Back to the grind.
Go to either Google News or Twitter and do a search for redevelopment. You’ll find that a growing number of cities all over California are giving in and paying their ransom payments to keep their redevelopment agencies alive (of which funds are largely being diverted to local school districts). Last week Cupertino and Windsor joined the crowd. Still no word on how Oakland or San Jose will deal with their eight-figure payments, though as Lew Wolff said in the big interview, that’s more of a problem for Oakland than it is for San Jose. Still, San Jose would be more in the clear if they dealt with it properly, which may not happen depending on the outcome of its lawsuit. I have heard that the lawsuit is more a tactic to get the state and San Jose to negotiate more friendly payment terms. Whether or not that’s the case, the hearing for the lawsuit is scheduled a week from today. As for Oakland? Uh, there’s an article by the Trib’s Angela Woodall on her difficulty in getting recent records regarding the sale of properties at Jack London Square.
One more redevelopment white flag item: the head of the California Redevelopment Association, John Shirey, just took the Sacramento City Manager job. Regardless of the outcome of the lawsuit, Jerry Brown won this battle.
According to the L.A. Times, the Dodgers are expected to lose $27 million this year compared to 2009 revenue. Most of it comes from lost ticket sales and no-shows of already sold tickets. Out of Jim Peltz’s study of the numbers from the team’s bankruptcy filings, there are some mighty tasty gems.
- Per capita lost revenue from either an unsold ticket or no-show was $11.74. This is in keeping with estimates of $11-12 of post-ticket spending inside the ballpark per fan.
- Total revenue was $286 million. This included:
- $42.6 million from central revenue (national/international TV, radio, merchandise)
- $41.5 million from broadcasts
- $27 million from advertising promotions
- $25.5 million in concessions
- $20 million in suite revenue
- $11 million in parking
If you cut all of the figures in half save for central revenue, I’m guessing that you have a pretty good estimate of what the A’s get annually.
I don’t care much for the Rangers, but I like their fans’ efforts to get rid of the wave. I support this despite knowing the wave’s place in Coliseum lore.
This tweet from SI baseball writer Jon Heyman can’t be among the most reassuring:
Drove past marlins new park. Gorgeous stadium in eyesore neighborhood. Hope someone goes (no 1 at sun life today)
If you haven’t noticed, no one on the West Coast can hit.
At The Nation (via NPR), Field of Schemes’ Neil deMause argues for stadium subsidies to die. Surprisingly, there’s no mention of how that policy is already in place in California.
Considering I bring an iPad to games regularly, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the Angels partnering with T-Mobile to provide Android tablets for $10 a game. Since I attend 30 games a season, I would have practically paid for my tablet with all of the rental fees over the last two seasons.
Joe Audelo is an Oakland superfan.
newballpark.org 
re: banning the wave
“The Macarena went away, why won’t this?” Jimmy Kimmel, around 1999.
Can’t help but chime in on this Jon Heyman comment. This guy has some nerve. What does “eyesore neighborhood” mean? Does it mean that he finds the nearby building aesthetically unappealing? Does it mean that he perceives it to be an unsafe place? Does the Bronx qualify as an “eyesore neighborhood”? What about the South Side of Chicago? This is a stupid irrelevant statement. Tweets can be reckless. As for “i hope someone goes”. Yea me too. The City and County Boards forced the stadium on the taxpayers who did not want it. I’d hate to see it end up as a waste of money. Lastly as for it being a “beautiful park”, in the context of the neighborhood it is not. Sure nice park, but it is misplaced.
PS – I am from Miami. Not sure where Heyman is from.
Is parking included in the unsold ticket lost revenue?
@gojohn10 – No, it’s entirely in-stadium.
That crack by Heyman is exactly why I can’t stand the NY-based sports media – what an ass! The area around AT&T Park was not exactly Central Park West when that ballpark was being built.
My wife doesn’t understand by contempt for the wave. Losing by seven and the home crowd is doing the wave drives me crazy.
Jerry Brown is “rat bastard” and I cannot believe he is Governor “again”.
He is raiding these redevelopment agencies that create jobs for their cities that allow them to use the subsequent property tax revenue for future projects.
Forget ballparks for one second here…..I am talking about how San Jose was able to retain Cisco Systems and Sanmina-SCI. How did they do that? With the use of redevelopment funds they were able to get creative and help these 2 major corporations build their Worldwide HQs in the city.
On top of the property taxes the taxes in general from these businesses themselves are huge. I am not against funding schools and what not but the school system is poorly run and needs major re-organization from the top to bottom…..Without that we will just spill money down into a “black hole” and just give teachers more of an excuse to not work and build up their pensions which I do not agree they deserve at all.
I work in Hi-Tech, do I get a pension? No way, what a colossal waste of taxpayer $$ to give k-12 teachers pensions that people like myself have to pay out of our tax dollars.
This plus the fact the State themselves won’t make the necessary cuts from their General Fund budgets and instead go after funds that are not in their direct grasp.
The State officials don’t want to cut their spending, salaries, pensions, or benefits but want to rob the local governments of their right to job creation and city development.
Unbelievable that guy Jerry Brown is….But most A’s fans agree he is a “rat” from his days in Oakland.
EZ Sid, my wife is a high school teacher. Theres lots to debate on that topic.Let’s just keep this about baseball bro 🙂
@Sid – you are throwing a lot of different things out there. I’m no fan of Moonbeam. But don’t get “mad” at Public School Teachers. We do not get paid enough for what we do. I would be happy to discuss doubling the pay rate in exchange for dismantling the State Teacher Retirement System (STRS).
Yes, as the child of two NYC Public School teachers, I can attest to what Sid is talking about. Why, there are times when I can’t even get a hold of my mom and dad because the cell reception on their 100-foot twin yachts has gone out, or the phalanx of servants they have on hand to wait on their every whim is slacking again… so hard to get good help these days. I mean, it’s awful… the only time I ever get to see either of my parents is when they fly in on their matching private Lear jets — you know the ones, they come equipped with sets of high-powered binoculars at every window seat so the opulent occupants can look down upon the little people from 35,000 feet. Thank god they were able to build themselves a private landing strip at the Hayward Airport or who knows what would happen… they might have to charter me my own jet to head out to NY to come visit them in their matching, 1,000 acre spreads in the Hamptons that they garnered whilst sitting in the classroom with their feet up, reading the newspaper all those years. Thankfully they are able to snag me the penthouse suites at the Plaza Hotel on Central Park South or who knows where I’d stay? Lucky my parents were able to snooker the City of New York and all those taxpayers out of those untold, flowing riches or I might not to be able to afford this caviar cheesecake I am noshing on before meeting Tiger for a round on the links at 6pm.
The St Paul Saints officially made their stadium a “No Wave Zone” years ago. There’s signs at the entrances and everything. Sit down and watch the pig bring balls to the ump!
I’ve never been much of of a Wave fan but was part of history in that playoff game in 1981 against the Yanks on National TV where Krazy George first got the wave going. We were all freaking out, like what is he trying to do here and then we all caught on, and it went around and around and around and it was a big hit. The kids loved it back then and still do now. If that will keep them going back to the park and have a good time, I don’t have a problem with it.
The wave says the game alone is not entertaining enough. And when “fans” do it when the team is losing, it says they really aren’t bothered all that much by what’s happening on the field, court, ice. In which case they should stay home and do the wave in their living rooms.
The wave was cool – 30 years ago. Now, I would prefer it be critically damped out of existence.
I would be awfully surprised if the A’s realized $10 million in suite sales.
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The wave is wretched. The fact is was created at the Coli is the single most embarrassing thing about being an A’s fan.
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I was at a Warriors playoff game a couple years ago, and the crowd started doing the wave WITH ONE OF THE WARRIORS PLAYERS SHOOTING FOUL SHOTS. That was when I knew the supposedly great Warriors’ crowd had officially jumped the shark.
its all about tradition—-the wave is awesome when you got 110,000 people in the stands…and they speed it up, slow it down, reverse it…. Big 10 football is great—Go Nittany Lions—
Wikipedia says the wave was first done at Pacific Lutheran University in the 1960s. Places such as the 1976 Montreal Olympics and U of Washington also have laid claim to it. I remember somebody trying to get one going at a Genesis concert I was at at Giants Stadium – that was in 1987.It’s long past its time to go. We should have waved bye bye to the wave a long time ago.
@bartleby–yeah, the wave kind of sucks, but Give Krazy George some credit there. He’s a Coliseum icon, and we should cherish him like Banjo Guy, MC Hammer and Mrs. Fields.
Check out Mrs. Fields back in the day.
JOE AUDELO – OAKLAND A’S/RAIDERS “SUPER FAN” – Tribune article
This is a very positive article from one very dedicated A’s fan and Raiders fan. I hope this will see the light of day on this blog.
[Ed. – This was added to the post shortly after you had sent it to me. I’m not sure why you persist on thinking there’s some grand censorship scheme here. There isn’t. Article clipped due to obvious copyright violation.]
@A’sObserver…
Good article..but it was posted in the main blog. no need to copy paste in comments.
There is one basic that stands out with the building of the new Marlins ballpark and that of the one built for the Twins in Minneapolis. There was no public vote for either ballpark. That being said the people in Minnesota couldn’t be more happier with Target Field. The renderings for the new Miami ballpark are fantastic and that will sell plenty of tickets despite the Marlins being a so so team. As far as the neighborhood goes well the city of Miami gave the Marlins what it considered to be a fair allotment of land for the stadium and the parking garages. The team couldn’t ,or wouldn’t, get a better placement to put the park from the city.
Neil deMause’s call for stadium subsidies to end is echoed by political conservatives everywhere as well as from liberals like those that read “The Nation”. In the current political and economic climate of the US these days such a call is kind of out of date. Not like anyone is going to get a public facility build unless they put in some of their own money into the project.
I disagree. Calls for public subsidies to end make total sense simply because no money exists.
@Dinosaur Jr: I never said that public subsidies should continue. I said that deMause’s stand is dated because of the political climate from politicians ,state and local whichever being the case, and the bad economy has already made it so. Whomever needs a new facility must meet the standards set by the state or the city they are in , more than likely face a public vote, or build the stadium/ballpark/arena on their own.
OT: I just heard on ESPN that David Stern said that the owners and players were open to contracting teams to make a deal. He hoped that it wouldn’t come to that. Looks like you squelch that Ellison/Hornets to SJ rumor.