A LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY REPEATING

In Los Angeles, there are a few things you can always count on. Traffic on the 405, Storm Watch news graphics accompanying the first drizzle of the year and sham celebrity weddings (Thanks, Khlomar…third-best Laker marries third-best Kardashian sister!).

Add to that list, the inevitable “The NFL is coming back to L.A.!” story. Usually it turns up sometime in January as though it’s some part of the official Rose Bowl wrap-up package. This year however, the rumor mill starting grinding a few months early. L.A. Times’ NFL writer Sam Farmer did his due diligence in reporting on a proposed stadium in the City of Industry.

(By the way, there’s a City of Industry and a City of Commerce but no City of Residence…what gives?)

Feeling like I knew what the story would say even before reading it, I asked Farmer (via Twitter) if he re-wrote the story every year or just dusted off an old copy and changed all the pertinent names and locations.

His response, which confirmed many of my suspicions: “It’s ‘select all,’ control C, control V.”

There are those in Los Angeles who would really love to see the league drop itself down on our collective sports couch. They’re just vastly outnumbered by the people who hear the knocking but aren’t in any rush to answer the door.

Why would they be? In a city filled with transplants, most of the football fans in town have a team they cheer for. For proof, look no further than the Seattle Seahawks bar I stumbled upon in the heart of Culver City. Imagine my surprise when hordes of blue and green clad rowdies starting showing up and demanding that the televisions be changed to their beloved ‘Squawks.

Admittedly, I harbored some secret sadistic glee when Devin Hester broke free for a long touchdown that eventually was the game-winner (it helped slightly ease the pain from Brett Favre sinking the 49ers earlier in the day with his buzzer beater). But that’s the point…no one here wants a hand-me down team. There are plenty of football fans in this town, but not enough of one team to support it if they decided to settle down in The Basin.

Add to it that the league isn’t considering expansion – it took years to organize into eight neatly arranged divisions and they’re not going to add a 33rd wheel. That’s to say nothing of being able to get the weekly NFL doubleheader on your local network affiliate. Why mess that up for a team you may or may not care about?

Yet this story resurfaces every year like the city’s own personal game of MadLibs. For the middlemen trying to bring the NFL back: respect their persistence, but question their judgment. There’s no doubt that the biggest sporting enterprise in the country looks a little odd not having any ties to the nation’s second largest media market, but at some point continually chasing your tail over something that few really care about makes you look like an all-day sucker. And probably pretty dizzy as well…

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