View From The Porch: Reds, Whites, Greens, Blues, Colts.

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Reds, Whites, Greens, Blues, Colts.

Disappointed by the Colts' failure in the Lucas Maximus arena Sunday, a former Plebeian Tribune is calling for a refund of the proles' ticket prices.

27 comments:

Anonymous said...: Let's see, what pressing business could there be in Indianapolis government?

Cleaning up the near Eastside? No.

Expanding the convention trade? Of course not.

Rebuilding Indianapolis water supply infrastructure? No, no, no.

I know let's all kvetch about a professional sports team and the coach's decision to bench the 1st string. That's nothing short of genius!

Let's get on that right after we put up another turtle statue in Broad Ripple.

Shootin' Buddy; 9:15 AM, December 30, 2009
Caleb said...: I heard this and I lol'd. I mean come on, from whence did Colts' fans get the idea the team "owed" them anything? It's a business, people, and the first obligation of the Colts' franchise is to make smart business decisions, which include benching their starters in meaningless games like the one against the Jets. Fans are stupid.; 9:42 AM, December 30, 2009
Will Brown said...: I would be curious to discover what connection our formet Tribune has with the Bakers Union (that being the other traditional alternative to games). Does he intend the money go toward expanding the bread supply instead?; 9:44 AM, December 30, 2009
Ed Foster said...: Couldn't you just get them all in the stadium and do a Belisarius on them?; 10:53 AM, December 30, 2009
Anonymous said...: Oh, here's an idea...
Let's keep Peyton in for the whole game. If he gets sacked in the fourth quarter and dislocates his right shoulder, everyone will talk about what a good game it was and how noble it was for the Colts to fight to the end.
Some people are just too dumb to live!; 11:35 AM, December 30, 2009
Fuzzy Curmudgeon said...: Anonymous, you are a fool.

Either play the best team you have or don't play. If Peyton ends up with a season-ending injury, that's the way the cookie, er, offensive line crumbles. Peyton could get hurt just as easily in the first playoff game, too...and then where would the Colts be? "Out on their ass" comes to mind.

Great victories are never won by the pusillanimous or the cautious. Yes, I'm talking to you, Bill Polian and Jim Caldwell.

I'm not even a Colts fan, and last Sunday's debacle infuriates me. Heads need to roll in the executive suite over this.; 11:52 AM, December 30, 2009
Keith said...: Great victories are also not won by overconfident leaders who risk their best men for a victory that will not matter. Any student of history can tell you that. The Colts did what was necessary to maximize their chances of victory in the playoffs. Hell I'm not a football fan and even I can see it, a Pyrrhic victory is no victory at all.; 12:29 PM, December 30, 2009
Jason said...: As for the fans who complained that even a Super Bowl win wouldn't assuage the pain of having an imperfect season, well, they really need to rethink their dedication to spectator sports. I mean, I was one of the few Colts fans who was happy with the move to Indianapolis (as that was the team I picked to follow back in 1st grade when they were still in Baltimore) so it's not like I haven't seen really bad years, like Jeff George's rookie season... going 14 and 2 or 15 and 1 is great, getting in the playoffs is great, and getting a Super Bowl victory? That's icing on the cake.

Still, though, it's sports and not keeping the city running smoothly. I wonder how much this guy had riding on the Colts on that game?; 12:46 PM, December 30, 2009
OA said...: Keith said...
Any student of history can tell you that.

Okay Professor, can you tell me what the Giants did a few years back when they didn't mail it in during the last regular season game against the Pats? How'd that turn out for them? Can you do me the favor of contrasting that with how often teams mail in the second half of the last regular season game and get bounced in the first or second round of the playoffs?

Football ain't the W.W.II European theater, son.

"Hell I'm not a football fan..."

The hell you say!; 12:57 PM, December 30, 2009
Jayson said...: These aren't children. They're pro athletes whose job is to WIN every time they take to the field. EVERY time. Manning has gone almost 200 games without an injury that made him miss a game. The reason for that is his line is one of the best in football and they protect him, so the reasoning that all of a sudden he's going to get hurt is pointless cause the stats don't back that up.

Most of all, the Football Gods demand glory, not caution. Going undefeated and getting the ring makes your team football immortals. The Colts are now the NFL version of an overprotective parent.; 1:35 PM, December 30, 2009
NotClauswitz said...: Since when does Colt make fans? For computers? For the HBAR? I heard that the pistols are undergoing some kind of recall - there's another kind of Colt?; 1:37 PM, December 30, 2009
dave said...: Pissed at the coaches' decision? Pleased with it? Don't care?

Fine, choose your path. The point is that you *don't* get the government involved. Christ, what is wrong with people?; 2:09 PM, December 30, 2009
Caleb said...: Man, people who say that the Colts had an obligation to go for the perfect season don't really understand business. First and foremost, a football team is a business organization, and the players are the employees. The management has in the past decided to rest players when they've got their goals (first round bye, home field advantage) locked up, regardless of the feelings of the fans. This is because management believes that's what is in the best interest of their business.

If the goal is to win to the Super Bowl, then what they did is consistent with past actions of the business. People who expected them to do otherwise are silly, and people who feel like they should get their money back are just stupid.; 2:49 PM, December 30, 2009
Kristophr said...: I think Colt should sue this team for besmirching the Colt Firearms trademark.

They should rename themselves the Indianapolis GLOCKs.; 3:22 PM, December 30, 2009
OA said...: Management? Shall we discuss what bright ideas management has come up with in the world of firearms? Coaching like a bean counter isn't any better.

The point I made above hasn't changed. Teams that sit starters the last regular season game (and lose) often choke in the playoffs. Happens time and time again. You don't tell your players that ostensibly this game doesn't matter, that it's okay to lose it (and they lost a perfect season, no less). That's not much of a mindset to foment heading into the playoffs. Wrong time of the year to take your foot off the gas, especially when offensive timing is so critical. Then again the Colts have been underachieving for the better part of a decade, so I don't know why anyone's surprised by what they did. They still have the mentality of a loser.; 3:25 PM, December 30, 2009
Rick R. said...: Caleb -- it's even more critical to the franchise to preserve their players than that.

The players are both employees AND captial.; 3:34 PM, December 30, 2009
Caleb said...: OA - two of three times the Pats won the Super Bowl this decade, they sat Tom Brady and Co. for the final game of the season, or played the minimally.

Didn't seem to hurt them.; 4:01 PM, December 30, 2009
OA said...: Did they lose a perfect season any of those times?; 4:06 PM, December 30, 2009
Caleb said...: No, as a matter of fact, the year the Patriots lost the perfect season they didn't rest their starters, played the entire season...and then lost the Super Bowl. So they won 2 or 3 utterly meaningless games, and lost the game that really mattered.; 4:26 PM, December 30, 2009
OA said...: Know what's cool about this? We'll find out what happens soon enough.; 4:34 PM, December 30, 2009
Joel said...: The Indianapolis Hecklers has a kind of poetry to it...; 5:09 PM, December 30, 2009
NotClauswitz said...: The Hecklers & Coughers - because you suck and they hate you?
Or...the Indianapolis Hi-Points?; 7:37 PM, December 30, 2009
Skip said...: My Chargers are gonna take the Ring this year, so fix your streets.; 9:03 PM, December 30, 2009
Caleb said...: God, I hate Philip Rivers so very much.

And OA is right - the best thing about this is all we have to do is wait and see what happens. Although I predict now that if the Colts win the Super Bowl, people will be coming out of the woodwork saying "resting the starters was the right thing to do!"; 11:19 PM, December 30, 2009
Anonymous said...: It's a freaking business, period.
They make decisions like insurance companies use actuarial tables.

"Whats going to generate the most money for my business?"

PT Barnum was right.

Gmac; 11:25 PM, December 30, 2009
Keith said...: As I said I am not a football fan so I neither know nor care about the Giants incident you mention. The only thing that matters is that the Colts did what was necessary to maximize their chances in the playoffs. Perhaps other teems have done differently in the past, but if they did it was them who made the mistake, not the Colts.

As a side note I do have to wonder why all these people are so worked up about this. Even if you think it was a bad decision it's still only a football game.; 1:06 AM, December 31, 2009
Ken said...: Even if you think it was a bad decision it's still only a football game.

In learning that important lesson, it helps to be a fan of the Cleveland Browns. Ask me how I know. :-P

What's interesting about all this from a non-football perspective (I love football, but let's look at it from the outside for a moment) is that it demonstrates how governments distort markets. The NFL enjoys a limited antitrust exemption that, among other things, allows the league to bargain collectively with the TV networks and squash prospective competitors like bugs.

It also creates a certain disconnect between the paying customer and the business. For one thing, it's not entirely clear what the customer is paying for: Is it three or so hours of entertainment, or does the customer have a right to expect that the team will treat every game as a fall-on-your-sword proposition, or what?

Every business deals with heterogeneous demand, so it's likely that different fans will have different answers with regard to what they think they're paying for. Another effect of government interference in the market for pro football, though, is that the customer has no alternative if pro football (and not entertainment in general) is what he wants to buy.

In addition, practices like personal seat licenses and the volume of business done in season tickets further insulates teams from immediate economic consequences springing from decisions the fans don't like. Long story short: It's tough for an NFL fan to vote with her dollars because there's no place else to go (assuming pro ball is what she wants to see) and a lot of the dollars are already in the team's pocket anyway. About all you can do is show the TV cameras a bunch of empty seats, wear a bag over your head, or carry a sign saying "Jump, Art (Modell)," or vote with your dollars next year. The PSLs are a disincentive for that, too: Too many people don't understand sunk cost, and conclude their "investment" in the PSL requires them to escalate commitment.

Those are just two of the problems government has made with respect to pro football -- you really want to talk mischief, let's talk "franchise free agency" and the degree to which taxpayers foot the bill for places like Lucas Maximus.; 8:48 AM, December 31, 2009