NFL Merry-Go-Round: Relocation Roundelay

[Gothamite]

And what a snow job the whole "London team" nonsense really is.

Gothamite with Effort Post of the Year. That was awesome. Looks like this might be a threat after all.

Aw, shucks.

Thanks,

[CubsFanBudMan]

This seems to be a common theme:

this purchase of a too-small-for-a-stadium piece of land

it's barely large enough for a stadium

The plot of land is 60 acres. MetLife Stadium takes up 40 acres, the new Levi's Stadium will take up 42.

Would it be better to have more land, and therefore more parking spots? Sure. But this plot seems more than large enough to fit the stadium itself with some parking, and I'm sure a deal could be worked out for all those parking spots across the street.

Admittedly, this is very unscientific, but I took the plot of land as seen on Google Maps:

Looks narrow, but I checked to see if you could fit the Coliseum (seating capacity 93,000) on that plot. Turns out that you can:

Some good room for parking left over. Hell, if Kroenke wanted to, he could add a full-sized replica of the Rose Bowl and still have some room left over.

Those are just the local stadiums, but they're college, so maybe they're apples to oranges. Let's see what happens when I put my local stadium on this map. Keep in mind that it houses stadium facilities for two teams, just as I presume the LA stadium would:

Still no problem. But what if those seats aren't enough? I think FedEx Field still has the largest capacity among NFL stadiums, so let's see what that looks like:

And just because everything's bigger in Texas - JerruhWorld fits too!

And that's before we even ask the Hollywood Park people if we can buy any little pieces of their lot (which may or may not be an option, I honestly don't know).

Now, those are all stadiums built for other sites. An architect would come up with something to work within, taking best advantage of, this site's unique layout.

So whatever you want to say about this Inglewood site, "too small for an NFL stadium" doesn't seem to be a terribly valid criticism.

The too small quote was the LA Times' phrase, not mine. One of the St. Louis pieces references Cowboys Stadium, which sits on 140.

If you're the NFL and you're going back to the second largest market in the country after two decades, building a home for countless future Super Bowls (as opposed to the one-time thank-you bowls), are you going for "good enough" or "get it right"?

I think the NFL has shown over and over again where they stand on this. They aren't the type to "squeeze in," San Fran being an exception. But aren't they always with stadiums?

P.S. Love the maps.

[Gothamite]

What about this makes you think it can't be "get it right"? I never said "good enough", only that the initial reports of too-small didn't seem accurate.

Actually, with the possible exception of the post 9/11 rules, Inglewood looks like a pretty good option.

[Rockstar Matt]

I always hate to see a city lose a team, but I'm so stoked about the possibility of the Rams returning. Of course it's all speculation, but this is very interesting.

I wouldn't expect Kroenke to stay anything about the prospect of the Rams moving until this time next year. He still has a full season to play in St. Louis and he would be foolish to say anything that could alienate the fanbase there.

[Gothamite]

The fanbase isn't stupid - they know what's going on behind the scenes.

[CubsFanBudMan]

What about this makes you think it can't be "get it right"? I never said "good enough", only that the initial reports of too-small didn't seem accurate.

Actually, with the possible exception of the post 9/11 rules, Inglewood looks like a pretty good option.

So did Farmers Field. So did City of Industry. They just had some hurdles, too. But nothing that couldn't be negotiated, right? I never said you said "good enough." It just seems the NFL wants its return to be perfect.

This might be nice for the Rams vs. St. Louis, but isn't L.A. about more than that?

Otherwise, why haven't the Vikings, Chargers, Raiders and Rams already broken ground? It's crying wolf at this point.

[Rockstar Matt]

The fanbase isn't stupid - they know what's going on behind the scenes.

Yes of course. I meant that it would further alienate the fanbase in St. Louis if Kroenke publicly announced that the Rams were moving to Los Angeles.

[Gothamite]

True, but he's not going to do that until everything's lined up, is he? Lots of work to do even if that's his only plan at this point.

He can ride out 2014 and then announce at the end of the season, when he's free to move. If that's what he wants.

[STL FANATIC]

The strange thing—and one of the main reasons why I think Kroenke's first concern is staying in St. Louis—is that the Rams have done more since Kroenke took over full ownership of the Rams to cement their place in St. Louis and grow their reach in the surrounding region than the franchise had done in all the 15 or so years prior... except for the one thing that really secures their place. The stadium/lease.

The Rams community service has been top notch. The best of the three pro teams in St. Louis and one of the best in the NFL. They've started marketing beyond the immediate metro. They've expanded their pre-season network. All kinds of things. None of those outweigh the stadium, it's just hard to figure exactly why he'd do all that and still be secretly planning to bail.

That's why I think the more likely scenario is that this is just another play of leverage. It may not be a bluff. It may be a real, legitimate backup plan. He can build a stadium there if he can't work it out in St. Louis. But I think for now this is just a step in the process of the St. Louis stadium negotiations.

(But I, of course, could be dead wrong.)

[CubsFanBudMan]

Yeah, I'm not saying it's not possible, either. But recent history has made me cynical about L.A. as a real threat ... at least until a few more chairs are pulled from the game.

[dbadefense1990]

Here's what I'm thinking: the moment a team relocates to Los Angeles, no matter if it is the Rams, Raiders or Chargers, they will be instantaneously the most hated team in sports.

Everyone of us knows how this whole episode of "Kroenke flirts with Southern California" will end: eventually, fans in St. Louis will cave-in to all the paranoia of losing an NFL team, give-in to the pressures of league executives to build a taxpayer-subsidied stadium and the NFL keeps its powerful bargaining-chip in place. By the time the new Vikings stadium opens up in 2016, a whopping 23 new stadiums will have been built since 1995, many infamously using Los Angeles as a threat to leave. That dangle of the 2nd largest city in America as a chip has been effective to those city's taxpayers as a terror scare because of (1) the media and financial potentials of a team relocating west and how more secure they'd be here in those terms than in the current city, (2) perceived stereotypes of Los Angeles not being an NFL-type city, including how shameful the league would be to have a football team in a fairweather city where all people act like celebrities, banksters and hipsters, not caring a soul in the world for the essence of NFL football like Green Bay, Philadelphia or Cleveland, for example, and (3) the league appearing to cater to the interests of large markets and teams.

Over and over again, the NFL has never pulled the dare-card and moved a team to Los Angeles, and each time, most NFL fans from other teams celebrate, if not gasp in relief. But the moment the NFL does approve a relocation, expect a flurry of hate for the team that arrives here from the get-go, because all those "fears" of Los Angeles treating a football team will come true. Conversely, expect NFL fans to give sympathy to the city who lost its team, all because it came at the expense of those "Hollywood fairweather fans not caring about the National Football League."

[CubsFanBudMan]

Guess I'm not the only cynical one. Field of Schemes weighs in:

http://www.fieldofschemes.com/2014/01/31/6727/real-estate-developer-buys-real-estate-everybody-freaks-out-that-rams-are-moving-to-l-a/

[Still MIGHTY]

Here's what I'm thinking: the moment a team relocates to Los Angeles, no matter if it is the Rams, Raiders or Chargers, they will be instantaneously the most hated team in sports.

...No.

[The_Admiral]

Had it been the Vikings or Bills, absolutely. I don't think anyone would really care if the Rams went back whence they came, especially now that the unseemliness of their engineered relocation to St. Louis is semi-common knowledge. Also, NFL fandom has become so ubiquitous that to say the millions and millions of people in Southern California are categorically unfit to like pro football because of the presence of the entertainment industry is preposterous beyond words. It hasn't stopped New York. I think it's silly to say Los Angeles couldn't support a team. With the centralized revenue the NFL brings in, a big empty ranch in Wyoming could support a team. It's just a matter of cashing in the eternal bargaining chip.

The Chargers moving would have been met with apathy, as most Chargers-related happenings are.

[Brian in Boston]

What about this makes you think it can't be "get it right"? I never said "good enough", only that the initial reports of too-small didn't seem accurate.

Actually, with the possible exception of the post 9/11 rules, Inglewood looks like a pretty good option.

So did Farmers Field. So did City of Industry.

The problem with the Farmers Field proposal had only so much to do with location. The bigger problem with said project was that AEG's Phil Anschutz ultimately decided that he wanted to pay a discounted price to secure a significant percentage of whatever team relocated to the facility. Barring that, he wanted AEG to control the vast majority of revenue streams generated by the facility. Neither option sat well with Goodell-and-Company.

As for the Los Angeles Stadium project in City of Industry, that proposal's problem was, in fact, location. Contrary to all of Ed Roski's claims and the league's measured comments, City of Industry never had a snowball's chance in Hell of securing an NFL franchise. The moneyed movers-and-shakers of the Greater Los Angeles power-base - the big-ticket target-audience for the NFL in the region - are predominantly ensconced on the Westside of the metro area: Beverly Hills, Holmby Hills, Bel Air, Westwood, Brentwood, Pacific Palisades, Malibu, Santa Monica and the like. There's absolute no way that said crowd was going to fight their way from the Westside out to City of Industry in bumper-to-bumper traffic eight-plus times a year. None. It simply wasn't going to happen.

Stan Kroenke doesn't face Phil Anschutz's problem of having to secure an NFL franchise; he already owns the Rams. As for a stadium in Inglewood, while a drive from the aforementioned Westside communities might not be an outright joyride, it would be nowhere near the slog that traveling from said neighborhoods to City of Industry would be.

Finally, the notion of an NFL franchise relocating to a new stadium at Chavez Ravine is the longest of longshots. Such a facility would have to be built on a portion of the Dodger Stadium parking lots. As part of the sale of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Frank McCourt retains part-ownership of said land and would profit equally with Dodgers ownership from any development of said property - including construction of a stadium to house an NFL team. After the nightmare he proved to be as an MLB owner, does anybody honestly believe that the NFL is going to want to have to deal with McCourt, either as a landlord, or a party that property has to be purchased from?

[The_Admiral]

How much do you think the improvements to the Forum, Hollywood Park site, and potentially an NFL stadium could improve the standing of Inglewood? Is this the best plan for a stadium yet, to the extent that it is a plan?

[CubsFanBudMan]

Thanks for the breakdown, Brian. I guess I have the same question as admiral. Is this the absolute best piece of land that has been on the table in the past 5-10 years? Or is it really just a "Kroenke can make it work"? I don't see the NFL settling in any way.

I guess my point was that every proposal has had red flags of some level, but that hasn't stopped a lot of jumping to conclusions that "you'll see the Rams and Chargers at Farmers Field in 2015." Or, "Look, the new renderings use purple and gold." Until the NFL drops by to essentially quash it and then hindsight is 20/20 and the next sure thing comes along.

[Gothamite]

Thanks for the breakdown, Brian. I guess I have the same question as admiral. Is this the absolute best piece of land that has been on the table in the past 5-10 years? Or is it really just a "Kroenke can make it work"? I don't see the NFL settling in any way.

This is the absolute best piece of land, because it's owned by the guy who owns the team, and the team is about to be freed from the remainder of its lease. That can't be said about any of the other proposals that have been on the table.

I guess my point was that every proposal has had red flags of some level, but that hasn't stopped a lot of jumping to conclusions that "you'll see the Rams and Chargers at Farmers Field in 2015." Or, "Look, the new renderings use purple and gold." Until the NFL drops by to essentially quash it and then hindsight is 20/20 and the next sure thing comes along.

Who here has said anything like that? I'll admit, some of us are convinced that St. Louis has failed as a market and LA will have a team again, but that's a cold-eyed analysis of the market and the lease. Wildly jumping to random and contradictory conclusions based on nothing? Who are you talking about?

[tigerslionspistonshabs]

So is Farmers Field still a thing? Or did it die?

[Gothamite]

So is Farmers Field still a thing? Or did it die?

It's still very much a thing. So is the downtown plan. Those are shovel-ready, with all the environmental permits and clearances in place, they just need a team.

The reason nobody's moved to one of them yet is that the teams in trouble - the Chargers, Rams, Raiders and until recently Vikings - all had designs/hopes on a new stadium where they are. In addition, both LA developers wanted to buy all or part of a team and move it, but there just aren't any for sale. Even the teams with stadium problems have stable ownership uninterested in selling off even a piece so long as there was a hope their current cities would come through. So stalemate.

What makes this plan so much more likely then the other two is that all the variables - project developer, land owner, team owner - are wrapped up in one man. Those major hurdles, which have paused the other two projects, just don't exist here.

Add to it that the Rose Bowl just won a court case allowing it to host an NFL team starting in 2015, and you've got a perfect storm. There's your temporary home while the Inglewood park is built.

If Kronke wants to move, he'll have very few obstacles. Rams partisans have said that he definitely does, and we'll see. But even if that's his secret inclination, St. Louis and Missouri better start sweetening their offer (doubling or tripling it) or get very, very creative if they want the Rams to stay. Because this land purchase last month changes the relocation landscape enormously.