urbanSTL

I don't think the NFL wants to go to London. I don't think they want to deal with the St. Louis lawsuit. And I don't think they want to fund a new stadium in St. Louis.

We'll see which poison pill they decide to swallow, if any.

The outcome that I see as being least likely is the NFL funding a return to St. Louis. And I don't see taxpayers or politicians in St. Louis or Missouri jumping at the chance to pay, either. Not for the Chargers. Not for Spanos. Not for the NFL.

I just don't see it. At all.

Now, if it were an expansion club and St. Louis was willing to pay up, then maybe.

Random notes:  

The NFL needs a new threat for it's extortion scheme now that LA is full.  That is why they have promoted and will continue to encourage the idea of a London team.  Every owner in the league who wants a new publicly-funded stadium for the foreseeable future can now simply mutter, "*cough* London...".

I think it will be a long time before the NFL expands again, for the above reason, and also the fact that they would need to add four teams in order to have balanced divisions.  There aren't four viable markets unless they go back to St. Louis and San Diego, add a third Texas team, and / or can find a few markets in Canada that will support a team, none of which seem likely.

To be fair, I think that's a pretty small group: New Orleans, Detroit, Minnesota, Atlanta, Houston, Indianapolis, and St. Louis are the only cities to ever have had "dome" stadiums.

The Superdome has hosted 7 Super Bowls (and will host its 8th in 2024), but New Orleans is a city that's almost perfect to host the Super Bowl, which is why they've hosted it more than any other city except Miami.

The Silverdome hosted once, in 1982.

The Metrodome hosted once, in 1992.

The Georgia Dome hosted twice, in 1994 and 2000.

Neither the Astrodome nor the RCA Dome ever hosted a Super Bowl.

So three cities that had dome stadiums never got to host a Super Bowl in their dome stadiums, though both Houston and Indianapolis have since been awarded Super Bowls since they opened new facilities. The only cities with dome stadiums to host the SB since 1992 have been New Orleans and Atlanta - both cities more ideal to hosting Super Bowls because of their mild winter climates. Throughout history, there have only been 5 Super Bowls ever played in non-coastal cities as far north as St. Louis - two each in Detroit and Minnesota, and one in Indianapolis. The only SB ever played in an outdoor stadium this far north was in New Jersey five years ago.

ESPN article on NFL difficulties in LA...excerpt below concerning the St. Louis lawsuit:

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/281 ... os-angeles

AT A HOTEL bar last spring in Key Biscayne, a few owners and executives discussed a lawsuit that had not only failed to fade away, like most inevitable litigation following a team's relocation, but had mushroomed into a leaguewide headache, shoving the L.A. mess into each owner's email server and threatening everyone's bottom line. A group that included the city of St. Louis, the surrounding county and the Regional Convention and Sports Complex Authority were suing the NFL, claiming in a 52-page state court complaint that Rams officials and league executives violated the league's own relocation bylaws by failing to negotiate with the city in good faith, among other issues. The suit argued that the Rams induced the city to spend more than $17 million on plans for a new stadium that the team never intended to consider because Kroenke had planned long earlier to move to L.A. The complaint alleged breach of contract, unjust enrichment, fraudulent misrepresentation and business interference. The city is seeking billions in damages.

The NFL publicly dismissed the case as baseless and privately saw it as retribution from a city angry at Kroenke, whose departure forever destroyed his relationship with his home state. In his 2016 relocation application, Kroenke had written a scathing indictment of St. Louis both as a football city and as an economic engine, ignoring the loud and loyal crowds during the Greatest Show on Turf. But so far, the St. Louis plaintiffs have quietly won every court motion and decision, including a devastating defeat in the Eastern District of the Missouri State Court of Appeals, in a St. Louis courthouse, on June 12, 2018. The Rams' lawyer, Andrew Kassof, argued for the lawsuit to be sent to arbitration, corporate America's venue of choice. Kassof's argument hinged on what he saw as a clear and simple technicality: The NFL relocation policy was moot because the Rams had the right to relocate whenever they wanted, due to their year-to-year lease in St. Louis' then-Edward Jones Dome. The lease had expired in 2016, Kassof argued, so the Rams were free to leave.

Judge Philip Hess sounded suspicious. "Do the Rams have the ability to move without the NFL's approval?" he said.

"No," Kassof said. "They need the NFL's approval, and ..."

Hess cut him off. "Isn't that what this is about? The relocation policy of the NFL?"

It was a stunning moment in a nearly empty courtroom. Hess' question had forced Kassof to undermine his own case. Christopher Bauman, representing the plaintiffs, seized on it, winning the argument and keeping the case out of arbitration. Last month, the Rams petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to issue a stay, and the high court denied it. Teams have been forced to provide eight years of phone records and emails for discovery -- and had to hire legal teams and data experts to sift through them. Kroenke has had to foot all the legal bills for the teams and league, part of an indemnification agreement the league presented to the Rams, Chargers and Raiders on the morning of the L.A. vote. The legal bills have reached eight figures for some teams.

St. Louis is now seeking each owner's cut of the Rams' and Chargers' $550 million relocation fees -- about $35.5 million per -- as restitution, infuriating owners. Over the past year, the league has dedicated a full hour at owners meetings to debating the merits of "Hard Knocks" but hasn't formally addressed the St. Louis case in depth, irritating some owners even more. The lawsuit has even reopened old wounds from the relocation process. Discovery turned up a damning email from a Carson project official outlining to St. Louis authorities all the ways the Rams seemed to be in violation of the league's relocation policy, providing a blueprint for the city of St. Louis' lawsuit. The email enraged league and Rams executives and undermined Spanos' reputation as the consummate company man, even though he didn't write it. "The perception was that Dean always put the league first and Stan was only out for himself," a team executive says. "Neither was ever completely true."

It has all served as a reminder that before the shotgun marriage there was an ugly divorce, ensuring nobody gets out unscathed.

^Oh, this is all precious. And the best part would be everyone else eating the cake Stan was baking himself with the move. The lawyers, Spanos, yes indeed Jones, and . . . our fair city! Yeah. We could find better uses for that money than Stan's brain injury sales machine.

Just for the record, I have never before liked a football story quite so much as I do now. Better than the superbowl, this! (Someday somebody should make a film. Will make film, no doubt. Once the story plays out. Just waiting to see if it will be comedy or tragedy.)

Anaheim Ramps up Security at Public Meetings Amid Effort to Quash Debate and Push Through Stadium Deal
https://voiceofoc.org/2019/11/anaheim-r ... dium-deal/

DTGstl314 wrote:To be fair, I think that's a pretty small group: New Orleans, Detroit, Minnesota, Atlanta, Houston, Indianapolis, and St. Louis are the only cities to ever have had "dome" stadiums.

There was at least one city not mentioned. Seattle had the Kingdome.


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m2tbone wrote: ↑

Nov 23, 2019

DTGstl314 wrote:To be fair, I think that's a pretty small group: New Orleans, Detroit, Minnesota, Atlanta, Houston, Indianapolis, and St. Louis are the only cities to ever have had "dome" stadiums.

There was at least one city not mentioned.  Seattle had the Kingdome.


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Ah, yes, totally forgot about that one.

Well they're the fourth dome that never hosted a Super Bowl.

DTGstl314 wrote: ↑

Nov 23, 2019

KansasCitian wrote: ↑

Nov 07, 2019

I don't think the NFL wants to go to London.

I would have to think no franchise owner would want a team based in London, given the massive competitive disadvantage it would place that team at simply because of the time difference. Eight road games per year with an 8-12 hour flight travelling to a city that is at least 4 hours behind (EDT) and as much as 8 hours behind (PST) would take quite a toll on the players. The U.S.-based teams that would have to travel to London would only be at that disadvantage once per season - the London team would have that disadvantage for half the season.

Unless you have an owner who just cares about money like Stan and not as much about winning. If they think they can make more money with a team over there than here or they find a London based owner then they probably would be fine with it. 

^If the NFL was smart and capable of thinking long-term over making a quick buck, they would just start a Europe Division with four new franchises.  They would play each other 8 times, so would only have to travel across the pond four times a season.  It shouldn't be hard to find four owners and locations in Europe - they might find that just within Ireland and the UK - and there are plenty of stadiums in which to play.

sc4mayor wrote: ↑

Oct 24, 2019

^ Those were plans put forth by the CVC before the Rams took the CVC to arbitration, which then ruled we had to build a new stadium...then they eventually left.  At least if I have my timeline right.  As far as any proposed Dome upgrades made after the Rams left I only remember hearing about widening the concourses between the convention center and Dome.

The arbitrator's original ruling wasn't exactly that we had to build a new stadium, but that we had to do the Rams requested improvements to the Dome, which had a pricetag of around $750 million. It basically involved tearing down the south, east, and and most of the north sides of the dome (retaining the western portion which abuts America's Center and replacing it with this:





That was in May 2012, which was a few years before the 10-year upgrade checkpoint (March 2015) that allowed the Rams to escape the 30 year lease.

Stl101 wrote: ↑

Nov 21, 2019

ESPN article on NFL difficulties in LA...excerpt below concerning the St. Louis lawsuit:

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/281 ... os-angeles

And this ESPN article by the same authors from Feb. 2016 is definitely worth a re-read after reading the above:  

ESPN - THE WOW FACTOR; Inside the NFL's Wild Return to LA 

dweebe wrote: ↑

Nov 25, 2019

Am I remembering it incorrectly but even if St. Louis had done the $750 million Dome renovations, wouldn't it have meant the following?
1)the Rams would have had to play 2 or 3 seasons at a neutral site?
2) the convention center would have been unusable for like 12 to 18 months?
3)Kroenke wouldn't agree to a lease extension; Not even a token couple of years?

Yes it would have required something like playing at Busch or out at Mizzou.....
AND, even if STL agreed to the Rams Proposal, it was a non starter since Kroenke wouldn't even agree to a lease extension.  So STL was going to put $750MM and then do it all over again when the lease expired in 2025 and Kroenke would then have demanded a new stadium...

KSDK (CH. 5) mentioned the lawsuit this morning and said that STL/CVC is looking for $550M.
I didn’t know there was a specific amount. Now that could be incorrect, but I was thinking the initial demand would be in the billions. Maybe their goal is $550M, but that doesn’t seem correct, that they would make that kind of demand this early. I bet stanK would jump at the chance to pay $550M today, the way this suit has gone thus far. STL just keeps racking up the wins. Let’s hope that keeps up, so stanK continues to shake in his boots at the thought of not only having his scam exposed, but also cutting deep into his wallet. With the cost overruns on the LA ‘stadia’ his fortune is already taking a huge hit. Love it!