People, people, I have been horribly neglecting keeping you up to date on the exciting new stadium proposal by the owners of the San Diego Chargers! See, last Thursday … no, wait, that’s from the Chargers’ own website. Okay, here we go … no, that’s from the former newspaper that fires anyone who isn’t a “cheerleader” for the Chargers stadium. Come on, there’s got to be some halfway professions journalist in San Diego covering this, right? What do we have here, the local Fox TV affiliate? Sure, that’ll do:
Interim Mayor Todd Gloria and San Diego Convention Center Corp. President and CEO Carol Wallace today reiterated their support for the current plan to expand the convention center, despite a new pitch by the Chargers to include a football stadium in the project…
“I want to work with the Chargers to keep them here, but I want to do it in a way that is as thoughtful a process that we went through with the convention center expansion, and one that can allow me to go to the people in the city to explain what we’re getting with that investment,” [Gloria] said.
So, basically what’s going on is that the Chargers management has decided that in all the chaos over the mayor of San Diego resigning over sexual harassment charges and nobody much wanting to take his place, this would be a perfect time to throw out a new stadium proposal, this one to build a new stadium and convention center complex at a different downtown site than the existing convention center. Which nobody knows how to pay for, and no one in elected office seems too excited about, but hey, the city’s plan to expand the current convention center comes up for a hearing next month, so best to throw a monkey wrench in that now, right?
Meanwhile, there’s a wide open field for journalists wanting to investigate whether this Chargers proposal is workable in the slightest. Normally I’d turn to the Voice of San Diego for this sort of thing, but they seem to have only just noticed that it’s football season, so maybe they’re preoccupied with other things. Seriously, anybody?
So, is it just me or are NFL teams becoming more and more desperate?
I mean, this plan seems to follow the standard “house appropriations” guideline: “Sure, you can have your $2Bn school lunch program… but you’ll have to vote for the $170Bn missile program I attached to it to get it”.
Maybe the Chargers feel that if no-one is in the Mayor’s seat (there’s a joke there but I won’t touch it today….), there’ll be nobody to say “no” and hey, presto… new stadium… maybe attached to the convention centre or seaworld or gosh, just about anything really…
Local media can no longer be relied on to report factually about stadium and arena deals. Too much of their content comes from having a good relationship with the owners of the local sports team. Already fighting for survival, they’re not going to give up a huge chunk of virtually free content that is in high demand from the public. Being locked out of the sport teams’ facilities and being denied access to their players and employees would be a huge blow. They could still report on the games but that’s become only a small sliver of the content media gets from covering sports. They have to keep the owners happy so it’s unlikely that they’ll do anything to endanger their special relationships.
San Diego is a good example of Disaster Capitalism where those with a desire to profit from a chaotic situation lay in wait for something to go wrong so they can jump into the confusion and have what would normally be opposed slip in through the cracks. Detroit’s arena plan is another example of this.
>So, is it just me or are NFL teams becoming more and more desperate?
Desperate but still getting their way. It’s hard to tell if the NFL thinks their product is in danger. Some of the stadium deals like the one Arthur Blank’s Atlanta Falcons are getting really don’t even need a team in the stadium to be financially successful. So much of the money comes from the public that if the NFL’s actual product declined (concussion issues taking away their free farm system, elimination of the NCAA economic model based on unpaid labor, etc), the owners would still be able to make a profit from the new stadiums.
Of course they would prefer to still be the nation’s most popular sport and rake in the money they do, but many of these stadium deals are structured in such a way that it isn’t a requirement. But they might have their heads in the sand when it comes to the potential for their popularity and labor pipeline to disappear. Those at the height of their power often do believe their own mythology of invincibility. It’s hard to know if the push for all these new stadiums is them recognizing the potential danger to their main product or simply each owner trying to one up the other in fleecing the public.
Jason you put it better than I could about local newpapers (what’s left of them anyway) bending over backwards to appease sport teams.
I was on the phone once a few years back with the San Jose Mercury editor, I told her that I cancelled my subscription (after 25 years) because the paper was completely biased in their reportage (one problem was a system of revolving stadium reporters who relied heavily on team and city council press releases to write their stories).
The editor sort of paused to listen but didn’t attempt to refute anything I said. She probably knew it was largely true, but what was anyone going to do in her spot?–The 49ers have done advertising in the Merc and citizens groups can not afford this.
The Chargers know that the public will vote against public funding for a stadium so they have to try and piggyback on another project so a new stadium isn’t just a new stadium.
@ John Bladen San Diego is “Enron by the Sea”
@ Jason The NFL is not at risk. Just look at how many ignorant kids are still joining the military. It’s far more respectable to risk your health and life pursuing a career in football hoping to get rich than it is to choose a career of killing children for corporate greed. The NFL will be fine.
The San Jose Mercury News and the Santa Clara Weekly each received several tens of thousands of dollars for advertising during the Yes on Measure J (49ers stadium) campaign. The SJ Merc also ran these online ‘ghostlike’ grayish-blue pro-stadium ads which would appear for a couple of seconds when you logged in, then disappear. The ads suggested that the stadium would be free to the public.The reporting, as SCJ mentioned above, was completely biased in favor of the City Council stadium boosters and 49ers. The reporting is still biased, and often based on 49ers press releases. The Merc won’t report accurately about the 49ers lawsuit to obtain property tax dollars from our former redevelopment agency. Every article is slanted in the 49ers favor.
During Measure J in spring 2010 is when our household canceled its 2 decades + daily subscription to the SJ Merc News. Since then, the Merc has shrunk in content, sections, thickness and actual width and height of the paper. I will look at the Merc’s content online for free, but won’t ever give the Merc another dime. I, too, called them and told them at the time why we were canceling, and they did not care. Every time the Merc calls to try to convince us to become paid subscription holders again, I tell them the same thing. They took a survey a while back about what they need to change – and the biggest complaint people had was ‘biased news coverage.’ Have they changed anything in response? No.
I love the smell of public stadium cash in the morning. Mmmmmm.
I work for the Mercury News. I’ve been there 26+years and am retiring in three months. I’m personally and professionally embarrassed by what my paper has turned into. Not one employee I deal with has any pride in our product. Trust me on this, I’m leaving in the nick of time. The paper will never ever be what it was, both in content and editorial freedom. I was stopped by the CHP in Alpine County earlier and when the officer asked who I drove for, I was embarrassed to tell him. And he grew up in San Jose.
Don’t worry, after what happened tonight, I don’t think the Chargers are ever going to get any public support on a new stadium.
The Chargers should just renovate Qualcoom and the city could help with maybe 20% of the funding cost.. i think having a convention center would help both the Chargers and the city make money
Like the ignorance spewed out on Facebook and other sites that are anti-stadium and anti-progressive, I guess this site is the incubator of that type of rhetoric. All of us in favor of a new stadiums laugh at this nonsense because we know that money is already being wasted RIGHT NOW on the current stadiums. Sure, right now Atlanta honestly doesn’t need one by who should try to stop that city from making their community more wealthy and so what it hard working enterprising billionaires capitalize-that is the American way. Yes, Qualcomm in SD could collapse any day and kill spectators, it is that OLD. NOW THAT WOULD LOSE MONEY FOR A CITY IF YOU ASK ME. BOY LAWSUITS WOULD BE A BEAR WOULDN’T THEY! Most anything that is used by the public- ANYWHERE IN AMERICA has to have some sort of public subsidy. It is idiotic to think otherwise. Taxes would be assessed toward tourist like me in the form of hotels and car rentals. SO WHAT! Super bowls, college games and so many other events would bring in revenue for the city over time regardless of what your research states, although-I agree they would not do much for employment in the short term as those jobs are blue collar and temporary-STILL BETTER THAN NOTHING. But, then again we would have to get past all the geeks who hated sports back in school because it made them feel ineffectual and emasculated. I guess wounds still linger into adulthood. Anti-stadium and Anti-Progress sentiment=REVENGE OF THE NERDS? Quite possibly, but what we do know is that it is ignorance. In the end I think progress will persevere. As usual Nerds-0 and Progressives-1. Looks like we will win again- pro sports are just too powerful and too many people care!
John, I like your style. NFL plutocrats across the land salute you!