First 2009 NFL and fantasy football magazines hit the racks

by | Jun 7, 2009 | Fantasy Football, NFL Random Thoughts

BALTIMORE (Zoneblitz) – I’m in Baltimore at a conference for my day job for the next few days. During a short jaunt for lunch I wandered into one of the large bookstore chains and came across the first football annual magazines.

I rarely buy Athlon anymore. It used to be one of my “must buy” publications, mostly because it came out first. The magazine still has some good content, but it comes out just a little bit too early for my tastes. It feels a little bit like they sacrifice quality and current information for being the first major publication out after the NFL draft. Nonetheless, if you are hungering for information on the season ahead, they as always are among the first ones out.

One I do buy every year is Lindy’s Pro Football. I like the way they analyze every single player on every team’s roster and I love the several pages of draft coverage that typically include best picks and biggest leaps for each team.

The pro version isn’t due out for a few days yet but the college preview is on the rack.

I ended up making two purchases.The first was the jointly published annual by Yahoo! Sports and Pro Football Weekly, which teamed up to produce a solid preview of the real football season coupled with a sizable section of fantasy information. They’ve got a nice ranking of players by position as well as analysis by so-called fantasy football experts from each publication.

Sporting News Fantasy Football ’09 is also on the rack. My second purchase includes a mock, 12-team draft conducted by various Sporting News contributors and staff.

My initial reaction to at least the first round of the mock draft is lukewarm. I liked the top four picks, but after that I think there are some reaches. What do you think?

1. Adrian Peterson
2. Matt Forte
3. Michael Turner
4. Maurice Jones-Drew
5. Steven Jackson
6. Brandon Jacobs
7. DeAngelo Williams
8. Brian Westbrook
9. Frank Gore
10. LaDainian Tomlinson
11. Larry Fitzgerald
12. Drew Brees

Anyway, we’ll have more analysis and thoughts on some of the publications as they come out en masse. In the meantime, who would you put in your top 10 or 12 fantasy picks for the 09 season? Do you agree with the experts from above? Or do you have different thoughts?

NFLPA settles retired player lawsuit; Madden next in sights?

by | Jun 5, 2009 | Business of Football

A few days ago DeMaurice Smith, the new head of the NFL Players Association, asked for unity among current and former players as the union and the National Football League prepared to embark on negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement.

Thursday, perhaps in a tip of the cap toward achieving that unity, the NFLPA settled a lawsuit that alleged the union had breached licensing and marketing terms while using retired players’ images in video games and other projects, according to several media accounts including the linked ESPN article by Chris Mortensen.

The settlement, for about $26 million, was just under the $28.1 million a jury had awarded the retired players in a San Francisco court last November. The union had originally planned to appeal the court judgment.

Herb Adderley, a former Dallas and Green Bay cornerback, was one of the main faces behind the suit and a frequent antagonist of former union head Gene Upshaw, who died in August. “I’m elated that this thing is coming to a close,” he told the Associated Press. “It’s a great feeling and I’m happy to be a small part of it.”

Retired players have been fighting the union hard in recent years over disability and pension reform along with the licensing issues. With this issue seemingly out of the way for now, it appears as though they may be preparing to next put John Madden in their sights.

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Yahoo sues for free access to NFL player stats

by | Jun 3, 2009 | Business of Football, Fantasy Football, NFL News

Yahoo Inc. has filed suit in Minnesota alleging that the NFL Players Association has no right to charge for player pictures, biographies and statistics used to drive its fantasy football games.

According to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the NFLPA has argued in the past that such information is proprietary.

This isn’t the first time the issue has arisen. CBS Interactive and NFL Players have been fighting over the issue in court since September 2008. CBS filed suit in Minnesota while NFL Players filed a countersuit in Miami a week later.

Richard Berthelsen, acting chairman of the NFLPA at the time, said in a September 2008 press release announcing the lawsuit that “It is just wrong for companies to use the rights of NFL players to generate revenues for their own benefit without any compensation to the players. NFL PLAYERS will take all steps necessary to protect its rights, and the rights of NFL players generally.”

Last year CBSSports.com announced that it would proceed with a college fantasy football offering after Major League Baseball Advanced Media lost a suit in which it claimed ownership of statistics generated by baseball players.

The U.S. Supreme Court in June refused to hear its appeal.

Harrison heading to NBC

by | Jun 3, 2009 | Hall of Fame, NFL News

Rodney Harrison is scheduled to make an announcement on his football future this afternoon, but the Boston Globe, the Boston Herald and Dan Patrick, on his Wednesday morning radio show, broke the news early.

The former Charger and Patriot safety will hang up his helmet and shoulder pads and join NBC’s Football Night in America.

I really like the move from a sports media standpoint. For a sport already short on good announcers that is already losing John Madden this season, Harrison can become one of the next generation of analysts. He’s well spoken, he’s a good analyst and I recall him bringing some humor along with his insights. This should be a very good move for him.

As a player he was a huge hitter, possibly the most intimidating safety of his era. He attempted to play one Super Bowl with a broken arm and yes, he was also injury prone through stretches of his career. He missed the last 10 games of his career with a thigh injury suffered last season.

He also had a reputation for being a dirty player and he was suspended at one point for violating the NFL’s substance abuse policy, after which he admitted to taking human growth hormone to help him recover from injury.

On the Patrick show this morning, he acknowledged the mistake and that he knew what he was doing was wrong. “I put football in front of my family and in front of my life,” he said.

So there’s the long and short of Harrison. That makes Harrison a Hall of Fame candidate starting in 2014. Does he make it?

Plax afraid of jail?

by | May 29, 2009 | NFL Random Thoughts

The New York Post has a notebook with some interesting tidbits about Anquan Boldin and Plaxico Burress.

Our feelings about Drew Rosenhaus likely don’t differ from a lot of fans who think the slick agent is one of the problems with the game. Boldin appears close, according to the paper, to replacing him with Tom Condon. Ever notice how Rosenhaus clients like Terrell Owens and Chad Ocho Doucho end up looking like the bad guys in public relations battles with their organizations?

Boldin was heading down the same path. Perhaps he’s grown wise to Rosenhaus.

My favorite part of the story is the revelation that Burress is “deathly afraid” of going to jail. Might have been good to ponder that BEFORE he went to the nightclub with a gun in his pants.

Apparently he turned down a deal that would have garnered him just two months in the can. Kind of  provides proof that some of these guys think they can get away with anything, doesn’t it?

Good stuff, Plax. Good stuff.