The Los Angeles Rams will play at the Los Angeles Coliseum for the next three seasons while their new stadium in Inglewood is being built, and they got off to a terrible start in Sunday’s home opener. This had very little to do with the Coliseum being 84 years old, and everything to do with it being so hot that 160 fans were treated for the heat including 14 who had to go to the hospital (it doesn’t help that the Coliseum lacks even a partial roof), and to the Rams management not doing proper crowd control and not thinking to order any jumbo cases of bottled water. From Deadspin, which has been diligently compiling all the horror stories:
Here are your best stories from the game. From Ian, a success story:
I went to the game with a couple buddies yesterday and the concession stand debacle was as big of an abortion as advertised. Left with 4:20 left in the 2nd quarter to grab waters for our group and ended up having to wait in 3 different lines since the first two I was in ran out. Continued to wait through the entirety of halftime and returned to my seat with about 7 minutes left in the 3rd… BUT I GOT THAT DAMN WATER!
Matt tells us that concessions were woefully understocked in St. Louis too:
My wife volunteered regularly for charity concession booths at all of the pro sporting events in St. Louis, including the Rams games. She always said that the Rams ran out of everything before half time. The Cardinals and Blues never had all of the problems she saw at the Rams games.
The whole organization is obviously run by amateurs. The product on the field, marketing blunders, concessions, drafting players. They fail in literally every way they can. Not any different than the other teams that asshole owns.
Another tipster describes the traffic, both human and motor:
Traffic, gridlock. Entry, chaotic and overcrowded. Concessions, sorry we’re out by halftime!? Protection from elements, nada! Rams fans, smack talking and booing their own team with chants to kill the Seahawks kicker! People smoking. Security, what security? Leaving the stadium, dangerously crowded in all walkways. Gridlock at the trains/busses. Complete hell! The NFL should not allow that stadium to host ANY games until they can provide safety and security for the fans!
At least fans only had to pay between $50 and $1,000 for parking. Welcome back to the NFL, Los Angeles!
I am very pleased to see that transit is in the conversation when it comes to getting to the Coliseum. In the linked story, UCLA urban planning professor Donald Shoup offers a voice of sanity, noting that the high cost of parking is good in that it motivates people to use the many transit options that are available. For example, the Expo Line goes right by the stadium.
Shoup says, quite refreshingly: “You can avoid paying $100 [for parking] if you’re willing to take transit to the game…. I don’t think we should feel really sorry for people who drive to a game and want to park…. They have the alternative of bicycling or taking transit or walking.”
How do arrangements for food service work at the Coliseum? Who is responsible for the costs and who gets the revenues for Rams’ games? Heard rumblings that at Rams game in St. Louis, concessions would notoriously run out of things around half time.
Is there a thing where if Stan is getting all the revenue he’s certainly not going to participate in the costs of providing even a nominal level of food/drink/water for survival?
“… if Stan IS NOT getting all the revenue…”
If that’s not obvious.
The StL media disputes that the StL Rams ran out of concessions.
http://sports.live.stltoday.com/Event/NFL_chat_with_Jim_Thomas_28
The concessionaire is Legends, same as USC and all Coliseum events. They handle the concessions and the Rams get some portion of the revenues. Legends’ other venues include the Rose Bowl (UCLA), Angels Stadium, Yankee Stadium, and AT&T Stadium (Dallas Cowboys).
The concessionaire for the Edward Jones Dome was Delaware North, going back to 1999, 11 years before Stan Kroenke bought the team.
Do USC games have these problems, or is it just a Rams thing?
SC never has this problem. Then again, Stan doesn’t care and never have. This is strictly a real estate play, as the value of his franchise doubles from one locale to the next.
Thinking along the same lines, Mark.
Were the problems worse because of the extra people (can’t recall exactly, but it seems to me that USC used the stadium with the old “raiders” configuration of about 72,000 seats available)?
Or was it mostly disorganization on the Rams officials/management front?
Or a combination of both?
No-one should be surprised that a stadium this old and outdated had problems when filled almost to capacity. Whether these can and will be addressed in some way is the bigger question. It’s not just a Rams issue either, the NFL needs to step in to guarantee fans a reasonably safe environment. I don’t expect an 80yr old stadium to have modern amenities, but current fire codes (did the LA FD issue a permit for 90,000 fans at this facility in 2016?) and the like do need to be met. If that means only 60-70,000 can attend, then so be it.
These were not crowd size or concession problems so much as heat/alcohol/newbie-fan problems (I would hope people will figure out that you can bring in water bottles and snacks, and there are these things called “drinking fountains” located throughout the stadium). There’s no fire code issue; USC uses a 93,000-seat configuration for some games. All 2016 Rams games are sold out at 80K to 90K+ seats, depending on the game, so there’s basically no chance they will reduce capacity, which would mean invalidating thousands of already-sold tickets. However, they might decide not to have any more 90K games than the ones currently planned (Panthers & 49ers).
Lucky the new stadium will have a roof to protect everyone from the brutal weather of southern california.
Yeah I hear the weather is just terrible there and everyone is flocking to Minnesota.
Once at the Jones Dome I ordered a beer right at the end of the third quarter. The lady took my money, opened a beer, and handed it to me. Some other lady came and snatched the beer out of my hand and made the lady give me the money back since beer sales had “closed”. I mentioned this to a Rams employee but he didn’t care (and this was before the 2015 lame duck year).
It may have been a concessionaire but in these situations everything falls back on the team, good or bad.