Sports

January 30, 2013

Magenta, aubergine, violet--call it what you like, but no doubt you’re seeing an awful lot of purple around Baltimore these days. As the Ravens prepare for the Superbowl this weekend, we thought we’d take a look at the “purple economy.”

There is purple!

The Baltimore Ravens are going to the Super Bowl. They'll square off against the San Francisco 49ers in New Orleans on February 3rd. Tom Hall talks with Mark Hyman about last night's AFC Championship game and looks ahead to the Super Bowl.

The college football bowl season is in full swing. None of the players is getting paid to play in the bowl games -- or any other game for that matter. Historian Taylor Branch says we should change that. Tom Hall talks with Branch about the Bowl Championship Series and the state of college sports.

The seemingly endless stream of college football bowl games has been underway for the last few days. Two of the four Bowl Championship Series games, the Rose Bowl and the Orange Bowl, were played yesterday. The Sugar Bowl is tonight. The Fiesta Bowl is tomorrow night, and on Monday night, the BCS National Championship Game will pit undefeated Notre Dame against Alabama.

This segment originally aired on May 8, 2012.

The University of Maryland's big and expensive move from the ACC to the Big Ten is being met with a lot of resistance, from fans to alumni. We'll examine the controversial move with WYPR's Sports-at-Large commentator (and UM alumnus) Milton Kent.

The University of Maryland announced last week that in 2014 it will abandon the Atlantic Coast Conference in which it's athletic teams have competed for the past 60 years. It will move to the Big Ten, a league that actually includes 14 teams, who are largely based in the midwest.

More than 700,000 Marylanders don't know where their next meal is coming from. We discuss the Maryland Food Bank’s latest efforts, including a collaboration with farmers and prison inmates to get fresh produce to those who need it.
Then, only one American team, the Baltimore Stallions, has ever won the Canadian Football League's version of the Super Bowl. We talk with Jim Speros, owner of Baltimore's short-lived, but championship team.

And J. Wynn Rousuck reviews "Next to Normal" at the Vagabond Players.

The Grey Cup, the Canadian Football League’s version of the Super Bowl, will be played for the 100th time on Sunday. Since it began, only one American team, the Baltimore Stallions, has won the Cup. That was in 1995.

Sheilah talks with Baltimore Stallions owner Jim Speros about how Canadian Football came to be in Baltimore.

More on the Baltimore Stallions:

Web Extra: Speros on the NFL's expansion to Baltimore

Web Extra: Speros on the difference between American football and Canadian football

Play ball, but where? Sheilah discusses the Hagerstown Suns' facility options with Tom Riford, President and CEO of the Hagerstown-Washington County Convention and Visitors Bureau and Kristin Aleshire, Myserville Maryland Town Manager and Hagerstown City Council candidate.

Maryland Morning theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck reviews "Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson" at the Maryland Ensemble Theater.