Raiders/Packers preseason game at Winnipeg=total debacle

[mikecubs]

Packers will play Raiders in Winnipeg in preseason

The Green Bay Packers are headed to Canada. They will play the Oakland Raiders in Winnipeg, Manitoba, for their third preseason game, as has been expected for weeks.

The Winnipeg Blue Bombers of the Canadian Football League announced Wednesday the game will be played at 7 p.m. Aug. 22 at IG Field. The stadium was built in 2013 and seats 33,000.

Tickets will go on sale to the general public on Saturday at 10 a.m. CDT. Ticket prices, determined by promoter On Ice Entertainment, range from $75 to $340 Canadian dollars, equivalent to about $56 to $255 in U.S. currency.

Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers said he looks forward to leaving the country to play, be it Canada or England. The Packers are the only NFL team that has not played or is not scheduled to play in London as part of the NFL's International Series.

"I'm excited to get up there. It's fun to travel with the squad to a different country," Rodgers said. "We still haven't been to England yet, but hopefully this doesn't count as our out-of-the-country trip, 'cause I think a lot of us would still like to go to England.


"The popularity of the NFL is worldwide. I was in Paris this offseason and went to a Packers bar, so that just kinda shows you the reach of the NFL. I'm sure there's a bunch of Packer fans (in Canada), 'cause they're everywhere."

It will be the Packers' first football game outside of the United States since they played a preseason game in Tokyo in 1998.


The game was listed on the schedule without a date or location because the Raiders and the NFL first considered Regina, and according to at least one report, Edmonton, but were unable to secure deals for games there.

That left Winnipeg or, as a last resort, Lambeau Field.

Packers President and CEO Mark Murphy had indicated in recent weeks the game would likely be in Canada. He was more specific during his most recent fan Q&A on the Packers web site. In answer to a question from a Canadian Packers fan, Murphy wrote, "I fully expect that we will be playing the Raiders in Winnipeg in the third week of the preseason."


Jeff Hamilton
@jeffkhamilton
Sources have confirmed the #Bombers will host the NFL pre-season game between Oakland and Green Bay on Thursday, Aug. 22. There is currently a Valour FC game that evening but work has been done to move it. Also, word is average ticket price will likely exceed $200. #wfp

138
3:07 PM - Jun 4, 2019
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The Packers played Oakland in the preseason last year as well, losing 13-6 at Lambeau Field. This year, they'll play the Raiders twice. A regular-season game is scheduled for noon, Oct. 20 at Lambeau Field.

The Raiders, who will host the Chicago Bears at Tottenham Stadium in London on Oct. 6, will be the first NFL team to play games in three countries in a single season.

www.greenbaypressgazette.com/story/sports/nfl/packers/2019/06/05/its-official-packers-play-raiders-winnipeg/1322139001/

[mikecubs]

What irony. I post a million things on Oakland Raiders/Oakland A's ect... and the Raiders actually come to Winnipeg for a game. LOL

[mikecubs]

No Fun League flops at IG Field
Raiders-Packers pre-season tilt a debacle of epic proportions

I’d love to tell you about the fantastic football game that went down at IG Field on Thursday night, with a raucous, packed house looking on as star NFL quarterbacks Aaron Rodgers and Derek Carr took turns going deep to their talented crop of receivers such as Davante Adams and Antonio Brown.

Except I’d be lying. Absolutely none of that happened.

What actually played out was nothing short of a sham. A boondoggle. A complete and utter embarrassment. And anyone who shelled out their hard-earned dollars to take in the action — and I use that term loosely in this case — has a right to feel like they got completely ripped off. Because they did.


The final score shows the Oakland Raiders beat the Green Bay Packers 22-21 on a last-minute field goal in a meaningless pre-season contest. But that doesn’t even begin to tell the full story of what unfolded. I’m not kidding when I say I expect to see a string of lawsuits flowing out of this gong show, with various parties pointing fingers at each other.

Sure, the game is going to be remembered. But for all the wrong reasons.

Where to begin?

How about the fact the field, which had to be reconfigured from the CFL size of 110 yards to the NFL size of 100 yards, was reduced to 80 yards just before the game began. That’s right, each end zone was actually on the 10-yard line. Marked by a bright orange pylon. Seriously. You can’t make this stuff up. All we were missing was the windmill and clown’s mouth.

Apparently there were last-minute concerns over the state of the playing surface. A gathering of players, coaches, management and NFL executives just a couple hours before kickoff led to some speculation the whole game might actually be canned. Which, in hindsight, might have been the best move rather than the farce that followed.


Andrew Harris
✔
@andrewharris33
LOL so now we have a bump in our lil end zone cause of this... we will play thru it tho! .... A sand baseball infield is way more safe in the middle of a football field for sure!

1,422
8:29 PM - Aug 22, 2019 · Edmonton, Alberta
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"The field met the mandatory practices for the maintenance of surfaces for NFL games based on an inspection (Wednesday). Concerns arose (Thursday) surrounding the area where the Blue Bombers’ goal posts were previously located. The 10-yard line will function as the goal line at this game. In lieu of kickoffs, the ball will be placed at the 15-yard line," the Raiders, who were the "home" team, said in a statement emailed out during the first quarter.

Yes, even our football fields have potholes.

"LOL so now we have a bump in our lil end zone cause of this... we will play thru it tho! .... A sand baseball infield is way more safe in the middle of a football field for sure!" Winnipeg Blue Bombers running back and Winnipeg native Andrew Harris tweeted out Thursday night, a cheeky reference to the fact the Raiders share their home stadium with the Oakland Athletics of MLB.

Naturally, this led to all kinds of ridicule on social media from observers across North America watching the game on television, and it’s unfortunate Winnipeg (and the Bombers) will take their share of it. Because like everything associated with the event, this is entirely on the NFL and the Toronto-based promoter, On Ice Entertainment. The Blue & Gold simply rented out their facility and let the guests take over. They also have no financial stake in how it turned out, which they should be thankful for.

The absurd field flop was bad enough, but it’s just one of a number of "Lucy pulling the football out from under Charlie Brown" type whiffs.

Oakland Raiders' Anthony Rush dives onto Green Bay Packers' Keith Ford as he clings to a recovered fumble in the 4th quarter.

How about the fact that, despite claims to the contrary when the game was first announced and tickets went on sale, none of the big names actually suited up. Of course, that news wasn’t communicated to anyone until moments before kickoff, with Green Bay announcing 33 healthy scratches, including Rodgers. Same goes for Carr, Brown and other prominent Raiders.

The whole sales pitch surrounding the game was that all of the stars would come out and probably play at least the first half, since it was happening during the third week of the pre-season.

Lies. All of it lies. Instead, we were treated to an assortment of NFL backups, wannabees and never-will-be’s, many of whom will likely be playing in the CFL in short order. It says something when the loudest cheers of the night came from fans applauding themselves in the fourth quarter for succesfully getting a sustained "Wave" going around the stadium.

As for the crowd, it was announced after the game that there were 21,992 fans in the stands. My best guess was somewhere in the 18,000 to 20,000 range. The bigger question is how many of those were paying customers versus giveaways meant to "paper the house" and save some face? We’ll never know, because the promoter won’t say.

Sluggish sales had been a big story leading up to the game, with approximately half of the stadium showing as available on the Ticketmaster site earlier this week, thanks to grossly overpriced tickets that were running north of $400 and represented a clear miscalculation of this market. Local sports fans were staying away in droves. But then a strange thing started happening, with many of the blue dots representing unsold seats on Ticketmaster suddenly vanishing.

The promoter previously slashed prices for about 6,000 end zone seats — after initially claiming there would be no such price reductions. And that angered many of the loyal fans who bought tickets when they first went on sale in June, only to discover they got suckered into paying about twice as much as others who were late to the party.

Despite On Ice president John Graham’s claim that the ticket agency would handle issues, I’m told many fans have been met with "Sorry, final sale, no refunds," upon their repeated inquiries. On Ice painted themselves into a corner by charging way too much out of the gate, then made a bad situation even worse.

Speaking of Graham, he’s pretty much gone into hiding throughout this process, including not responding to several messages I’ve sent him. Other media colleagues have expressed similar concerns.

Graham did break his silence to speak with Paul Friesen of the Winnipeg Sun on Wednesday, sort of, and went on a bizarre rant, accusing him (and other local media) of biased reporting — even asking the veteran scribe at one point if he was trying to "go to war" with him.

Friesen was later told his media credentials were being revoked for the game, leading to an hours-long behind-the-scenes battle that ended with the NFL getting involved and Friesen rightfully being allowed to cover the game. Talk about trying to shoot the messenger.

But wait, there’s more! How about Graham’s promise in June for a big festival and celebration of football surrounding the game. He even cited the Winnipeg Jets "Whiteout" street parties as something they would try to emulate.

"It’s not that we’re flying in, playing a game and getting out of town," he claimed at the time. "We don’t do those things."

But that’s exactly what happened here. Both teams flew into town late Wednesday, with no practices or player availability prior to the game. And then they left, just as quickly as they arrived. There was little fanfare or related activities, other than the Bombers putting on a viewing party at The Forks for those who couldn’t afford tickets to the game.

Go figure that Oakland’s punter, A.J. Cole, getting off the team plane wearing a "Winnipeg, Alberta" T-shirt he’d ordered on Amazon, was actually far down the list of embarrassing things associated with this game.

We weren’t the first choice to play host, with Edmonton and Regina rumoured to be the original destinations targeted. Given how it all played out, those cities can breathe a big sigh of relief that they avoided having this debacle in their own backyard.

As for Winnipeg, I suspect most people will be saying good riddance to what was billed as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but ended up being nothing more than a Mickey Mouse production that most people saw for the greedy cash grab that it was.

See you later, NFL. Sorry it didn’t work out. It’s not us. It’s you.

www.winnipegfreepress.com/sports/football/nfl/no-fun-league-flops-at-ig-field-557950232.html