The crazy-ass plan for Maricopa County to sell the Arizona Diamondbacks‘ Chase Field — which the Diamondbacks owners want either upgraded or replaced or they’re threatening to move — to some out-of-state investment bankers turned out to be even more crazy-ass than anyone expected, as the potential buyers haven’t even shown up to any meetings to discuss a sale price. Apparently a used stadium with an angry tenant who has to approve your purchase and probably won’t isn’t a hot commodity among real-estate investors, who knew?
Instead, the county may hire an outside firm to appraise the stadium and its surrounding land, to see if its $60 million asking price was reasonable. Which, sure, go for it, Maricopa County. But it’s still hard to see how shifting ownership of the stadium resolves the underlying problem, which is that D-Backs owner Ken Kendrick is demanding at least $187 million in stadium upgrades, mostly for things his lease says he has to pay for, a battle that is likely to end up in court. Maybe the county should sell the stadium to a bunch of lawyers — at least they’d guarantee themselves lots of billable hours.
Isn’t this a(nother) case where the owner is contractually bound to play in the former BOB for a number of years yet?
So his negotiating leverage would be… what? I’ll break my lease and let you take me to court and win damages, then hope that my new host organism will pay those costs too?
The negotiating leverage is “If you don’t pay for all these upgrades that we’re insisting it says in the lease you have to pay for (even though it doesn’t really say that), we’ll charge you with abrogating the lease and then leave.”
Yeah, it’s a crappy gambit, but it’s pretty much all they have.
Crazy idea, but follow me on it.
Let’s say the A’s buy the Diamondbacks stadium, and then evict their tenants the Diamondbacks…
Could they in theory move in?
The D-Backs have a lease through 2027, I believe, so nobody’s evicting anybody.
If I want to look at warehouse baseball, I’m going to hang out in the Sam’s Club electrics aisle, buy me an ice cold Sam’s Cola and some popcorn and hang out until the kid with pimples who manages the areakicks me out..