Category Archives: Football

01.31.11
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Redevapocalypse What-If Scenarios

Now for the “fun” part.

Last night I described the fate of redevelopment in a California where the concept no longer works within the budget framework. Today it’s time to discuss all of the great/terrible fates that await our favorite local sports franchises should RDA funding sources dry up.

49ers Bond Rush
It all starts not with the Oakland Athletics, but rather the San Francisco 49ers. The linchpin to the Santa Clara stadium plan is $114 million in public funds, $42 million of it from the RDA (the 49ers would provide a partial advance). This money would have to be raised before any RDA dissolution or cutbacks take place, so the deadline would presumably be sometime in the next 4-5 months. This means that Santa Clara would have to go to the bond market three times for the stadium project:

  • $42 million from the RDA
  • $35 million from the newly assembled Mello-Roos district (hotel taxes)
  • $330 million from the Stadium Authority

If the RDA doesn’t get the bonds by the deadline, there’s no chance that the hotels will even tax themselves for their piece, let alone fund a RDA shortfall. The agreement between Santa Clara and the Niners would have to be reopened so that an alternate funding source could be inserted, and that source couldn’t be tied to the general fund in any way. The Stadium Authority couldn’t get started because there’d be no certainty of the project getting off the ground until the funding package worked itself out.

$40 million doesn’t seem like a big deal as it’s less then 5% of the project cost. It’s still a lot of money to raise and a big enough gap to throw a wrench into the works. There’s a chance that both parties could figure out a way to bridge the gap but it’s not going to happen immediately, and unless it’s the team pledging to cover it completely, any contractual details will require renewed scrutiny.

Should the team find the sledding too rough, there’s always a Plan B. They can run to Oakland, where the Coliseum Authority and the Raiders will be waiting with open arms.

The Coliseum Authority has bonding authority and capacity through its joint powers, the City of Oakland and Alameda County. There’s that nagging problem of ongoing debt burdening both parties through 2026, which can be looked at one of two ways: Should the JPA endeavor to get a new two-team NFL stadium built in the hopes that helps cover the debt or cut its losses and keep paying the debt even though the Raiders could be long gone before it’s retired? (Not that amassing more debt is favorable as the current bonds were downgraded to BBB last month.)

The problem Oakland and the JPA has going forward is the fact that the new Raiders stadium plan had integrated redevelopment along Hegenberger, including a new conference center, hotel and retail. With the well run dry, none of that stuff could get built unless some new taxation/indebtedness occurred, or unless the stadium project’s funding coved it. So what you’d be left with is in all likelihood an updated version of the stadium and arena complex, surrounded by parking. Sounds familiar, eh?

On the other hand, if Santa Clara is able to get the funding ball rolling, it’ll prompt the Raiders to move more quickly in order to leave Oakland. Al Davis isn’t going to live forever, and Roger Goodell is a take-no-prisoners negotiator who has been clamoring for the two teams to share a stadium. Whatever the location, expect an agreement between the host city and the two teams sooner rather than later. Otherwise it might be too late for both.

Which Way Warriors
We’ve discussed the Warriors and the Lacob-Guber group’s interest in San Francisco. The Port of SF owns land to the south of AT&T Park that could be well suited for an arena. This is important as the money’s already spent, no new funds required. In order for a new arena to be built, it would have to be privately financed and it would make the most fiscal sense if two teams shared the arena, not just one. This model has worked well in Chicago and Dallas, where both cities’ representative hoops and hockey teams created partnerships to build their venues. The Giants being the developer has only limited impact since they couldn’t materially impact which touring acts or other events came to town. Two teams means two major winter sports teams, not just the W’s and a minor league franchise.

Can it be done? The Giants/Warriors would have to attract the Sharks or a second NHL team, neither of which seems likely. SVSE would probably entertain the offer as a way to extract lease concessions from San Jose, but it wouldn’t move beyond that. It’s much like trying to get the W’s to move south permanently – it’s technically doable but highly unlikely. Lacob-Guber could also use the SF arena as a stalking horse for improvements to the Arena.

Again, any new arena in SF is only possible if it is privately financed. The good news? There will be so little big project construction in the future (save for public facilities) that the labor could be relatively cheap.

It was nice knowing you Cowtown
Unlike some of the whispering about MLB contracting two teams, there actually has been talk about contracting the Kings. And it will only get louder as the current season draws to a close later this summer. The woes of the Kings and the Maloofs have been chronicled here and elsewhere for some time now, and there doesn’t seem to be a light at the end of the tunnel for them. Mayor Kevin Johnson is playing this like he has to walk the ball up the floor and dump it into the post every possession instead of being able to do anything dynamic like this. Being a mayor is a tough job. I want to see the Kings stay in Sac, but it’s hard to see long term with every proposal linked to some kind of redevelopment. The NBA probably won’t buy them as it did the Hornets, which leaves the Kings in some sort of limbo for years to come.

San JosA’s
The landbanking strategy San Jose has used for years has never been more wise than right now, as it works to cobble together the remaining land at Diridon. As I understand it, the money is basically untouchable at this point and SJRA can do whatever it wants as long it takes care of its housing set-asides (25%). If SJ and the A’s are given the green light, the vote this summer or fall won’t be about ballparks vs. schools since the money will already be spent. The debate will be about baseball vs. other housing or commercial developers in a time of a glut of both housing and office space. And yes, the decision could drag on for another several months or even a year.

Oakland mayor Jean Quan has been publicly silent on what the death of RDAs could mean for the Victory Court project, and that’s not a good sign. When the mayors went up to the Capitol last week, the most quotable guy there was Chuck Reed, not Quan. There should be a greater sense of urgency there if Oakland’s various supporters want the donut hole strategy to come to fruition, but it’s not happening publicly, perhaps by design. Should the EIR be delivered at the beginning of April, there will be ample opportunity to go over every detail of the document, and it’s that thoroughness baked into the CEQA process that could eventually kill MLB in Oakland. The way I see it, Bud Selig is looking for a politically expedient opportunity to declare support for San Jose, and that could come in the form of a 400-page EIR that brings up more questions than answers. Why? Because Lew Wolff has to have been in his ear constantly about this redevelopment business, and opportunities are running out fast. Maybe the day of reckoning wont occur immediately, it might occur well along in the process as it did in Fremont. Either way the clock is ticking as it is for AT&T in that commercial for the Verizon iPhone.

Of course, if Let’s Go Oakland had declared Victory Court as its site in December 2009 instead of 2010, Oakland might not be in such a bad position. Oakland’s only saving grace now is something out of its control: the continued difficulty with T-rights negotiations. That’s like basing your retirement plan on an upcoming shared inheritance – will you get a good enough piece, or will it mostly go to the more favored child/mistress/charity? It’s not a real investment strategy.

01.18.11
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Anschutz makes demands for LA NFL stadium

The head of AEG has a big checkbook. With that comes the ability to dictate terms. As reported by the Los Angeles Business Journal, Phil Anschutz has laid out the conditions needed for him to drop some serious coin on the downtown, retractable roof stadium.

  • Agreements with various corporations for naming rights and other sponsorships that would bring in tens of millions of dollars in annual revenue.
  • A commitment from Los Angeles city officials for speedy approvals and $350 million in bonds to replace the West Hall of the city-owned Los Angeles Convention Center that would be torn down to make way for the stadium.
  • A commitment from an NFL team to move to Los Angeles.
  • A commitment from the NFL itself to approve an L.A. team.

Now that the future of redevelopment is uncertain, it would appear that the second item would be the toughest nut to crack. That $350 million would be paid off by a ticket surcharge, which translates to a RDA funding and a quasi-governmental stadium authority handling the bonds. The time crunch will make things really difficult, but knowing LA politics, I wouldn’t stack up all of my chips against it.

01.16.11
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CBA Talk: The NFL is getting ready for war

Every time I tried to start this post earlier in the week, some fantastic new nugget from Maury Brown (site/Twitter) got me to read further. If you really want to get in depth, follow Maury’s thorough, seemingly unending coverage at The Biz of Football and at Forbes. It’s pretty much one-stop shopping if you want to get up to speed.

That said, I’ll preface my overview via an exchange I had with Maury a couple days ago on Twitter.

me: @BizballMaury If you walk into a restaurant filled with NFL players, your meal will be on them guaranteed.

Maury: RT Ha! Really want NFL accountability @marinelay3r: You walk into a restaurant filled w/NFL players, your meal will be on them guaranteed

For some time, he’s been trying to get some hard numbers to determine whether or not the NFL’s claims of economic turmoil have any real merit. So far, the evidence points to the league’s case being B.S. They’re trying to argue that rising player costs, combined with falling revenues, requires a reduction in the guaranteed share the players get. Here’s the league’s case in bullet point form:

  • NFL wants a roughly 18% drop ($1 Billion) in the amount of money given to players.
  • In lieu of a drop, the NFL wants to convert 2 preseason games into regular season games, making the regular season now 18 games long plus 2 preseason games.
  • A rookie cap or slotting system must be introduced to keep rookie contracts in check.

The players union wants things kept the same, a sign that usually means that they (the side that favors the status quo) have the better end of things. And the lack of a rookie cap makes things seem a bit out of whack, even though the evidence is mostly anecdotal. The big issue is really the 18-game schedule. The NFL’s position is that revenue coming from the 16-game schedule is not good enough to sustain the teams, even though 30 of 32 showed profits in each of the last three years.

The players are most concerned with their own health. Most fans know that during the preseason, teams don’t usually have their starters play entire games, even having them play only a series in the first game and a quarter in the second game. The rest of the time is spent figuring out which other players will make the roster. The NFL wants to convert two of those games to meaningful regular season games, which is great from the standpoint that at least we as fans won’t be subjected to five pointless exhibitions in August. But it also increases the chances that players will be injured, even though they’re not getting anything extra from it.

Why is the NFL pushing for this so hard? Because they can afford to. They have a ton of leverage in this situation. League activity ends with this April’s NFL Draft, which itself will be different because teams won’t be able to sign players during the proceedings, and there may be limitations on trades during the draft. After that the nation will be in lockout watch, and precious team-building time in the form of OTA’s, minicamp and training camp will be lost. All the while, the players won’t be paid yet the league and owners will pocket $4 Billion in TV revenue even though there’s no guarantee that any games will be played. With no pressure to get anything done except their own agenda, it’s likely that a lockout will drag on well into the fall, perhaps longer than the 1987 NFL Strike.

The prevailing thought many fans may have is, “These guys can’t gamble on losing fans with an extended work stoppage.” Frankly, I think this is hogwash. Football has hit a perfect nexus of attracting both hardcore and casual fans. HDTV significantly improves the presentation, not as much as it does for hockey but more than baseball or basketball. If you’re a casual fan, you don’t need to show up more than once a week for four hours. If you’re a hardcore fan, you have plenty of things to suck you in during the week: the endless news cycles on ESPN and NFL Network, fantasy football, talk radio. There’s also the Super Bowl if you don’t care more than once a year. Even with each network paying out $1 Billion for the right to broadcast games annually, that’s a small price to pay for a ratings slam-dunk product. If there is a pro sport that is most resistant to backlash from a work stoppage, it’s pro football. In recent weeks NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has repeatedly tried to ensure the public that a deal could be done easily and quickly. NFLPA head De Maurice Smith has been sounding the alarm for a lockout for over a year. The NFL has had almost 25 years of labor peace and unmitigated growth thanks to the most harmonious labor-management relationship in pro sports. Right now, it’s hard to see them getting back to that point.

01.10.11
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Brown to Redevelopment: Your days are numbered

Governor Brown just finished his press conference, where he explained his budget plans. Brown is pushing for $12.5 Billion in spending cuts, and he is asking the legislature (and the voters) to extend temporary income, sales, and car taxes that are set to expire this year. As for the redevelopment golden goose, Brown said that existing (already bonded) projects are safe. New projects, on the other hand, are in trouble. Brown wants to “phase out” redevelopment agencies and start taking back $1.7 Billion in tax increment annually. What it comes down to is this: If you don’t have your project started and well underway in the next 12-18 months, you are screwed. There continues to be some debate as to how the governor could eliminate RDA’s, with the agencies enshrined in Article 16 in the Constitution and recently passed Prop 22 acting as protection. The governor seems to be saying, “If we get rid of RDA’s, there are no more protections.” Yow. Okay, who would this impact? Let’s put together a list:

  • San Jose Diridon Ballpark – While the City is speeding up land acquisition, what about Autumn Parkway and other mitigations? Will the funds be in place for the rest of the project, or will it get kicked down the road?
  • Oakland Victory Court Ballpark – Oakland already had to deal with a tight schedule based on a 2015 Opening Day. Now, Oakland will have to get its bonds raised and land in place right around the time an EIR is certified, or even before certification. Expect for Oakland to push MLB harder to decide in its favor, even without anything significant in place.
  • 49ers Stadium in Santa Clara – The quasi-public stadium authority would have to get its loans and/or bonds in place in the next 18 months as well.
  • New Raiders Stadium at the Coliseum – A new stadium is practically a nonstarter given the funding questions. Expect the Raiders to look south sooner rather than later.
  • Downtown Los Angeles NFL Stadium – The now $1.5 Billion stadium (+$500 million in the last two weeks) would require $350 million in bonds, which won’t be available if RDA’s go away.
  • City of Industry NFL Stadium – Ed Roski’s plan involves his own land, but much of the stadium cost would be funded by tax increment on the land improvements, thanks to much of the city being one large redevelopment zone. Uncertainty regarding RDAs makes the prospects for building infrastructure for the stadium and ancillary development, murky at best.
  • Sacramento Kings Arena – As Kevin Johnson’s arena task force continues to talk things out, time is running out, especially for an arena at the long dormant Railyards.
  • San Francisco Arena – Land south of AT&T Park could serve as the site for a new arena. Controlled by the Port and with development rights given to the Giants, it’s likely that any dev plan there will require at least the same kind of public outlay that made the ballpark deal work. Proponents would have to find another source for that funding.
redev_cut

Slide captured from the governor’s briefing

The message is abundantly clear: If you want to get something built, get a move on. (BTW, take a look at the counter on the right today. Eerie.)

01.10.11
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News for the week of 1/10/11

I had a pass for CES but couldn’t go at the last moment. While I’m lamenting that, here are some truly newsworthy items.

  • The Maloofs are not only having trouble keeping the Kings afloat, they’re having trouble keeping the Palms afloat, at least according to Bloomberg. Two private equity firms are looking to buy controlling stake in the celebrilicious casino, with the possibility that the Maloofs would continue to operate the Palms, albeit with a reduced stake. No wonder there’s no talk of the Maloofs putting up money for a Sacramento arena. The family sold a $100 million beer distribution business in New Mexico last year to bring in some cash. It’s interesting that although the Kings have been discussed as either a prime sale candidate or worse a contraction target, there are few indicators that the Maloofs are interested in cashing out the franchise. They must really love their basketball team.
  • If fans are truly interested in stripping away baseball’s antitrust exemption, they might want to take a page from a new Washington lobbying group called Playoff PAC. The group, started in 2009, has stated its goal to eliminate the controversial BCS system and replace it with a true college football playoff tournament. Playoff PAC’s weapon of choice is to try to push anyone who will listen into investigating possible tax violations by the organizations which control three of the four member bowls of the BCS. While Playoff PAC does not have a ton of cash, but its limited efforts may actually be bearing fruit.
  • The downtown LA football stadium plan is finding takers. Farmers Insurance may become the naming rights sponsor, to the tune of 30 years, $20 million a year.
  • A draft race course route for the 2013 America’s Cup is up, and it’s quite cool.
  • Governor Brown will release his budget plans later this morning, and I will be paying close attention (as should you).

Will we hear something about KTRB this week? I sure hope so.

01.08.11
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CBA Talk 2011: A comparison of leagues

Three of the four major professional sports leagues have collective bargaining agreements which will expire later this year. In the NBA and NFL, discussions between management and labor have been contentious for at least the last year, with threats of work stoppages all too real and quite likely. That makes MLB an outlier, as there has been little tension in its ongoing labor discussions, even though its CBA will run out only a few months after the other two leagues’. The NHLPA authorized a one-year extension of its current agreement in the fall, allowing its CBA to expire after the 2011-12 season, but under the terms of the agreement, no further extension can be negotiated between the union and league. With Donald Fehr brought in to helm the NHLPA’s side of future talks, the players there aren’t looking to go soft at the table.

Before we get into the details, I’ve put together an overview of each league’s current CBA, sans drug testing details. Next week, each league will get its own post and in depth analysis. For now, take a look at the table and if any questions or corrections come to mind, throw them into comments. Every effort has been made to verify all of the data in the table, including each league’s CBA documents when possible. Still, there may be some issues with what’s reported, so here’s your chance to fact check. It’s also your opportunity to steer the discussion in a certain direction if you so choose.

I look forward to your questions and comments. Until then, enjoy the rest of the football weekend. My thoughts are with those who were senselessly hurt or killed at the Tucson atrocity today, and their families.

12.13.10
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Dolich supports a new “multi-use” stadium

A reader alerted me to Andy Dolich’s piece last week in the Biz Ball section of the CSN Bay Area/California website. Dolich goes back through the postwar history of stadia in America, going from the multipurpose bowls of yesteryear to the new single purpose venues of the last twenty years. He then summarizes the current difficulty experienced by California teams when it comes to getting stadia built. After that, he proposes an idea so strange it might have come out of the 60’s: the 49ers, Raiders, and A’s should all share one stadium where the Coliseum currently sits. In supporting this “multi-use” concept, Dolich cites major technological advances, such as the movable seating decks at ANZ Stadium and customizable LED displays used everywhere nowadays. While Dolich’s sense of history is sound, he left out a major factor that has sent both the NFL and MLB on different tracks. The Neo-Classical ballparks are much smaller in terms of capacity than their predecessors, while the new football stadia are much larger. 40,000 has emerged as a sweet spot for MLB, while 65,000 is preferable for the NFL. No amount of new technology is going to be able to mask or easily move 25,000 seats, not even tarps. The requirements for baseball and football have diverged so much that it’s hard to envision even attempting to make a multipurpose stadium work these days. Let’s take a look at how the two sports’ requirements differ:

  • Proximity to the field. In baseball, it’s customary to have the first row at the same level as the field, or perhaps a foot above the field. In football, the first row may be 6-10 feet above the field.
  • Quantity of premium seating. Football stadia tend to have 7,500 club seats and 100-200 suites. Ballparks have 3-4,000 club seats and around 40 suites.
  • Confinement. Colder seasons force football stadia to enclose their suites behind glass, whereas ballparks like to take advantage of the summer by putting the seats outside the glassed-in parts of the suites.
  • Surfaces. While Field Turf and other advanced artificial surfaces have gotten better at mimicking grass, they’re still far away from being truly comparable for baseball applications. The fake stuff is welcome in football, where there’s no need to worry about having a true ball bounce or roll. If a stadium were to utilize grass, the dirt infield problem emerges.
  • Environment aesthetics. In football, the stadium is the scene. In baseball, ballparks are frequently designed take advantage of a pastoral or urban backdrop.
ANZ Stadium's pitch. Note the tracks used to move the seats in and out.

ANZ Stadium’s pitch. Note the tracks used to move the seats in and out.

The technology that Dolich espouses does little to address the differences in fan experience that the single purpose venues achieve. For instance, ANZ Stadium‘s movable seating sections could be an inspiration. Prime lower deck seats are mounted on tracks that expand and contract based on each sport’s specifications. It sounds good until you realize that the difference in capacity between ANZ’s rectangular (rugby, soccer) and oval (cricket, Aussie Rules) is only 2,000 seats. As a cricket venue it is severely compromised in terms of dimensions, with far more cricket tests played at Sydney’s older Cricket Ground. Movable seating decks have been employed to mixed success in the United States, the most prominent examples being the Louisiana Superdome and Candlestick Park. Aloha Stadium and Mile High Stadium both had novel methods to move entire seating stands. At Aloha, four double-deck stands either pinched in for football or widened out for baseball. Eventually the stadium was locked into its football configuration, much the same way The Stick’s east stands have been kept in their football mode. LED displays are great replacements for signage. They make an excellent platform for disseminating game information. But they don’t address the capacity disparity. From a fan experience standpoint, it could be said that the displays are sometimes counterproductive since they are so distracting. Either way, they’re just window dressing. Dolich uses the current economic state as justification for building a multipurpose stadium. Why bother, if the fan experience will only be marginally better than the current stadium, and will always be compared to superior experiences at single purpose venues? Dolich worked for the 49ers as a consultant to help improve the experience at The Stick, and was not particularly prominent in the selling of the new stadium to Santa Clara residents. He was unceremoniously let go at the beginning of this calendar year, and now he’s practically endorsing an alternative to the plan. If this were the 60’s, when both baseball and football were played in 50,000-seat ashtrays, it might be feasible. Times have changed. Until someone figures out how to make 25,000 seats disappear, the idea is not really worthy of discussion.

12.12.10
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Metrodome roof collapses

I don’t know if it’s divine intervention for Brett Favre or symmetry with the Minnesota Vikings’ season. Either way, this video of the Metrodome’s roof collapsing is awesome.

The game has been rescheduled for Monday night at Detroit’s Ford Field. The teams could’ve played at TCF Bank Stadium at the University of Minnesota, but the smaller capacity stadium (50,000 vs. 64,000 for the Metrodome) would’ve caused ticketing problems and the visiting Giants had not brought any cold weather gear (of course not, they were going to play in dome). Still, they should’ve played at TCF, if only to give Vikings fans a taste of what it was like to watch a game outdoors, as they did at the Met for 20 years.

12.10.10
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Raiders Coliseum: The impact

Back in October, a new plan for the Coliseum complex was unveiled, and it had no traces of the old multipurpose bowl. The feasibility study released then was careful not to show a specific opening date or year for the Raiders’ new stadium. Instead, a 48-month project timeline was given, with 15 months for EIR preparation and 30 months for construction. Although sharing a Santa Clara stadium with the 49ers remains an option, it’s clear that team CEO Amy Trask prefers to have the Raiders in their own digs.

To understand what the impact of the new stadium would be on the Coliseum complex, I did a quick-and-dirty Photoshop overlay to see how the current and future pieces fit together. First, the new plan as drawn up for the Raiders:

Now the overlay:

The overlay isn’t exact, but it’s close. The big reveal is that the footprints of the new stadium and the old Coliseum overlap slightly. That indicates that some part of the Coliseum would have to be torn down in order to complete the stadium. A precedent for this already exists in Cincinnati, where the outfield chunk of old Riverfront Stadium was removed to make way for Great American Ball Park. The yellow stripe running through the area is the easement for underground sewer interceptor, which can’t have permanent structures on it. While it appears that part of the new stadium sits on the easement, the stadium could be constructed in such a way that the interceptor would remain accessible. (If you’re asking why the A’s haven’t asked about doing something like this at the Coliseum, stop right there. They have asked.)

Assuming that the Raiders can get all of its ducks in a row (a big if), it’s possible that construction could start as early as mid-2012. Which means, of course, that the existing Coliseum would be affected. Significant portions of the original structure might have to be torn down. Hemmed in by the old stadium and the interceptor easement, the new stadium designers will have to be clever to design it in such a way that minimizes such impact. Since there’s no final site plan or stadium design, there’s plenty of time to sort all of this out.

The biggest issue is the timeline. The plans call for a severe reduction of available parking during and even after construction. Most of the old Coliseum would be replaced by a large public plaza leading to the BART bridge. For the A’s and Raiders’ 2012 and 2013 seasons, I’m guessing that parking would be reduced by 3,000 spaces or more, roughly 30% of the complex’s available spaces. A parking garage and additional surface parking obtained by buying nearby properties would help make up the shortfall, but most of those spaces wouldn’t be ready right away. Cutting into chunks of the Coliseum would probably remove parts of the upper deck that the A’s don’t use right now. On the other hand, the Raiders need those seats. Chances are that if part of the old stadium has to come down, the Raiders would play in a reduced capacity stadium for those two years (the Tennessee Titans played at Memphis’ Liberty Bowl and 40,000-seat Vanderbilt Stadium while what is now LP Field was being built). The iceplant between Gates B and C might have to go.

If construction couldn’t start until 2013 or later, the impacts to the A’s and Raiders could be fewer. The A’s should hopefully have something going somewhere, with the need to endure the transition lasting only one season. The Raiders could play at the Coliseum throughout the entire construction period. The Warriors? They’re screwed.

11.30.10
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Phil Anschutz and Magic Johnson to buy Chargers?


I’ve been in San Diego for the last 9 days, and as anyone who has seen the local newscasts down here can attest, they’re not far removed from Anchorman, at least in terms of content. Tonight was time for a shakeup, however, as a report from Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio indicates that AEG head/billionaire Phil Anschutz is teaming up with Laker great and former team part-owner Magic Johnson to buy a major stake in the San Diego Chargers.

Chargers chief counsel Mark Fabiani is busy trying to do damage control, but he’s also the same guy who said two weeks ago:

“If AEG buys a piece of this team, then people have a right to be concerned,” Fabiani admits. “But it’s totally hypothetical at this point. Goldman Sachs has talked to people all over the country, all over the world, not just in L.A. It’s all rumors.

Goldman Sachs has supposedly been retained by the Chargers in order to find a buyer for Spanos family patriarch Alex Spanos’ 36% share of the team, the largest of any individual partner. Much of the team has been divvied up among the elder Spanos’ children. Johnson’s interest isn’t certain, though the timing is certainly curious. Johnson sold his 4.5% stake in the Lakers in October. Current and prospective NFL owners aren’t allowed to hold stakes of MLB or NBA teams outside their respective home markets (though the NFL doesn’t currently have a Los Angeles franchise and the NBA doesn’t have a San Diego team).

Assuming that Anschutz/AEG is able to convince the remaining Spanos family partners that further trying in San Diego will only lead to a dead end, they’ll be able to get the ball rolling quickly on their $725 million, downtown LA stadium concept. While I still think the idea of building a 70,000-seat football stadium in downtown LA is ludicrous, this is AEG we’re talking about, and the company is practically infallible in town right now, with the success of Staples Center and LA Live! They’ll certainly get the benefit of the doubt. And amazingly, they could get it done without Ari Gold.