http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/19143...os-angeles

Awesome. :popcorn:

Quote:they spent millions developing plans for a new riverfront stadium project aimed at retaining the Rams.

St. Louis wants to recover that money? Isn't that like me trying to sell something to a customer and then suing the customer to recover my business development costs after the customer buys the product from someone else?

And really, any expenditures for fancy stadium drawings, etc., were aimed at persuading NFL owners to prevent Kroenke from moving. I'd like to see how they are going to show that the NFL owners had already decided several years ago to approve a not-yet-submitted application to relocate the Rams to LA over equally not-yet-submitted applications from the Raiders and Chargers.

I suppose they have a chance, though, because they filed their lawsuit in St. Louis.

Seems to me they should have tried this as the Rams were trying to move, not now, granted the attendance might tank when fans know the team is moving.

Welcome to the mid-90's, franchise free agency at its finest. The Jaguars and Bucs (horrid attendance and TV ratings) could be next, as well as the Bills. Their fanbase is passionate but how do they survive there?

Gotta love government...

Move the Jags to St Louis, and build that stadium. Problem solved.

Also, build the MLS stadium. What a bunch of maroons.

The reason for the lawsuit is really to nullify the Rams' lease on the practice facility. The city and county can't do anything other than watch a multi-million dollar facility rot. And the lease agreement allows the Rams to buy the facility for one dollar at the end of the lease. The facility is in a growing commercial area/

There could be a chance of St. Louis winning.

http://www.espn.com/espn/otl/story/_/id/...an-kroenke

Goodell and the NFL are screwing up these relocations like the NHL with their southern expansion in the nineties, except the NHL could at least argue that they wanted to increase hockey's reach and that they needed to move some teams out of declining markets. The NFL on the other hand relies the least on local markets out of the big four leagues and will soon have two teams in a city that was already getting apathetic about one, and another team in what will be the most casual fan base in the league. They should've moved the Raiders to LA, Chargers to Las Vegas, and Rams to San Antonio if they were hell-bent on moving them, though the Rams should've stayed imo.

It wasn't totally up to the NFL where those teams would move.

(04-14-2017 02:39 PM)_C2_ Wrote:  It wasn't totally up to the NFL where those teams would move.

Sure, but there's no doubt they had significant influence in the process. There's no doubt Goodell could've told Kroenke "are you crazy, why are you saying no to a new stadium, either buy another team or stay in St. Louis" and steer the owners towards the Raiders/Chargers LA plan. He isn't all powerful, but he can set the agenda and push owners towards voting in ways that force outcomes to his liking. Even if nothing happened, the status quo of any one of the three moving teams staying in their respective cities wouldn't be some awful disaster for the league. Instead, in a couple of years we'll see an empty Vegas stadium full of away fans.

Just buy another team. Yeah, I'm sure it's that easy.

Especially when neither the Raiders or Chargers owners were selling, and such purchases have to be approved by the current owners.


He was already in the ownership group of the Rams. It was his team.



Frankly, the Rams should've never left LA. That just never should've happened.

But where were they gonna play the last 20 years? The Rose Bowl? The Coliseum? The Angels' Stadium? They had no choice.

(04-15-2017 02:08 PM)Love and Honor Wrote:  There's no doubt Goodell could've told Kroenke "are you crazy, why are you saying no to a new stadium, either buy another team or stay in St. Louis" and steer the owners towards the Raiders/Chargers LA plan.

The Raiders and Chargers had a bogus Carson stadium plan that they couldn't have paid for.

Only Kroenke had the money to get a new LA stadium built and financed, so he had the leverage. The NFL's only alternatives for LA were (a) Kroenke goes to LA, or (b) No NFL in LA.

Vegas was always going to get the Raiders once Nevada put $750 million in tax money on the table. No way the NFL was going to walk away from that, because it sets a new dollar figure that NFL teams can now use to extort more money from local governments.

Good. I don't want NFL team owners building private stadiums.

I want public facilities, built by and for the people. NFL just rents out the facility 8-11 times a year, anyway.

I pray they at least know what to do with these stadiums once they're done serving pro sports. The Astrodome is a joke right now.

(04-17-2017 07:02 PM)_C2_ Wrote:  I pray they at least know what to do with these stadium once they're done serving pro sports. The Astrodome is a joke right now.

I read that someone wants to designate the Astrodome as a historic landmark and keep it there forever.

Well whatever they do, they need to do something to it. It's like that car sitting in the driveway that never gets used as it sits next to Reliant/NRG.

(04-17-2017 10:13 PM)_C2_ Wrote:  Well whatever they do, they need to do something to it. It's like that car sitting in the driveway that never gets used as it sits next to Reliant/NRG.

I wish they had made the silverdome into a driving range of sorts, historic places like these could be nostalgia hotspots for other uses.

Why wouldn't the Astrodome have been blown up by now ... ??

(04-17-2017 07:02 PM)_C2_ Wrote:  I pray they at least know what to do with these stadiums once they're done serving pro sports. The Astrodome is a joke right now.

The formerly named Edward Jones Dome is connected to the big convention center in St. Louis and is involved for a decent number of events there, so it'll be used for the foreseeable future. We're seeing the Qualcomm drama play out in San Diego right now, who knows how that'll end up. Oakland has been tossing out renovation ideas for the Coliseum now that the Raiders are gone and the Warriors have one foot out the door across the bay, but in case the A's leave there for a different stadium site it's difficult to see it sticking around for much longer. Land in that area is so expensive that even in a dumpy part of town like that it'll get turned into something at some point.