Newsroom Debate

Little history is needed here. When the NFL came up with the World League of American Football, it was supposed to be a stepping stone for both spring-summer football and used as a gateway to Europe.
However, when the European teams were outdrawing the U.S. and Canada (Montreal had a team) at the gate, the NFL decided to cut its losses and concentrate on Europe.
The allocation of players has, and still is, a sticking point. Guys didn't want to get burned out or hurt playing basically all-year long. However, NFL teams, seeing that it can be a developmental league, put the screws on young taxi-squad and fringe players to participate.
The concept works in Europe because they don't know anything about American football. They can't tell the difference in the type of players. It's much like we are in professional soccer. We as a society can't tell the difference.

 

The BCS bowl game played annually in New Orleans is the Allstate Sugar Bowl. Some papers call it that. Some call it the Sugar Bowl. Some papers still use the former name for events that now have an entirely corporate name, such as Peach Bowl instead of Chick-fil-A Bowl. We selectively break the "that's what it's called" rule in this business. That's just how it is, and there will always be disagreement (and, often, hypocrisy).

 

My old shop finally drew the line with the training camp of an NFL franchise, conducted in a nearby community. Substituting some of the particulars, the team wanted it referred to as "Kroegers Canton Bulldogs Training Camp Presented by Johnson Buick."

We decided that "Canton Bulldogs Training Camp" sufficed, and we ditched the official logo in favor of something we whipped up to serve as daily furniture in the section. The team, of course, went bonkers but it didn't stop them from cashing the check for our annual trade/advertising agreement covering both camp and the regular season.

 

You call it Canton Bulldogs Training Camp or Canton Bulldogs training camp?

 

I highly recommend the movie "Europa, Europa." Good stuff.

And ...

sj.ms salutes you, HH.

 

Upon further review, I believe we went lower case on "training camp."

 

These papers are well within their rights.

These papers are not. And I miss the Peach Bowl as much as anybody.

 

I'm afraid I'll have to agree to disagree with some of you.

I make a major distinction between dropping the freebie advertising on bowl games, etc., and naming a league something other than its official name. I see a big difference between the two.

 

Fair enough, but I think people make good points about the Turin/Torino and Milan/Milano aspect. Maybe it's just a matter of having a columnist rip the NFL for being pretentious and calling it NFLE in agate and news stories.

NFLE would render the spelling irrelevant.

 

It's the official name. There trying to sound cool I think, but it's sounds stupid. But if it's the official name, go with it regardless of how dumb it sounds.

 

So, is a paper somewhere running a story about this freakin' league or what?

(If someone got shot/stabbed/shanked/whatever on the field and I missed it, I apologize for my ignorance of the news today. I've been cleaning the garage.)

 

How many people here who use NFL Europa because it's the official name are going to consistently refer to the former Division I-A as the Football Bowl Subdivision in their copy, or the former I-AA as the Football Championship Subdivision?