December 21, 2005
Wait till next year
The D.C. mayor's office has officially announced that the Washington Nationals lease vote has been put off at least until January 3. But though that means blowing the end-of-year deadline agreed to with MLB, D.C. sports chief Mark Tuohey didn't seem concerned, or at least put up a good front, telling the Washington Times: "The fact that we are going to be a few weeks late on this is, in my judgment, not going to be an issue. ... We are going to be working with baseball over the next few weeks to prepare the document that will go before the council."
MLB officials have threatened to take D.C. to binding arbitration after the first of the year, but the Times also provides some reasons why that might not be such a great option:
Several persons with knowledge of the lease situation said an arbitrator could rule that the city must pay for all of MLB's costs associated with the stadium deal in the past year. However, an arbitrator also could rule that the baseball stadium agreement signed last year is invalid without the lease in place and free both the league and city from any obligations. It is seen as unlikely that the arbitrator would force the city to build the stadium.
In other deadline-extension news, Minnesota Vikings owner Zygi Wilf and Anoka County have agreed to extend their deal to build a $675 million football stadium, while waiting to see if the state will come up with a share of the funds. Yet another reason never to take stadium "deadlines" seriously - though if you needed yet another reason, you really haven't been paying attention.
