John Oliver did a segment on how much of america is being robbed by billionare team onwers.  Of course the awful deal with the Bengals is discussed:

 

 

Also, note how he can't come up with anything to tie Cincinnati to, like nothing its known for when it has a rich history, I know it was a joke, but its very telling of how the rest of the world views the place its a giant ???

I chuckled at the Cincinnati-Cleveland confusion.

 

But I agree with his sentiment. Pro sports owners in the United States collectively hold cities hostage to build new stadiums that include sweetheart deals where owners collect significant portions of the revenue. I've read competing economic analyses on whether or not it's worth it, but it would be nice if there were a way to force these billionaire owners to build their own new stadiums.

I chuckled at the Cincinnati-Cleveland confusion.

 

But I agree with his sentiment. Pro sports owners in the United States collectively hold cities hostage to build new stadiums that include sweetheart deals where owners collect significant portions of the revenue. I've read competing economic analyses on whether or not it's worth it, but it would be nice if there were a way to force these billionaire owners to build their own new stadiums.

 

Not until there is a memorandum of understanding (or even a legal agreement) between all cities, counties, and states in the country to not use public financing for stadiums. Cities can complain about it all they want, but as long as there is one other city out there willing to fork over public money to entice a team to relocate, it's going to continue being an issue.

It's funny that every team uses Los Angeles in their threats to relocate. If you aren't the Lakers you are completely irrelevant in that town. No football team in America would willingly move their team to LA.

Not until there is a memorandum of understanding (or even a legal agreement) between all cities, counties, and states in the country to not use public financing for stadiums. Cities can complain about it all they want, but as long as there is one other city out there willing to fork over public money to entice a team to relocate, it's going to continue being an issue.

 

Oh yeah, I absolutely agree, and I don't know if that's realistic. I can dream though, right?

 

As an aside, I'd be curious to find out just how much Canton/Stark County residents are going to ultimately end up forking over for the new stadium. The naming rights are going to an out-of-towner, but I think that locals will be footing most of the bill if I remember correctly.

 

Interesting to note, Tottenham Hotspurs of the English Premier League are building a fancy new stadium (which will also host two NFL games per year) and it appears that most of the funding for the project is private. I'd be curious to find out how common it is for stadiums for major sports in European countries to be built with public funds. My suspicion is that it's pretty rare and this is more of an American "tradition."

It's funny that every team uses Los Angeles in their threats to relocate. If you aren't the Lakers you are completely irrelevant in that town. No football team in America would willingly move their team to LA.

 

I don't know, I think any NFL team in Los Angeles would basically be a license to print money for the ownership. It's a gigantic market and even with a potentially apathetic local fanbase, there'd still be enough people to sell out and make a lot of money through television rights.

They're not stuck inside all winter watching TV like we are. It's like motorcycle racers complaining that motorcycle racing isn't on TV enough while spending all weekend riding or in the garage.

It's funny that every team uses Los Angeles in their threats to relocate. If you aren't the Lakers you are completely irrelevant in that town. No football team in America would willingly move their team to LA.

 

You clearly haven't been following football developments in LA. There are two separate stadium proposals on the table and two, possibly three teams who are promising/threatening to move here. I live in LA and don't care if we have football or not, but a lot of others want it.

I have heard that sports fanaticism in LA even for the  teams that are there is nothing compared to how it is in most cities.

It's funny that every team uses Los Angeles in their threats to relocate. If you aren't the Lakers you are completely irrelevant in that town. No football team in America would willingly move their team to LA.

 

You clearly haven't been following football developments in LA. There are two separate stadium proposals on the table and two, possibly three teams who are promising/threatening to move here. I live in LA and don't care if we have football or not, but a lot of others want it.

 

With LA, there was never a NFL venue. Build it and a franchise would do very well there. The 1 proposal is close to LAX, you can see the former racetrack

and Forum when flying in.

You clearly haven't been following football developments in LA. There are two separate stadium proposals on the table and two, possibly three teams who are promising/threatening to move here. I live in LA and don't care if we have football or not, but a lot of others want it.

 

Yes, I've followed the proposals. Wake me when one of them actually gets built. LA is being used for leverage to get a new stadium for the other cities.

They're not stuck inside all winter watching TV like we are. It's like motorcycle racers complaining that motorcycle racing isn't on TV enough while spending all weekend riding or in the garage.

 

There is also major traffic issues with a crowd that is not the blue collar variety that makes up most other NFL markets.  They aren't getting up at 6 am to drive to Pasadena and tailgate with their buddies from the steel mill.    They want to leave the house an hour before and be in their club seats.    That ain't happening in LA....

^There are plenty of blue collar people in LA, and if you've ever been to a USC game you'll know that tailgating is very popular there too.  Sports fanaticism in LA might be less than Chicago or Philadelphia, but I found the city to be pretty into sports when I lived there, or at least certain parts of the population.  Dodgers games (particularly in the outfield) are known to be pretty rowdy, but the die hards are mostly hispanic and a little overlooked compared to whatever celebrity might be sitting in the diamond seats beyond home plate.

You have to keep in mind the size of the LA market. Even if only 20% of the people in the LA CSA are "football fans," the number of people that includes is the entire population of the Cleveland/Akron CSA.

Part of the problem is that all numbers start to sound the same to most people once they begin to end in *illion.  Most people don't break it down further than that--it's worst at the federal level, where "trillion" and "billion" sound the same to too many lay ears.

 

What that means is that people lose sight of the difference between spending $100 million on a stadium and $500 million on a stadium.  Value City Arena cost about $110 million (around $150 million today).  Nationwide cost about $175 million ($240 million today), which is actually.  In return-on-equity terms, therefore, Nationwide needs to generate about 60% more economic benefits to generate the same ROI (and even more now because the various local governments put more money into it recently).  And Nationwide, even at 240 million 2015 dollars, would be considered a bargain-basement stadium by today's standards: many of these new stadiums have $500 million+ price tags.

 

Anticipated obsolescence also seems to have shrunk dramatically, given that replacement rate Oliver mentioned.  Huntington Park was a $70 million AAA stadium, but it replaced a stadium that had lasted since 1932 (though with some major renovations during its life, of course).  If Columbus gets 75 years out of Huntington Park, then I'd be quite comfortable calling that money well spent, but that's probably an unrealistic assumption.

^There are plenty of blue collar people in LA, and if you've ever been to a USC game you'll know that tailgating is very popular there too.  Sports fanaticism in LA might be less than Chicago or Philadelphia, but I found the city to be pretty into sports when I lived there, or at least certain parts of the population.  Dodgers games (particularly in the outfield) are known to be pretty rowdy, but the die hards are mostly hispanic and a little overlooked compared to whatever celebrity might be sitting in the diamond seats beyond home plate.

 

Definitely true--but the people the NFL are courting are not blue collar.  They need them club seat and suites revenue in LA to make the model work.  Those types of people won't sit in traffic for three hours to get to a stadium. 

If the stadium is in Inglewood, it isn't far from wealthy sections of Los Angeles.  If it's downtown, they're used to it (Dodger Stadium and Staples).

^There are plenty of blue collar people in LA, and if you've ever been to a USC game you'll know that tailgating is very popular there too.  Sports fanaticism in LA might be less than Chicago or Philadelphia, but I found the city to be pretty into sports when I lived there, or at least certain parts of the population.  Dodgers games (particularly in the outfield) are known to be pretty rowdy, but the die hards are mostly hispanic and a little overlooked compared to whatever celebrity might be sitting in the diamond seats beyond home plate.

 

Definitely true--but the people the NFL are courting are not blue collar.  They need them club seat and suites revenue in LA to make the model work.  Those types of people won't sit in traffic for three hours to get to a stadium. 

 

Is traffic that bad in LA on Sunday morning? NFL franchises rely on wealthy club suite buyers and joe 6 pack who buys the cheaper tickets.

^There are plenty of blue collar people in LA, and if you've ever been to a USC game you'll know that tailgating is very popular there too.  Sports fanaticism in LA might be less than Chicago or Philadelphia, but I found the city to be pretty into sports when I lived there, or at least certain parts of the population.  Dodgers games (particularly in the outfield) are known to be pretty rowdy, but the die hards are mostly hispanic and a little overlooked compared to whatever celebrity might be sitting in the diamond seats beyond home plate.

 

Definitely true--but the people the NFL are courting are not blue collar.  They need them club seat and suites revenue in LA to make the model work.  Those types of people won't sit in traffic for three hours to get to a stadium. 

 

Is traffic that bad in LA on Sunday morning? NFL franchises rely on wealthy club suite buyers and joe 6 pack who buys the cheaper tickets.

 

You can pretty much guarantee that an NFL game in Los Angeles, in a brand new facility, will have the most expensive average ticket in the league.    Will there be Joe 6 packs?  Of course!  Somewhere up in the nosebleeds.  Just like at the Lakers games. 

 

And won't this new franchise/NFL want to participate in the TV ratings bonanzas like Monday night football?  Gametime at 5:30 pm Pacific time?  In downtown LA?  Or Inglewood?  Cue the fear of Footballcarmageddon....

^ And there aren't major traffic issues getting to football games in Atlanta, Houston, Washington, etc??

...and New York, and Seattle, and Miami, and...

Everyone is missing my point.  It's not about the traffic, which, yes every city above has, but LA is still at the top of the heap.  It's about the people they need to support it.  The Hollywood and corporate elite are the ones who don't want to sit in traffic all day on Sunday when they can just watch it on TV.

Everyone is missing my point.  It's not about the traffic, which, yes every city above has, but LA is still at the top of the heap.  It's about the people they need to support it.  The Hollywood and corporate elite are the ones who don't want to sit in traffic all day on Sunday when they can just watch it on TV.

 

What evidence do you have to support that claim? If you look at a number of studies, you will find that LA does not always come up as #1 in most congested cities, and those cities that come in above it do just fine drawing people to their football stadiums. Plus, I'd venture to say the LA region has a higher number of "elites" than other metro areas, so even if a lower percentage of them have a desire to buy seats at the stadium, that still leaves a lot of people who may.

Everyone is missing my point.  It's not about the traffic, which, yes every city above has, but LA is still at the top of the heap.  It's about the people they need to support it.  The Hollywood and corporate elite are the ones who don't want to sit in traffic all day on Sunday when they can just watch it on TV.

 

You do realize these are the same Hollywood and corporate elites that willingly sit in traffic to head to an In-N-Out Burger on a random Wednesday evening, correct?  Los Angeles is used to traffic.  It isn't a deterrent for them going to a football game on a Sunday.

Everyone is missing my point.  It's not about the traffic, which, yes every city above has, but LA is still at the top of the heap.  It's about the people they need to support it.  The Hollywood and corporate elite are the ones who don't want to sit in traffic all day on Sunday when they can just watch it on TV.

 

What evidence do you have to support that claim? If you look at a number of studies, you will find that LA does not always come up as #1 in most congested cities, and those cities that come in above it do just fine drawing people to their football stadiums. Plus, I'd venture to say the LA region has a higher number of "elites" than other metro areas, so even if a lower percentage of them have a desire to buy seats at the stadium, that still leaves a lot of people who may.

 

Let's start with the history of the NFL in Los Angeles.  They last two teams left because they couldn't sell tickets and the games were always blacked out.    There are a host of reasons for this, but the underlying reasons probably remain.

 

And yes, you may cite traffic studies that may spread the traffic out over the LA metro, but I don't think there would be many on this forum who would disagree that LA doesn't have the nations worst traffic problem.  Do Seattle, Miami or Washington have events like Carmageddon or Obamajam making the national news a few times a year? 

 

 

Everyone is missing my point.  It's not about the traffic, which, yes every city above has, but LA is still at the top of the heap.  It's about the people they need to support it.  The Hollywood and corporate elite are the ones who don't want to sit in traffic all day on Sunday when they can just watch it on TV.

 

So traffic is bad on Sunday mornings, say 10:00 to 11:00 AM when people would be driving to the game? IDK I don't live there.

USC draws larger than NFL crowds all the time, so I think you're a little over concerned about the effect of traffic on attendance in LA.  As ColDay said, traffic is just part of the norm in LA, and you learn to deal with it.  I do think that USC and UCLA's football programs dilute the market for an NFL team, but there are enough people in So Cal to support just about anything.  I know several old time LA folks who really miss having the Raiders and Rams, and there is a long history of the NFL in LA.  Once they get their stadium situation figured out, the city will definitely have a team, maybe 2, and I suspect that they will be well supported.  You can make excuses for why people won't show up in just about any market-- who would go sit in the cold for 3 hours in Buffalo/Cleveland/Cincinnati, no one cares about football in Seattle, small market in Jacksonville, etc.  Winning (and somewhat marketing and local pride) puts butts in the seats.

Everyone is missing my point.  It's not about the traffic, which, yes every city above has, but LA is still at the top of the heap.  It's about the people they need to support it.  The Hollywood and corporate elite are the ones who don't want to sit in traffic all day on Sunday when they can just watch it on TV.

 

What evidence do you have to support that claim? If you look at a number of studies, you will find that LA does not always come up as #1 in most congested cities, and those cities that come in above it do just fine drawing people to their football stadiums. Plus, I'd venture to say the LA region has a higher number of "elites" than other metro areas, so even if a lower percentage of them have a desire to buy seats at the stadium, that still leaves a lot of people who may.

 

Let's start with the history of the NFL in Los Angeles.  They last two teams left because they couldn't sell tickets and the games were always blacked out.    There are a host of reasons for this, but the underlying reasons probably remain.

 

And yes, you may cite traffic studies that may spread the traffic out over the LA metro, but I don't think there would be many on this forum who would disagree that LA doesn't have the nations worst traffic problem.  Do Seattle, Miami or Washington have events like Carmageddon or Obamajam making the national news a few times a year? 

 

 

 

They played in the 100,000 seat plus Coliseum, and shared it for a while with the Raiders, which had no suites and premium seating......and really

few chairback seats. The Rams then moved to a baseball stadium in Anaheim. Riverfront, Three Rivers were better stadium options than what LA

had to offer back then.

USC draws larger than NFL crowds all the time, so I think you're a little over concerned about the effect of traffic on attendance in LA.  As ColDay said, traffic is just part of the norm in LA, and you learn to deal with it.  I do think that USC and UCLA's football programs dilute the market for an NFL team, but there are enough people in So Cal to support just about anything.  I know several old time LA folks who really miss having the Raiders and Rams, and there is a long history of the NFL in LA.  Once they get their stadium situation figured out, the city will definitely have a team, maybe 2, and I suspect that they will be well supported.  You can make excuses for why people won't show up in just about any market-- who would go sit in the cold for 3 hours in Buffalo/Cleveland/Cincinnati, no one cares about football in Seattle, small market in Jacksonville, etc.  Winning (and somewhat marketing and local pride) puts butts in the seats.

 

USC and UCLA both draw strong attendance #'s. Mora has UCLA back at a high level. Going to be a good rivalry again.

Everyone is missing my point.  It's not about the traffic, which, yes every city above has, but LA is still at the top of the heap.  It's about the people they need to support it.  The Hollywood and corporate elite are the ones who don't want to sit in traffic all day on Sunday when they can just watch it on TV.

 

So traffic is bad on Sunday mornings, say 10:00 to 11:00 AM when people would be driving to the game? IDK I don't live there.

 

Actually yes.  That's why LA is so insane.  There can be stop-and-go jams at 330am on a Wednesday.