12/21/24
October 19, 2016
SportsFilter: The Wednesday Huddle:
A place to discuss the sports stories that aren't making news, share links that aren't quite front-page material, and diagram plays on your hand. Remember to count to five Mississippi before commenting in anger.
Everything I know about NFL, I learned from Don Lane.
posted by owlhouse at 10:35 AM on October 19, 2016
NoMich, with what Hurricane Matthew did to NC, I'm just glad you had a downstairs that was (I hope) unflooded and fit to spend time in.
My Cubs fanatic stepfather passed away in 2003 with the Cubs up 3-1 on the Marlins in the NLCS. I woke up on Oct 12 feeling sad that he would not get to see the Cubs finally go to the World Series.
A few days later, I gave thanks that he was spared the eventual crushing defeat. The condolence version of "sports is dumb and only dumb people like sports", at least for Cubs fans, is: "he's in a better place now".
posted by beaverboard at 11:59 AM on October 19, 2016
Bill Belichick hates Microsoft, Microsoft says everybody else loves it, and the NFL stands by Microsoft. For $80 Million did you expect anything else? Of course, Belichick is not alone in his feelings for Microsoft, which I'm sure a few in our community might share.
In Microsoft's defense, the problem most likely lies in the stadium infrastructure. In my working days I had the same problems when setting up the data networks needed to pull the data from the systems under test to the remote control location. Once the test sites upgraded their infrastructure to dedicated fiber-optic cables and decent switches/routers, life became a lot easier. Using wireless is touchy and requires some very careful frequency management. The NFL needs to hire some good network people to set something up that runs on fiber, has plenty of redundancy, and keeps Norwood (MA) Airport's tower from calling plays at Gillette.
posted by Howard_T at 03:28 PM on October 19, 2016
If the problem is only in NE a simple solution would be to run fiber to the field near each bench and blast from an ap there.
Dedicated frequencies are also relatively easy to implement in today's world if required for stability. Think of the last concert you attended ... 7 or 8 different instruments and a bunch of mics all wireless to to amp/mix/pa/etc without issue and cost effectively.
You'd think for $80 million it should work flawlessly, but ..
Comes down to the Patriots needing to hire a good engineer to resolve the issue. Reliance on Microsoft support is usually not the best solution in most scenarios isolated to only Microsoft products, never mind a solution where Microsoft products are a small portion of the end system {personal opinion, as is everything I post here}.
posted by cixelsyd at 05:47 PM on October 19, 2016
Well they can't run any more services underground to the sidelines at Gillette. That's where all the compressed air and vacuum lines are. Along with escape tunnels for low level team personnel should investigators show up.
Gosh, I wish the insufferable Will McDonough was still alive - I can't believe we got all the way through the psi-fi of DefGoodellFlatusGate without him. Lord only knows what he would have had to say about it. Whatever it was, by his reckoning, it would have been the end-all gospel truth. Because he and no one else got it directly from Parcells.
posted by beaverboard at 06:48 PM on October 19, 2016
For Thursday nights game, I'm going with Green Bay by 10 and a LOCK. (nothing is posted yet, and it's time to head to work)
posted by jagsnumberone at 01:00 PM on October 20, 2016
One never knows what a fan might come up with. With the price they charge for seats in the vicinity of this fan, one would think that a bit more "couth" might be involved. Perhaps this was not his first beer of the evening.
I was at the game last night (please note that today is Thursday, but no Huddle has been posted yet) and while I did not see the incident in the gif, there was a better one that was captured on the Jumbotron. During the T-short toss, one fan was standing, holding a nearly full beer. A tossed T-shirt struck the head of a fan in front of him and bounced up and landed edge on in the beer. It couldn't have been placed any more accurately. I really wish I had been videoing the Jumbotron.
posted by Howard_T at 04:59 PM on October 20, 2016
hire a good engineer to resolve the issue
The impression I get from the several articles I have seen on this is that the League is responsible for the setup, and that the laptops and ancillary equipment are put in place only a matter of hours before the game. I find this a bit hard to believe, but nothing the NFL does would surprise me. What needs to happen is that the NFL hire a really good network engineering firm to put a fiber system in place in each stadium. The basic architecture of each system should be identical, that is the equipment (switches, routers, cable) should be identical models from the same manufacturer in each stadium. Things like cable runs, equipment positioning and so on would, of course, be dependent on the stadium layout. The weakest link, if things are done right, would be from the end of the fiber at the sidelines to each laptop. The only sure way to prevent any RF interference would be to use some Ethernet Cat-5 cable, but then mobility would be restricted. I guess now that Belichick is a grandfather, he has the right to distrust all things "techie".
posted by Howard_T at 05:13 PM on October 20, 2016
Me last night:
Wife goes upstairs
I tune in the Hurricanes game just in time to see Edmonton go up 3-0.
I switched over to the Cubs game just in time to see the Dodgers go up 4-0.
I go upstairs mumbling how sports is dumb and only dumb people like sports.