and not much else as it was - he wasn't even a very good IDP player, for example, in tackle leagues (like ours) because he didn't get that many tackles per week. Frankly, any defense that loses one player and suddenly sucks isn't a good defense to begin with. The Bears lost 3/4 of their secondary and still played acceptably (not well, not nearly up to Bears standards, and I *****ed every week as I should, but not 26th in the league by any stretch).

SD's offense hasn't played up to snuff (20 points against KC???), and their defense has been horrible; and holding KC to 19 is not something to be proud of. Well, unless you're Detroit...

[Ben Kenobi]

Um, that last TD was in the 4th quarter, and you don't get to disallow it because of a ref's call. It was a 60-yd, 14 play drive in which the Bolts failed to stop them numerous times, including a 4th and 8. The truth is, San Diego actually won on the strength of the missed PAT in Q2.

Ok, so the Chargers are really a 5-4 team and leading the West?

That PI was garbage, and if you want to assess the Chargers accurately, you can't include the bogus call.

Last year, that was a pretty fierce unit. Hard to believe that losing one guy -- Merriman -- drops them to 26th in the defensive standings.

It's all pass defense. Run defense will be in the top 10 after the Pitt game. They were ranked 7th against the run last year, and about 15th against the pass, in terms of yardage, and not points.

Their strength has always been turnovers and sacks, which has been non-existant. Merriman commanded double teams every single play, and losing him is comparable to the Indy defensive unit without Sanders.

[Ben Kenobi]

Hard to believe indeed. Merriman was a pass rusher and not much else as it was - he wasn't even a very good IDP player, for example, in tackle leagues (like ours) because he didn't get that many tackles per week.

Wow. Tackles are a **** stat to evaluate defensive players. It's all about the scheme.

The chargers play a 3-4, which means that the ILBs are the ones who get the majority of the tackles, and the OLBs are the ones who get the sacks. Comparing Merriman with 4-3 OLBs is wrong, because the role is completely different. The closest 4-3 analogue is someone like Haynesworth for the Titans, a DE. How many tackles does Haynesworth have?

For the Chargers, the reason their pass defense has been so poor is because they haven't been able to get a pass rush going. Merriman commanded double teams and the team has not yet adjusted without him.

I admit, I was surprised too at how great an effect missing Merriman, but the Chargers haven't had a sack now in 3 games and you wonder why the pass defense looks so bad?

SD's offense hasn't played up to snuff (20 points against KC???), and their defense has been horrible; and holding KC to 19 is not something to be proud of. Well, unless you're Detroit...

As for the Bears analogy, the cornerstone of the Bears' D is the fellow who's your MLB. See how well the Bears do if he should ever go down for an entire season.

Holding them to 13 is an improvement. I agree the offense struggled, settling for 2 field goals that should have been touchdowns, but the Chargers are still the second best offense in all the AFC, behind only Farve's Jets.

[-Jrabbit]

19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19, 19

The stat is "Points Allowed" and that's how many the San Diego defense allowed KC to score.

[-Jrabbit]

No one is denying Merriman's skill. But they did fine without him -- playing the 3-4 scheme -- when he was suspended for 'roids.

[snoopy369]

For a linebacker, tackles are precisely how you measure their skill. Linebackers aren't CBs (who can be thrown away from, or effective at PDs), and they aren't DTs (who often get few tackles because the other team doesn't run against the good lines). Run or pass, linebackers always get plenty of tackles, and the good ones get more than others. They're generally the single most effective indicator of the impact that LB has on the rest of the team.

Merriman certainly was a good pass rusher, but outside of that he simply wasn't very useful. I am well aware they play a 3-4; but that doesn't mean the OLBs can't get tackles. They get somewhat fewer... but Merriman simply doesn't play run defense well. He's too aggressive and overcommits on the run. As long as you double team him in the pass rush, you won't have a significant threat from him in the game.

The Bears have played quite a few games without Urlacher in the past few years, and without Briggs, and without Mike Brown, and ... etc. They don't play as well, certainly (and Urlacher is basically a QB, in that he runs the defense out on the field - so they lose more than just a player when he goes out); but they don't suddenly become one of the worst D's in the league.

If you want to feel optimistic about the Bolt's chances based on a one point victory over the Kansas City Chiefs, feel free. I won't hold you back. But I know that if the Bears beat the Lions by a point, I wouldn't exactly be talking big about them...