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

[GDAWG]

A bit of news on the Angels AL West foes over in Oakland:

 

 

 

 

[Red Comet]

Anaheim City Council is getting sued over the very secret sale of underpriced land to the Angels. Who would've thunk?

[Guest]

On 12/22/2019 at 6:02 PM, QCS said:

Anaheim Angels > California Angels > Los Angeles Angels > Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

 

The team doesn't play in Los Angeles. Anaheim is its own distinct city, even if it's within the LA metro. Oakland is part of the San Francisco metro, but it's still its own city. The Angels play in Anaheim, and should represent that fact. 

How do you feel about Santa Clara 49ers and East Rutherford Giants and Jets?

[JayMac]

36 minutes ago, sayahh said:

How do you feel about Santa Clara 49ers and East Rutherford Giants and Jets?

And a D.C. football team that plays in Landover, Maryland?

[LMU]

[ClevelandBaronsNHLfan]

On 12/23/2019 at 5:42 PM, infrared41 said:

 

Cleveland has had more hockey teams than I can remember. AHL, WHA, NHL, IHL, and back to AHL.  None of them have been particularly successful. It's not the Coliseum's fault that hockey has never worked here. That aside, I think the WHA's Crusaders, a team in a league that wasn't the NHL, averaged about 6,500 a game in their short tenure at the Coliseum because they were pretty good. At that time, in this area, 6,500 a game for hockey is like getting 35,000 a game for baseball. The Barons 2.0 New NHL Version wouldn't have worked if they had played downtown for free. Whatever the Indoor Soccer League team was supposed to be did well despite the games being played in Richfield. Indoor soccer fans set an attendance record there. I don't think you can use hockey's failure as some sort of proof that the Coliseum was a failure. But what do I know, I was only here for the entire existence of the Richfield Coliseum. Granted, living here and following those teams doesn't give me the same expertise as a Brewers fan who read some articles, but I do think I have some perspective on the matter. 

 

 

The original Cleveland Barons were very successful in the ahl winning nine Calder Cups. The current ahl team one the cup in 2016.

[infrared41]

8 minutes ago, ClevelandBaronsNHLfan said:

The original Cleveland Barons were very successful in the ahl winning nine Calder Cups. The current ahl team one the cup in 2016.

 

I was talking about attendance, but thanks. 

[monkeypower]

I was reading through the Angels history on Wikipedia, because I've got nothing better to do, and I noticed some things.

 

Quote

In 1962, under the terms of their agreement with O'Malley, the Angels moved to Dodger Stadium, which they referred to as Chavez Ravine.

 

In 1964, [...] The need for a new stadium became more evident. It was believed that the Angels would never develop a large fan base while playing as tenants of the Dodgers. Also, O'Malley imposed fairly onerous lease conditions on the Angels; for example, he charged them for 50% of all stadium supplies, even though the Angels at the time drew at best half of the Dodgers' attendance.

Stymied in his attempt to get a new stadium in Los Angeles, Autry looked elsewhere. His first choice for a stadium was the site offered by the city of Long Beach. However, the city insisted that the team be renamed the Long Beach Angels, a condition Autry refused to accept. He was able to strike a deal with the suburban city of Anaheim in Orange County, and construction began on Anaheim Stadium (nicknamed The Big A by Southern Californians), where the Angels moved in 1966. On September 2, 1965, team ownership announced the Los Angeles Angels would thenceforth be known as the California Angels, in anticipation of the team's move to Anaheim the following year.

 

So it was believed the Angels would never develop a fanbase trying to play underneath the Dodgers and then owner balked at a team name preferred by a city and it impacted stadium issues?

 

Time is a flat circle.

[The_Admiral]

Big-time passive voice there -- it was believed by whom? I think the real story is that the O'Malleys gouging them on revenues was never gonna work in the long run.

 

Long Beach would have been interesting. I looked into it further and the stadium would have been where an "El Dorado Park" currently is, which I guessed was a racecourse but is, in fact, an actual park. How pleasant. It's about twelve miles west of Anaheim Stadium, six miles inland from the convention center, and twenty miles south of Dodger Stadium. I think that really would have been an ideal location in terms of keeping one foot in Los Angeles while still reaching out to the growing suburbs to the east. Not that Anaheim was a disaster by any means, but Long Beach probably would have been better. Maybe they even could have bared their teeth on the whole name-change thing and remained an L.A. team forever.

 

EDIT: here's what the O'Malleys pulled, baseball owners really were just elevated carnies

 

What didn’t raise the Angels’ ire?

* They were billed for window washing in catacomb offices at Dodger Stadium that had no windows.

* They objected to being charged half of the cost of resurfacing and repainting the parking lot because they received none of the parking revenue.

* They complained when regularly billed for landscape maintenance, arguing that the Dodgers were going to landscape no matter how many tenants they had.

* And, in what they considered the ultimate swipe, they angrily complained when charged for half a season of toilet paper, insisting it should have been prorated on the basis of attendance.

[monkeypower]

Yeah it's passive voice, it is just a long Wikipedia writeup at the end of the day and I don't think many peers are reviewing the "History of the Los Angeles Angels" page. I was more aiming to the part there's (apparently) been a history with the Angels and their name. 

[monkeypower]

Angels development plan includes 150 acres of parks, shops, homes and restaurants. 

 

That open area in centre and left field are a proposed "grand entrance plaza" and I don't know if I like the look of it. Also, I guess prepare say goodbye to the parking, the big hats out front and the Disney rocks.

 

 

The article says the Ducks are supposed to unveil a similar type development plan for the Honda Center land tomorrow.

[The_Admiral]

I'm totally on board for losing the giant hats and the Disney rocks, but I am having a hard time reconciling how you're going to run a baseball team out of Anaheim with no parking lots. What are people gonna do, teleport in? I like New Urbanism as much as any dork here but even I know where I'm licked.

[sky1324]

Unless those buildings are parking garages, what is their plan here, to remove all the parking then hold their hands and say "well, we tried!" then head to whatever LA suburb will build them a stadium? I like it and it looks nice, but it seems like the game-day experience would be hell if you can't park within a reasonable distance.

[monkeypower]

2 hours ago, the admiral said:

I'm totally on board for losing the giant hats and the Disney rocks, but I am having a hard time reconciling how you're going to run a baseball team out of Anaheim with no parking lots. What are people gonna do, teleport in? I like New Urbanism as much as any dork here but even I know where I'm licked.

 

40 minutes ago, QCS said:

Unless those buildings are parking garages, what is their plan here, to remove all the parking then hold their hands and say "well, we tried!" then head to whatever LA suburb will build them a stadium? I like it and it looks nice, but it seems like the game-day experience would be hell if you can't park within a reasonable distance.

 

The article mentions two parking structures, but then also prefaces it with this.

 

Quote

For fans, the plan promises gathering places for eating, drinking, shopping and relaxing before and after games, in part a bid to ease traffic that largely would be directed to two new parking structures.

 

So there's plans for two parking structures, but all these other attractions will hopefully help reduce traffic by having people coming early and leaving later so there won't be congestion? I don't know about that.

 

The building directly above the Big A in the top picture is the transit station, so maybe they'll also work to have more transit to the games now?

 

Keep in mind, this whole plan is still subject to the sale of the land to Moreno's group, which hasn't happened yet, and this is the timeline in the article.

 

Quote

Construction is set to start by 2025 and run through 2050

 

[The_Admiral]

That's making the dog walk on its hind legs here. It's Orange County/suburban Los Angeles, it's not built for transit and never will be. There's encouraging stuff going on with the L.A. Metro (or at least there was until Americans decided, with help, that trains are to blame for the pandemic), but that's miles away. With, for instance, Wrigley Field, it's not easy to drive there, but it's not easy to drive anywhere around there. This is inventing a walkable area in an ocean of sprawl. This wouldn't change the whole well-entrenched car culture, it would just be really inconvenient.

[monkeypower]

I'm not saying transit is a good solution, I was just throwing it out there as possibly a potential side-option (in the loosest sense of the term) because it is right there, sort of.

[ltjets21]

How many times can they renovate the same stadium? You are still going to have cramped concourses if you are renovating a 60 year old stadium. I don't see the point of investing money in a development that consists of an old stadium and an old arena as the focal points.

[SFGiants58]

6 hours ago, ltjets21 said:

How many times can they renovate the same stadium? You are still going to have cramped concourses if you are renovating a 60 year old stadium. I don't see the point of investing money in a development that consists of an old stadium and an old arena as the focal points.

Hey, it’s better than demanding a new stadium all the time. Heck, I’m pretty sure this is how most clubs in Europe handle their stadium situations. They’ll work with the old building as long as you can, getting into a Theseus’ Ship situation after about fifty years of doing this.

[Gothamite]

There’s absolutely no reason that the stadium can’t continue to be renovated.  Dodger Stadium is still one of the jewels of baseball. 

[SFGiants58]

Just now, Gothamite said:

There’s absolutely no reason that the stadium can’t continue to be renovated.  Dodger Stadium is still one of the jewels of baseball. 

Heck, the Dolphins’ privately-funded renovation should be the gold standard for how to handle “new stadiums.” Do a totally transformative renovation instead of asking for a new place.

 

Granted, it should only be if the base structure was good. Something like Candlestink wasn’t going to get better with new gizmos. It can also go too far, like the Soldier Field spaceship.