I'm not one to believe in the Doomsday scenarios being thrown around about a lockout wiping out the 2011 season- However, I'm not about to discount the possibility the owners could pull what they did in 1987 to break the union: Scab games. Yeah, the owners called them replacement games, but they were straight-up crap. Even though the games were played in front of half-empty or less stadiums and drew abysmal TV ratings, three missed game checks were enough to convince a majority of players to come back to work on the owners' terms.
I'd guess that fans would be even less receptive to scab games in 2011 than they were in 1987. The game and its players are vastly more popular than they were in 1987, and it's hard to imagine fans paying full price for game tickets or the NFL Sunday Ticket package when CFL and arena rejects are filling NFL rosters. Throw in the MASSIVE popularity of fantasy football, and you'd have millions of fantasy nerds shitting kittens at the notion of casting their lot with squads of unknowns.
The unpleasant reality is that if scab games happened again, they'd count in the standings just like they did in 1987... and the results of those games could determine whether our Seahawks make the playoffs. That's what we saw in 1987, when a win by the Scabhawks over the fake Dolphins in the 1st scab game ended up placing Seattle in the playoffs while Miami ended up watching the postseason on TV. Here's a very brief look at that crucial 24-20 win:
To me, the idea of Seattle's Super Bowl hopes coming down to our guys off the street beating another team's collection of rejects IS FUCKING TERRIFYING. I don't think that scab games are likely to happen again, but if no agreement is reached by the summer, they could be the owners' last resort to break the will of the player's union.
This is all depressing as shit, isn't it? Hopefully I'll get all this doom and gloom out of my system soon- It really isn't my style.
2 comments:
Don't forget, Steve Largent came back in replacement game #3 and caught 27 passes for 554 yards and 7 touchdowns (stats subject to verification). It was a dagger in the heart of the players' union.
I love your passion for the Seahawks, but when you venture outside that love your politics and Red Sox mongering leaves me cold. Maybe I'll start a blog called Steve Largent's Strike Breakers, or SLSB, to counter this DKSB nonsense.
In the strike of '87, Largent, Kemp and Fredd Young came back after the players voted to play, and they wanted to make sure they could control any playoff implications. And it worked. Largent mentioned later that he does not personally recognize any of the records he set in that game, and had formally asked they be expunged.
As far as NFL owners foisting guys who were unloading microwaves at the Kmart loading dock last week (actual background of a real scab player in 1987) and on the fan base, and making their TV contract and said fan base pay full retail for their inexcusably shitty product, it has fuckall to do with politics, and everything to do with piss-poor customer relations.
And it IS terrifying to consider the aforementioned Kmart loading dock guy holding Your Seattle Seahawks' 2011 playoff future in his unable-to-wear-an-NFL-uniform-any-other-way hot little hands. Just be happy Uncle Pete and Schneider are already trying out every Kmart loading dock guy they can find.
And, in conclusion, on behalf of loyal Beard fans everywhere, I assert, under the very Constitution used by so many belligerent buffoons (who have never read it) that vilify all who dare to vary in the slightest from their medieval worldview, that you are most welcome to fuck right off if you don't like what The Beard has to say. On the blog that he owns, and is the sole provider of material for.
Or, perhaps, you could present a reasoned argument as to the merits of why your views might differ, and develop a dialogue that will allow those that differ from your way of thinking to see it's merits and change their minds. If that ain't your style, remember that if you surround yourself with Yes Men, you will make no mistakes, but you will grow no wiser.
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