Episode 180 - 2015 NFL Midseason

We actually recorded this last week, which is why we talk about Denver still being undefeated.

However, we have indeed reached the midway point of the NFL season.  With that, Mike and Tim made their midseason NFL adjustments:

Division	Mike's Original Picks	Mike's Adjusted Picks	Tim's Original Picks	Tim's Adjusted Picks
NFC North	Green Bay	Green Bay	Green Bay	Green Bay
NFC South	New Orleans	Atlanta	Carolina	Carolina
NFC East	Philadelphia	Philadelphia	Dallas	NY Giants
NFC West	Seattle	Arizona	Seattle	Arizona
NFC Wild Cards	Arizona St. Louis	St. Louis NY Giants	Philadelphia NY Giants	Atlanta St. Louis
AFC North	Pittsburgh	Cincinnati	Baltimore	Cincinnati
AFC South	Indianapolis	Indianapolis	Indianapolis	Indianapolis
AFC East	New England	New England	New England	New England
AFC West	Denver	Denver	Denver	Denver
AFC Wild Cards	Cincinnati Houston	Pittsburgh Oakland	Pittsburgh Miami	Pittsburgh Oakland

Mike's Original Super Bowl Champs: Green Bay
Mike's Adjusted Super Bowl Champs: New England
Tim's Original and Adjusted Super Bowl Champs: Green Bay

We also touch on some NFL non-LA topics, specifically replacing a preseason week with a regular season game, and regular season games on foreign soil (read: London, Mexico City, and Toronto).

And what do you think of Tottenham (hosting NFL regular season games)?!



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Episode 179 - November Potpourri

Less than 24 hours after the Royals win the 2015 World Series, Mike and Tim got together to podcast about that victory, Tim's accompanying safety, and how he came very close to batsu during the Royals' ALDS with Houston.

We then transition from baseball to NFL relocation talks, and Mike's defense of the much maligned Joe Buck (mostly for Buck's defense of St. Louis as a football city).  We briefly talk about the hearings from last week.  For more info, we refer you to our previous episode with Mike's emotional - and strongly worded - review of the hearings.

We also touch on the NCAA proposal to push college basketball season back a month, and the semi-related prostitution scandal at Louisville (which touched Mike's alma mater, UMKC, by virtue of a now-former assistant coach who was involved in said scandal as a player for the Cardinals).

Fair use: We open with Lorde's "Royals" in honor of the aforementioned team's World Series win.



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Royals Win World Series - and Tim Wins Safety

30 years after winning their first World Series title, the Kansas City Royals win their second, 4 games to 1 over the New York Mets.

(As I'm typing this, fireworks and loud cheering can be heard from my house.)

And for the second year in a row, Tim correctly predicted the World Series champions.  Therefore, he is SAFE!

Episode 178 - NFL LA Relocation Hearings

This week saw the NFL hold public hearings in each of the cities whose teams have threatened a move to Los Angeles.

This was of particular interest to Mike, a lifelong St. Louis Rams fan (whose fandom started when the team was in LA).  If you're a regular listener to the podcast, you know that Mike is adamantly opposed to the idea of his favorite team moving back to LA.

That said, Mike's Rams, along with the San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders, are among the teams threatening a move to LA, a city that once housed all three of these teams - and all fled for the same reason, and the reason the city has now gone two decades without NFL football: it's a terrible football city.

Per NFL bylaws, public hearings were held in all three cities this past week.  Mike watched all of the St. Louis and San Diego hearings and part of the Oakland hearing.

Mike gives a brief summary of each hearing, as well as his thoughts on the LA situation in general, and issues a strong warning to the NFL.

WARNING: This is the first episode of the WSC podcast to carry an "Explicit" label for very strong language.

This episode includes audio from the St. Louis meeting, courtesy of 101 Sports in St. Louis.  And Ned Beatty returns to warn the NFL owners - and especially the Rams' owner - that they are "meddling with the primal forces of nature."

You can watch the three hearings here:
- St. Louis hearing (October 27)
- San Diego hearing (October 28)
- Oakland hearing (October 29)



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This is why Mike hates a certain Dodgers pitcher.

Photo credit to Michael Rinke on Facebook.

World Series 2015 is set.

For the first time ever, the World Series will feature two expansion teams.

Also, Back to the Future Part II was dead wrong.

The 2015 World Series will feature the New York Mets and the Kansas City Royals.

A friendly reminder: Tim's adjusted pick to win the World Series (Kansas City) is still alive and well.

The Royals go into this World Series 1-2 all-time, winning in 1985 (over St. Louis) and losing in 1980 (Philadelphia) and last year (San Francisco).

The Mets are 2-2 in the Series all-time, winning in 1969 (over Baltimore) and 1986 (over Boston).  Their loses were in 1973 (Oakland) and 2000 (Yankees).

This is indeed the first time two expansion teams have met in the Fall Classic. 

The Mets started play in 1962 (same year as the then Houston Colt .45's [today's Houston Astros]), effectively replacing the California-bound Giants and Dodgers (which explains their blue and orange color scheme) and when they finished with 120 losses, still the mark of single-season baseball futility. 

The Royals started in 1969 (along with the San Diego Padres, the then-Seattle Pilots [now Milwaukee Brewers], and the then-Montreal Expos [now Washington Nationals]) as a replacement for another Cali-bound team, the A's.

Episode 177 - MLB 2015 Batsu Games

Mike and Tim discuss their 2015 MLB picks and issue their batsu games.

For the Washington team batsu game, Mike decided (by coin flip) to have the guys do karaoke.

Other possibilities included: doing background voice work for Mike's in-production web series or playing a game of Twilight Imperium (a sci-fi board game notorious for taking 6-8 hours to play a single game).

For Mike's bad picks: he's simply getting a pie in the face.

Tim still has Kansas City alive in the playoffs.  Good luck to the Royals this postseason.

Mike also announced that for their NBA picks, because picking division winners has proven pointless and tedious, will now be handled similar to NHL: at the start of the postseason.

Lastly, we talk at length about the NFL LA situation, the league's owners' meetings happening this week in New York, and what the likely outcome will be for LA.  Simply put, the very influential six-owner panel on all things LA seems to be siding with us: Chargers (and possibly Raiders) in LA.  Let's hope that does wind up being the case.



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