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ESPN - Capitals, Wizards owner Ted Leonsis acquires Arena Football team

Renegade7

By Renegade7
in The Tailgate

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Renegade7

Renegade7

Posted
Posted

Did not see a thread on this, tried to search.  I'm glad DC did it, but surprised it wasn't Snyder. 

 

http://espn.go.com/espn/story/_/id/14945800/washington-capitals-washington-wizards-owner-ted-leonsis-acquires-arena-football-team

 

WASHINGTON -- Ted Leonsis' Monumental Sports & Entertainment announced it has acquired an expansion Arena Football League team to begin play at Verizon Center in the spring of 2017.

Washington will join the eight other teams in the league. The team does not yet have a name.

 

Commissioner Scott Butera said in a recent phone interview that the AFL liked Washington as a market because of geography and Monumental's ownership. Leonsis' company owns the NBA's Wizards and NHL's Capitals as well as the arena.

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DC9

DC9

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Yeah... let's be real about Ted, outside of lucking into Ovechkin and then having a great team THIS year, he's done very little to inspire as an owner.


I've been to a couple of Arena games... I'd be surprised if it takes.

 

It's an "event town" for sure, but I don't see myself driving up to DC for an indoor football game where forward motion is legal.  At least at this point.

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Springfield

Springfield

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Yeah... let's be real about Ted, outside of lucking into Ovechkin and then having a great team THIS year, he's done very little to inspire as an owner.

I've been to a couple of Arena games... I'd be surprised if it takes.

It's an "event town" for sure, but I don't see myself driving up to DC for an indoor football game where forward motion is legal. At least at this point.

Cmon now, the Caps have been a top tier hockey team for nearly a decade.

I'd be willing to check out an arena football team.

Ted does have a problem keeping crappy GM's for too long though. Maybe he isn't as fickle as us fans, to a fault.

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DC9

DC9

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Cmon now, the Caps have been a top tier hockey team for nearly a decade.

I'd be willing to check out an arena football team.

Ted does have a problem keeping crappy GM's for too long though. Maybe he isn't as fickle as us fans, to a fault.

 

Yes... the Caps have relied on Alex Ovechkin for nearly a decade.

 

This is the first year you can say they really went out to get him a team.  Last year we got some defense, but he did nothing to help Ovechkin for the longest.

 

So, as I said, he "lucked into Ovechkin".

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Springfield

Springfield

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Yes... the Caps have relied on Alex Ovechkin for nearly a decade.

This is the first year you can say they really went out to get him a team. Last year we got some defense, but he did nothing to help Ovechkin for the longest.

So, as I said, he "lucked into Ovechkin".

Yeah, he did luck into Ovechkin. I was referring to the "THIS year" part of the comment. They've been good for nearly as long as Ovechkin has been here, so the luck part of the equation stands... just it's more than just this year.

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PokerPacker

PokerPacker

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Sounds like we're only really talking about George McPhee's merits, since the only thing being talked about is the success of the team itself, and no mention of the rest of what the owner brings, such as Leonsis changing the way sports owners interact with fans, and how about the upgrades he brought to Verizon center so long ago? Man was it great when he replaced the old video board up there with the HD screens: http://www.ledsmagazine.com/articles/2007/08/verizon-center-to-install-first-true-hd-indoor-led-scoreboard.html

On the merits of McPhee as GM, yes, Ovechkin dropped into his lap, but he also drafted quite a few other pretty good players. On the current roster, McPhee drafted: Ovechkin, Backstrom, Kuznetsov, Burakovsky, Wilson, Johansson, Carlson, Alzner, Orlov, Holtby, and Grubauer. He signed Schmidt out of College and Beagle out of the AHL. He traded for Chimera. That's 14 of our preferred 20-man roster brought in by McPhee. He could have done more for our defense, but let's not pretend the only thing GMGM ever got right was winning the Ovechkin lottery.

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BRAVEONTHEWARPATH93

BRAVEONTHEWARPATH93

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Interned for the Philadelphia Soul team a few years back.

AFL is an extremely tough sale everywhere. Teams fold and relocate every year. DC is so fickle that I doubt this works out long term.

The biggest thing is that the AFL is marketed to families. If they marketed more to younger adults maybe, it could be a cool thing to do on a Saturday night. But instead it's just a bunch of families and kids group because that's the easiest group to sell tickets too

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DC9

DC9

Posted
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Sounds like we're only really talking about George McPhee's merits, since the only thing being talked about is the success of the team itself, and no mention of the rest of what the owner brings, such as Leonsis changing the way sports owners interact with fans, and how about the upgrades he brought to Verizon center so long ago? Man was it great when he replaced the old video board up there with the HD screens: http://www.ledsmagazine.com/articles/2007/08/verizon-center-to-install-first-true-hd-indoor-led-scoreboard.html

 

So I'm not a huge basketball fan, but I do have a twitter account.  I know Ernie Grunfeld is not well liked and hasn't been pretty much ever.  So it's not a "dump on McPhee" thread and I'm not sure anyone is trying to make it one.

 

I know a lot of DC fans misplace their disappointment and blame on GMs, but I also know a ton of them do. 

Interned for the Philadelphia Soul team a few years back.

AFL is an extremely tough sale everywhere. Teams fold and relocate every year. DC is so fickle that I doubt this works out long term.

The biggest thing is that the AFL is marketed to families. If they marketed more to younger adults maybe, it could be a cool thing to do on a Saturday night. But instead it's just a bunch of families and kids group because that's the easiest group to sell tickets too

 

That's exactly my thing.  I'm not sure when their season is, but if there is another option (Redskins, Nats, O's, DC United when they build their new stadium) I'm not sure that I choose Arena Football over any of those.

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“Misdirection”

“Misdirection”

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Season is during the spring-late summer I believe so the biggest competition is Nationals Orioles and United. There's only like 8-9 home games compared to baseballs 5,000. Not to mention its indoors and will be relatively inexpensive. This is a football town so I'm sure most football starved skins fans would check out a game or two.

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