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April 27, 2011
49ers' hiring of Yu a sign of stadium desperation?
The San Francisco 49ers have hired venture capitalists and ex-Facebook exec Gideon Yu to be their "chief strategy officer," a move that has already triggered all kinds of speculation about why on earth a guy of Yu's stature would take such a job, and what this means for the 49ers' Santa Clara stadium deal. As the San Jose Mercury News' Tim Kawakami writes:
Guys like Yu usually buy teams (or at least purchase percentages of them), they don't seek employment from them.
So... I asked [49ers owner Jed] York specifically if Yu is coming in as a minority investor, and York said he was not.
But it's sort of like saying a crumbling institution is hiring Bill Gates strictly as an IT guy—umm, at some point, that doesn't quite fly all the way.
Kawakami speculates that the 49ers "need some new brainpower on the financing front," and that Yu could even be a potential buyer for the team should the Yorks decide to sell. Certainly with the Santa Clara stadium currently stalled by the one-two punch of the lockout and the economy, new ideas would be welcome. But unless he has some hidden talents, it's hard to see how Yu is going to generate a billion dollars out of thin air unless things change significantly on the football revenue front.
Add to this the 49ers' hiring of CAA Sports to get the naming rights sold, and it looks like pure hype.
As for Gideon Yu gaining admission to the NFL Millionaires' Club, I seriously doubt that. If Ed Roski can't do it - what's the likelihood that a techexec will get in? You'll get an NFL franchise if the other 31 owners don't blackball you.
Naming rights? Check out Oakland - a stadium called "Overstock"! It's a laugh riot - Overstock.com is paying a stinking $1.2 mil a year - less than Monster Cable paid to rename Candlestick!
With all of this, we actually have people in Santa Clara with the inane fantasy that we're getting a Farmers Insurance deal in Santa Clara - and that is complete nonsense.
But the worst part of all of this is that the San Francisco 49ers are in violation of the Term Sheet - which explicitly gave control over the naming rights marketing to the Santa Clara Stadium Authority.
If you think for one minute that the 49ers are going to fairly represent the interests of our city in that naming rights gamble, think again.
Regards,
Bill Bailey, Treasurer,
SantaClaraPlaysFair.org
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You have to understand that Oakland & San Francisco's stadiums are dumps. They don't want to put their name on the building because it's only used for the NFL, nothing else. The Santa Clara Stadium would be used for football, soccer matches, concerts, etc. I'm sure the 49ers brass know that they won't get a Farmers Field naming-rights deal but they'll get something decent (especially if the Raiders are co-tenants), which will go into parts of the funding for the stadium to be built.
Posted by NFL in the Bay Area on April 28, 2011 10:58 AM
NFL in the Bay Area,
Please name the alternative events that the SC stadium would be used for. I still haven't seen anything that isn't a joke.
Posted by SANTA CLARA JAY on April 28, 2011 12:11 PM
The "49ers brass" are chasing rainbows! If getting a local company to sponsor the stadium, then why hire an outside firm? If the stadium is such a highly attractive, then why the outside firm? From this action,it is obvious to anyone who hasn't been blinded by the red-n-gold bunting that a stadium in Santa Clara is a white elephant that NO ONE wants to flush any money into. Except the City Council members who have been bought and paid for. Shame on all of them ... they WILL get what they have coming to them for ripping off Santa Clara and cheating the voters with all their lies! I can't wait to see them all fail. Oh - Happy Days!
Posted by ReadyRanger on April 28, 2011 01:39 PM
If the projections of every single stadium booster out there who includes soccer as bullet point #2 for an NFL stadium were met, the entire UEFA Champions League would be played stateside by now.
NFL in Bay Area:
Non-MLS soccer games, if the SC stadium gets any, would be about 1 every couple years as an optimistic scenario. There's no guarantee promoters of high profile exhibitions would use that stadium unless the rental fee is right for them. Luxury boxes versus dump does not factor into venue selection for soccer promoters.
Stanford Stadium has a long history of hosting soccer events, and more recently Oakland Coliseum has been capturing more events too, including a Mexico national team game last month. A new stadium in the Bay Area would have to wrestle with these two venues, and possibly the new SJ Earthquakes stadium (if that ever happens) to get a small piece of what high-profile soccer comes to the region.
Posted by sasha on April 28, 2011 01:56 PM
This week's Santa Clara Weekly has a great article by Stanford Economist Roger Noll. He puts at 20% the odds of the 49ers stadium being built. He states that there are "too many problems". What a waste of money that could have gone to the city!
Posted by Rosey on April 28, 2011 06:57 PM
S.C. Jay sure said it.
The claims that we're going to be able to use a subsidized stadium in Santa Clara for every other sport under the sun are flat-out ridiculous.
The promoters of those sports will never be able to afford it, for one thing.
For another, sports that book 25K to 30K spectators are going to have a lousy soccer/lacrosse/tennis match day experience when they're languishing in a stadium with 65K to 70K seats. Soccer matches at the Coliseum routinely fill only half the seats.
Concerts? Yeah. The Stones or Promise Keepers blow through maybe once every five to ten years. Not nearly enough to pay off what an NFL stadium is going to cost us.
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I'll simply refer "NFLnBA" to the city of Santa Clara's OWN Agenda Reports - which acknowledged that a subsidized stadium in our city will be bookable for ten NFL games + seventeen other events per year. That's a stinking 27 events per year.
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See why the Santa Clara stadium - and it's $444,000,000 subsidy by us - is a total loser?
Those 27 events, by the way, wouldn't even come close to meeting the conditions set by Farmers Insurance for L.A.'s so-called "naming rights deal."
Which is exactly why the claims of a $700M naming rights contract for Santa Clara is so laugh-out-loud funny.
Bests,
Bill Bailey, Treasurer,
SantaClaraPlaysFair.org
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Posted by Bill Bailey on April 28, 2011 11:45 PM
Hello! A Super Bowl every 4-5 years will create huge tax revenue from the nearby hotels and bring a huge amounts of revenue and tourism to the area.
The 49ers are 1/4 of the way there with 140M in luxury suite sales plus the 114M RDA contribution from the city.
Consider naming rights, advertising, PSLs, NFL, and team itself have yet to contribute and we are still 4 years away.....If the Raiders agree to join then its over 100%.
The Bay Area is one of the most lucrative markets in the U.S. and has more disposable income than any other market.
You will see this get built and be shocked when it actually makes money for SC...