new relocation thread! starting with JT: Kroenke faces rough road out of town

[zn]

Kroenke faces rough road out of town

By Jim Thomas

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/football/professional/kroenke-faces-rough-road-out-of-town/article_460da03e-0329-58b5-977b-bc5167ce952c.html

Whether the Rams abide by league guidelines, or simply go rogue and move on their own, relocation isn’t a slam-dunk process.

Amy Trask, who worked in the Oakland Raiders’ front office for nearly three decades, knows better than most. For years she was the organization’s highest-ranking executive, second only to late owner Al Davis.

She was with the Raiders in the mid-’90s when the club defied the league by moving from Los Angeles back to Oakland without NFL approval. She also knows the Inglewood, Calif., site where Rams owner Stan Kroenke plans to build a stadium.

“That’s the site Al and the Raiders, that we looked at in 1995,” she said. “I’m very, very familiar with that.”

The Raiders ended up moving back to Oakland in 1995 as part of a wave of relocations in the ’80s and ’90s that also saw the Baltimore Colts move to Indianapolis, the St. Louis Cardinals move to Phoenix, the Los Angeles Rams move to St. Louis, the Houston Oilers move to Tennessee and the Cleveland Browns move to Baltimore.

But as Trask said, with a chuckle, “It’s not like the olden days in that regard. The league really battened down the hatches to prevent teams from acting as rogue agents.”

Since that “relocation era,” the league has tweaked and added to its relocation policies. The league has also implemented financial penalties for teams that move without league approval.

Kroenke’s bold move has him partnering with the Stockbridge Capital Group on a 300-acre development in Inglewood that includes retail, office and residential development.

Some league observers and team executives were surprised by the move, league sources told the Post-Dispatch. In essence, Kroenke is seen as jumping ahead of Oakland and San Diego, teams that have had long-standing stadium issues and like the Rams can easily get out of their leases to relocate.

“Relocation is an arduous process,” warns Trask, who after resigning from the Raiders in 2013 now lives in Los Angeles and works for the CBS Sports Network. “There are relocation guidelines which have been articulated and set forth by the league. Certainly the league can change those guidelines at any time …

“But as currently drafted, those guidelines include a requirement that the team has really exhausted all possibilities in its current market.”

It would be difficult to say that the Rams currently meet those guidelines, because Kroenke has yet to even meet directly with former Anheuser-Busch executive Dave Peacock and local attorney Bob Blitz. Peacock and Blitz form the task force appointed by Gov. Jay Nixon to put together a new stadium plan for St. Louis.

If Kroenke goes through with the normal league relocation protocol, it’s a three-step process. Step one is presenting a detailed relocation proposal to be examined by league staff.

“And I can’t emphasize enough the word ‘detailed,’” Trask said. “It’s got to include financial data. Forward-looking projections. And forward-looking by decades, not by a year or two. The league office staff will then scrub and scrub and scrub that relocation proposal.

“There’s some really terrific men in the league office who are going to look at that, and then only when the league office is satisfied that it has all of the answers will that proposal be presented to the league committees. The stadium committee, the finance committee.”

Committee approval is the next step.

“The finance committee is the most powerful committee in the league,” Trask said. “Those committees then have to take a look at it, and agree that they wish to present it to the membership as a whole.”

The final step is getting league approval by three-fourths of the league owners — or 24 of 32 “yes” votes.

(According to Jason Cole of BleacherReport.com, San Diego Chargers chairman and president Dean Spanos believes he has at least the nine “no” votes necessary to block any move by the Rams to Los Angeles.)

Getting the committee votes is the key in the process. Houston Texans owner Bob McNair, once unsuccessfully courted as a potential owner in the failed St. Louis expansion effort in the early ’90s, is chairman of the finance committee.

That eight-member committee also includes Jacksonville owner Shahid Khan, the central Illinois businessman who was trumped by Kroenke in his effort to buy controlling interest in the Rams in 2010.

The stadium committee is chaired by Steelers president Art Rooney II, and includes Arizona Cardinals president Michael Bidwill, son of Cardinals owner Bill Bidwill.

“In my almost three decades in the league, I cannot recall any time a league committee endorsed something — voted for it unanimously — that it didn’t also garner the vote of the full membership,” said Trask, who appears on two CBS Sports Network shows — “That Other Pregame Show” and “We Need to Talk.”

So the key, not only for Kroenke in terms of relocation, but also for Peacock and Blitz, is to get to know and lobby the committee members as well as league staff.

“I have observed over the years that the municipalities which meet directly with the league office and engage in a dialogue and a process with league staff and league committees have often met with success,” Trask said. “In other words, if they work directly with the league office, that may be something that’s beneficial.”

That’s a tactic Peacock and Blitz are using, in part because they’ve been unable to bring Kroenke to the negotiating table.

The NFL recently decreed that there will be no relocation to Los Angeles by any team in 2015. And it appears the Rams will comply with that request. Team officials have told the Post-Dispatch that they will not file for relocation this year.

But if Kroenke changes his mind and moves without league approval, there are penalties involved that weren’t there in the ’80s and ’90s.

“The league has put in place a number of safeguards, if you will, which make it very, very, very hard for a team to … act as a rogue agent,” Trask said.

“These safeguards are really draconian. They involve financial penalties and other penalties that really should deter teams from doing things like that without (league approval).”

Among them are forfeitures of part of a team’s annual share of leaguewide television revenue. Another is forfeiture of a team’s share of leaguewide income from NFL Properties — the league’s merchandising arm.

“Now some owners may assess the costs and benefits and say I’m willing to do that, I can bear the financial burden,” Trask said. “And if I have to have a fight with the league, I’ll have a fight with the league. I’m going to do it anyway.

“But I think an owner will have to think long and hard about so doing.”

[zn]

Latest Thoughts on Stan Kroenke, the Rams and the NFL in St. Louis

Shane Gray

January 08, 2015

http://www.insidestl.com/insideSTLcom/STLSports/STLRams/tabid/137/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/15973/Latest-Thoughts-on-Stan-Kroenke-the-Rams-and-the-NFL-in-St-Louis.aspx

By now, most everyone is aware of Sam Farmer’s Los Angeles Times report that broke the news of St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke’s plans to team up with Stockbridge Capital Group to construct an NFL stadium and multifaceted development at Hollywood Park — a location that has been rumored as a potential league venue site since the mid 1990s.

As Farmer points out, there have been more than a dozen L.A. area stadium proposals that have come and gone over the last 20 years. Will the aforementioned Kroenke plan, however, finally be the one that goes from conceptualization to reality and ultimately bring the NFL back to L.A.? At this point at least, the answer to that question would appear to be a yes.

With that said, I would like to touch on a multitude of topics in response to the prospective Kroenke/Stockbridge Capital Group stadium development:

-As I have pointed out previously, there has never been a team relocate with a state of the art venue plan approved in its current market, even prior to the introduction of the NFL’s relocation guidelines and certainly not since they were tweaked and tightened following the moving mayhem that took place in the 1990s. When considering how the NFL controls the L.A. market, that specific league guidelines are in place related to potential relocation and the above-mentioned historical precedence that no team has moved with an approved stadium plan in place at home, local fans have reason to maintain hopes of keeping the Rams in St. Louis.

-In spite of the thinking of a vast many observers, the Rams future is a long way from being decided.

For one, As Bill Plaschke of the L.A. Times emphasized here with supportive evidence, both the pro Rams to L.A. crowd and the keep the Rams in St. Louis contingent should take a wait-and-see approach in regard to anything NFL to L.A. related. Those who are suggesting the Rams to L.A. is somehow a done deal need a reality check.

As I detailed in this feature a few months back and as was covered this week by Farmer and Nathan Fenno of the L.A. Times, the league and its franchises have extensively used the nation’s number two market to help spur deals in other cities. In fact, the Farmer/Fenno column linked above reports that 18 teams have been connected to L.A. at some point in recent years.

For whatever reason(s) — in spite of lessons that should have easily been learned by the history shared above — people are completely convinced that this time it just has to be different. Inexplicably, people in the media and other interested observers alike have already decided that there is no chance that any of this could be leverage related.

But why in the world is that stance taken? Aren’t these people looking at this from a very close-minded and limited perspective?

How come people assume that there has to be a limit to a leverage play, rather than understanding that the bigger the play the bigger the possible reward? Short of loading up the moving vans and driving out of town, there is no official leverage limit that actually exists. Even then — as was evidenced with the Seahawks fiasco in 1996 — that doesn’t guarantee a move.

In short, the bigger the play the bigger the potential response in terms of getting a larger and better deal from a city and state. To think otherwise is foolish.

I guess the fact that The Kroenke Group voluntarily released this information days before the local proposal was to come out — and yes we are talking about “Silent Stan” here — could not have possibly involved other motivations other than the ones that people assume that it did. Apparently, it is inconceivable that this news broke intentionally for the reason of upping the ante for a better offer from Peacock/Blitz just before the proposal was submitted to Nixon and released to the public. Nixon, by the way, will get to recommend changes that he sees fit upon viewing the plan.

I mean, I know it is just beyond absurd to consider, but what if the potential L.A. project indeed was made known at this time to help ensure that the St. Louis proposal was pressured to the utmost at the last second to entice the very best offer possible in the next few days? Nah, that couldn’t possibly be something that a shrewd businessman would even consider doing. Impossible.

Sorry for the overly thick use of sarcasm, but it is as if people just assume there is some imaginary line in the sand that says if you cross this point then what is occurring just cannot possibly involve an effort to extract a more beneficial deal. It’s as if the thinking is that if it looks a little real and a little threatening then that could indeed be leverage, but when something is done that actually creates an even greater position of power and positioning and looks even realer, well, then that somehow eliminates the possibility of leverage.

Sorry, but just as it is silly to dismiss the potential that Kroenke could ultimately make a strong attempt to both build a venue in L.A. and move the Rams, it is also just as silly to assume that there is no chance that any of this is possibly related to coercing an optimal offer.

On that point, Brent Schrotenboer of USA Today and Woody Paige of the Denver Post are among many who have suggested the possibility of a very powerful leverage play being at work here in an attempt to get the very best deal conceivable in Missouri.

Secondly, even if a move is ultimately attempted, its approval is far from a lock. The league tightened and altered the moving guidelines since the musical chairs of relocation that occurred during the 1990s, as former Raiders CEO Amy Trask told Jim Thomas in this report. A team would have to prove it has exhausted all options in its current market and meet a plethora of requirements as detailed in the NFL’s rules for relocation — many of which the Rams have not yet met.

Let me be clear: the Rams did not meet relocation guideline requirements during the arbitration process, in spite what some desperately want to believe. They have certainly not “exhausted all options in the current market”, among other prerequisites which have not been met.

Yes, the Rams would be free to go due to the arbitration ruling if St. Louis was not trying to put together a viable new stadium plan. If that were the case, then yes, the arbitration process would have went a lot further towards placing the Rams in position of fulfilling the league’s relocation criteria. But with St. Louis working on other options and a stadium plan that the league is said to like, the arbitration process was not anything close to the be all/end all related to the Rams future in the STL.

In addition, Bleacher Report’s Jason Cole reports that Chargers owner Dean Spanos believes he has at least nine votes in place to block an attempted move even if Kroenke were to attempt to uproot the Rams.

Thirdly, even if Kroenke attempts to move without approval, an unapproved move could cost a rogue franchise their share of league-wide TV revenues, among other possible penalties. Obviously, such financial losses would be significant as each NFL team took in nearly $200 million in TV revenues a year ago.

With all that said, there are a plethora of possible outcomes regarding this situation, including but not limited to:

-The possibility of Kroenke developing and profiting from the land around the proposed new edifice and then leasing the football facilities out to another team or team(s) — even if done in the name of Stockbridge — and profiting from both the stadium and surrounding development while keeping the Rams in St. Louis in a new venue with added revenue streams that would significantly increase the value of his franchise while avoiding a relocation fee and other costs associated with a move. That would be quite the coup, but would anyone put it past him at this point?

As for Governor Nixon’s Dave Peacock/Bob Blitz stadium task force and their coming proposal, they will and should forge forward with the retention of the Rams being the first priority of their effort to secure a multidimensional development that would include a new stadium, the retention of the NFL, the prospects of an MLS franchise as well as extensive ancillary development surrounding the facility.

Rather than throwing their hands up and crawling into the fetal position due to the news of Kroenke’s L.A. interest, the Peacock/Blitz team should be all the more determined to fight for the Rams by continuing to work directly with the NFL to bring about a solution that makes it virtually impossible for the organization to relocate.

Some have said, why try to keep them if they want to go?

First, far too many are assuming the appearance of wanting to move equates to a fact that Kroenke indeed desires to move. In spite of the strong indications that this is the case, it is not necessarily so.

Secondly, there are but 31 cities in the world who play host to the National Football League, and hosting one of the franchises is a big deal. If the Rams leave, there are no guarantees that another team will ever again call the Gateway City home.

Thirdly, for those who are justifiably upset at Kroenke, why let him have what many believe he wants without fighting tooth and nail to keep the Rams? Why make it easy on him? Why not work with the NFL to do everything possible to stop him from removing the Rams from Missouri? For those angry with the Rams owner, what better way to get back at him than for the city and state to come up with a plan that prevents him from getting what many have decided he desires elsewhere?

Finally, if the NFL blocks a move of the Rams and Kroenke is dead set on getting to L.A., he might then decide to sell the franchise and buy another team to perhaps attempt to move to California rather than keeping ownership of the Rams in St. Louis. At that point, he could either be stuck in the Lou or sell the club to another ownership group.

With all that and more considered, leaders should clench their jaws and move ahead with steadfast determination to see this through and come away with their stated goals achieved. Now is not the time to quit, it is the time to start fighting with enhanced fervor.

While focusing on the Rams, it is wise that the Peacock/Blitz team continue to look into other alternatives (hello Raiders or Jags) and do what is reasonable to retain the NFL and move forward with a project that could do at least four things:

1: If done correctly, it will retain an NFL presence in some way shape or form — preferably with the Rams. After all, starting with a new fanbase for a third time would be far from an ideal outcome.

2: A new venue would free up the dome to add dates from August through January and increase revenues there substantially. At last report, the dome/convention center was bringing in north of $150 million per year. With the facility enhanced and adapted, it is possible that eventually those revenues could double (and certainly create a net gain annually over what new venue costs would be per year).

3: This project would facilitate development of blighted land and bring year round jobs to a region of St. Louis that could use them, as well as enhance tourist activity which also generates more revenue.

4: A new venue could also bring the MLS to the Gateway City, something that would generate added revenues at the stadium and in the city while making a whole lot of soccer lovers very happy.

–As for the possibility of adding another NFL team if the Rams indeed attempt a move and get away, a new venue could accomplish that feat with the increases in franchise value and revenue streams it would bring considered.

An educated guess would suggest that both the Raiders and Jaguars could be in play under that scenario.

The Raiders would bring a natural rivalry with the cross-state Chiefs (assuming they remained in the AFC West), and the Jaguars would bring owner Shad Khan and top executive Mark Lamping — among others — home to the St. Louis region.

–At this stage, the best thing for fans in both St. Louis and L.A. to do is to let the dust settle just a bit.

There are a lot of variables at play here, and this saga in St. Louis — and in L.A. — is far from over. In fact, there will be several more twists and turns before things are ultimately resolved.

[PA Ram]

Jason La Canfora ‏@JasonLaCanfora 30m30 minutes ago
City of St Louis will unveil a new NFL stadium plan at a press conference at noon local time tomorrow

"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. " Philip K. Dick

[Agamemnon]

stltoday.com
Plan to keep NFL in St. Louis to be revealed
1 hour ago • By David Hunn

ST. LOUIS • Details of the plan for a new downtown football stadium here are expected to be announced Friday.

In November, Gov. Jay Nixon appointed a two-member team — former Anheuser-Busch President David Peacock and current Edward Jones Dome attorney Robert Blitz — to tackle the task of keeping professional football in St. Louis. Nixon gave them 60 days to evaluate options and prepare a report.

Peacock and Blitz are expected to make that report public on Friday. The plan is to include an open-air stadium on the Mississippi riverfront. Financing options are unclear; Nixon has said he wants any new stadium to be a “public asset,” but also insisted there would be “no new tax burden on taxpayers.”

The report will further discuss financing options.

The news comes on the heels of an announcement Monday that St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke and an investment group will build a privately financed 80,000-seat stadium as part of a massive revitalization of Inglewood, Calif.

Some have expected the Rams to leave St. Louis for years, since the team engaged in a lengthy battle over upgrades required by its lease with the Edward Jones Dome. Two years ago, the city lost the battle, when a three-member arbitration panel ruled in favor of the Rams’ request for publicly financed renovations worth perhaps $700 million. Dome authorities declined, giving the Rams the option to go year-to-year on the team lease.

Nixon said the Rams have until Jan. 28 to inform the Dome of the team decision.

An unsanctioned Rams move to Los Angeles could raise the ire of league officials and owners.

A strong St. Louis stadium plan could persuade the league to try to pressure Kroenke to keep the Rams here.

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/plan-to-keep-nfl-in-st-louis-to-be-revealed/article_e1e77d44-59e1-50a1-87f4-17b56c6d233b.html

Agamemnon

[zn]

This is all one bloody mess if you ask me.

[Zooey]

zn wrote:

This is all one bloody mess if you ask me.

And there is still cross-ownership.

There was speculation some time back about Kroenke’s interest in the Broncos.

Shane Gray is right that there are a lot of possibilities, and right now, the people who are sure of Kroenke’s intentions are mind-readers. I don’t think we are going to need a thread a week, though, because this is going to drag on for a year or so.

Interesting the NFL has said nothing.

[SunTzu_vs_Camus]

Interesting indeed, Zooey!

I think StLouis dragged their feet for 2 years…and Stan wasn’t gonna do it (al the Raiders, Chargers have FOR YEARS!!)
…especially, when Stan has the means to carry it out and singlehandedly bulid a stadium/NFL Network offices, studios..
essentially an NFL theme park over the 300 acres. The NFL Experience will be a theme park almost! Moving the team nearly triples the Rams value – something a new stadium in StLouis will not do…it just won’t.

And the first team back to LA will get the spoils of a year or two before another team shares the place….essentially making the 1st team the real/home team of LA….along with all the merchandising to boot! Oh yeah, iirc, stan has a soccer team also that he could bring to LA that he would fill based on the huge contingent of soccer fans in SoCal among the Hispanic community alone!!

Honestly, after 20 yrs…the NFL site at Hollywood Park would be a mecca to the NFL!! And the NFL will have plenty of room to grow among the 300 acres of space. The owners of the other 240acres will have the NFL…the #1 sport in the US…as it’s tenant.
It’s just a perfect place and fit for the Rams Stan and the NFL Network.

THAT’S why the NFL has said nothing. Stan is far to smart and deliberate to do this without there being a nod/wink in place from the NFL. Hell, the Raiders & Chargers did nothing for years…cuz they couldn’t!! Stan can….and IS!

As for the leverage angle, certainly it’s possible…but it would be the weakest of plays to get a few hundred million in value for the Rams…when moving them will instantly TRIPLE the value – Rams being winners or not. There will easily be a 5 year grace period of excitement after the move here in LA where the money will flow!

Build it Stan, cuz as you rightly know, they WILL come! And the NFL Network will be right being them! ;]

"I should have been a pair of ragged claws...
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas."

[zn]

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Peacock urges fans to keep attending games.

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Not many details on public financing, but Peacock says he’s been given confidence that there’s a way make it work w/out new taxes.

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Says stadium would be done by 2020

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Peacock says league would chip in $200 million and Kroenke minimum of $200 million

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Peacock has yet to meet w/Kroenke but says Rams are aware of these plans and have been involved

Jim Thomas @jthom1
PSLs will help finance

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Stadium will cost 860 to 900 million

Jim Thomas @jthom1
10,000 parking spaces for tailgating

Jim Thomas @jthom1
7,500 club seats

Jim Thomas @jthom1
64,000 seat for football, 34,000 seats for soccer.

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Shows stadium configuration for football and soccer.

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Artist renditions are impressive

===========

St. Louis makes its pitch to keep the Rams

by Michael David Smith

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/01/09/st-louis-makes-its-pitch-to-keep-the-rams/

Days after news broke that Rams owner Stan Kroenke plans to build a stadium in Los Angeles, St. Louis has unveiled a plan to build a new stadium of its own, either to entice the Rams to stay or to bring in another NFL team down the road if the Rams leave.

The plan, unveiled at an event in St. Louis today, acknowledges that the Edward Jones Dome is obsolete by NFL stadium standards and proposes that a new, 64,000-seat stadium be built in its place.

According to Jim Thomas of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the proposal calls for the stadium to open by 2020 and cost about $900 million. The idea is for about half of the stadium cost to be publicly financed and the rest to come from the NFL and Kroenke.

St. Louis may be serious about trying to keep the Rams, but that doesn’t mean Kroenke wants to stay. It’s telling that Kroenke hasn’t been talking to St. Louis civic leaders about his plans, and no one from the Rams attended today’s unveiling of the St. Louis stadium plan. If St. Louis does build a new stadium, it may be a stadium that another team moves into, after the Rams move away.

[Zooey]

http://www.fieldofschemes.com/2015/01/09/8334/st-louis-stadium-task-force-lets-throw-450m-at-kroenke-to-get-rams-to-stay/

St. Louis stadium task force: Let’s throw $450m at Kroenke to get Rams to stay
Posted on January 9, 2015 by Neil deMause
Live from watching the St. Louis how-we’re-gonna-keep-the-Rams press conference on the interwebs:

That was a question to Gov. Jay Nixon’s stadium negotiator (and Anheuser-Busch exec) Dave Peacock, who presented his proposal for a new stadium to make Rams owner Stan Kroenke re-up his lease in St. Louis. And yes, that’s a $900 million price tag, with $450 million of it coming from the public. More from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

The facility would feature 64,000 seats, with 7,500 club seats. Financing the project, he said, would involve public and private money, as well as seat licenses paid by fans.

“There are ways to source public financing and do it with the same or less burden on the taxpayers,” Peacock said.

And:

The current Edward Jones Dome would become “a competitive asset to use” to attract conventions, Peacock said.

I will endeavor to get Heywood Sanders in here to comment on that one, if he ever stops laughing.

Anyway: 450 million smackeroos. That is a hell of a lot of money to keep a team that you just spent $600 million to lure to town 20 years ago, so either Peacock knows something we don’t know about the seriousness of Stan Kroenke’s threat to go to L.A., or he’s ignoring my advice about not bidding against yourself. Or he just figured most new stadiums cost around $900 million and thought, “Enh, let’s offer to go halfsies and see what they say. That sounds fair, right?” Dumber things have been done for dumber reasons.

[wv]

SunTzu_vs_Camus wrote:

As for the leverage angle, certainly it’s possible…but it would be the weakest of plays to get a few hundred million in value for the Rams…when moving them will instantly TRIPLE the value –

But the Rules say,
an owner cant move just to make more money.
So…there’s that. In the ‘Rules’.
Fwiw.

w
v

[Zooey]

zn wrote:

Jim Thomas @jthom1
Not many details on public financing, but Peacock says he’s been given confidence that there’s a way make it work w/out new taxes.

WTF?

This is an important detail.

And public money is public money. Unless I’m missing something, that’s either taxes or bonds. Which are still paid off by taxes in the long run.

[zn]

Zooey wrote:

zn wrote:
Jim Thomas @jthom1
Not many details on public financing, but Peacock says he’s been given confidence that there’s a way make it work w/out new taxes.

WTF?

This is an important detail.

And public money is public money. Unless I’m missing something, that’s either taxes or bonds. Which are still paid off by taxes in the long run.

One rumor is tourist taxes.

[Agamemnon]

I think he said in the press conference that the largest portion of revenue would come from new PSLs. Half psls, half nfl and half owner or something like that. 😉

Agamemnon

[Agamemnon]

Plans for St. Louis’ New NFL Stadium Unveiled
from 101ESPN Plus 40 minutes ago Not Yet Rated

Watch as Dave Peacock unveils and explains plans for a new NFL stadium in St. Louis. Peacock proposed the plans as a member of a task force Gov. Jay Nixon appointed to keep St. Louis an NFL city.

Agamemnon

[bnw]

zn wrote:

One rumor is tourist taxes.

The tax on hotel and rental car in the Phoenix, AZ area is outrageous. You are told it is to pay for the stadium in Glendale.

The upside to being a Rams fan is heartbreak.

Sprinkles are for winners.

[Agamemnon]

Do you think the Rams will have something on today’s press conference????

Agamemnon

[Agamemnon]

stltoday.com
Planners announce open-air, riverfront NFL stadium
1 hour ago • By David Hunn

UPDATED with details at 12:35 p.m.

Dave Peacock announced plans Friday for a new open air football stadium on the St. Louis riverfront.

“This is about the future … and that we need to fight for what it rightfully ours,” Peacock said.

The facility would feature 64,000 seats, with 7,500 club seats. Financing the project, he said, would involve public and private money, as well as seat licenses paid by fans.

“There are ways to source public financing and do it with the same or less burden on the taxpayers,” Peacock said.

Gov. Jay Nixon appointed Peacock, former Anheuser Busch president, and Edward Jones dome attorney Bob Blitz to develop a plan to keep professional football in St. Louis.

The new stadium would also accommodate soccer.

Peacock called the project more than a football stadium: “We are talking about a revitalization of our downtown.”

Details of financing the $860 million to $985 million estimated cost are included in the report he turned over to Nixon. An estimated $400 million to $450 million would come from the National Football League and the team. An additional $460 million to $535 million would come from public sources, including extending current bonds, brownfield tax credits and up to $130 million in seat licenses.

“Our vision is a redevelopment of the North Riverfront. … There’s green area, there’s trailways, there’s pathways.”

Site preparation would begin by June, according to the plan. The stadium would open for the 2020 NFL season.

Peacock said the plan would eradicate blight and turn the area into a crown jewel. Thirty-three buildlings are in the project area, and a majority are vacant, he said. The city owns one-fourth of the land. The plan preserves the 1902 Power and Light Building.

Redevelopment of this area is imperative for the health of the St. Louis community, he said.

Interest rates are pretty low right now. “If you’re going to do something, now is sort of the time to do it; money is a little cheaper. … We see a healthy sense of urgency behind this project.”

HOK here and 360 Architecture in Kansas City worked on the design, he said.

Bob Blitz recalled that in the 1990s St. Louis built a stadium without a football team. Now, it has a team, with an “obsolete” stadium, Blitz said.

The current Edward Jones Dome would become “a competitive asset to use” to attract conventions, Peacock said.

The news of the stadium plan comes on the heels of an announcement Monday that St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke and an investment group will build a privately financed 80,000-seat stadium as part of a massive revitalization of Inglewood, Calif.

Some have expected the Rams to leave St. Louis for years, since the team engaged in a lengthy battle over upgrades required by its lease with the Edward Jones Dome. Two years ago, the city lost the battle, when a three-member arbitration panel ruled in favor of the Rams’ request for publicly financed renovations worth perhaps $700 million. Dome authorities declined, giving the Rams the option to go year-to-year on the team lease.

Nixon said the Rams have until Jan. 28 to inform the Dome of the team decision.

In a statement Friday, Nixon thanked Peacock and Blitz for their work on the stadium plan and said he spoke with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell earlier this week about the effort.

“This proposal would not only protect St. Louis’s status as an NFL city, it would also provide the opportunity to redevelop underutilized areas of the city and create jobs,” Nixon said in a written statement.

An unsanctioned Rams move to Los Angeles could raise the ire of league officials and owners.

Come back to STLtoday.com for more on this story.

Miklasz: St. Louis isn’t a bad football town

McClellan: Kroenke joins our Rogues Gallery

Missouri officials won’t get in a bidding war

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/article_e1e77d44-59e1-50a1-87f4-17b56c6d233b.html#.VLA-NR5GOBM.twitter

Agamemnon

[Agamemnon]

Do you think the Rams will have something on today’s press conference????
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/01/09/rams-dont-have-much-to-say-about-st-louis-stadium-proposal/

Rams don’t have much to say about St. Louis stadium proposal
Posted by Mike Florio on January 9, 2015, 4:09 PM EST
Kroenke Getty Images

On Friday, a new task force formed by Missouri governor Jay Nixon published a proposal for a new stadium in St. Louis. For the Rams. To play in. If they don’t move to Los Angeles.

The Rams, who didn’t attend the press conference at which the new stadium was announced, have issued a statement regarding the proposal.

“The St. Louis Rams have worked for many years, with several agencies and commissions, and their senior management, responsible for stadium facilities in St. Louis. This includes multiple discussions with the Governor’s recently formed NFL Task Force. We received the Task Force materials shortly before the press conference. We will review them and speak with the Task Force representatives.”

That’s what they said. Here’s what it likely means.

We’ve given the politicians years to make a viable proposal for a new stadium. They’ve yet to do so. We even went to an arbitration over what it would take to put the current stadium in the top 25 percent of all NFL stadiums. Our proposal won, but the politicians chose not to upgrade the stadium. Which puts us on a one-year-at-a-time lease. Which allows us to leave.

And leave we will if, as we expect, the proposal made Friday contains the same deficiencies that past proposals exhibited. Actually, we now hope that the proposal is deficient, because we’ve begun the process of emotionally detaching from St. Louis, given the recent announcement that owner Stan Kroenke wants to build a stadium in Los Angeles. We would have preferred no proposal at all. But now that a proposal has been made, we need to read it and find fault with it to justify our intention to move.

Agamemnon

[GreatRamNTheSky]

After that presentation all I can say is you better start breaking out your old LA Rams gear because that deal is not trumping what is happening for the league and Kroenke in LA.

Grits

[InvaderRam]

this next year is going to be very painful. either way. i wonder how ugly it gets.

[wv]

InvaderRam wrote:

this next year is going to be very painful. either way. i wonder how ugly it gets.

Well…it is just football,
ya know. Its not like Nam.
Or bowling.

And despite all the hoopla
I’d guess 90 percent of all fans
dont actually go to the games in person.
They just watch their TVs.

w
v

[InvaderRam]

ok. it won’t be that painful. but really. i’d rather this just be over with. if they’re going. just go. if they’re staying. just stay. i hate that this is getting drawn out. i’d rather just be able to watch the rams and not have to discuss this anymore.

but yeah. it is just football.

[wv]

InvaderRam wrote:

ok. it won’t be that painful. but really. i’d rather this just be over with. if they’re going. just go. if they’re staying. just stay. i hate that this is getting drawn out. i’d rather just be able to watch the rams and not have to discuss this anymore.

but yeah. it is just football.

Well in a Just World,
every city would have a pro football team.
I think that principle is in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Or the Port Huron Statement. The original Statement.
Not the compromised
final draft, though.

w
v

w
v

[zn]

St. Louis unveils plan for stadium

By Nick Wagoner | ESPN.com

http://espn.go.com/blog/st-louis-rams/

ST. LOUIS — Less than a week after news came that St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke is part of a group developing a new NFL stadium in Los Angeles, St. Louis revealed a plan for a new stadium of its own Friday afternoon.

The plan calls for the construction of a 64,000-seat open-air NFL stadium on about 90 acres on the north St. Louis riverfront, about a half-mile from the Gateway Arch.

According to former Anheuser-Busch president Dave Peacock and local attorney Bob Blitz, the two-man task force appointed by Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon to come up with the plan, the new stadium would cost between $860 million and $985 million, with construction to begin in 2016 and be completed in 2020.

In addition to housing a football team, the plan also accounts for the potential addition of a Major League Soccer team, some renovations of the Edward Jones Dome to attract major sporting events like the Final Four, and additional development in the currently blighted north St. Louis area. Peacock has been in contact with MLS commissioner Don Garber.

According to Peacock, the proposal isn’t just about keeping football in St. Louis but altering the way the city is viewed.

“It’s about the future of our region,” Peacock said. “It’s about how we are perceived, it’s about no longer accepting the notion that our assets can just dissolve in front of us or leave.”

===

Key bullet points from St. Louis stadium plan

By Nick Wagoner | ESPN.com

http://espn.go.com/blog/st-louis-rams/

ST. LOUIS — As with any stadium proposal anywhere, there are plenty of moving parts when it comes to the new deal being put on the table in St. Louis’ attempt to keep the Rams in the city.

With that in mind, this is an effort to lay out some of the key points of the proposal. By no means is this comprehensive, and Friday’s news conference didn’t answer anything close to all of the tough questions and hurdles that remain, but here’s what the task force of Dave Peacock and Bob Blitz wanted to convey on Friday in bullet-point form:

The plan features an open-air, 64,000-seat stadium on the north riverfront with views to the south of the Gateway Arch and downtown St. Louis. There are an estimated 10,439 parking spaces provided in the plan, and the stadium will have access to multiple forms of public transportation.
The expected cost is between $860 million and $985 million.
The goal of the plan isn’t just to house an NFL team but also lure a Major League Soccer team. Peacock and Blitz have already discussed that possibility with MLS Commissioner Don Garber, and the plans have built in 30,000 lower-bowl seats for MLS and international soccer events.
The stadium will be a public asset owned by a public entity such as the St. Louis Regional Convention and Sports Complex Authority and would be leased to the Rams (or the NFL team it houses) with the ability to sublet to a possible MLS franchise. Any revenue splits, operating rights, management agreements, parking terms, signage, naming rights and other revenue generating initiatives would be negotiated with the NFL team.

Here’s the breakdown of the 64,000 seats for NFL games:

54,020 general seats
2,000 suite seats (includes private suites and on-field seating)
480 loge box seats (eight seats in each of 60 boxes)
7,500 club seats

The 90-plus acre site is a mix of publicly and privately owned property. The aforementioned cost includes the expected purchase and acquisition of the properties.
The plan also includes the financing of improvements to the Edward Jones Dome so it can be repositioned as a permanent convention center that can also be used to attract major sporting events such as college basketball’s Final Four.
From a financing perspective, the new stadium is not expected to add any new tax burden on taxpayers locally or in the state.

Here are the estimated costs:

Land/Demolition – $90-110 million
Stadium construction – $600-650 million
Parking/infrastructure needs – $170-225 million
Total – $860-985 million

Here’s how the financing is expected to work according to Peacock and Blitz:

Private financing

NFL team ownership – $200-250 million
NFL (committed to match up to $200 million through G4 loan program) – $200 million
Total – $400-450 million

Potential public sources (all contingent on commitment of private financing)

Extension of bonds on Edward Jones Dome – $300-350 million
Missouri Development Finance Board support – $15-25 million
Brownfield tax credits (for improving blighted areas) – $25-30 million
Personal seat license proceeds – $120-120 million
Total – $460-535 million

According to the plan, the land would be acquired, bids for contractors and site preparation would begin between June of this year and December 2016. The financing documents and lease documents would be negotiated and signed in 2017, with site preparation completed and permits obtained the same year. Actual construction and marketing of the seat licenses would begin in early 2018, with construction completed in time for the start of the 2020 NFL season.

[Zooey]

Okay.

That’s it.

Nothing happens for a month.

Then the Rams file to terminate the Ed Jones dome.

And then nothing happens until the vote in Inglewood. May or June. A lawsuit maybe gets filed. An environmental impact report comes out.

And next Fall, cards start getting placed on the table again.

So I’m thinking BPA in the first round, QB in the 2nd, and all OL after that, with a LB or DL peppered in here or there.

[zn]

Stadium plans guarantee nothing in St. Louis or L.A.

By Nick Wagoner

http://espn.go.com/blog/st-louis-rams/post/_/id/15357/stadium-plans-guarantee-nothing-in-st-louis-or-l-a

ST. LOUIS — It’s been a week of pretty pictures revealing elaborate plans not only for new NFL-sized stadiums in Los Angeles and St. Louis but also for trendy developments in and around those new venues. Those pictures sitting on an easel, coming across a wide-screen television, or printed on heavy stock as a handout look great but they don’t mean much more than the paper they’re printed on.

The intentions of St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke are clear. The intentions of Dave Peacock, Bob Blitz and the city of St. Louis are also clear. There will be plenty of negotiations and conversations had over the next, well, who knows how long it will all take? But there are still many difficult questions that need to be asked and answered.

In the grand scheme of things, though, the future of the Rams in St. Louis could ultimately fall in the hands of the people who reside at 345 Park Avenue in New York City. That’s home of the NFL offices, and if we’ve learned anything about the league in the past few years, it’s that it will do what it believes is best for the league.

Considering that, it’s no coincidence that as Peacock presented the St. Louis plan on Friday afternoon, he consistently referred to having an understanding of the bylaws and rules that dictate relocation in the NFL. He cited the league rules that say a team must exhaust all opportunities in its current city and referred to the rule that a team owner cannot move simply to enrich himself further.

There are other important to note provisions that say things like a team must put forth a “good faith” effort to negotiate with its current city before it can leave. That falls in line with the “exhaust all opportunities” portion of the rulebook.

To that end, Peacock, who has been working on the project for more than a year and putting in long hours for the past three months, emphasized the expedient efforts with which the St. Louis plan has come together.

“If we were moving in ’16 or ’17 on a new stadium, based on when this process started, I think that would be half the time a lot of other teams did,” Peacock said. “I don’t necessarily buy the ‘too little, too late.’ … I believe those NFL bylaws have been governing actions of the league for a while now and I have faith.”

Of course, Kroenke’s counter to that would point to the failed arbitration process to revamp the Edward Jones Dome as well as the time after that in which St. Louis made no real offers to keep the team. Even in the statement the Rams issued Friday afternoon, there were subtle hints of a team implying that it’s been “good faith negotiating” well before Friday’s reveal.

“The St. Louis Rams have worked for many years, with several agencies and commissions, and their senior management, responsible for stadium facilities in St. Louis,” the statement read. “This includes multiple discussions with the Governor’s recently formed NFL Task Force. We received the Task Force materials shortly before the press conference. We will review them and speak with the Task Force representatives.”

The argument that the city didn’t negotiate much during and after the arbitration process rings true but it also doesn’t mean that all options were exhausted. Pointing to the differences in required public money and the idea of retrofitting the Edward Jones Dome to guarantee 10 more years rather than a long-term solution, Peacock doesn’t see negotiations for a new stadium and arbitration for the old one as the same thing.

“Trying to compare that to our proposal is a little bit of apples and oranges,” Peacock said.

When all is said and done, through the many permutations of what could happen, the NFL and its owners will be the ones to decide on what it values most. Kroenke offers the most tangible Los Angeles plan in two decades, and the league has made no bones about its desire to return to that market.

St. Louis offers a real, seemingly feasible plan to continue as an NFL city. And while the league has rules and bylaws, it’s also showed plenty of willingness to alter direction toward what most benefits the overall health of the league.

For that reason, Peacock has been sure to keep the league in the loop every step of the way. He met with NFL executives in November and with the Rams and more league executives later on.

“We’ve had great discussions with the league,” Peacock said. “The NFL is extremely engaged in this.”

Meanwhile, some around the league were taken aback by the reveal of the Los Angeles plans on Monday but that doesn’t make Kroenke’s offer any less appealing.

It’s highly unlikely that there will be a resolution to any of this anytime soon. In the meantime, at least now we know where Kroenke and St. Louis stand. Unless Kroenke and the Rams surprise by simply agreeing to St. Louis’ plan, it’s up to the NFL to determine what happens next.

[wv]

I wonder if the fact that the Rams used to reside in LA
will carry any weight in this decision?

When i add up all the factors on both sides,
it seems like a close case. Sometimes
weird subtle things tip the balance in close cases.

w
v

[Agamemnon]

The hardest part of all, said Neil deMause, editor of the stadium subsidies website Field of Schemes, is figuring out what Kroenke’s really up to. Either he’s planning a billion-dollar bet on Los Angeles with one foot already out the door, or he just got St. Louis to cough up $400 million by issuing a news release about a stadium in L.A.

“And the thing is,” DeMause said, “If [Kroenke] goes for this plan, we’ll never know if it was a bluff or not.”

Times Staff Writer Sam Farmer contributed to this report.

http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-sp-sn-st-louis-pitches-stadium-plan-20150109-story.html

Agamemnon

[zn]

Support, timing key to Rams plan

By Jim Thomas

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/football/professional/support-timing-key-to-rams-plan/article_7e2fb1d3-e88c-5e7d-8317-60fc286b74dc.html

The St. Louis stadium/Rams relocation saga reached another milepost Friday with the unveiling of a stadium project on the north edge of downtown that would cost between $860 million and $985 million.

For now, the proposal presented at Union Station by Dave Peacock and Bob Blitz is the life raft that’s keeping NFL football afloat in St. Louis.

“I think to the degree that we progress on a plan and demonstrate the viability of it, we’re in good shape — the community — because the NFL bylaws have certain stipulations that relate to moving and relocation that we will have met in the local community,” said Peacock, who with Blitz was appointed by Gov. Jay Nixon to develop a plan to keep professional football in St. Louis.

But if the situation reaches the level where the Rams are lobbying with the league to move to Los Angeles, two areas are almost certain to be discussed:

• Is the St. Louis effort to address its stadium situation a case of too little, too late?

• Is there sufficient support in the business community and corporate sector to keep the Rams profitable and viable in St. Louis?

Peacock, a former Anheuser-Busch executive, seemed almost eager to address both topics during an hour-long presentation and news conference.

“We have a sense of urgency,” Peacock said. “But I can tell you, San Diego’s been slogging away for years trying to get a stadium and has not been able to achieve it. The Minneapolis project took several years. Atlanta. San Francisco.

“If we are actually able to raise the financing and start a project in 2016 based on where we started, this would be lightning speed in the stadium world relative to what’s been done at other places.

“So I don’t necessarily buy the too little, too late. Because if you also read the NFL bylaws, they’re very clear that they don’t have a time parameter associated with them. They basically say that the team has to exhaust all of its opportunities in the local market before it can move, and that no team can move just for the opportunity to make more money. I believe in those NFL bylaws.”

Although the Rams have said next to nothing during the entire stadium process, the team’s statement in response to Friday’s unveiling of the stadium plan spoke volumes. It read in part:

“The St. Louis Rams have worked for many years, with several agencies and commissions, and their senior management, responsible for stadium facilities in St. Louis. This includes multiple discussions with the Governor (Jay Nixon)’s recently formed NFL Task Force (Peacock and Blitz) …”

It may sound like bureaucratic jibberish at face value, but the underlying point is that the Rams want it known that they’ve been working hard at a stadium solution for “many years” with no success. While also pointing out that the task force is “recently formed.”

It’s a message designed as much for the league office and the 31 other franchise owners as it is for St. Louis. And those franchise owners could be voting on relocation as early as spring 2016.

Meanwhile, as of Monday, Rams owner Stan Kroenke has already reached an agreement to build a stadium in Inglewood, Calif., not far from the Los Angeles airport.

As this scenario unfolds, the Rams’ argument at league meetings and behind the scenes is expected to include questions about the “sense of urgency” by St. Louis. One question that may have already been posed by the Rams in league circles: Why wasn’t this task force formed after the arbitration decision in January 2013?

(That decision favored the Rams’ estimated $700 million proposal to upgrade the Edward Jones Dome.)

Peacock said Friday he has been working on the stadium project “off and on” for more than a year, and has been doing intensive work over the past three months.

Providing examples of the level of activity, Peacock said there was a meeting with league officials in November shortly after the formation of the task force. He said there have also been meetings that involved both Rams and NFL officials together, as well as what he called “constant contact” with both entities.

Peacock also confirmed what previously had been reported through sources, namely, that Kroenke had yet to meet directly with the task force.

“I have not met, nor has Bob met Stan,” Peacock said. “I’m sure he’s seen these (stadium plans) because they’ve been shared early on in the process. I don’t know the impact or his reaction, because we haven’t met with him.”

It should be noted that Peacock said he has yet to meet formally with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell so far in this process.

“I’m sure we’ll meet with Stan Kroenke when the time is right,” Peacock said. “His representatives have represented him well. At the same time we’re dealing with the right people at the league and we’ve been given, I’d say, the right level of support to continue on our path.”

As for the question of business and corporate support, the NFL relocation guidelines specify that a team requesting to move must demonstrate it has exhausted all opportunities to be successful in its market. A perceived lack of corporate support is an area the Rams are expected to attack as battle lines are drawn in the team’s increasingly apparent attempts to relocate.

“I like to deal in fact and data,” Peacock said. “The facts are half of the NFL teams play in cities with less Fortune 1000 companies than St. Louis has. We have seven of the top 200 private companies in the country.

“From just an economic standpoint, about 13 teams play in cities with a smaller GDP, if you will, or economy, than St. Louis. So it’s hard for me to say we don’t have the business support or the capability of business support.”

[Zooey]

Agamemnon wrote:

The hardest part of all, said Neil deMause, editor of the stadium subsidies website Field of Schemes, is figuring out what Kroenke’s really up to. Either he’s planning a billion-dollar bet on Los Angeles with one foot already out the door, or he just got St. Louis to cough up $400 million by issuing a news release about a stadium in L.A.

“And the thing is,” DeMause said, “If [Kroenke] goes for this plan, we’ll never know if it was a bluff or not.”

Times Staff Writer Sam Farmer contributed to this report.

http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-sp-sn-st-louis-pitches-stadium-plan-20150109-story.html

I don’t think the public money portion of the Peacock plan went up since Monday. There wasn’t enough time. It wasn’t a bluff to get Peacock to up the ante. There wasn’t enough time for Peacock TO up the ante.

But I don’t think the LA plan would affect that, anyway. The Peacock team isn’t stupid. They’ve known from the beginning that they had to appeal to Kroenke as much as possible. They knew from the beginning that they had to create as good a stadium as possible with as appealing of a financial arrangement for Kroenke as possible. Free land, opportunities for revenue, etc.

Opinion: After thinking about this for a week, I am inclined to think that Kroenke is serious about moving to LA.

The value and prestige of the franchise will escalate beyond ANYthing he can manage in St. Louis, regardless of the best efforts of that community. I think he made his decision before he bought the land in Inglewood. The value of that franchise in LA with stadium ownership is so far beyond the value of the franchise in St. Louis in a privately/publicly shared venue…it is not close. And Stan likes to own the whole shebang anyway; we know that from his other holdings. Seriously, the difference between the Rams in Peacock’s pub/priv stadium in STL and the Rams in a private stadium in LA is in at least 9 digits of value, possibly 10 digits. That’s a lot of digits.

The statement from the Rams today established their position on the “reasonable negotiations” portion of the NFL requirement. In court, they would argue, “Too little, too late.” And I think there is no chance that St. Lou can sweeten the pot at this point. I don’t think this is a leverage ploy. I think it was over a year or two ago.

There are still a lot of ways this thing can unfold. There are still the Jaguars, the Broncos, the Chargers, the Raiders, and who knows who else who may enter into this before it is over, but one thing I’m pretty sure of at this point is that the Rams are not going to play in Peacock’s stadium under Kroenke’s ownership.

[Author]

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