Angels tell Anaheim they're opting out of their lease on Angel Stadium

[Still MIGHTY]

Honestly, I’m not having this ing discussion again. Just unnecessary pot-stirring from Markazi, who’s relatively new in his tenure as a columnist at the Times and hadn’t got his swing at this 14-year-old, torn down, beaten up piñata.

 

Gothamite, you were wrong about all this the last time it came up, and you’re still wrong about it now.

 

California Angels was fine. Anaheim Angels was fine. If they had never changed and stayed the Los Angeles Angels when they moved 50 years ago, that also would have been fine. But the toothpaste was out of the tube. Trying to go back was a mistake the instant they thought of it, and all we’ve been doing is arguing ever since.

[Brian in Boston]

2 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

In a classic running gag from Jack Benny's radio show, Mel Blanc portrays a train station announcer who makes the announcement "train leaving on track 5 for Anaheim, Azuza, and Cuc...amonga".

 

The true comedy in that bit - at least for those familiar with Southern California geography - is that the three communities were never linked by the same passenger rail line.

 

Also, over the course of The Jack Benny Program's history - both on radio and television - Benny, Blanc, and the show's creative team hit upon the idea of gradually extending the pause that the train conductor would insert between the beginning and ending of the name Cucamonga. If memory serves, the record was set on the television version of the show, with a full  five or six minutes of dialogue taking place amongst various cast-members between Blanc's initially intoning, "Train now leaving on Track 5 for Anaheim, Azusa, and Cuc..." and eventually bellowing, "... amonga!!!"    

By the way, it's Azusa... with an S. 

 

[SFGiants58]

4 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

The mentions of the cultural distinctiveness of Orange County miss the point. The important factor here is simple geography. For a city the magnitude of a Los Angeles, a smaller city only 30 miles away is always going to be part of the larger city's metro area, notwithstanding any cultural differences, and regardless of whether that smaller city is located in another county or in another state. (In the cases of Detroit and Vancouver, smaller cities belonging to the larger city's metro area can even be located in another country.)

 

Brooklyn, Oakland, and the New Jersey Devils beg to differ.

 

4 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

Yet it is true that the Angels essentially disavow Los Angeles in their branding. They are thus squandering the benefits of identifying with one of the world's greatest cities.

 

Again, this also applies to the Brooklyn Dodgers and Oakland Athletics. You at least have extensive amounts of freeway separating Anaheim and Los Angeles, which isn’t as much the case between Brooklyn-Manhattan and SF-Oakland.

 

It’s OK to reject the big-name city in favor of local ones.

 

4 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

What makes the current situation feel so weird is the multiple changes of name. If the team had been called the Los Angeles Angels since its inception, or if it had retained its longstanding identity of California Angels, the t-shirts that read "Angels Baseball" would not be so awkward.

 

Retaining LA probably would have been ideal, while going for California should have been impossible after Charlie O. moved the A’s to Oakland. State names are terrible, but using a state name while playing alongside another team in your state is stupid.

 

4 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

The only thing that is for sure about the team's varying names is that "Anaheim" should never have been among those names. The reason touches upon why baseball is indeed different from hockey: hockey is a niche sport in the United States, while baseball is a huge national institution.

 

That shouldn’t matter. That shouldn’t matter at all.

 

4 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

Those are the types places with which Anaheim can be classed; while Los Angeles ranks with other world-class cosmopolitan centres such as New York, London, and Paris.

 

Maybe that was the case when Jack Benny was on the radio, but things change. Not every city has to be world-class. It’s OK to be niche in baseball, especially when said niche sets you opposition to the hegemon (the Los Angeles Dodgers). Again, do “New York Dodgers” and “San Francisco Athletics” sound good to anybody?

 

4 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

To put it most starkly: Major League Baseball is too big for Anaheim. And so is the NFL. But the NHL is not. 

 

That’s still terrible reasoning. The NHL isn’t a minor league. It’s more niche than baseball, but it’s not that much more niche.

 

Anaheim is a valid name for a baseball team. @Still MIGHTY and @Brian in Boston are right about it and how people misunderstand it. 

[Gothamite]

2 hours ago, SFGiants58 said:

Brooklyn, Oakland, and the New Jersey Devils beg to differ.

 

Nobody is seriously suggesting that Brooklyn isn’t a part of New York City,  But Brooklyn by itself is larger than all save three cities in the country, and the name “Brooklyn” sells  all across the city and across the country.  You can’t seriously suggest that “Anaheim” does the same.  After all, no Eurotrash poseur ever named their kid “Anaheim”.  

 

(If you wanna play East Coast/West Coast rivalry, come on.  Let’s get nuts.) 

 

 

 

 

Similarly, nobody seriously thinks that northern New Jersey isn’t a part of the New York metroplex.  There’s very little of New Jersey that isn’t a satellite city, of either NYC or Philadelphia.   But even so, New Jersey has eight million people from which to draw.  Eight million people to fill with local pride. Anaheim has what, four hundred thousand?

 

The Bay Area is a unique situation, with three cities in close orbit.  But Anaheim is no Oakland in its relationship to its neighbor.   Either of them.

 

Nobody’s arguing that using the name of a smaller entity can’t work for a baseball team.  Only that it doesn’t always work for a baseball team, and it was dragging down the Angels.  There needs to be a significant amount of cultural cache behind the name, that just isn’t there in this particular case.

 

Which is not a bad thing.  Not every city can be Los Angeles.  Not every city should be Los Angeles.  (Really, not every city should be Los Angeles.)  The state needs Fresnos and Bakersfields and Davises and San Berdoos too.  They’re all wonderful, they all bring something.  If the Angels move to El Segundo or Torrence or Pasadena or Monrovia or Thousand Oaks, they should still be the Los Angeles Angels.

 

FWIW, and just to get back to the original topic, I hope the Angels don’t move out of Anaheim.  I like them in Anaheim, it fits their relationship to the Dodgers. Can’t think of a better place for them anywhere in the whole Southland.

[_DietDrPepper_]

I haven’t been paying much attention but could they technically relocate to another city outside of LA Anaheim region? What are the odds of that. Especially with Portland striving to get a team

[B-Rich]

Just for reference sake, let's look at Anaheim-based teams in everything but the dinkiest of leagues (and some cool old logos, of course).

• First up, September 1965 --  With one month left to go in the season, the Los Angeles Angels are renamed the California Angels, as they will be moving to Anaheim the following season. 
• 1967 --  ABA expansion team Anaheim Amigos last one season in that city, then are sold and moved to Los Angeles, becoming the Stars. 
• 1974 -- WFL expansion team placed in Anaheim; named the Southern California Sun; lasts two seasons:
• 
• 1978 -- NASL's St. Louis Stars move to Anaheim Stadium, follow the Angels' lead and become the California Surf; last three seasons:
• 1978 -- World Team Tennis franchise placed in Anaheim, named the Anaheim Oranges (in a later '80s incarnation at the same location, called the California Oranges)
• 
• 1980 -- The Rams follow through on a planned moved to suburban Anaheim, but remain the "Los Angeles Rams" (despite a blurb I read in Sports Illustrated article in the late '70s suggesting that they may be called the "California Rams")
• 1993 -- NHL expands to Anaheim, team name is  "Mighty Ducks of Anaheim", later changed to "Anaheim Ducks"
• 1994 -- Anaheim Piranhas in the Arena Football league; last till 1997.
• 1997 --  Angels changed name from California Angels to Anaheim Angels.
• 2005 -- Team owner changes baseball name to Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
• 2014 -- Anaheim becomes home to LA KISS of the Arena football League; lasts to 2016.

 

So for teams playing in Anaheim:

• we have 4 instances of "Anaheim", 3 of "California", 2 of "Los Angeles" or "LA", 1 of "Los Angles of Anaheim" and 1 of "Southern California". 
• Tenure-wise in toto, we have 40 years of "Anaheim"; 39 years of "California", 18 years of "Los Angeles" or "LA", 14 of "Los Angeles of Anaheim" and 2 of "Southern California".

 

It's obviously the most messed-up location in terms of name-place in major league sports. 

[Still MIGHTY]

5 hours ago, Gothamite said:

Similarly, nobody seriously thinks that northern New Jersey isn’t a part of the New York metroplex.  There’s very little of New Jersey that isn’t a satellite city, of either NYC or Philadelphia.   But even so, New Jersey has eight million people from which to draw.  Eight million people to fill with local pride. Anaheim has what, four hundred thousand?

 

(Congratulations on dragging me back into this with your condescending ass.)

 

Yes, let’s compare the population of a state and a city. Makes sense. The Angels aren’t just filling the local pride of Anaheim. Angel fans don’t stop at the city limits. Anaheim is the main representative of Orange County, which is over three million people.

 

And to say Anaheim has no cultural cache? It’s ing DISNEYLAND, my dude. C’mon.

 

5 hours ago, Gothamite said:

If the Angels move to El Segundo or Torrence or Pasadena or Monrovia or Thousand Oaks, they should still be the Los Angeles Angels.

 

Yes, if the Angels moved to El Segundo or Torrence or Pasadena or Monrovia or Thousand Oaks, they would be the Los Angeles Angels. Because they would be IN LOS ANGELES.

 

Again, great, you used to at one time live in Southern California. That does not make you the expert. My family is from New York. I’ve visited NYC more than any city outside of SoCal. I love New York. I don’t come at you trying to tell you how and what New York is. So maybe you just leave the LA/OC dynamics to the people that grew up and/or currently live here. I think we have a better handle on this.

[Still MIGHTY]

Again, the toothpaste was out of the tube. You’re not going to get Angel fans in Orange County to say “yes, Go Los Angeles” when they didn’t for 40 years. Yes, they could’ve stayed LA upon move and nobody would be the wiser. They changed to California because they saw, even in 1965, that they weren’t in LA, then they added the specificity with Anaheim. 

 

When you have something that represents your community and you can say “yes, that is us, that is ours, not the big dirty brother, this is *our* team” and then that thing wants to leave you behind and represent people it hasn’t in ages while still living in your city, you can’t see how that plays?

 

If we do want to do a New York comparison, the Brooklyn Nets. They were at one point the New York Nets, take in the whole area. Then they became New Jersey, how many people in NY stayed with them? Then they jump to Brooklyn, how many people in NJ stayed with them? How many non-Brooklynites in NY embrace the Nets? People of Brooklyn are pumped though, right? “Hell yeah! BROOKLYN! This is ours!” How would Brooklyn Nets fans feel if at some point they went back to being the New York Nets? Didn’t move, stayed in Brooklyn, and after years of being called Brooklyn, they went back to claiming all of New York, just for advertising dollars?

[pmoehrin]

I don't get it. I could understand if using the LA name actually made a difference to the bottom line. But as far as I can tell, in every case where its been tried, it doesn't.

 

Around 13 million people live in the LA metro area. Out of that 13 million, only about 4 million actually live in Los Angeles. That means more than 2/3rds of the residents in the LA metro area DON'T live in Los Angeles.

 

It also means a team could do just as well playing immediately outside of Los Angeles as they could in downtown LA. But by using the LA name, you risk pushing the very same fans you're trying to attract away. And for what? For some vein notion that Los Angeles is the only city in the area that matters? It strikes me as going out of the way to attract a fan that likely isn't coming regardless of what the team goes by.

 

They had it right with California Angels. It perfectly reflected their identity as a suburban team trying to attract LA sports fans who don't live in LA. Every name change since has been a downgrade from the one preceding it.

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

On 6/14/2019 at 1:09 PM, Still MIGHTY said:

If we do want to do a New York comparison, the Brooklyn Nets. They were at one point the New York Nets, take in the whole area. Then they became New Jersey, how many people in NY stayed with them? Then they jump to Brooklyn, how many people in NJ stayed with them? How many non-Brooklynites in NY embrace the Nets? People of Brooklyn are pumped though, right? “Hell yeah! BROOKLYN! This is ours!” How would Brooklyn Nets fans feel if at some point they went back to being the New York Nets? Didn’t move, stayed in Brooklyn, and after years of being called Brooklyn, they went back to claiming all of New York, just for advertising dollars?

 

That would delight me to no end. As a kid I became fascinated with Dr. J, and so the New York Nets became my team. I stayed with the team after the move to New Jersey. But they lost me with the move to Brooklyn. I couldn't imagine that they'd take the name of Brooklyn when Brooklyn is not a separate city anymore (as it was when the Dodgers were named). But they did.  I tried to stay with them; I bought several hats and other gear after the move (nothing that said "Brooklyn"; just stuff with the shield logo that preserved a shred of the team's former identity). But ultimately I could not keep my enthusiasm up; I have lost my interest not only in the Nets but in the entire NBA. 

When the new name was first announced, and I was despairing over the decision not to restore the team's original name, I imagined the poster that I would like to have seen if the decision had gone the other way.

 

I know that the team is starting to get good.  I admire both Russell and Dinwiddie.  But, overall, I am just not feeling it.  For a team in my city to not take the name of my city is alienating to me; and this has killed my fandom.  However, if the New York Nets came back, I'd immediately be very much into it. 

 

I realise that the name "Brooklyn" seems cool to people around the country, to whom the name implies only brownstone Downtown Brooklyn and the artistic scene centred on Williamsburg. But people in the rest of New York City who are familiar with the whole borough know that Brooklyn really ain't s--t. In my opinion, this naming hurts the Nets in their quest for fans in the New York City area.  Other fans may not be as emotional I as am about the name question, simply because they weren't Net fans in the first place.  For most New Yorkers, the Nets are just a nonentity.  Knick fans probably outnumber Net fans even in Brooklyn!  The Knicks could suck for decades while the Brooklyn Nets were winning titles, and there still would be many times more Knick fans than Net fans in the city than Net fans.  Hell, there are more Celtic fans in New York City (including in Brooklyn) than there are Net fans!  The phenomenon of the Nets' arena filling up with Celtic fans in matchups of the two teams, which many assumed would be left in Jersey, has definitely followed the team to its current home.  

Also, even if the Nets' move from New Jersey had not pissed off those fans, no New Jersey fans are going to care about a Brooklyn team, whereas, they do in fact care about several New York teams (which makes sense, as North Jersey is part of the New York metro area). The Nets have a potential to win some fans on Long Island, based on their decision to put their G-League team in the New York Nets' former arena and to call that team the Long Island Nets. Even still, to think that this fan base would rival the size of the mass of Knick fans out there would be highly unrealistic. 

The result of the Nets' flawed naming strategy is that they are a team with large-market costs and small-market potential. 

 

Anyway, while it might be tempting to see the comment "For a team in my city to not take the name of my city is alienating to me; and this has killed my fandom" as applying to both the Nets and the Angels, the two situation are in fact not analogous because the Nets' name is exclusionary while the Angels' name is inclusionary.  The Nets reject the name of their home city in favour of a smaller sub-local name that excludes the majority of their home city, while the Angels reject the name of their home city in favour of a larger metro-area name that includes their home city and much more. In other words: the name "New York" covers the entire city as well as the adjacent locations in North Jersey, Long Island, and the Hudson Valley; likewise, the name "Los Angeles" covers the entire city as well as the adjacent locations in Orange, Ventura, San Bernardino, and Riverside Counties.

[neo_prankster]

3 hours ago, B-Rich said:

Just for reference sake, let's look at Anaheim-based teams in everything but the dinkiest of leagues (and some cool old logos, of course).

• First up, September 1965 --  With one month left to go in the season, the Los Angeles Angels are renamed the California Angels, as they will be moving to Anaheim the following season. 
• 1967 --  ABA expansion team Anaheim Amigos last one season in that city, then are sold and moved to Los Angeles, becoming the Stars. 
• 1974 -- WFL expansion team placed in Anaheim; named the Southern California Sun; lasts two seasons:
• 
• 1978 -- NASL's St. Louis Stars move to Anaheim Stadium, follow the Angels' lead and become the California Surf; last three seasons:
• 1978 -- World Team Tennis franchise placed in Anaheim, named the Anaheim Oranges (in a later '80s incarnation at the same location, called the California Oranges)
• 
• 1980 -- The Rams follow through on a planned moved to suburban Anaheim, but remain the "Los Angeles Rams" (despite a blurb I read in Sports Illustrated article in the late '70s suggesting that they may be called the "California Rams")
• 1993 -- NHL expands to Anaheim, team name is  "Mighty Ducks of Anaheim", later changed to "Anaheim Ducks"
• 1994 -- Anaheim Piranhas in the Arena Football league; last till 1997.
• 1997 --  Angels changed name from California Angels to Anaheim Angels.
• 2005 -- Team owner changes baseball name to Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim
• 2014 -- Anaheim becomes home to LA KISS of the Arena football League; lasts to 2016.

 

So for teams playing in Anaheim:

• we have 4 instances of "Anaheim", 3 of "California", 2 of "Los Angeles" or "LA", 1 of "Los Angles of Anaheim" and 1 of "Southern California". 
• Tenure-wise in toto, we have 40 years of "Anaheim"; 39 years of "California", 18 years of "Los Angeles" or "LA", 14 of "Los Angeles of Anaheim" and 2 of "Southern California".

 

It's obviously the most messed-up location in terms of name-place in major league sports. 

 

But lest we forget the only other reason all of us are able to point out Anaheim on a map is because of Disneyland.

[Gothamite]

1 hour ago, pmoehrin said:

I don't get it. I could understand if using the LA name actually made a difference to the bottom line. But as far as I can tell, in every case where its been tried, it doesn't.

 

Arte Mareno said that it did.

 

He said that corporate partners and sponsors weren’t willing to pay as much to an “Anaheim” team as they are to a “Los Angeles” team.   We have no way of proving or disproving that, but neither do we have any reason not to take him at his word. 

[LMU]

1 hour ago, Gothamite said:

 

Arte Moreno said that it did.

 

He said that corporate partners and sponsors weren’t willing to pay as much to an “Anaheim” team as they are to a “Los Angeles” team.   We have no way of proving or disproving that, but neither do we have any reason not to take him at his word. 

It's all about the TV contract.

 

The issue again is that he's only sticking his toe in enough to get the media rights money without actually committing to either the region the stadium is in nor the region they're named after.  They're the only Big 4 franchise that won't sell a shirt with a city/state/region on it.  That's pretty pathetic.

[SFGiants58]

3 hours ago, pmoehrin said:

They had it right with California Angels. It perfectly reflected their identity as a suburban team trying to attract LA sports fans who don't live in LA. Every name change since has been a downgrade from the one preceding it.

 

I’d say something similar, except with Anaheim being the best name. It represented where they played, set them apart from the Dodgers’ pre-established LA hegemony (an important trait of an expansion team, Mets/Islanders excluded).

 

Winning the World Series in 2002 should have codified it as their proper name. I get that it might not have been monetarily advantageous to keep the Anaheim moniker, but I’ll defend the Anaheim name. If the Ducks can do it, then so can the Angels.

 

It’ll be a good day when Arte sells the team.

[Gothamite]

4 hours ago, LMU said:

It's all about the TV contract.

 

The issue again is that he's only sticking his toe in enough to get the media rights money without actually committing to either the region the stadium is in nor the region they're named after.  They're the only Big 4 franchise that won't sell a shirt with a city/state/region on it.  That's pretty pathetic.

 

For at least the last ten years, Oakland has been using just the name “Raiders” on most merchandise. 

[Cosmic]

21 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

In a classic running gag from Jack Benny's radio show, Mel Blanc portrays a train station announcer who makes the announcement "train leaving on track 5 for Anaheim, Azusa, and Cuc...amonga".

 



 

Those are the types places with which Anaheim can be classed; while Los Angeles ranks with other world-class cosmopolitan centres such as New York, London, and Paris.

A radio bit from the 40s has absolutely no bearing on whether or not Anaheim is a major city in 2019. You might as well live by Issac Newton's opinion of New York City... it will be just as relevant today.

[goalieboy82]

On 6/14/2019 at 12:42 AM, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

The mentions of the cultural distinctiveness of Orange County miss the point. The important factor here is simple geography. For a city the magnitude of a Los Angeles, a smaller city only 30 miles away is always going to be part of the larger city's metro area, notwithstanding any cultural differences, and regardless of whether that smaller city is located in another county or in another state. (In the cases of Detroit and Vancouver, smaller cities belonging to the larger city's metro area can even be located in another country.)

 

Yet it is true that the Angels essentially disavow Los Angeles in their branding. They are thus squandering the benefits of identifying with one of the world's greatest cities.

 

What makes the current situation feel so weird is the multiple changes of name. If the team had been called the Los Angeles Angels since its inception, or if it had retained its longstanding identity of California Angels, the t-shirts that read "Angels Baseball" would not be so awkward.

 

The only thing that is for sure about the team's varying names is that "Anaheim" should never have been among those names. The reason touches upon why baseball is indeed different from hockey: hockey is a niche sport in the United States, while baseball is a huge national institution.

 

In a classic running gag from Jack Benny's radio show, Mel Blanc portrays a train station announcer who makes the announcement "train leaving on track 5 for Anaheim, Azusa, and Cuc...amonga".

 

 

Those are the types places with which Anaheim can be classed; while Los Angeles ranks with other world-class cosmopolitan centres such as New York, London, and Paris.

 

To put it most starkly: Major League Baseball is too big for Anaheim. And so is the NFL. But the NHL is not. 

and this too:

 

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

On 6/15/2019 at 8:31 PM, goalieboy82 said:

and this too:

 

 

Yes, indeed! The Looney Tunes cartoons contain so many great bits taken from radio shows. And it wasn't only Jack Benny.  Mel Blanc brought the voice of his Happy Postman character from Burns and Allen's show to his characterisation of the Easter Bunny.

 

And there were several Fibber McGee and Molly gags that I first heard in the cartoons: Bugs once recognised Myrtle the phone operator, and said to her "That you, Myrt? How's every little thing?"; Blanc did his version of two characters played on the show by Bill Thompson (who was the voice of Droopy Dog): Wallace Wimple (with the abusive wife Sweety Face, called Sweetie Pie in the cartoon) and the Old Timer ("That ain't the way I heared it!"); and Daffy Duck once uttered Molly's famous "'Tain't funny, McGee". When I eventually heard these things on The Fibber McGee and Molly Show, I would slap my head and go "Oooooooh, so that's where that's from!"

 

The Looney Tunes / Merrie Melodies cartoons taught several generations so much about the entertainment world, including radio comedy, popular music (I cannot even count how many hit songs I heard first as sung by Bugs Bunny!), and movies. This cartoon series itself became a cultural touchstone, and one of the most significant artistic achievements of the 20th century.

[colortv]

The LA Rams played in Anaheim for 15 years.

 

Angel stadium is 30 miles from downtown LA.

 

The Cowboys play in Arlington, the 49ers in Santa Clara etc.

 

The LA metro extends far past the distance of Angel stadium, and the Dodgers or any LA sports team will tell you any day it's part of "their" market. There's probably at least as many Dodger fans in OC as there are Angel fans.

 

There are financial, logistical, and other substantive issues that come into play for where teams physically play in their metro areas, anything else is just nitpicking when you've got nothing better to do.

[FiddySicks]

On ‎6‎/‎14‎/‎2019 at 11:45 AM, pmoehrin said:

They had it right with California Angels. It perfectly reflected their identity as a suburban team trying to attract LA sports fans who don't live in LA. Every name change since has been a downgrade from the one preceding it.

 

I've been torn to shreds here for suggesting this (It was a long time ago, though), but I've always thought the California AL teams should be as follows:

 

Southern California Angels

Northern California Athletics

 

 

You somewhat solve several problems by going this route.