"How would you like to see the Redskins take on the Cowboys? --- AND have the Washington Redskins Cheerleaders soap up and scrub down your car???"

Well? How would you like that?

Check out that ad!

It appears on the Web site for WTEM, Dan Snyder's sports talk station, to promote the latest listener contest. Top prize will bring the Redskins cheerleaders over to wash your car.

Kinda yucky?

The radio ads are just as outrageous, with panting males and all sorts of breathy talk of scrubbing and rubbing. The campaign is also just the latest evidence of Snyder's thing for cheerleaders. He took over the Washington Redskins Cheerleaders shortly after buying the team, and has increased their role in his global marketing scheme ever since.

The car wash campaign marks a new level of subservience for the Redskins Cheerleaders, and cheerleaders in general. The message is: "Put down your pom poms and grab a sponge!" That tells the world that Snyder can force his troupe to put on something skimpy and service Joe Sixpack.

Basically, Snyder's pushing a Madonna/Whore image for his cheerleaders.

Well, minus the Madonna.

(AFTER THE JUMP: More on the Redskins cheerleaders? Snyder is being called "Lord Farquaad"? PhotoGate update: Snyder really did censor Dan Steinberg? Isn't the Leonsis worship getting outta hand? Guaranteed Win Night proves AGAIN that it's a sure thing? Remember "The Sure Thing"?)

Look for more about the Redskins' owner's history with cheerleaders in a Cheap Seats column that'll come out sometime later this week.

***

Update on PhotoGate: Dan Snyder DID censor Dan Steinberg's photos from the Tampa Bay game!

Steinberg had chronicled the ill-will among the home fans at FedExField, and his piece was accompanied by photos of the ill-willed wearing anti-Snyder T-shirts and garb.

Steinberg took the photos himself, while walking around the stadium. He's been taking those photos at FedExField and posting them without problems since he started doing the Sports Bog.

But hours after he put up shots of the Tampa Bay game, a game during which stadium security confiscated thousands and thousands of bags that discontented ticket buyers planned to wear on their heads, those photos disappeared from washingtonpost.com.

Steinberg, my former regular Friday lunch date, declined to comment on what went on.

But sports editor Matt Vita says the photos were pulled from Steinberg's Bog at the behest of the Redskins: "The Redskins said he was in violation of his credentials for taking the photographs. We honored that request, because at the end of the day, they control access to their facility."

Vita would not discuss the possible implications of ignoring the Redskins request to yank the photos.

Round: Snyder, 10-8.*

***

Over at Dan Snyder's message board, extremeskins.com, some of the discontented have taken to calling the owner "Lord Farquaad."

That's harsh. But it beats the crap outta "Synder."

***

Leonard Shapiro, who was taking his slams of Dan Snyder to the Miami Herald recently, has brought 'em all back home to the Washington Post. Well, to washingtonpost.com, anyway.

Shapiro goes down the path of comparing Snyder to Ted Leonsis.

This Caps team is great fun, and Leonsis these days is impossible not to love, being the open, accessible owner of a winning team. Just a couple years ago, he was brawling with Caps fans in the concourse of the home arena! Yet he's still out there glad-handing and giving fans and players and George McPhee all the credit.

And, sure, Snyder remains in hiding, and after hearing a couple boos and "Lord Farquaad!"'s he's ordering his thugs to take your paper bags away.

But the Caps worship is getting out of hand. This ain't the first time the Capitals have been pretty good. The current Caps squad hasn't gotten as far, and absent #8 isn't as obviously talented, as the 1989-1990 squad, and that team's fans were as committed and crazy. Nobody put Abe Pollin on a pedestal back then.

Damn, that was 20 years ago? What a geezer post this is!

***

Guaranteed Win Night comes in again!

Cheap Seats Daily spied that +52-run run differential differential (R²D²™) the Minnesota Twins enjoyed over the Detroit Tigers, and couldn't lay off the Twins in the one-game playoff to get into the standard postseason.

Some folks might have been worried when Detroit was up a run in the top of the 10th, or had the bases loaded with one out in the 11th.

But not us.

No, not us, even as we "watched" the game on ESPN.com's silly/amazing MLB GameCast and figures flashed on-screen saying that Detroit had a 72 pecent chance to win the game with a guy on second and one out in the 11th, so Minnesota intentionally walked a guy, and that gave Detroit runners on first and second and a 74 percent chance to win the game. (I'm no baseball guy, but if you increase the opponent's chance of winning by intentionally putting a runner on first in that situation, how come EVERY manager does it?)

But, again, while we were confused by the pro-Detroit percentages, we were not worried. Because here at Cheap Seats Daily, we know, to re-quote the dumbass adage we made up while begging folks to put the mortgage and then some on Minnesota, that pitching might win championships, but R²D² Wins Ballgames™!

Vegas has gotta be worried about the success of Cheap Seats Daily's free touting service. Good thing for Delaware that that state didn't get sports gambling like it wanted, or by now both my readers would own half of Wilmington.

Plainly, Guaranteed Win Night™ is the surest thing since Nicolette Sheridan. (IMDB's database lists Sheridan's character in the 1984 movie The Sure Thing as "The Sure Thing.")

Watching that movie clip now, among the things that occur to me is that Sheridan mighta been the template for Snyder's vision of a Washington Redskins cheerleader. She just needs a sponge.

***

*Full disclosure: I freelance music reviews for the Washington Post.

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

A sampling:

This is Snyder's team; he was intimately involved in assembling it. He keeps his favorite players on speed dial, watches practices on the sidelines and demands face time and explanations from the coaches he personally hired. Whatever you think of Zorn, he is Snyder's own selection. It was Snyder who told Joe Gibbs, "He would make a great head coach." He is personally responsible for naming Vinny Cerrato, a proven failure, executive vice president of football operations, for the Redskins' lack of core strength, for their inability to power the ball in the red zone, which is thanks to his decade of neglect of the interior lines in favor of big free agent signings.

But no sampling can do the column justice. It's all wondrous.

(AFTER THE JUMP: Reading recommendations? Nats give fans an unforgettable "Bang! Zoom!" when down to last strike? Thom Loverro says forget "Bang! Zoom!" Ted Leonsis says Caps better than Jesus? When's the wake for Hoop Dreams? Say it ain't so, Susie Kay?)

My only problem with Jenkins' article is that nowhere in the piece is there a disclosure that she has written books with Lance Armstrong, or any mention of all the allegations that Armstrong doped while winning all those Tour de Frances.

(Whoa! Where'd that come from? Enough with the Lance Armstrong! Innocent til proven guilty! Heard of it? Geezus Chrysler! Let Sally do God's work!)

OK, OK! Go read Sally Jenkins' column again!

***

Sure, it's early in the football season, but I'm certain that nothing the Redskins do this year will wow their fans as much as last night's Nats' win over the Mets wowed those spectating or otherwise watching or (in my case) listening.

Justin Maxwell's grand slam with his team down a run in the bottom of the last inning of the last home game of the year---Maxwell was down to his last strike, in fact---gave me the sort of thrill chills I hadn't gotten since Boise State beat Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl a few years ago.

Sure, the game meant nothing in the big scheme---the Mets are huge losers, and the Nats have already wrapped up not only last place in the division for 2009, but the worst record in the majors. But the rest of the season meant less than nothing while Charlie Slowes called Maxwell's HR with the fans going crazy crazy crazy in the background. Sports magic, it was.

No matter how lousy this team is, the ending was enough to make you think: Wait 'til next year!

***

Thom Loverro, alas, says don't wait 'til next year.

Loverro predicts very dire times for the Washington Nationals, at least at the turnstiles. By the end of next season, Loverro says, Nats management will look back wistfully at the 2009 debacle.

This organization is not on the brink of turning around the Jim Bowden culture that buried D.C. baseball in a deep, dark hole that will take years to dig out of. Let's say the Nationals wind up with 57 wins to show for 2009. A 10-win improvement would be a dramatic jump. That means about 67 wins next season. Think that will cause a spike in attention and attendance?

Sometime before the start of the season, Kasten has traditionally shared the season-ticket sales for the season. This year he did not, but we got a pretty good idea from some of the sparse crowds at Nationals Park that it is somewhere around 12,000 - down from the high of 22,000 during the inaugural 2005 season at RFK Stadium. There's no reason not to believe that next year it could fall below 10,000.

Loverro's always right. I just wish he'd've waited a day or two before killing my post-Justin Maxwell buzz with reality.

***

As the Washington Capitals open their regular season tonight, the Washington Times previews the season with a story headlined "Leonsis: Capitals set for dynasty."

Considering how smart and humble Ted Leonsis had been with the media in recent years, and with Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, the superstar leaders of the defending Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins, both being younger than Alex Ovechkin, I found that headline startling.

Ted would call his team a dynasty?

Well, I've read the story once and scanned it a bunch of times, but I can't find any quote where the Caps owner uses the word "dynasty" or claims that the team is "set for dynasty." I see him sorta bragging that he likes the way his organization is set up, but no "dynasty" claims. Maybe I'm just missing something. The Times' Web site does godawful things to my browser, no foolin'.

But if I'm not missing anything: It's like those "John Lennon: Beatles More Popular Than Jesus" headlines that helped take the Fabs off the road in 1966.

Only, Lennon actually said that.

***

Tonight's the goodbye party for the Hoop Dreams Scholarship Fund at the Historical Society of Washington, D.C.

The charity was founded more than a decade ago by then-H.D. Woodson teacher Susie Kay.

Kay decided to dissolve the fund earlier this year because of dwindling charity dollars going to group's like hers. From the start, she worked the schedule of a dairy farmer. In the end, Hoop Dreams subsidized the college educations of more than 1,000 kids from D.C. public high schools.

She made the city a better place.

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

One fascinating (to me) part of the story that I didn't get into for space reasons: While sitting on the Anacostia building over the years, Monk and Mann, joined by Darrell Green, lobbied the residents of Sursum Corda, a low-income housing development off North Capitol Street NW, to turn control of that woeful development over to them. The ex-teammates made their pitch to redevelop the property right after the murder of 14 year-old Jahkema Princess Hansen. They did not get the job.

For both the Anacostia and Sursum Corda projects, Monk and Mann used the Bennett Group, a DC-based development firm headed by LuAnn Bennett, wife of a longtime Congressman, Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.).

Congress gave the Good Samaritan Foundation at least $775,000 in grants for the training center project.

The Bennett Group's slogan, which pops up every now and then on the firm's web site: "The bottom line for Bennett Group is value. For us, that means delivering projects on time and on budget, without compromising on quality."

That adage doesn't really jibe with what went on at the Carver Theatre site.

***

(AFTER THE JUMP: Capitals announcer blows off Falls Church High School Reunion for Fan Fest? Anacostia High has chance at Worst Season in DC High School History? Will Eastern and Spingarn keep Anacostia from their date with destiny? The Nats no longer need to consult Mapquest on the Road to 100 Losses?)

There are two big get-togethers in the area this weekend: The reunion of the Falls Church High School Class of 1979, and the Washington Capitals Fan Convention.

Because of the latter, Wes Johnson won't be able to attend the former.

Johnson is the Caps longtime P.A. announcer, and far as I can tell the only guy from Falls Church (full disclosure: my alma mater, same class as Johnson) to ever make anything of himself. The only other alum from FCHS to get the spotlight was a Pizza Hut delivery man who jumped the White House fence and got shot in 1995.

Johnson, a professional voice-over artist when not riling up the home fans from his perch in the penalty box, has been working the microphone at Verizon Center since 2000.

He says he favored an understated delivery when he first got the Caps job, but turned into the over-the-top bellower fans now know and love after a gig for a video-game producer in which he had to play an arena announcer... for gladiators.

"For that job, I put my regular voice 'on steroids,'" says Johnson, speaking figuratively in case it's illegal for P.A. guys to be juiced, "and it carried over to what I do with the Caps. And, I've found the arena-announcer-for-gladiators voice works pretty well with hockey, too."

Johnson will spend all Saturday at the Caps event, to be held at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center in Oxon Hill. Other scheduled special guests include NHL commissioner Gary Bettman, owner Ted Leonsis, general manager George McPhee, head coach Bruce Boudreau and former fan favorites including Rod Langway, Al Iafrate, and the long-absent Dennis Maruk.

Tickets for the Caps event are sold out. If you want to go to the Falls Church High reunion, however, call 703-471-6700.

***

Anacostia has a fighting chance of posting an 0-11 season. That might well have never happened in DC high school football history. Some DCIAA teams this year have added a game to the traditional 10-game maximum slate that has long been in place for prep football.

DC football has long been a game of haves and have nots, and Anacostia is the only one of the have-nots in the public school league to throw in the extra game on this year's schedule.

Anacostia has gotten off to the kind of start that makes the winless, record-breaking season seem very possible:  The Indians are already 0-4 and have suffered some major blowouts, including a 60-0 pounding from Dunbar last week.

But ignominy isn't going to come so easily:  Anacostia has games at the end of the season against Spingarn and Eastern, the reigning kings of DC's Have-Nots.

So far in 2009, Spingarn and Eastern have a combined record of 0-4, and have been outscored 168-12. Both schools will take big time beatings today. Spingarn faces Dunbar, and Eastern, which didn't even field a football team last year, will get grounded and pounded by charter school powerhouse Friendship Collegiate.

But, Eastern has only eight games listed on its schedule this year, and Spingarn nine. So neither has the chance for Historical Badness that Anacostia does.

Cheap Seats Daily will keep an eye on Anacostia as it makes its way along the historic Road to 11 Losses!

***

Speaking of historic losers: Nats lose! Nats lose!

The 7-6 loss to the Dodgers at home gives the their 100th defeat of 2K9.

The Road to 100 Losses is the The Road Traveled for this bunch -- three years in a row they've got triple digit defeats. So now the franchise has the same number of 100 loss seasons in Washington as it had in all its years in Montreal! (Anybody who says DC isn't a cursed baseball town hasn't seen "Damn Yankees"!)

One of Riggleman's postgame quotes, meant to praise his boys for not getting blown out like they got blown out on Tuesday, is an unintentional thigh-slapper: "That team's going to be popping champagne any day," Riggleman said, "and we're right there with 'em."

Well, if by "right there with 'em" Riggleman means his Nats, running away with worst-team-in-the-majors honors, are within just 39 1/2 games of the Dodgers, who've won a major-league best 92 games this year, then...OK, Coach, you ARE right there with 'em!

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

Did anybody tell Abe Pollin?

***

Lebron's come and gone. But we only have to wait a week for the next celeb sports doc extravaganza: Luis Tiant will be at the E Street Cinema downtown on June 22 for red-carpet screening of "The Lost Son of Havana," a film about the ex-Indian- Twin-Red Sock-Yankee-Pirate-Angel's trip back to the Cuban capital, which is his Akron.

After the screening the movie's producers will throw a bash across the street from the theater at the ESPN Zone. But don't expect much. In the invitation the party's organizers just sent out, they're promising that: "Light refreshments will be served in accordance with House Ethics rules."

House ethics used to lead to the wildest parties in town. Jack Abramoff mussed up everything.

***

Sign of the times or the Times? Despite a big write-up in Sunday's Washington Times, the Hoop Dreams Scholarship fund had to cancel its next big fundraising event for lack of interest.

Hoop Dreams has been a powerhouse on the DC charity and social scene for more than a decade. The organization was started in 1996 by former H.D. Woodson teacher and sleepless superhero Susie Kay, who began holding an annual outdoor basketball tournament to help her students get money for college.

Her cause took off, and before long, Kay, backed by Ted Leonsis, Ari Fleischer and scads of local pro athletes and federal lawmakers (including John McCain and Barack Obama), was divvying out grants to kids from schools all over the city. (Leonsis threw more than checks at the group, serving for years as a mentor to Kay's kids.)

The organization now claims to have funded continuing education for more than 1,000 DC students.

The plan was to celebrate that milestone on June 25, with a soiree at the Historical Society of Washington, DC, called "1,000 Strong."

But this morning Hoop Dreams sent out a brief, terse announcement that the event was canceled "due to lack of ticket sales."

"For the few people who purchased tickets online you will receive a full refund," read the cancellation notice.

Hoop Dreams' cause remains righteous. This party might be canceled, but the party can't be over for this bunch.

Other hoops-related charities are claiming big doings around here: The group Nothing But Nets, also known for raising funds through basketball tournaments, is holding a series of local events this week with the Mystics, DC United, the Bayhawks and Michelle Obama and Jack Evans, and says it will use the proceeds to send 10,000 malaria nets to various refugee camps in Africa.

***

Good golly, did David Letterman look like a coward and a buffoon last night, caving in and bumbling through a fake apology for his lazy line about Sarah Palin's daughter getting "knocked up" by Alex Rodriguez.

Yeah, talk about an athlete impregnating a Palin daughter really isn't fit for a late-night monologue. It's ok to use that material in a campaign press release, however.

Guess it's all been said. But let's take another look at Palin with her daughters at the Flyers game during the campaign, one of many appearances at sporting events where she's used her kids as human shields.

What network fool told Letterman to crater?

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

A little after 7:30 p.m., a shot from Pittsburgh's Sergei Gonchar goes off bodies in front of the net and Sidney Crosby pushes the loose puck in. Eight seconds of playing time later, Penguin Craig Adams scores his first career playoff goal. It's 2-0, but the game, series and season feel over.

In one rotten hour, what had been a fab month in local sports was over.

When's Redskins camp open?

***

Ted Leonsis always talks about the "10-step plan" that the Caps have been following. He means the rebuilding scheme that got them to verge of a conference final for the first time in 11 years.

But last night, an early victim of his plan came back to bite him.

In 2004, with his team losing most games and eight-figures a year, Leonsis got GM George McPhee to trade or release every name player but Olaf Kolzig. One of the dumpees was Sergei Gonchar, a former first-round Caps pick, who was sent to the Boston Bruins for Shaone Morrisonn.

Morrisonn is the guy who took a dumb penalty midway through the first period, and midway through the power play Gonchar set up Crosby for the game's first goal. Pittsburgh never looked back.

Amazingly, the main topic on WJFK's postgame show was on how quickly McPhee should be fired.

***

The Washington Post reports the Washington Wizards held a pre-draft workout for Marquette guard Wes Matthews. His dad, also Wes Matthews, was a first-round pick for the old Bullets in 1980, ending a three-year run of busts in which the team used their top pick on, in order, Roger Phegley, Joe DeSantis and Matthews.

Abe Pollin's loyalty was such that he let General Manager Bob Ferry keep his job for another 10 years.

***

Girl vs. Boys: The filly Rachel Alexandra will not only compete against the world's best three-year-old colts in Saturday's Preakness, she'll be expected to beat them.

The track released its opening betting line yesterday, and Rachel Alexandra, who didn't run in the Kentucky Derby, was atop it at 8-5.

Derby winner Mine That Bird is the second choice in the 13-horse field at 6-1.

***

Speaking of the Freakness: The New York Times ran a story about the end of BYOB at the Preakness. Both Cheap Seats readers will find nothing new in the article, but the accompanying photo is Pulitzer worthy.

And if that shot doesn't make you nostalgic for the Running of the Urinals, there's no hope for you.

***

Don't Speak Ill of the Deadskins. In a fine thread called "Least Favorite Redskin of All Time" on the team-owned message board, posters recalled the players they most wished had never worn burgundy and gold.

Among the usual suspects -- Deion Sanders, Michael Westbrook, Heath Shuler -- a poster going by Leopard11 chimed in with "Dan Turk."

The poster was still mad that Turk, a mostly dependable former long snapper from 1997-1999, made a bad snap in the last minute of a 1999 playoff game against Tampa Bay.

Somebody must have informed Leopard11 that Turk died of testicular cancer less than a year after the miscue, prompting this retraction:

i take that back Dan Turk was not a bad player just made one bad snap not a biggie but was a playoff game. I totally take that back he was a good Redskin.

***

Davids don't always whup Goliaths: Last night Bishop Ireton lost its lead to Paul VI and a chance at a rare athletic championship in the conclusion of a game suspended on Monday because of weather.

Playing in the WCAC, the powerful DC-area Catholic schools league, Ireton over the last 40 years has won just four titles in all boys sports -- three in soccer and one in lacrosse. Yet Ireton was leading Paul VI 3-2 in the top of the sixth inning of the WCAC baseball championship, played in Bowie on Monday, when the skies opened up and umps called off play.

Standard rules call for a game to be declared official after five innings, so Ireton normally would have been granted the biggest win in the school's history and its first baseball crown. But before the title game, coaches agreed that because of the stakes they'd play a full seven innings no matter what.

And when the teams gathered again last night in Annandale to take it from the top of the sixth, or top of the VIth, Ireton quickly lost its lead and the game, 4-3.

Again, this being the Catholic schools league, you'd think the Man Upstairs wouldn't play favorites. But Paul VI coach Billy Emerson apparently takes Monday's timely rainshowers as a hint that God was on his side's side.

"We kind of thought the Lord was looking out for us because he stopped momentum right there,” Emerson told dcsportsfan.com.

Clearly.

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

First off: Ted Leonsis somehow wasn't included among hockey's best. If there's ever been a more beloved sports owner in this town than Leonsis circa 2009, I can't remember him.

Hard to believe it's only been five years since Leonsis was brawling with home fans at Caps game, eh?

But he was. Days after he unloaded Jaromir Jagr and his $11 million salary to the Rangers in January 2004 in the midst of a talent purge, a 20-year-old season ticket holder named Jason Hammer brought a sign to the then-MCI Center that said "Caps Hockey, AOL Stock -- See a Pattern?"

Hammer sat among a group of fans heckling the owner, and waved the placard at Leonsis throughout the game. Leonsis got so incited he went after the kid in the concourse after the final horn. The account of the incident in the Washington Post said Leonsis "grabbed [Hammer] by the neck and threw him to the ground."

The only things wounded during the melee, however, were Leonsis' public image and his wallet. Leonsis was fined $100,000 and suspended for a week by the NHL, made up quickly with the kid (without any litigation), and the talent purge worked out fabulously for his team: The Capitals went to the bottom of the league gave them the draft pick used to get Alex Ovechkin.

And, once again, Leonsis is beloved. The diehardest New York Rangers fan I know around here has become a Caps fan after, he, too, fell for Leonsis.

How could Sports Illustrated leave Leonsis off the list?

***

Now to the other side: Dan Snyder came in at No. 3 on roster of bad football owners. Nothing man-bites-dog about that. Snyder is to these shitlists like Meryl Streep is to Oscar nominations. Of COURSE he's gonna be named! But it's gotta burn Snyder that Steve Bisciotti from just up I-95 made the "best" list. Kinda mutes the "Give Mr. Snyder time to learn how to be a good owner!" defense.

***

The Lerners came in at No. 5 among baseball's worst, but only because they're new owners. With the non-rent paying, non-draft-pick-signing brilliance they flaunted last season, the Lerners clearly have what it takes to supplant the No. 1 bad guy, Peter Angelos, on future SI polls.

***

If soccer was considered a major enough sport by Sports Illustrated, DC would have been a cinch for that sport's lousy owner list, too.

It's clear now that DC United's Victor MacFarlane, a San Francisco-based developer, only bought into the holding group that controls the team so he could get some building deals here.

That ain't happened yet, and looks like it won't ever. And United management's public whining is getting really irksome. Take it inside, guys.

***

One last SI List bit: Mark Cuban came in as the third best basketball owner in the land. If the SI issue had been published a week later, given what happened in the Dallas/Denver game a few days ago, no way the Mavericks boss makes the cut.

Awesome Trivia about Mark Cuban: He was a massive stockholder in Six Flags, and promoted Snyder's takeover of the company.

This from BusinessWeek in early 2006, shortly after Snyder's Six Flags coup:

Another investor, tech billionaire Mark Cuban, is cheering Six Flags almost as loudly as he does his Dallas Mavericks. "They've shown they know how to create great entertainment," Cuban writes about Snyder and [CEO Mark] Shapiro in an e-mail.

Buh huh huh huh...

***

Happy 30th to Ryan Zimmerman. When you're chasing DiMaggio, life begins at 30...

***

Cheerios are in trouble with the federal government. The feds sent General Mills a letter telling them to stop saying in advertising that the cereal "can Lower Your Cholesterol" and can cure cancer.

So how long before The Man goes after Snyder for his latest direct mail campaign to sell tickets? Snyder's marketing mailer claims season ticket holders can "Resell your tickets at a profit via StubHub for any game you are unable to attend!”

Bah. Not with 91,000 seats and an average of less than 8 wins since Snyder took over in 1999.

Snyder's ads also say buying season tickets for the Redskins is a "once in a lifetime opportunity."

Sure it is...in Opposite Land!

But in the real world, given how demand for Skins tickets has sunk, the only way it's a once in a lifetime opportunity is if you don't eat enough Cheerios and your cholesterol level and/or cancer prevent you from sticking around till next season.

***

The Wizards (remember them?) left an impression on somebody. Or maybe a bruise. An Akron paper praises the noble way Lebron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers are winning, while putting forth the Washington Wizards as Goofus to James' Gallant. James gets kudos for "never resorting" to the roughhouse tactics opponents tried last year, "when DeShawn Stevenson took a vicious swing at James' head as he went for a layup."

At least somebody's talking about the Wizards. Just not around here.

***

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

Given how everything's coming up cherry blossoms for the Caps this season, it's hard to imagine the franchise being in the near-death state it was back then.

But the team headed into the 1982 offseason having not made the playoffs for the eighth straight year -- meaning the Capitals had yet to play a single postseason game in their history -- at a time when 16 of 21 NHL teams qualified for the playoffs each season.

And then Abe Pollin sort of lost his mind.

The previous decade had been an amazing one for Pollin as a basketball owner, with his Bullets having made the NBA Finals an amazing four times.

But nobody was showing up to watch the Caps lose. So Pollin put his hockey team up for sale, and handed out all sorts of ultimatums to fans and local businesses and local government about tax breaks and season ticket sales, and threatened that if his demands weren't met, this town would never see the Caps alive again.

It's a sign of how much goodwill Pollin had built up around here from basketball that everybody didn't just tell him to shut up and leave and take his hockey team with him.

But, instead, fans and the business community rallied around an organized effort called Save the Caps. Steve Mehlman, a superfan, was one of the organizers and leaders of that campaign.

My favorite tidbit: The Capitals were so pitiful at this point in their history that the DC chapter of the Special Olympics even earmarked donations from the Summer of '82 to  Caps tickets in hopes of changing Pollin's mind.

Pollin, obviously, eventually cooled off, and the Caps didn't leave.

And it worked out well for him: At the height of the Save the Caps effort, Pollin had put the franchise up for sale for just $7.5 million.

But he kept the squad until 1999, when he sold to Ted Leonsis for...$85 million.

Abe should send Mehlman a few quid...

What next? Is Leonsis going to ban folks from walking into the Verizon Center?

Or maybe crater an amusement park chain?

Or, oh geez, just start losing?