Al Davis, RIP
So apparently Steve Jobs, died last week? Maybe you heard about it. It seems that everyone ran to their Zunes to praise the man who literally revolutionized the way we ignore the homeless in our walk to work. Just a bunch of whining and crying and waxing poetic on iPads and Newton and other fully assembled and ready-to-go computing machines. So yes, it was a huge deal and I'm not sure how we'll ever do in his absence.
It will take the death of a truly remarkable man to make the shadow from the guru of Apple. And so we can be thankful for Al Davis , who shuffled off this mortal coil on Saturday, slipping the surly bonds of earth, blah blah, whatever. I probably don’t need to tell you this, but Al Davis epitomized everything this website is about. Through sheer cunning and derring-do, Davis committed his life to two things: lawsuits and trolling the everliving s**t out of the most successful sports league this country has ever known.
After the jump, just read baby….
The NFL said the Raiders abandoned Los Angeles simply because they thought they had found a better deal in Oakland; Davis asserted the league forced him to retreat to Oakland by interfering with his attempt to secure a modern stadium with luxury boxes and other amenities.
He insisted the Raiders retained the territorial rights to the nation’s second-largest TV market and, if the league tried to place another team in Los Angeles, it would have to buy the rights back from the Raiders.
In 2001, Davis lost his $1.2 billion lawsuit against the league in Los Angeles Superior Court. Davis appealed the ruling but lost.
Davis moved his team after roughly a decade in Los Angeles and then claimed he still owned the territorial rights to the L.A. market. Could he have possibly won with such a claim? Does it matter? Did it ever? Most stories about Davis claim that the enmity between Davis and the NFL originated in the old AFL days when Davis, as commissioner of the upstart league, thought the NFL screwed the AFL during merger negotiations. While that’s a perfectly pleasant story, I choose to believe that Davis wasn’t driven by some petty butthurt from way back when. Instead, I think Davis was quite simply… a troll. And trolls aren’t mad. No, u mad. And trolls don’t care about winning. Or, rather, they care about winning something much greater than money or victories. Davis was in it for the lulz. Just lulz baby. This, fair reader… THIS is a life worth celebrating.
Kinney High School Sacramento - News
By Kinney Recruiting Ed. note: This post is authored by Evan Jowers and Robert Kinney of Kinney Recruiting, sponsor of the Asia Chronicles. Kinney has made more placements of US associates and partners in Asia than any other firm in the past five years
Freshman Miranda Myers (St. Francis, Sacramento)
This blog covers track and cross country in California. I have been a fan, athlete, coach, official, prep editor, author, blogger, and photographer since 1953. I have announced at the NCAA West Regional, the Pac-10, the Stanford Invitational, the Mt. SAC Relays, and the California State Meet. I have attended five Olympic Games and four World Championships. I am a U.S. Correspondent for Track and Field News. Freshman Miranda Myers, who won the Ed Sias Invitational frosh/soph race last Saturday, is the daughter of Mason Myers (Vacaville 1987). She had the eighth best girl's time at the meet. Her father was the Northern California High School Cross Country Runner of the Year in 1986. Mason placed second in the 1986 Kinney West Regional at Woodward Park in Fresno in 15:00.0 and fifth in the 1986 Kinney National Championships in San Diego in 15:08.7. Born San Francisco, 3/16/41. Father: Daniel Ralph Conning, born Oakland 8/20/97, Spotnails salesman. Mother: Veda Conning, born in San Francisco, 03/07/02 S.F. Recreation secretary. Education: Lincoln HS 1956-59; U.S. Naval Academy Prep, Bainbridge, MD 1959-60; U.S. Air Force Academy 1960-61; UC Berkeley 1961-64; San Francisco State 1964-65; Hayward State 1967-June 1968. Career: Pan American Airlines salesman 1965-1967; Castlemont HS, Oakland student teacher/coach 1967-68; King JHS, Berkeley teacher/coach 1968-73; Berkeley HS teacher/coach 1973-1999. Political Affiliation: Democrat. Religion: United Church of Christ. Life member: Sierra Club, California Academy of Sciences. Brother: Ralph Stanley Conning, born in San Francisco, Sept. 29, 1935, salesman, Palatine, IL. Married Marian Gail Barr, June, 5, 1964, born in Washinton, D.C. March 8, 1942, Pastor Amistad United Church of Christ www.amistad-vacaville.org. Children: James, born 1966, VP Technology Dictionary.com, Oakland, CA; Sarah, born 1969, Radiation Oncology Social Worker, University of Chicago Medical Center; Andrew, born 1971, doctoral candidate Harvard.
