Stadium/Arena Saga Omnibus

[who do you think]

So ignoring the Sunday issue... I know they don't own the Jazz anymore, but is Larry Miller corp or whatever still capable of being principal owners of a big league team, as far as we know? Or at this point are they just another group of yokels and pitchmen making websites and drawing on napkins while they wait for someone with actual money to come along, like Nashville?

 

If it's the former I would think this puts their bid way out in front of all the other roll call cities. I think we've established that no one important wants to own/build anything MLB-related in Portland or Montreal, and Vegas entered the "two more weeks" meme zone a while ago.

[Jimmy!]

1 hour ago, BBTV said:

 

I have Phillies season tickets.  Even when they blow.  If they didn't exist and we had only a minor-league team, I would probably go to a game or two just for fun, but they wouldn't be the "event" that a major-league game is.  I cannot hold it against people that they don't want to spend their time at minor-league games. 

 

That's not to say that there aren't reasons that would carry over to a ML team - but sometimes it's just that people want major-league sports and not minor league.  I no neither Portland nor it's situation with the Beavers (assuming that's it's MiLB team still) - but I have a hard time equating minor-league support to major-league support.

The third iteration of the Beavers left in 2010. 

[Walk-Off]

On 4/14/2023 at 7:59 PM, the admiral said:

The Mormon Church is a moneymaking enterprise; they'll raise no stink about it if they run the numbers on a SLC baseball team and can find a way that they'd come out ahead. They're against gambling but built Las Vegas. They're against homosexuality but profited from radio stations that played Elton John and Joan Jett. The church owns a mall. They don't have actual principles that the rest of baseball would have to acquiesce to.

 

While I am not personally aware of anything that the Latter-day Saints Church has done to help "build" Las Vegas as we know that place today, I did live for a while in a region where, at the time, the LDS Church-owned Bonneville International Corporation owned and operated two commercial FM radio stations -- one specializing in classic secular rock music and the other devoted to alternative secular rock.  Thus, my impression is that the LDS Church has been most willing to own and/or run businesses that at least seem to contradict well-known church doctrines if and when the church can keep an extremely low profile about such enterprises.

 

Yes, the LDS Church's highest-ranking leaders have apparently spent decades tolerating Sunday home games played by the current Salt Lake Bees club, previous professional baseball teams in Salt Lake City, and pro baseball teams elsewhere in Utah (e.g. the Pioneer League's Ogden Raptors) and in heavily Mormon communities outside Utah (e.g. the Pioneer League's Idaho Falls Chukars).  Even so, I would not put it past the LDS organization's grand poobahs to be brazen enough to exploit Major League Baseball's far higher profile and level of wealth by trying to hold an MLB franchise in the church's mother city to an unreasonably much higher standard regarding compliance with LDS doctrines on matters such as the home game schedule.  Should that happen, I hope rather strongly that the team's ownership and/or the MLB commissioner's office will use the LDS Church's history of "sinful" business ventures to push back hard against any such demand.

[The_Admiral]

1 hour ago, Walk-Off said:

While I am not personally aware of anything that the Latter-day Saints Church has done to help "build" Las Vegas as we know that place today

 

They settled the place, have a long history of quietly investing in casinos, and ran everything on the ground for Howard Hughes.

 

We used to have Bonneville stations in Chicago and they were probably the best-run shops in town. 

 

[gosioux76]

20 hours ago, Jimmy! said:

The third iteration of the Beavers left in 2010. 

 

They did not leave. They were sold. That's a big difference in this circumstance.

 

The Beavers' exit from Portland wasn't because the city didn't want our couldn't support baseball. They left because the owner, Merritt Paulson, also owned the Portland Timbers soccer club and was investing a significant amount of capital to move that franchise into Major League Soccer. One of the league's requirements in that pursuit was that the Timbers play in a soccer-specific stadium.

 

That meant that PGE Park (now Providence Park), which was the home of both the Beavers and the USL-era Timbers, would have to be renovated into a soccer-specific venue, which rendered it unusable for baseball.

 

Paulson made several attempts to relocate the Beavers within the metro area, but was unable to find a suitable location nor a local government that was willing to help him finance a new stadium. He eventually sold it to an ownership group that eventually put the club in El Paso, Texas.

 

Much like @Gothamite was suggesting, there is no reason to suggest that Portland would fail as a baseball market based on this example. 

[Jimmy!]

Doesn’t matter how they left. They still left.

[dont care]

11 hours ago, Jimmy! said:

Doesn’t matter how they left. It was the third time they still left.

FTFY

[kolob]

On 4/15/2023 at 6:20 AM, Walk-Off said:

 

While I am not personally aware of anything that the Latter-day Saints Church has done to help "build" Las Vegas as we know that place today, I did live for a while in a region where, at the time, the LDS Church-owned Bonneville International Corporation owned and operated two commercial FM radio stations -- one specializing in classic secular rock music and the other devoted to alternative secular rock.  Thus, my impression is that the LDS Church has been most willing to own and/or run businesses that at least seem to contradict well-known church doctrines if and when the church can keep an extremely low profile about such enterprises.

 

Yes, the LDS Church's highest-ranking leaders have apparently spent decades tolerating Sunday home games played by the current Salt Lake Bees club, previous professional baseball teams in Salt Lake City, and pro baseball teams elsewhere in Utah (e.g. the Pioneer League's Ogden Raptors) and in heavily Mormon communities outside Utah (e.g. the Pioneer League's Idaho Falls Chukars).  Even so, I would not put it past the LDS organization's grand poobahs to be brazen enough to exploit Major League Baseball's far higher profile and level of wealth by trying to hold an MLB franchise in the church's mother city to an unreasonably much higher standard regarding compliance with LDS doctrines on matters such as the home game schedule.  Should that happen, I hope rather strongly that the team's ownership and/or the MLB commissioner's office will use the LDS Church's history of "sinful" business ventures to push back hard against any such demand.

 

As a member of the prominent religion here in Utah the "concern" of Sunday home games isn't so much a matter of LDS leadership demands, in fact I'd say there hasn't been much of a demand from leadership since (if ever) the early 20th century. However, over the past 20-25 years it's more so a matter of population demand. While a good segment of LDS fans probably wouldn't attend a Sunday home game, SLC and the surrounding areas have enough of a population where it's a moot point.

 

 

[LMU]

 

[Cujo]

Finally. It's almost over. 

 

[who do you think]

Quote

 

The Oakland A’s are closing in on an agreement to construct a $1 billion baseball stadium north of Allegiant Stadium with the support of Gov. Joe Lombardo and top lawmakers in a deal that will not involve new taxes, multiple sources confirmed to The Nevada Independent on Wednesday.

 

According to sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity, the A’s will cover the costs for the 30,000-to-35,000-seat retractable-roof stadium to house the Major League Baseball franchise on a nearly 100-acre site near Tropicana Boulevard and Interstate 15.

 

 

turn down for HUWHAT

 

Isn't this the same franchise that has to go out and panhandle just to afford the likes of Mitch Moreland?

[Cujo]

 

[ZapRowsdower8]

Most of the time I hate to see a team move, but I think this one will hurt more than most, purely from a uni point of view. I don’t see the current A’s look fitting with what Vegas teams want to bring to the table. We may be losing one of the best uniforms in all of sports. 

[WestCoastBias]

Sad.

[aawagner011]

Las Vegas becoming quite the sports town. Within just a couple years, they’ll have gone from zero top level professional teams to hosting NHL, NFL, and now MLB.

[GDAWG]

1 minute ago, aawagner011 said:

Las Vegas becoming quite the sports town. Within just a couple years, they’ll have gone from zero top level professional teams to hosting NHL, NFL, and now MLB.

 

NBA and MLS are next.

[SCMODS]

It won't  really matter because 30 years from now Vegas will be swallowed up by the desert sands. 

[McCall]

5 hours ago, ZapRowsdower8 said:

Most of the time I hate to see a team move, but I think this one will hurt more than most, purely from a uni point of view. I don’t see the current A’s look fitting with what Vegas teams want to bring to the table. We may be losing one of the best uniforms in all of sports. 

Nah. They aren't gonna be changing their uniforms drastically. Probably not all, save for some Las Vegas sleeve patch. Maybe replace "A's" with an "LV" on the elephant logo, but not color change or hat logo change.

[McCall]

6 hours ago, Cujo said:

Finally. It's almost over. 

 

Future home of XFL/USFL Oakland.

[Walk-Off]

Shortly after the news broke in Las Vegas, both Casey Pratt and Brodie Brazil uploaded YouTube videos in which they gave their respective initial reactions.

 

I will let everyone reading this post watch either or both of those videos and make up their own minds as to what to think about Pratt's and/or Brazil's takes.  However, I do find it amusing that Brazil's video has already attracted at least one commenter advocating for MLB to put an expansion team in Oakland if and when the A's leave and even at least one other commenter expressing a hope that the Tampa Bay Rays would move to Oakland if and when the A's depart from that city.

 

Should the A's consummate a move to the Las Vegas area or any other place well away from the overall Oakland-San Francisco-San José media market, I, for one, do not see MLB letting any existing team relocate to join the Giants in the Bay Area, nor can I imagine Oakland per se regaining a presence in MLB even via an expansion franchise.  Instead, as far as I can tell, the absolute best hope for a post-A's Bay Area to have two MLB teams again would be through an expansion that adds a club to San José or another South Bay locale.  Yes, the Giants have succeeded mightily at quashing any and all efforts by the A's to get a ballpark in any Bay Area community south of Alameda County.  However, I happen to be cynical enough to think that the Giants would tolerate a South Bay MLB expansion team -- a franchise that would be probably required to pay both a hefty expansion fee to MLB as a whole and a special indemnity to the Giants organization and which would need to start from scratch with its brand, roster, history, etc. -- much more than they have ever been willing to accept a relocation of a history-rich club like the A's to that same region.