MLS's Stadium Conundrum
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by user The Manly Ferry
The messy stadium situations affllicting MLS’s most threatened franchises - the Kansas City Wizards and Real Salt Lake (RSL) - continue to play out, albeit at drastically different tempos.
With RSL owner, Dave Checketts, “self-imposed” deadline for securing a soccer-specific stadium coming due Saturday, a last minute, political scramble has ensued in Salt Lake City, Utah. It spite of the participation of what one report dubs some of the state’s political heavyweights, the stumbling block remains the same: how to fund a stadium without reaching into a hotel-tax kitty? The intricacies of the funding formulae make sorting the odds on the deal tricky; Checketts, for his part, continues to talk some kind of “win-win” solution. But absent any apparent means to close the “funding gap” in any of the going proposals, one has to wonder when Plan B (other buyer in Utah) or Plan C (moving the team out of state) go operative.
August 14, when Checketts has promised an announcement seems likely.
The situation in Kansas City, which works only under a later, league-appointed deadline set for October, looks better - at least on paper. A new ownership group, which would buy the franchise from current owner Lamar Hunt, has three municipalities bidding against one another for the privilege of hosting the stadium: Olathe, Gardner, and De Soto - nearly all of them appearing to be in the same corner of Kansas City’s outskirts/suburbs. At the same time, working between the official directions to Arrowhead Stadium and a Yahoo! Map, it doesn’t appear they’re much further out than the Wizards’ current home. Not being a local, though, such things aren’t easy to judge.
That question of distance curls another wrinkle into the larger equation. Suburban locales take sporadic, yet regular abuse from both fans and pundits; the abuse ratchets higher when exurban locations enter the discussions. For instance, rumors that a Philadelphia franchise will relocate to suburban New Jersey sent USSoccerplayers.com’s Kevin McGeehan into fits of incredulity. Smack in the middle of that essay, he grounds his argument in current realities:
“There is no form of public transportation from Pennsylvania to that part of New Jersey. Don't have a car? Don't feel like driving? Too bad. By placing the team in New Jersey, you eliminate a large part of your fanbase that is unwilling or unable to get to the stadium. We've already seen in Dallas and Chicago what happens when a team moves away from its fans -- they stop coming. This is not rocket science.”
The famous formula - “If you build it, they will come” - has a pleasant simplicity to it, but will they come if they have to stew in their cars for two hours going both ways?
For all the relief that comes with MLS building homes for their teams - thereby capturing all streams of revenue, gaining control over scheduling, etc - that’s hardly enough to bring the story to a happy end. The question comes down to one of alternatives. Do MLS’s comparatively modest revenues force it either to the low-end within major markets (Vineyard, Utah anyone?) or to shift to minor markets exclusively? Rochester, New York, which is already in play in RSL’s situation (see Plan C above), serves as one long-time example, but there’s also a fetching proposal for a Milwaukee, Wisconsin franchise currently being organized by Peter Wilt, who was a major player in the Chicago Fire’s arrival in their Bridgeview, Illinois, stadium.
Between the two, Kansas City seems to have the more favorable scenario; whether that’s down to KC’s people playing a smarter hand or differing political realities in each market remains an open question. As potentially risky as plunking down expensive buildings in nowhere locations may be, however, that seems a wiser course than the obvious alternative - moving franchises (San Jose), or folding them outright (Tampa Bay and Miami, Florida). If MLS gains a reputation as being either rootless or somewhat mercenary, that would pose very real problems in what is, between the league and suitor cities, a buyer’s market. So, this space favors building the stadiums...though on the condition that the owners hold as many tractor pulls and garden shows as it takes to make these things break even.
Date
Thu 08/10/06, 10:36 am EST
