The Lions And Red Wings Have Something In Common
Joe here.
There was much comment about 9 months ago when the Red Wings announced that season tickets were available as they had exhausted their wait list. There was much hand wringing, and one thing that came up was that there was only one Detroit team (at that time) that still had a waiting list: the Detroit Lions.
That list is long gone. In fact, it’s so gone that they’re now offering half-season plans and single-season plans that include the Club level, which the Lions swore up and down would never be available (you had to buy Club Level seats as a three-year-minimum package).
I can tell you that when I canceled my Lions season tickets after last season, the person I spoke with made it abundantly clear that he didn’t care: that there were plenty of names on that waiting list who would love my tickets. Guess they didn’t want them as badly as I thought.
Game #1: Pistons 91, Magic 79
Last night, the Detroit Pistons took it to the Orlando Magic in the second half resulting in a 91-79 victory in front of a loud home crowd. It was a very enjoyable game to be in attendance at, particularly since my seats were in row nine!
When it was clear that the Pistons had the game in the bag, we saw Walt Herrmann get some playing time. This move resulted in the drunk guy behind me yelling, “Pass the ball to Walt! They aren’t even looking at him! Let the white boy play!” And when he actually did get the ball and took a shot, I thought that guy was going to pass out from excitement. It was pretty entertaining to say the least.
For a more thorough analysis on the game from someone who knows her basketball, be sure to read Need4Sheed’s postgame thoughts.
Game #1: Pistons vs. Magic
Later tonight, I will be enjoying my first Detroit Pistons’ playoff game and only my second Pistons’ game this season. Last year, I went to about 10 Wings’ games, 7 Tigers’ games, and 4 Pistons’ games. Due to work, I’ve been to one Tigers’ game and one Pistons’ game so I’m really looking forward to relaxing at a game and just being a fan.
The Pistons made it to round two against the Orlando Magic after easily dispatching the Philadelphia 76ers in Game #6 by a score of 100-77. Tonight’s one should be a good one and the Pistons always make the games entertaining even when it’s a commercial break.
4/16 Quick Notes
Here are some quick notes before I head off to take another final exam:
- The Wings face off against the Nashville Predators tonight in a critical Game #4 of the first round series in Nashville. This is a key game for Detroit who needs to play with composure and consistency for the entire game and not here and there. I will be live blogging tonight’s game from the comfort of my couch. On Friday for Game #5, Joe Hass will return to BTJ for another live blog while I’m at work. My Dad also managed to buy a discounted second row single seat for Friday’s game (season ticket holders can buy single seats at a discounted price) so we’ll have some nice photos from the game as well.
- The Detroit Pistons played their last home game of the regular season in a 115-103 victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves to earn home court advantage if they made it to the NBA Finals. The Boston Celtics have the upper hand in terms of home court advantage in their conference. They finish the regular season tonight in Cleveland against LeBron James and the Cavaliers. As the Pistons gear up for their playoff run, be sure to visit my favorite two Detroit Pistons’ news sources - Need4Sheed and Detroit Bad Boys.
- The Detroit Tigers have won two games in a row to make their overall record 4-10. For Detroit fans, this is a sign that the team is starting to turn it around (or its just the Minnesota Twins, I guess we’ll have to wait and find out). Mack Avenue Tigers and Bless You Boys are enjoying the turn around in play. Let’s just hope that both the Wings AND Tigers can win and it’s not an either or type of situation (when the Wings lost on Monday, it was only the Tigers’ third win of the season).
- Interesting tidbit: Through the first week of the postseason, 47% of all goals scored came from Easton sticks. Red Wings players like Henrik Zetterberg, Nicklas Lidstrom, and Dan Cleary are among Easton stick users.
Leyland to drop ceremonial puck
Like many Detroit fans, I tuned into FSN Detroit yesterday afternoon for the Detroit Tigers’ opening day game against Kansas City. Unfortunately, the Tigers blew a 3-2 lead in the seventh and lost the game 5-4 in the 11th inning. Despite that, it’s great to have baseball season start back up and that means the summer is near!
If you are a Tigers fan and aren’t already visiting the following blogs, you need to start visiting them because they provide great coverage of the Tigers and I rely on them heavily for my Tigers news. My favorites are Mack Avenue Tigers, The Detroit Tigers Weblog, and Bless You Boys.
And to tie this back to the Wings, Tigers’ manager Jim Leyland will actually be dropping the ceremonial puck before Thursday’s game according to Bruce MacLeod.
The Detroit Red Wings will hold a special ceremonial puck drop prior to their home game on Thursday, April 3rd as Detroit Tigers Manager Jim Leyland will do the honors and drop the puck just prior to face-off between the Red Wings and the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Leyland, currently in his third season as Manager of the Detroit Tigers, has guided the team to a 183-142 record during his tenure. He is the 36th Manager in Tigers history and a veteran of 43 years in professional baseball. Leyland was named Major League Manager of the year in 2006 by Baseball America, and American League Manager of the Year by both the BBWAA and The Sporting News after guiding the Tigers to their first playoff berth since 1987. Leyland won a World Series title in 1997 as the Manager of the Florida Marlins.
FSN Detroit extends deal with Wings
The local FSN Detroit station has extended its deals with the Detroit Red Wings as well as the Tigers and Pistons to carry games well into the future (no definitive end has been given). FSN Detroit will be able to broadcast at least 70 Wings games each season (with any overlapping schedules going on FSN Plus). FSN’s deal with the Wings actually won’t go into effect until 2012-2013, which is when the 1997 signed contract expires. FSN Detroit has had the rights to all local Wings broadcasts since 2003.
For the first time, FSN Detroit will also have the only rights to local broadcasts for the Pistons’ games when the new deal goes into effect next season. Detroit sports fans will also catch at least 70 Pistons games each season. In addition to that, FSN Detroit will now broadcast a possible 152 Tigers games (they only showed 134 last year) and a whopping 103 of those games will be shown in HD.
The three deals are estimated to be worth over a combined $1 billion over at least ten years. Why would a company be willing to spend that kind of cash on broadcast rights?
FSN considers Detroit’s pro teams to be good business. It said the teams’ ratings — 7.5 for the Tigers last season, 4.8 for the Wings and 4.5 for the Pistons this season — rank second or third in their respective leagues for teams televised by regional networks.
Personally, I love the FSN coverage of the Detroit teams. After watching other games on Center Ice, I just feel fortunate to be able to watch/listen to Ken Daniels and Mickey Redmond call the game. FSN senior vice president and general manager Greg Hammaren said that he is quite satisfied with FSN’s air talent, and said “Who doesn’t love Mickey Redmond?”
The on-the-field prospects of all three teams has Hammaren smiling, too.
“I’m thrilled,” he said. “There’s a real possibility the city could have three championships this season. FSN has made a huge investment in the town I’ve come to love. Now the fan is coming out in me.”
The only downfall I see to all of this is that Pistons games used to be shown on Channels 4 and 20. Channel 4, WDIV, is a local broadcast station allowing fans without cable to view games. I’m thinking of my Grandpa who doesn’t have cable, but loves to watch the Detroit teams play. Now, his options are down to the Lions and maybe an occasional game that gets bumped to Fox 2.
Pistons 94, Grizzlies 67
As I mentioned in an earlier post, I attended tonight’s Pistons game against the Memphis Grizzlies and as the score indicates, it was an easy Detroit win, 94-67. My last game at the Palace was a 2OT victory in the ECF against the hated Cleveland Cavaliers so this game seemed not so exciting. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the game but it only reaffirms how much I love hockey more.
A couple notes about the game:
- Darko Milicic (a former center drafted by the Pistons) had four turnovers in the first half. The entire Detroit team had just four turnovers in the same timespan. Darko was booed pretty much every time he touched the ball, unless he made a mistake and then he was cheered.
- Tigers pitcher Dontrelle Willis attended the game and was nicely applauded by the fans in attendance. He recently signed a three year extension and hopes to reach out to the African American community in the metro Detroit area.
Attendance problems too?
The Detroit Red Wings aren’t the only Detroit team with empty seats. While NBA.com is reporting a sold out arena with 22,076 in attendance, you can see that definitely is not the case in the following cases. These photos were taken right before the start of the game, around the midpoint of the game, and then with three minutes left.
Yes, it was a game against the Grizzlies who have a poor 8-18 record, but it was a Friday evening game over the holidays when you’d think people would have more time to go to the games. The crowd reminded me of the Joe last year when it was officially sold out, but looking at the arena it was anything but sold out.
Pistons vs. Grizzlies
The Memphis Grizzlies come into town tonight to take on the Detroit Pistons at 8pm. I will be taking my brother to the game since we found cheap $18 seats (that were $40 face value) center court in the upper bowl and I couldn’t turn them down. As always, Detroit Bad Boys and Need4Sheed have got you covered with the latest Pistons’ news.
On Sunday, I will watch the Lions take on the Kansas City Chiefs at Ford Field. If they lose Sunday, they will end the season with eight straight losses (because there’s no way they’ll win in Green Bay in their last game). If that happens, they will be the first team to start a season 6-2 and lose the next eight games. That’s the Lions for you. Fortunately, they will be honoring Barry Sanders on Sunday so it won’t be a complete loss for those in attendance.
I spent three hours last night working on the re-design and I finally found a template I liked and modified it to fit BTJ’s style and needs. It’s still not ready to go yet, but I wanted to keep you all posted.
Tigers’ trade boosted ticket sales
Yes it’s another Detroit Tigers post, but things are kind of exciting right now after that big deal went down earlier this week.
According to the Detroit News, the Tigers have sold over $1.28 million worth of season tickets on Wednesday and Thursday. Wow!
“In my 12 years with the Tigers, I’ve never seen anything like it,” Bob Raymond, Tigers vice president of marketing and ticket sales, said Thursday. “Since I got into the office yesterday, the phones have been ringing nonstop. It’s almost 7 (p.m.) now, and the phones are still ringing.”
On top of that, TigerFest (the team’s annual winter event) sold out in just over 24 hours. The tickets went on sale at 10am on Tuesday. The big trade was finalized around 3:30pm on Tuesday. The event did sell out last year.
I know personally, I would love to get out to Comerica Park more often and I would like to buy some single game tickets when they go on sale in March. Unfortunately between not knowing the Wings playoff schedule and my own summer schedule, I’m not going to be able to do that and will likely have to rely on my friends taking me since their families have had season tickets for years.
I think that it’s safe to say the Tigers are the new hot item in town.
Tigers make a blockbuster trade
It’s on days like today, I miss the big signings or trades the Wings would do before the lockout and consequent salary cap. The Detroit Tigers, the other Ilitch owned pro Detroit sports team, made a blockbuster trade sending away their gems in the minor league in exchange for a great player who makes Detroit a World Series contender before the season even starts. I’m no Tigers’ expert and I definitely don’t know much about the other MLB teams so I will leave analysis to other bloggers who know more than I do.
What was the trade?
Detroit got Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis.
In exchange, the Florida Marlins received blue chip prospects in Cameron Maybin and Andrew Miller, and Mike Rabelo and 3 minor league pitchers.
Pat @ AOL FanHouse:
First up you’ve got Cabrera. He’s 24-years-old and while a lot is made about his weight, check out his Baseball-Reference page and the age similarity comps. Yeah. I know. Fact of the matter is, he could be one of those players that only come along every twenty years or so at the plate, and he’s joining a lineup that’s already got Gary Sheffield, Magglio Ordonez, Curtis Granderson, Carlos Guillen, Edgar Renteria, and Placido Polanco. Yikes. I’m not nearly as high on Wilils, but at the age of 25, he’s only two years removed from finishing second in the NL Cy Young balloting. He’s tailed off since then, but he’s still worth taking a flyer on.
In return, the Marlins have extracted a king’s ransom. Miller was the Tigers’ top pick in the 2006 draft and he’s flown through the minors. He’s really a top shelf pitching prospect and has mostly dominated in the minors. He’s struggled a bit in some brief appearances with the big club in Detroit, but remember he’s only a year and a half from being drafted. Maybin is every bit as good of a prospect. He’s flown through the minors since being drafted out of high school in the first round of 2005’s draft. The Marlins couldn’t ask for two higher ceiling players.
Two-big time prospects for two young stars. Trades simply don’t get bigger than this.
Billfer @ The Detroit Tigers Weblog:
When Dave Dombrowski decides to go for it, boy does he go for it. Like in 1997 when he loaded up for a run at the World Series, Dombrowski has quickly put together what has to be considered the best line up in all of baseball. To do it they had to give up 2 of the blue-est of blue chippers. Normally I frown on such a move, but rarely do you get in return a 24 year old with 138 career home runs and a 313/388/542 line in 2700 at-bats either. The Tigers had to have emptied their farm system, but this isn’t for a player on the wrong side of 30. This is someone who has yet to enter his peak. The Tigers have to sign him to a long term deal for this to work, but I can’t imagine they make this trade without some sort of frame work in place.
As for Dontrelle Willis, his 5+ ERA in a pitchers park in the NL is certainly disconcerting. But the Tigers were giving up a player that was likely to be in their rotation next year, and they had to fill that spot and there are certainly worse ways to do it than with Willis.
The Tigers gave up some seriously talented players, but if you’re going to do it, do it the way the Tigers did and get a couple guys in their mid 20’s in return. Cameron Maybin and Andrew Miller are tremendous prospects, but Cabrera is a rare, rare player and for the Tigers to acquire him is a major coup.
I know that for me, a Tigers’ fan but not a superfan, it’s an exciting trade and will get me to Comerica Park even moreso than last year (7 games). I can only imagine how excited the superfans must be right now.