Jump to content

Atlanta Sports Talk

ironchapman

By ironchapman
in Atlanta Coffeehouse

 Share

Recommended Posts

  • 4 weeks later...

  • Replies 263
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Popular Days

Top Posters In This Topic

Popular Days

  • 3 weeks later...
AubieTurtle Whistle-Stop

AubieTurtle

Posted
Posted

Remember the Gwinnett Gwizzlies? You can be forgiven if you don't. They were an expansion team of the new ABA a few years back with a cocky owner who tended to proclaim that they'd sell out the Gwinnett Arena and outsell the Hawks (which really isn't setting the bar that high), along with some snide comments about families not wanting to go downtown where "those people" live (gee, you'd think he worked for NASCAR).

Well, before they played their first season, they had to leave the ABA. They never played in the Gwinnett Arena either. They ended up in some skills development league. Curious as to their current status, I found that they've move their office to from Duluth to Stone Mountain, have changed their name to the Georgia Gwizzlies (come on, drop the W, it was funny when it was a play off of Gwinnett but now is just dumb looking), and are going to play their next season in a league called the ANBL. They will play their games at Morehouse College, so I guess "those people" in downtown are alright afterall.

But at least they still exist in some form. The Reigning Knights of Georgia, another ABA expansion team, whose home office was located in Duluth a couple hundred feet down the street from the Gwizzlies home office, actually did play. Apparently they have since folded and are totally out of business.

That leaves Atlanta's other ABA team, the Atlanta Vision (at one point named the Atlanta Mustangs), who play their games in a church gym in Lithonia. While they don't have very spectacular surroundings, at least it appears that they're a bit more humble about their minor league status and are operating accordingly. It would be easy to burn through money running a traveling team, even if you don't pay the players more that a few dollars. Just like any new small business, there must be operating funds to last several years, which I suspect was the downfall of the other teams.

So many minor league teams (in any sport), especially in new leagues, seem to be run by people with big egos (which makes them pretty much the same as the owners of major league teams) but little business sense.

I wonder how many other teams are out there on the edge of professional sports. I know we have an Australian Rules Football club and of course there are the Rollergirls, but I doubt either of them get paid so they can't really be considered professional sports (even if the quality is good). The Silverbacks are getting a high enough profile that even though they aren't a MLS team, it's hard to say they're on the fringe. I've also heard that we have a women's football team.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 3 weeks later...
ironchapman City

ironchapman

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Are pleasant memories of the 1991 season starting to replay in any of yall's heads?

Yep! They're rallying back!

Here's an interesting milestone the Braves have reached:

Jones Helps Braves Match 1930 Record

Andruw Jones was 5-for-5 with two homers and matched his career high with six RBIs, helping the Atlanta Braves become the first team since the 1930 New York Yankees to score 10 or more runs in five straight games with a 14-5 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals on Tuesday night.

Adam LaRoche, Chipper Jones and Brian McCann also homered for the Braves, who have scored 65 runs during their offensive explosion that includes two 15-run games. The last time the franchise reached double figures in five straight games was in 1897, when it was called the Boston Beaneaters and they totaled 61 runs.

The 65 runs in five games is the best by the franchise since those same Beaneaters totaled 78, including 25 in one game and 21 in another, from May 31-June 3. The Braves have 81 hits during their five-game run and 98 in their last six, going back to an 8-3 victory over Cincinnati on July 9, the last game before the All-Star break.

Very nice to see stuff like this happening. Give me even more hope for the season.

....And of course, it's nice to see that such a longstanding record was broken. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 2 weeks later...
Andrea Burg

Andrea

Posted
Posted

I was just going to say we should stick by our Bravos, even though they are having a rough go of it this year. You can't win the championship every season. On the bright side, we have won 51 games, which is more than than you can say for the Nationals, the Cubs or the Pirates.

I have lived here in many years when the Braves were far worse than this. Used to be that year in and year out, you could go out to the old Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium and there'd hardly be anyone there. Yet we ultimately managed to climb back on top. So as true Atlantans let's be sure we are not just fair weather fans! Go Braves!!!

addconga.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites
ironchapman City

ironchapman

Posted
  • Author
Posted

I feel so bad for Smoltzy, if it werent for our shaky-at-best bullpen (before recent acquisitions of Baez and Wickman) the Smoltz could easily be around 16-17 wins this season and be a 20 game winner.

Agreed.

Anybody looking forward to the start of the Falcons season soon?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Go Gators Burg

Go Gators

Posted
Posted

No argument there, but let's just say I like our chances this year. The Dome field advantage will be big after we knock of the Panties in week 1. :w00t:

We share the same hatred for the Panthers. Nice win against the Pats last night too, btw. The Falcons are my #2 team, I wont talk about them to much lol :thumbsup:

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 5 weeks later...
NCB Metropolitan Area

NCB

Posted
Posted

The Atlanta Falcons vs the New Orleans Saints in the practically brand new Louisiana Superdome next Monday night. U2, Green Day, parties, music, food, people, and just amazing fun throughout the entire city. News networks and reporters from all over the world in New Orleans covering the event. The Saints first game in the Superdome since 12/26/04 in front of 70,000 LOUD fans. And guess what, the football game should be great too! ;)

I don't know about you guys, but I can't wait! :yahoo:

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 3 months later...
ironchapman City

ironchapman

Posted
  • Author
Posted

I think it's time we revived this long dead thread. :)

Anyways, some interesting news for hockey fans like myself. The Atlanta Thrashers may switch divisions!

Thrashers may switch divisions (AJC)--Proposed move could put Atlanta in Western Conference

The NHL is discussing a realignment proposal that move the Thrashers to the Western Conference and reduce the number of divisions from six to four.

[...]The Thrashers would play in a seven-team division in which the only other team in the Eastern Time Zone would be Detroit. The five others would be in the Central Time Zone: Nashville, Dallas, Chicago, St. Louis and Minnesota.

Moving to the Western Conference would mean a great deal more travel for the Thrashers. The other Western division would comprise all Pacific and Mountain Time Zone teams: Vancouver, Los Angeles, San Jose, Anaheim, Phoenix, Colorado, Calgary and Edmonton.

It says in the article that our Thrashers are wanting to play more games against the Nashville Predators. I wonder how that will work out.

We've had a couple of our other teams (Falcons, Braves, etc...) play in the Western Divison before. What are the other forumers' thoughts on a proposed move.

I don't think it's such a good idea because it looks a little strange already with the Western Conference having one team that isn't technically in the West. That said, I wouldn't mind seeing a few more Thashers-Preds games.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
AubieTurtle Whistle-Stop

AubieTurtle

Posted
Posted (edited)

It's a terrible idea. The reason why other Atlanta teams were in their respective league's western division was because Atlanta teams are relatively new as are the teams out west, so until realignment, the western divisions were the ones with room for expansion. It was a bad situation but one Atlanta had to deal with for being late to the game, so to speak.

The Braves use to play lots of their games well past midnight because they didn't start until 10pm Eastern Time, because out west it was 7, which was a good time to start a weekday game since it game people time to get there after work. The added travel also was unfair because it wears down on the team.

If the NHL wants to reduce the number of divisions, they need to either find a different way to divide things from a geographic prespective or find a way to compensate the Thrashers for the extra burden. Something like a league financed salary for an extra player. Otherwise, there really isn't any reason for the Thrashers to agree to this. The games with Nashville would be nice, but really things need to be altered to where Nashville isn't in the west rather than put Atlanta in the west too.

The cynic in me thinks this may just be a way for teams from the more traditional markets to impose a handicap on newers teams. There are many northern fans who don't think hockey should be played in the south or the west and it bothers them even more that the new teams have been successful. They would be happy to see the Stanley Cup never go south of the Mason-Dixion line or west of the Mississippi (unless it is western Canada) again. Many would like to see all the new teams kicked out of the league, not understanding that sports will follow the money and that if the NHL never expanded, from these areas a new league would have risen with teams that would have attracted NHL talent.

It looks to me like to would make more sense to switch Washington and Nashville and stay with six divisions. I'm not sure why the NHL wants to go to four divisions (I haven't read the article so maybe it explains why) unless it has something to do with shortening the post season.

Edited by AubieTurtle
Link to comment
Share on other sites
AubieTurtle Whistle-Stop

AubieTurtle

Posted
Posted

Yes, it was a good game. Georgia really is a second half team. While I'm not a Georgia fan, I do cheer for SEC teams so I was happy to see them win.

It is interesting that the Peach Bowl (sorry, can't use the new name) gets the #2 from the ACC but only the #5 from the SEC. I know they've increased the payouts but I can't see the SEC dropping any of the other bowl games lower in the selection process. The problem is that when the SEC signed up for the Peach Bowl, it was a middle tier bowl. Now that it has moved up to the top non-BCS tier, there is no room for them. I think the same could be said about the Outback Bowl (formerly the Hall of Fame Bowl). Obviously the SEC isn't going to want to let any of its high profile bowls go, but they really are overloaded at the top end.

I don't know what the Peach Bowl can do about it. The SEC isn't going to willingly give up the Capital One, Outback, or Cotton Bowls and none of those bowls are going to volunteer to have a lower pick. Given the Peach Bowl's location, any threat to drop the SEC wouldn't be taken seriously. In the end, it may be that the SEC's #5 (or #4 if only one SEC team gets into the BCS) team is an ok match up for the ACC's #2. It certainly was tonight.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
 Share
Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.