The Los Angeles Daily News’s Vincent Bonsignore has a good article up today detailing the careful balancing act the NFL needs to play in deciding which, if any, teams end up moving to Los Angeles:
Short of San Diego or Oakland stepping forward with satisfactory stadium plans for the Chargers and Raiders, which seems to be a long shot at this point, or [Rams owner Stan] Kroenke surprising everyone by accepting the stadium proposal Missouri leaders are hammering away at, the NFL is headed toward a potentially ugly fight in which owners will be asked to take sides with or against one other.
Worse, if it ultimately comes down to a vote, the team or teams losing out will report back to their local markets with tails decidedly between their legs and left vulnerable while trying to revive new stadium talks.
And that, in a nutshell, is why you’re hearing a lot of rumor and innuendo right now, and no real action, especially on the part of the NFL: Any step forward by one team’s plans would mean a step backward for someone else’s — and the last thing the NFL or its owners wants is for anyone to lose leverage in negotiating a stadium deal. So the endgame here is going to have to be carefully calibrated to ensure that everyone gets a deal they can live with before anything gets finalized. (Bonsignore’s solution — let the St. Louis Rams and San Diego Chargers move to a shared stadium in Inglewood, and take $400 million from their relocation fees and stadium revenues and give it to the Raiders for a new stadium in Oakland — almost certainly won’t work, since it’s unlikely there’s an extra $400 million in profit just sitting around in any Inglewood finance plan, but hey, an article can’t have everything.)
Instead, let’s watch Hollywood Park racetrack get blowed up to make way for either Kroenke’s Inglewood stadium if it ends up getting built, or for something else if it doesn’t. Momentum!
The idea of having 2 new stadiums in the Bay Area (when Levi’s was designed to host 2 home teams) but only having 1 new stadium in New York, and possibly a single new stadium in LA, is absurd.
It all makes sense when you realize that neither of the 3 teams would land in LA and that is a hilariously bad NFL terrorism campaign against existing host cities.
@12:28pm annoymous. You make too much sense. They build a third locker room. How much does that cost?
The Chargers are staying put, San Diego City and County dropped their trousers and the deal works out.
Unlike Oakland, SD is flush with cash in their general fund and so is SD county. SD city is already subsidizing Qualcomm at 7M per year, so they are just moving it to the new stadium. The cash flush county is putting up 7M a year as well.
The #s make major sense, and since the Chargers get to keep all naming rights money and half of PSL costs their contribution is closer to 225M-250M than 300M.
Granted they don’t get the downtown location they wanted but this is the NFL where you play once a week. Mission Valley has most of the infrastructure in place because of the current stadium.
All the NFL is questioning is a land sale as a funding mechanism which is not going to stop this.
The Chargers in LA need a 2nd team, in the Carson situation they need to pony up 850M and the other team the same.
850M? How are they going to do that when they do not play in LA currently? They and the 2nd NFL team will cannibalize each other for ticket/premium seating sales.
The NFL needs one team to come to LA first so they can maximize the fan base. Stan Kroenke can do it by himself and has a development ready to go next to it currently under construction…..He brilliantly partnered with the developer.
Why would Kroenke allow a 2nd team when he does not have to? Why compete for the same fans and corporations if you don’t have to?
The Jets/Giants were easy because both played in NY/NJ for years. Even in the Bay Area had the Raiders/49ers come together it would have been easy as well since they have existing fan bases in the market.
But in LA, without a team existing there it makes no sense to move 2 teams there to start.
NFL allows the Rams to move to LA, Chargers stay put in San Diego……as for the Raiders?
Stuck in Oakland……They stupidly thought the 49ers would fail in Santa Clara and come crawling back to them to build in Oakland.
Dumbass Mark Davis….