Category Archives: Athletics

05.22.11
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The Neukom Doctrine

In the mid-90’s, Microsoft was at the top of the world. With unmitigated dominance over the computer operating system market, smaller competitors were crying foul as Microsoft used its stature to enter new markets and take them over. Often MSFT did this by bundling features into Windows for free, such as its Internet Explorer browser. This strategy was called “embrace and extend” though it really meant “embrace, extend and extinguish” to competitors, as Microsoft frequently added features that would lock out competitors.

Giants managing partner Bill Neukom is no stranger to this strategy, as he defended Microsoft’s practice of it during his tenure as general counsel until he left the company in 2002. Initially he and Microsoft lost the landmark antitrust case against the Department of Justice in 1999, only to have the decision overturned by an appellate court. The company and the government eventually settled out of court, which allowed the company to stay intact (DoJ was seeking to break it up). Historically, the decision for Microsoft is viewed as a somewhat pyrrhic victory, as it has struggled to innovate in the face of Google, Apple, and smaller upstarts over the past decade, resulting in flat stock performance during that period.

By building AT&T Park, Peter Magowan initiated his own form of “embrace and extend” with the fanbase by choosing a more attractable, accessible location for the Giants than the windy, transit-poor Candlestick Park. Suddenly it became much easier to bring in fans from throughout the city proper, plus well-heeled fans in Marin County (via ferry) and the Peninsula (via train). The Giants got the added bonus of tons of fans coming from the East Bay via ferry and BART. Many of those fans were ex-SF residents who moved out to warmer, cheaper suburbs like Concord and Pleasanton. In doing so, they struck at a huge part of the A’s East Bay fanbase, and while many of the hardcore A’s fans would stay allied with Oakland, the A’s lost one very important demographic: Giants fans who could frequently go to A’s games as a more accessible substitute.

Since then-A’s-owner Steve Schott couldn’t object based on the fact that the Giants were building within city limits, all he could do was to deal with it and look to improve the A’s stadium situation, which he tried with Lew Wolff at the HomeBase site and in Santa Clara. The former was declined by Coliseum officials, the latter by Santa Clara officials when rumors of Schott wanting to sell arose. Schott also infamously didn’t show for a presentation on Oakland’s Uptown site, which is the very least he should’ve done – even though Jerry Brown was never going to let an Uptown ballpark happen on his watch.

Neukom further extended Magowan’s strategy by acquiring the San Jose Giants. He also had the World Series trophy paraded all over the East Bay – though not Oakland, obviously. Now, he’s preparing to make an interesting choice regarding the Giants’ future.

Since the beginning of his tenure as managing partner, Neukom has been steadfast about the Giants’ territorial rights to Santa Clara County. The argument goes that the value of those rights was baked into the financing of AT&T Park, which means they’re also baked into the franchise’s value. As such, they’re sacrosanct and not up for negotiation. Naturally, being steadfast is not the only option that he has since Bud Selig may choose to nudge him in one direction or another. With that in mind, it appears that Neukom and the rest of his ownership group have three distinct options moving forward.

  • Don’t budge, let the A’s leave the Bay Area. The Giants have said publicly that they “hope” that the A’s are able to work out a ballpark deal in the East Bay, since it would respect the existing six-counties-to-two distribution of territories in the Bay Area. Secretly, they have to be hoping the A’s fail completely in the Bay Area and are forced to look elsewhere. The only really advanced threat of building in either Alameda or Contra Costa Counties was when Pacific Commons was in the planning stages. It concerned Magowan and Giants President Larry Baer enough that they scouted the location to see how close it was to Santa Clara County. With Fremont a bust and many outside Oakland skeptical that a privately financed ballpark deal can be done in Oakland, the Giants have to be licking their chops at the thought of a Bay Area completely to themselves. While there don’t appear to be any good relocation markets for the A’s at the moment, there’s no certainty that will remain so five or ten years down the road. Should the A’s leave the Bay Area, they would be compensated by the Giants for ceding the East Bay. The interesting thing about such a transaction is that like the Giants ceding Santa Clara County, it would place a price tag on a territory. If the argument among the big market teams is that they don’t want to see such a precedent, then they don’t want either outcome to happen. Strange, huh? It would get even more complex if the A’s were to move to Sacramento as Baer has suggested, because the A’s could lobby MLB hard to split up Northern California to gain exclusivity over much of the region up to the Oregon border and Northern Nevada, the same way Warriors and Kings TV territories are split. The split would be damaging to the the value of the Giants’ TV rights since they’d give up millions of households every game. The result is ultimate dominance over the Bay Area for the Giants, but a huge loss throughout their broader territory. From a bottom line revenues standpoint, it’s hard to say how much this helps the Giants. If the A’s move out of state, the Giants pay nine figures upfront. If the A’s move to Sacramento, the Giants lose money on an annual basis. There have been rumors about the the Giants being willing to pay off the A’s to leave, so it’s not like both teams haven’t thought about it.
  • Don’t budge, keep status quo. This option assumes many events occurring in sequence. First, Lew Wolff (or whoever the owner is if Wolff sells) would have to stay in the Coliseum several more years past the existing end of the lease while working out the details of a ballpark in Oakland. It also assumes that MLB absolutely believes that a privately financed ballpark deal can be and is being done in Oakland. The Giants would be fine with this as it maintains regional hegemony. It might not work quite as well for MLB. If the A’s have trouble filling the ballpark due to poor performance, high priced tickets, or both, the A’s will have an extremely bad debt position for MLB to deal with. As long as the A’s struggle (whether in old or new digs), the Giants will continue to essentially pay part of their revenue sharing payment directly across the Bay to the A’s, which could be $20 million or more in coming years. Remember that the Bay Area is the only market where one team effectively subsidizes the other. That’s another situation that has to give MLB and Giants ownership pause.
  • Allow the A’s to move to San Jose. Again, Neukom has been steadfast about not allowing this. How bad would the Giants be damaged? Once you remove TV money and other Bay Area local revenue, I figure that Santa Clara County alone is worth at least $25 million per year in revenue to the Giants (back of napkin guess). That’s a lot. That pays off AT&T Park all by itself and then some. Neukom’s argument is that they’d lose that revenue. Wolff and South Bay proponents counter that hardcore Giants fans will remain that way and the Giants’ losses won’t be so deep. In particular, Wolff has argued that the league should look at compensation for T-rights on an annual basis, where a threshold is set and the A’s pay for the gap that doesn’t meet that threshold. Whatever the compensation model, I don’t think the Giants would lose $25 million annually. They’d probably lose 50% of that number since many of the fans are casual and both fans and sponsors can be replaced by East Bay fans. Years ago Magowan floated a number like $100 million for Santa Clara County, while Roger Noll estimates that the actual value is around to $20-30 million. If you’re Neukom and his partners, how do you attack this? A one-time payoff, even $100 million, dissipates within 7-10 years and doesn’t do much for franchise value (currently $563 million). Noll’s number is a mere pittance to them. Even if the A’s come off revenue sharing, it doesn’t mean the Giants won’t stop paying in – they most assuredly will continue to pay, though a few million less every year. The best thing for them may be to simply shut up. But that sets up the possibility that Selig will name the price for them.

No matter what Neukom decides, it looks like he’ll have to pay. He either keeps paying to keep the A’s in their stadium rut, he pays them to leave, or he gets less revenue if he cedes the South Bay. With the aura of the World Series and record revenues pouring in, such a possibility seems extremely remote. When the time comes to figure out how all of this should work out, that glow will be the furthest thing from his mind. By no means am I sympathetic to either Neukom or Selig for dragging this out for more than two years, but this is a thumbnail sketch of the dilemma and it took 1,600 words. What price hegemony? It’s definitely not cheap. Or easy.

05.20.11
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News for 5/21/11 (Rapture Day)

KNBR update man Dan Dibley announced Friday that he was leaving the station for 95.7 Sports Radio, where it appears he will have similar (perhaps expanded) duties. He’s a quality guy who’s from the Bay Area and knows the local sports scene (including the Quakes), which for KBWF is half the battle.

Speaking of 95.7, does anyone know where Chris Townsend is? His Twitter feed has been silent for 24 hours. Maybe he’s just getting a day or weekend off. He has worked pretty much every day without a break since the station switched formats on Opening Day, so he deserves a rest. I hope everything’s alright otherwise.

Marcos Breton and Ann Killion both have profiles of the A’s as the team labors in in relative anonymity across the Bay from the World Champs. Such is life.

San Jose’s redevelopment king, Harry Mavrogenes, announced that he’s stepping down in a month. SJRA has been cutting staff and running on fumes for a year now, making Mavrogenes’ departure more symbolic than anything. The agency has been dying for a while, and for better or worse, will never be the same. With land acquisition and development powers transferred to the San Jose Diridon Development Authority (of which Mavrogenes was a signatory), his capacity as SJRA head was no longer needed to finish the ballpark work.

Did you know that the headquarters of Family Radio (whose leader Harold Camping is predicting The Rapture on Saturday) is on Hegenberger, just across the Nimitz from the Coliseum? There is a tangential relation to the A’s besides proximity. Family Radio bought KFRC-610 from CBS in 2005, creating a very uncomfortable combination of God talk and A’s talk/games during the 2005 season.

SFGate/Chronicle blogger Peter Hartlaub has a couple of great posts showing what BART could’ve been like if vision didn’t give way to politics and construction photos including the Transbay Tube.

Jamie McCourt wants an immediate sale of the Dodgers so that she can cash out while she can. Which would be awesome for Dodgers fans who want to turn the page, A’s fans who want the team taken off the backburner, and pretty much everyone else except for Angels and Giants fans who are experiencing some deep schadenfreude.

The athletic facilities at Stanford are going to turn into one gigantic WiFi hotspot, thanks to AT&T. You know, it’d be nice if Verizon did the same for the Coliseum, seeing as they’re the telecom sponsor there.

Added 5/21 9:30 AM- John Fisher has to be taking it in the shorts this weekend as the GAP dove 17% in trading yesterday after it reset annual earnings expectations down 22%.

05.18.11
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Wall Street Journal piece explains everything you already know

Tomorrow’s Wall Street Journal more-or-less has an article by the paper’s Silicon Valley reporter, John Letzing, that resets all of the current, relevant information about the San Jose’s ballpark pursuit.

The takeaways are these:

  • Lew Wolff declined to comment, deferring instead to A’s broadcasting veep Ken Pries.
  • Giants spokesperson Staci Slaughter likewise refrained from comment on territorial rights.
  • Oakland’s Dan Lindheim gave his brief statement in support of keeping the A’s, then declined further comment.
  • Pries, for his part, said Wolff may not be willing to fund construction of a ballpark in Oakland.
  • Longtime ballpark opponent Marc Morris thinks there are better uses for ballpark project money.

Then there’s this, which was sourced from San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed’s letter from Monday:

Last week, San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed wrote to Mr. Selig, noting that seven years had passed since the A’s first considered moving to San Jose and added: “Despite your lengthy deliberative process, success is still achievable,” according to a copy of the letter Mr. Reed released.

Remember that Wolff joined the A’s in the venue development capacity in 2003, then exercised an option to buy the team in 2005. Also remember that then-Mayor Ron Gonzales made his ill-fated pitch at spring training in front of Phoenix Muni in March 2005. I even started this blog in March 2005. Obviously, something’s up with that, right?

Well, no.

Wolff’s job from 2003 until 2009 was to search all over the East Bay, including Oakland and Fremont. That he did, though the veracity with which he did his search will always be up for debate. If Gonzales came calling in 2004 or 2005, Wolff could take the call but he couldn’t work out any details, just as Wolff and Reed can’t do now. Back in 2004, Diridon was not the preferred site. In fact, it was considered one of the most difficult sites to make work simply because it had multiple owners, so it required multiple negotiations to acquire the entire site. The possibility or relocating the PG&E substation was also considered problematic. Territorial rights perhaps moreso. If someone’s looking for some great pipedream involving Wolff and Diridon – it wasn’t there.

However, there is absolutely nothing wrong with keeping San Jose a fallback option. Any businessman worth his salt would. As 2005 became 2006 and so on, Wolff focused on Fremont instead of Oakland because of the difficulty doing the land deal at Coliseum North – again, related to potentially complex negotiations with multiple landowners instead of one. When the economic collapse killed the major tenets of the Pacific Commons deal, Wolff went to Warm Springs and met a ton of hostility there. Knowing that he’d have to figure out a more “sure thing” in terms of financing a ballpark, he went to San Jose.

The thing I continually puzzle over is this obsession with Wolff’s intent, whether it was in 2003, 2005, 2009, or now. All I know is that Wolff’s intent is to build a ballpark. He was willing to forego San Jose if he could get cheap land and a financing mechanism in place in Fremont or Oakland. That blew up and he had to adapt. If he’s wrong in his assessment that it can’t be done in Oakland, Selig and his committee should able to prove Oakland’s economic fitness. If not, San Jose should not be dismissed. It’s much, much too late in this saga to worry which city’s first, and whose citizens are being offended. It’s time to lay cards on the table. If Wolff’s bluffing, we’ll know. If either Oakland’s or San Jose’s hand is a loser, we’ll know. Like Wolff, I’d rather get a decision than hang in the ether for years. Because when that decision comes we can focus on whatever gets built, whenever that is. And we can start healing the rift that has created by this whole mess.

Added 8:42 PM – At San Jose Inside, Josh Koehn considers the impact of San Jose putting Mayor Reed’s pension reform measure and a ballpark measure on the same ballot.

Added 5/19 10:30 AM – Dave Newhouse wrote about what happened after Andy Dolich’s email was hacked. (Interestingly, I got one of those emails too but recognized it as a Nigerian prince-type scam immediately so I deleted it.) Dolich maintains that the solution for the A’s (and Raiders/49ers) is at the Coliseum, whereas San Jose would be too costly due to T-rights and Victory Court doesn’t have the funding to get it done.

05.18.11
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Blame it on the rain

Lately baseball writers have been looking far and wide to figure out what is keeping fans away from ballparks this year. Poor weather is the most often blamed culprit, thanks to 30-and-counting rainouts this season, 9 more than the entire total in 2010. Frank McCourt is also shouldering much of the blame, since the malaise hovering over the Dodgers is driving fans away from Chavez Ravine. Worse, the optics of ballparks with much worse (unannounced) turnstile counts than ticket sales makes the problem that much more apparent.

MLB isn’t alone in this regard. The NFL posted two straight annual attendance declines before bouncing back last year. NBA attendance has been flagging while the NHL has surged post-lockout. With the economy still spotty in many places, on-site pro sports consumption is considered something of a luxury for many consumers, making long-term commitments a tough sell in tough times.

We’re just past the quarter pole of the season, so I figured it was a good time to take a look at this. I’ve sampled off attendance statistics throughout the league, cutting off the last two seasons at May 20, 2010 and yesterday, respectively. The high number of rainouts this year and the generally irregular nature of the schedule makes it difficult to get a completely even comparison, so this was as close as I could get. While the Dodgers are the obvious trending team, when you look at the table below you might see something different.

Gains for last year’s two World Series participants, Texas and San Francisco, have more than made up for the Dodgers’ decline. In fact, the top five gainers have surpassed the losses incurred by the top five losers. Yet league attendance has gone down nearly 1% per game. The Dodgers are part of the economic foundation of the league, and once McCourt is rightfully ousted and a another owner enters the picture, the team’s attendance will be well on its way to recovery. So what’s the real problem?

If anything, the problem is the number of no-shows. Only the league and the teams know the actual number of people entering each stadium. If the announced crowd is double that of the actual number of people who show up, that could add up hundreds of thousands lost each game in terms of concessions and merchandise revenue. Take the A’s, for instance. The last two crowds were announced to be over 10,000, even though it was abundantly clear that far less than 10,000 were present. 5,000 no-shows x $10 per fan spent = $50,000. The A’s are used to this, so they staff accordingly for it and make it up on the back end thanks to revenue sharing. On the other hand, the Dodgers might have as many as 20,000 no-shows for a home date. 20,000 no-shows x $10 per fan spent = $200,000, and that might be conservative. Get 50 home dates like that, and suddenly the Dodgers have lost $10 million over the course of the season. If there’s anything that should provide impetus for Bud Selig to act on getting the Dodgers settled ASAP, that’s it.

As for the weather, that’s going to remain a tricky issue as the season progresses. The May 11 A’s-Rangers rainout had only one realistic makeup date thanks to complexities within the schedule. That date was July 7, which was confirmed earlier this week. Since teams can’t play more than 20 dates in a row and off days are scheduled to prevent that, putting a makeup date in one of those late season off days creates a risk of playing that kind of really long streak. The unbalanced schedule doesn’t help either because there’s no guarantee that one team will play an interdivisional opponent late in the season in a way that a makeup game can be accommodated. Worse, rainouts that are made up the following day as part of a doubleheader aren’t counted as part of attendance, which makes them a net loss on their own. Teams in the Midwest and East Coast are going so far as to preemptively postpone games, with upset fans reporting that the actual conditions at the cancelled game time weren’t as bad as feared.

We could run into a situation in which this season, which is to end on a Wednesday (September 28), may be strung out one or two days later to properly account for all teams in contention fulfilling a 162-game schedule. That would incredibly ironic because this season started on March 31/April 1 to ensure that the regular season part ended early and the postseason wouldn’t stretch too far into November. Looks like Selig and the competition committee might run into a solution for the rainouts that doesn’t solve their postseason problem. Maybe Selig is looking forward to a prolonged NFL lockout, which would cause MLB to be the only major pro sport on broadcast TV come November (NBA/NHL are relegated to cable then, and the NBA may also be in a lockout).

05.13.11
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Wolff on Monty Show interview is up (updated with notes)

If you didn’t get a chance to listen to Lew Wolff on The Monty Show at 8, the good people at Sports Radio 95.7 got the MP3 version out in a hurry. Download it and give it a listen. Then come back here and comment away.

My thoughts:

I think we actually got some new insight into how MLB’s panel is operating. Wolff said that the committee hasn’t contacted him about Victory Court or any other Oakland option. Combine that with the zero communication between Wolff and the City of Oakland, and it has me wondering if the committee is supposed to be keeping everyone at arms length. While Victory Court is being evaluated and the EIR process is happening (note the updated counter on the right) any additional talks among the parties would be premature at best. Wolff is only going to act based on the panel’s recommendations and Selig’s actions. I don’t think that’s the way this should be progressing, but that appears to be the game.

As Jeffrey pointed out, the panel is looking at financing, which is the make-or-break issue for Oakland. Oakland can minimize site and infrastructure costs by reducing footprint (and needed parcel buys) and limiting new parking construction cost, both of which have been done in San Jose. I figure panel is not going to recommend that Wolff builds at Victory Court unless the financing pencils out, because MLB is not going to put a team’s ownership in a bad debt position just to satiate local critics. For reasons explained previously, it’s a bad assumption to think that the money in San Jose is easily transferable to Oakland.

Undoubtedly, the ongoing redevelopment saga will factor in. If SB 286 passes and both Oakland and San Jose require votes for their stadium projects, how would that affect the panel’s perspective? Adding a vote requirement complicate the timeline for Oakland, since it’s not a given that they’ll be able to line up EIR certification and ballot deadline perfectly. Consider the following timeline:

  • SB 286 passes and is signed into law by Governor Brown (as opposed to scrapping redevelopment altogether) this June.
  • Victory Court Draft EIR emerges, also in June. (hypothetical date)
  • 60-day review and comment period puts us in August.
  • EIR staff takes another 3 months to respond to questions and comments. That puts us in November.
  • Final EIR is distributed in December.
  • Final EIR comment period is 45-60 days, puts us at February 2012.
  • Currently the 2012 primary is scheduled for February 7, though a bill (AB 80) is working its way through the legislature that might push the date back to June. If it passes, Oakland could get its vote in June. If not, November or a special election/vote-by-mail.
  • That puts a Victory Court opening day at 2016 unless Oakland is simultaneously doing additional site acquisition, which Mayor Quan has indicated they aren’t. It also messes with the Raiders’ new Coliseum project because the A’s would have to play at the current Coliseum through 2015. The Raiders’ stadium would also require its own vote. Now that’s tangled.

The redevelopment stuff wasn’t discussed in the Wolff interview, but it may provide insight into how the panel is doing its work. As long as these pieces keep moving and the earth shifts, it’s going to be hard to make a decision until everything settles.

Sidebar: Wolff started the interview by plugging the film Jews and Baseball: An American Love Story, which is playing as part of the Silicon Valley Jewish Film Festival. The film will play at the Camera 3 theater at 7 PM. After the showing there will be panel with Wolff, retired player Shawn Green, and A’s play-by-play man Ken Korach as the moderator.

05.02.11
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48 hours and a bobblehead

On Saturday I sat in section 130. This was the crowd during the game.

For today’s game I sat in my regular Value Deck seat in section 317. This was the crowd as the A’s took the field just before first pitch.

The announced paid crowd was 9,193, easily the smallest crowd of the season so far. The actual number of in-house attendees may have been as few as half that number. The unusual wraparound series configuration and the 12:35 getaway day start time both conspired to depress attendance for today’s tilt. It also didn’t help that unlike the previous three games in the series, there were zero promotional ties or giveaways for this game.

I fear that this upcoming Cleveland series will also fare poorly in terms of attendance. A friend from NYC is in town on business this week, and I got two $2 seats for Wednesday’s game. The game was not on my original schedule, and I have no idea if we’ll actually be able to go. Still, it was just a $4 expenditure at the box office, so no big deal, right? (Note: Plenty of $2 tickets remain for Wednesday night.) That absurdly high availability and cheapness of A’s tickets is a double-edged sword. It’s great for those of us who want to go at a moment’s notice. It’s not great for the A’s and it definitely doesn’t impress MLB.

As much as I want a beautiful new ballpark for the A’s, I’ll miss the “no big deal” accessibility of the A’s and the Coliseum right now. Actually, no I won’t. As amusing as it was to hear Grant Balfour swear (yeah, everyone heard it) after missing his spot on yet another pitch, I’d rather have a bigger crowd. And frankly, we shouldn’t need bobbleheads to get people to come out – many of whom only show up to get the swag and leave.

One thing I saw in the stands gave me a little hope. An (East) Indian man and his young son sat a row below me. They were immigrants. The son was wearing a rugby shirt. The kid loved baseball. His dad was doing his best to stay interested. The kid watched every pitch and was with the wedding-white-clad warriors the whole way. After Godzilla’s walkoff blast, I ran down the aisle and high-fived the father and son and everyone else within reach, which wasn’t a big deal because there were only eight people in the vicinity. I don’t know how the boy started loving the game, I just love how he and has were trying. Despite the lack of a crowd or a roster full of stars, we got a new fan. Hopefully for life. Hopefully, a lot more just like him soon.

04.28.11
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News for 4/28/11

It would appear that new Coliseum naming rights holder Overstock.com is the snake to current signage/broadcast sponsor and hedge fund Kingsford Capital’s mongoose. Or vice-versa. Weird.

The 49ers made two big announcements yesterday. They brought in mega-agency CAA to handle its naming rights search. That comes after Santa Clara authorized the team to start selling said naming rights. The 49ers also hired former Facebook and YouTube CFO Gideon Yu to become its Chief Strategy Officer. Yu may have been bored working at venture capital firm Khosla Ventures. You know how in the past I wrote wondering how the 49ers were going to finance the Santa Clara stadium? Well, this hiring proves that there’s some truth to it, and Tim Kawakami agrees. The Yorks are having to search far and wide, looking into perhaps novel or unexplored revenue streams to pay for the stadium. For Santa Clara taxpayers’ sakes, I hope they hit a vein of gold (preferably not on their uniforms).

It’s a bad time for online security. Sony’s PlayStation Network was severely breached last week and is still down for rebuilding. Now according to Deadspin, the New York Yankees accidentally leaked a file containing the names of 20,000 season ticket and plan holders. No credit card info was in the file, but plenty of personal information was. It didn’t get everyone, though. The suiteholders and high rollers in the really expensive (and often empty) club seats were not affected. It’s good to be the king. Also, the number of tickets sold (2.1 million) and revenue pulled in just for the non-premium sections ($131 million) are absolutely staggering.

Speaking of staggering, Frank McCourt visited New York to lobby Bud Selig to approve his own personal TARP bailout by Fox. The plan, which would have included $300 million upfront that would have gone straight into team equity, was not approved by the commissioner. That prompted McCourt to hold a 30-minute press conference in which he railed on Selig, calling his actions “un-American.” Listen to the audio. There are some serious theatre of the absurd elements. I thought it was all quite entertaining until I realized that the slow legal process that will tie up MLB and the Dodgers for the next two years will cause Selig to extend his term yet again, probably through 2013-14. I was instantly depressed.

Escondido’s AAA ballpark plan for the Padres may turn into a tech business park if Mayor Sam Abed has his way. Now that was quick.

Doctors are trying to reduce medication to Bryan Stow so that he can emerge out of his coma. #rootingforhim

Two different visions for old deflated domes:

  • The H.H.H. Metrodome is quickly getting its roof repaired. The new roof by Birdair won’t end Zygi Wilf’s quest for a new Vikings Stadium. It will be there in time for the Vikings’ 2011 season, assuming that the league starts on time. The replacement is being paid for by the stadium’s insurance, so there’s no new public cost.
  • B.C. Place in Vancouver is getting a unique cable-supported retractable roof built on top of the existing stadium, replacing the original roof. Construction of the roof and related improvements started shortly after last year’s Winter Olympics, with the price tag rising from $350 million to $458 million and now $563 million. The remodeled, reroofed venue will be home to both the B.C. Lions CFL team and the Vancouver Whitecaps MLS team.

Google Earth rendering of the new B.C. Place. Next to it is Rogers Arena.

More news today as it gets reported.

Added 11:40 AM – BART is workshopping different types of seats for its trains. The agency was prompted in response to rising cleaning costs for the fabric covers on the existing seats. They’re also playing around with narrower seats with less legroom, which I’m sure is a crowd pleaser. This change follows a switch from carpeted floors to rubberized floors, which is ongoing. Personally, I think wide and tall vinyl seats, such as those used on Caltrain’s Baby Bullet cars, would work well.

04.21.11
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A’s and Dodgers could be tangled up after all

The McCourt-Dodgers meltdown could have an unusual and for-now unmeasurable impact on the A’s depending on one decision: Who will be brought in to oversee the team now that MLB has seized it? According to ESPNLA’s Tony Jackson, the shortlist has three candidates:

  • Stan Kasten, former Nats president
  • John McHale, Jr., executive VP within MLB
  • Corey Busch, frequent MLB committee member and former team exec

Yes, that’s the same Corey Busch who’s on the A’s stadium panel with Irwin Raij and Bob Starkey. Busch has been all over the West Coast with his baseball involvement, including a key role in the ownership transition between Fox and the McCourts. Supposedly Busch was to stay on after the transition to become the Dodgers’ team president, but the job was offered to then-Red Sox front office man Mike Dee. Dee declined the position, got a raise, and eventually moved on to the Miami Dolphins in 2009. In 2005, Jamie McCourt became team president and executive VP. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was around the time the downward debt spiral began in earnest.

The commissioner’s appointee will have the tough task of sorting out the huge mess the McCourts made. Unlike Oakland, there will be no stadium study. Instead, it’ll be an effort to determine what abuses were made and what the team’s real fiscal health is. That’s important, because MLB will want to get as high a price as possible for the team once it finalizes its seizure. It wouldn’t be surprising to see Raij (law) and Starkey (accounting) brought in soon.

Problem is that the whole rigamarole would take at least a year, probably two. The McCourts’ divorce proceedings are in recess and aren’t scheduled to begin again until next year. Meanwhile, Frank McCourt is considering a lawsuit or injunction against MLB. That would be interesting since as we all know that teams (and owners) are prevented from suing each other or MLB thanks to the covenant known as the ML Constitution. If McCourt sues and a judge decides to allow his lawsuit to move forward instead of dismissing it early, the action would effectively challenge both the commissioner and baseball’s antitrust exemption together in one fell swoop. Which would be, well, is it 2012 yet?

The best thing for Frank McCourt would be to see the writing on the wall, take his lumps, and give up the Dodgers. That would speed everything else up.

Short term, what does this mean for the A’s? It could be interpreted as two possibilities. Either the panel is done with its work, or Selig has seen fit to put the A’s on the backburner while the Dodgers mess is cleaned up. Or both. The crazy thing about this is that the whole strategy about keeping the A’s and Rays in limbo for the upcoming CBA talks has been pretty much blown out of the water thanks to the much scarier impact of the Mets’ and Dodgers’ woes. Neither of those will get fixed before the next CBA is ratified. So, Bud, how about getting the “easy” stuff out of the way first?

More good reading: Dodger Divorce, Biz of Baseball, Forbes

04.21.11
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Isaac and Suke talk Dodgers-A’s-Wolff

Cue the conspiracy theories. Unsubstantiated reports have Bud Selig giving Lew Wolff right of first refusal on bidding for the Dodgers when it comes up for sale. Strange. Apparently this is all because Wolff lives there. Guess what? Brewers owner Mark Attanasio lives in LA, why not him? Discuss.

Update 2:30 PM – Right on cue, here’s a response from Wolff via Joe “Quicktweet” Stiglich (thanks Different James):

Lew Wolff, on being mentioned as potential buyer if Dodgers go for sale: “I’m only interested in the A’s — and getting above .500.”

More from Bill Shaikin:

Although Bud Selig’s takeover of the Dodgers on Wednesday could lead to a sale, Oakland Athletics owner Lew Wolff said Thursday he would not be a buyer.

“I’m not interested in the Dodgers,” Wolff said.

…

“My focus is deep into getting us a new venue for the A’s,” Wolff said. “That’s where my long term is.”

04.20.11
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A’s, City of Phoenix agree to extend Spring Training lease, improvements

The Arizona Republic is reporting that the City of Phoenix City Council is set to improvement a lease extension for the A’s at Phoenix Municipal Stadium and Papago Park. The lease will run $425,000 per year to the A’s through 2025. They’ll also pay $50,000 per year into a capital improvements account. Most of the improvements would be at the Papago Park training facility, not Muni.

(A’s director of minor league operations Ted) Polakowski said the improvements are needed not so much at the stadium, which will require ongoing maintenance, but at the training facility. The team is outgrowing the current indoor space, he said, and the parking lot is getting tight. The A’s would like additional clubhouse space for its minor-league operations.

Maybe they’ll build Rich Harden a shed where he can stay during his eternal rehab, amirite?

Total cost of the improvements is slated to be in the $8-10 million range. That’s a far cry from the $30 million that Lew Wolff was looking for, and much, much less than the $100 million spent for the Salt River Fields project. From the sound of things, both Wolff and Phoenix were driven by new fiscal realities. Phoenix was willing to help, but it wasn’t going to make major sacrifices to do it. Wolff probably saw how Salt River’s opening sucked the life out of the competing complexes in the Cactus League, and figured that any really expensive improvements to Muni short of a brand new complex would’ve been futile. At least they don’t have to share.

The piece ends on this note:

Robert Johnson, a political consultant who helped in the campaign for the Cubs facility, said Phoenix should jump on the A’s offer.

“It makes a lot of sense,” he said.

The interim agreement contains language allowing either party to pull out of the agreement with two years’ notice, but Harman does not anticipate that becoming an issue.

“The A’s have been a great partner for us,” he said, “and they are committed to staying in Phoenix.”

In Oakland, someone’s ears are burning. BTW, it would cost $10 million just to fix all of the plumbing problems at the Coliseum.

The great news is that just like before, you’ll be able to fly into PHX in the morning, take the free shuttle and then light rail ($3.50 round trip) to Priest Drive and walk right in. It’s so convenient, one reader and frequent commenter here was able to do this and catch a game during a layover a month ago. How’s that for convenient?