His NFL forecast for the next few years is gloomy

By T.J. SIMERS

Oct. 26, 2006 12 AM PT

DAVID ISRAEL is a former sports columnist, former, I presume because he put just about every paper he worked for out of business.

“I couldn’t kill off the Chicago Tribune,” he said -- the former columnist unable to contain himself, of course, without adding a punch line. “But you guys might.”

Some folks around here might remember him as a general columnist for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner, although I can’t recall anything memorable he ever wrote. He said, “I was a pretty writer,” so I would guess he was much like Plaschke.

I know he doesn’t believe The Tanker went into a pout against Phoenix, so there’s probably good reason to challenge his news judgment, but we’ll get to that in a moment.

He’s also a former TV producer, former, because none of his shows are still breathing. I’d tell you which ones he had a hand in making, but I don’t remember any of them.

I provide this background because you’re going to see Israel quoted everywhere today, and who is David Israel? And why is he predicting the chances of the NFL returning to L.A. are now “dead?”

Well, first of all, no one knows dead like Israel.

But when he goes one sentence further to say, “I don’t think the NFL is ever going to do this deal to return to Los Angeles, at least for the next 20 years,” keep in mind he’s a former sports columnist, and you know how those guys sometimes just like to make outlandish statements.

AS FOR his credentials, he’s an old pal of Gov. Schwarzenegger -- going back almost 30 years. “I was there the day he met Maria,” he said -- Maria apparently going for the Terminator rather than some scribbler who kills off newspapers.

The governor appointed Israel to the Coliseum Commission a little more than two years ago, and now the NFL has a serious combatant on its hands, a former columnist who still has something to say.

“L.A. is surviving quite nicely without the NFL and the NFL is surviving quite nicely without L.A.,” Israel said. “I guess the divorce is final.”

Israel said it’s time now, given the NFL’s shortsightedness about taking advantage of everything that California has to offer down the road, for the Coliseum to do a deal with USC to improve the stadium.

“The NFL is not only going to burn bridges, but blow them up when it comes to dealing with the governor and the mayor of Los Angeles,” Israel said. “Listen, I knew L.A. was dead in May when [Carolina owner] Jerry Richardson told the governor he ought to be worried about ending up with only one NFL team in California.

“It was an absurd bluff -- just one more attempt to leverage the state for public money.”

The NFL, which has stadium problems in San Francisco, San Diego and L.A., is talking $1 billion to bring the NFL back here. It’s an inflated figure -- construction for a new Coliseum costing around $700 million, but a reminder to owners that a free ride for L.A. will set a precedent they will have to live with down the road.

As far as I’m concerned, though, it doesn’t change a thing. The NFL is throwing its weight around, and so is the former columnist -- all of it changing nothing, but sickening those already sickened by this process.

Given the problems in New Orleans, Jacksonville and San Diego, I maintain a team will be here by 2010 -- 2011 at the latest.

“Over Jerry Richardson’s dead body,” said Israel, once a columnist, always outrageous.

ISRAEL LIKES the NFL, his father has been a Giants ticketholder for 50 years and Israel thinks an NFL team would be good for L.A. But he said the NFL theme song ought to be Dire Straits’ “Money for nothing, chicks for free.”

I’ll let someone else figure out which NFL owners are in the market for free chicks, but otherwise, I think I understand his point.

“The NFL owners are not going to get public money,” Israel said. “And the NFL can’t get an arm around that concept. So it’s time for L.A. to move on.”

THERE’S NO NFL team in L.A. but the tradition continues. Two years ago the first guest on the father/daughter gabfest was Commissioner Paul Tagliabue.

The NFL’s new commissioner, Roger Goodell, will appear Monday on the first father/daughter/Uncle Fred Roggin morning drive-time show on 570. Note to Israel: We will not be accepting calls.

RAN INTO a different website, www.hofmag.com, which deals with all kinds of Hall of Fame categories, so you know I wasn’t doing a search on Devean George.

Hate to admit it, but I was reading up on Emmitt Smith, the dancer, but tripped across a story titled, “He Shut Up and Played.” I figured maybe I had found a story on Jeff Kent, but surprisingly it was the work of Lesley Visser, a terrific writer for the Boston Globe before going into TV. She was writing about Troy Aikman.

I began to read some of the other stories on the site, every one of them written with a nice, positive slant on greatness, and realized this could do serious damage to Page 2 if any of this crept into the writing.

IF THE Clippers sign Chris Kaman to a five-year extension before Tuesday’s deadline, it might be time finally to retire the “same old Clippers” line.

TODAY’S LAST word comes from the e-mail address of Jason Thompson:

“Why don’t you write about Smush Parker and how he tanked in the playoffs? Or Sasha, who is supposed to be really great in Europe, but yet terrible in American basketball? Maybe if you showed some respect for people, then they would talk to you.”

Smush & Sasha probably would agree with you.

T.J. Simers can be reached at

[email protected]. To read previous columns by Simers, go to latimes.com/simers.