The curse laid hath done its handiwork, yet again

Posted by [email protected] | Apr 10, 2020 | Sports | 0 |

In the course of almost exactly two years, Talker has laid curses upon two spring football leagues. Both proved deadly. On April 7th, 2018, in The AAF is an AAwFul idea, we “decreed this AAF cult to be excommunicated and shunned.”

As prophesied and seen in I TOLD YOU SO: “AAF suspending operations, canceling end of season”, on April 2nd, 2019, the curse did its handiwork. The AAF perished five weeks after conception.

From I TOLD YOU SO: “AAF suspending operations, canceling end of season”

After the expiration of the AAF, a new spring league, the XFL, sprung up like poison ivy. In Waiting for the XFL to be the Ex-XFL, on February 8th, 2020, we decreed; “This league should be abolished before it is even borned.”

From Waiting for the XFL to be the Ex-XFL

Today, the second curse did its handiwork. Just about halfway into its maiden season, according to ESPN, “XFL suspends operations, lays off employees and has no plans for 2021 season.” Covid-19 had nothing to do with the demise of the XFL.

From Waiting for the XFL to be the Ex-XFL

Hear ye, heretic spring football leagues, disobey the accursed Talker at your peril.¹

NOTE

¹ Confession. In Who needs live sports when you have “This Date in Sports”, I wrote:

Perversely, the only league I was watching was the XFL. I have a sado-masochistic relationship with the XFL. As seen in Waiting for the XFL to be the Ex-XFL, I rail against the XFL, but kept watching. Go figure.

SEE

The AAF is an AAwFul idea

I TOLD YOU SO: “AAF suspending operations, canceling end of season”

Waiting for the XFL to be the Ex-XFL

About The Author

[email protected]

Welcome to Talker of the Town! My name is David Kramer. I have a Ph.D in English and teach at Keuka College. I am a former and still active Fellow at the Nazareth College Center for Public History and a Storyteller in Residence at the SmallMatters Institute. Over the years, I have taught at Monroe Community College, the Rochester Institute of Technology and St. John Fisher College. I have published numerous Guest Essays, Letters, Book Reviews and Opinion pieces in The New York Times, Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, the Buffalo News, the Rochester Patriot, the Providence Journal, the Providence Business News, the Brown Alumni Magazine, the New London Day, the Boston Herald, the Messenger Post Newspapers, the Wedge, the Empty Closet, the CITY, Lake Affect Magazine and Brighton Connections. My poetry appears in The Criterion: An International Journal in English and Rundenalia and my academic writing in War, Literature and the Arts and Twentieth Century Literary Criticism. Starting in February 2013, I wrote for three Democratic and Chronicle blogs, "Make City Schools Better," "Unite Rochester," and the "Editorial Board." When my tenure at the D & C ended, I wanted to continue conversations first begun there. And start new ones. So we created this new space, Talker of the Town, where all are invited to join. I don’t like to say these posts are “mine.” Very few of them are the sole product of my sometimes overheated imagination. Instead, I call them partnerships and collaborations. Or as they say in education, “peer group work.” Talker of the Town might better be Talkers of the Town. The blog won’t thrive without your leads, text, pictures, ideas, facebook shares, tweets, comments and criticisms.