Integrity. T-Minus Cruise Ship. Road Charge. Age Is Just A Number.
- I’m a football fan. From my days watching the Miami Dolphins win back to back Super Bowls to the Atlanta Falcons epic collapse in Super Bowl LI, the NFL has always been must-see TV for me. There have been many controversies with the NFL as the socio-economics of the league, the owners, the teams, and the players are no different than what happens within major corporate entities around the world.
Brian Flores, the former head coach of the Miami Dolphins, has made some very serious allegations stemming from his tenure as the Dolphins’ head coach, and including interviews he was asked to participate in as many teams look to fill their head coaching vacancies. I am not going to comment on NFL hiring practices and the “Rooney Rule” – that is a subject that stands on its own as one of the League’s major failures. What I will comment on is Flores’ allegation that the Miami Dolphins owner, Stephen Ross, trying to position the Dolphins with a higher draft pick, offered Flores a $100,000-per-game bonus for every loss by the Dolphins in the 2019 season, Flores’ first as the team’s head coach. Would Brian Flores lie as a backlash for Ross firing him after this past season? Would Stephen Ross actually attack the integrity of the game by offering his head coach money to lose games?
The commissioner of the NFL, Roger Goodell, works for the NFL team owners and is reportedly paid a base salary of $63 million annually. He has dealt with many issues with teams and their personnel – but this issue is not about player personnel issues. It is about the integrity of the game. In so many ways I hope Brian Flores is lying…but why would he? What is your take?
- As if the cruise ship industry has not suffered enough, another faux paus puts the Royal Caribbean brand in a bit of disarray. About fifty five miles east of where I live in Orlando, Florida, sits Port Canaveral. Just a few miles away from the port is Kennedy Space Center, which has never been more active with the private space exploration companies seeming having a launch once a week.
After three previous attempts were delayed due to poor weather, last Sunday’s SpaceX Falcon 9 launch was aborted just seconds before launch. No, not due to weather or a hardware/software issue, but because a Royal Caribbean cruise ship, against any and all protocols, sailed into the NASA “hazard area” off the Florida coast. Seriously people, are you telling me that the NASA/SpaceX and Royal Caribbean/Port Canaveral peeps had a failure to communicate? All indications are that NASA/SpaceX followed the proper communication advisory protocols, and that Royal Caribbean and the ship’s captain failed to stay away from no-go zone. NASA and SpaceX have not taken this failure lightly and the U.S. Coast Guard has launched their own investigation into this serious breach of protocol. As I have been told a few times…you can’t fix stupid.
- Just when we think the never-ending saga of interstate highway construction finally completed, for example the section of I-4 that cuts through Orlando, we learn that there is a possibility that many interstate highways may have to be replaced or retrofitted. No way, you say?
While I have written about the stake in the ground from Ford and other car makers with their commitment to electric vehicles, there has not been much discussion about electrical load factors servicing the onslaught of vehicles needing electricity to run. So some very smart people have decided that similar to placing your phone on a charging pad, constructing highways with electrical charging capabilities is the “road of the future.” In a few years, cars going down a road in a historic section of Detroit will theoretically be able to charge their batteries as they drive. That’s the goal of an Israeli company that is finalizing an agreement with the state of Michigan’s Department of Transportation to build the roughly one mile long experimental roadway.
If an electric car is capable of wireless charging journeys on powered roads, the thinking goes, it would be able to drive with virtually unlimited range, its batteries never running out of juice. Does anyone else predict some very interesting issues with this road technology?
- On Friday night, a group of us had dinner at the local trattoria, when one of our friends sent a group text. The look on everyone’s face, including mine, was one of puzzlement. I just don’t know what to say about this comparison.
The countdown continues: five weeks to Daylight Savings Time!
The NFL should be looking into Flores allegations very seriously. Sports gambling is becoming huge money maker for the NFL and this is bad news. I didn’t think about The 1918 -1970 / 1970-2022 compare until you mentioned it. Crazy shit.
On a good note. Matty Ice cream is now the highest active QB in passing yards.