It’s not on the calendar yet, but I have confirmed that Lew Wolff will speak at a San Jose Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce event in February. The specifics:
A’s and Earthquakes: Plans for 2009?
with Lew Wolff
Wednesday, February 11, 7:30-9:30 AM
@ Adobe Systems
Park Conference Room
345 Park Ave., San Jose
Online registration will be available shortly, and will be open until February 6.
Speculate away.
I’m confirming a big piece of San Jose-related news today. In preparation for that, here’s a clip of San Jose’s Municipal Code (link dead) related to building sports facilities within the city limits:
4.95.010 Prohibition of the use of tax dollars to build a sports facility
The city of San José may participate in the building of a sports facility using tax dollars only after obtaining a majority vote of the voters of the city of San José approving such expenditure.A “sports facility” for the purpose of this chapter is to be any structure designed to seat more than five thousand people at any one time for the purpose of viewing a sporting or recreational event.
“Tax dollars” for the purposes of this chapter include, without limitation, any commitment to fund wholly or in part said facility with general fund monies, redevelopment fund monies, bonds, loans, special assessments or any other indebtedness guaranteed by city property, taxing authority or revenues.
Nothing herein shall be construed to limit the city from allowing the construction of a sports facility funded by private investment.
If any provision of this chapter or the application thereof to any person or circumstance is held invalid, then the remainder of this chapter and application to other persons or circumstances shall not be affected thereby.
More later.
Effects from the economic crisis are hitting everyone, including wealthy team owners. Bruce Ratner has been forced to scale back value engineer his Brooklyn arena vision. The Yankees are looking for $370 million to “finish” New Yankee Stadium. Locally, talks of the Niners and Raiders teaming up to get a stadium done together may have started up.
Wait a minute. Haven’t we heard that last rumor before? Indeed we have, about this time last year. And we’re going to continue to hear this every year as both teams’ seasons end unceremonious early while their stadium destinies hang in the balance. We have no idea if there are any substantive discussions. We don’t know what it will take for the two teams to arrive at a proper compromise. Finally, we have no clue which muncipality out there would be interested in playing matchmaker, though I suspect that certain Santa Clara pols might be. The stadium architect may also have to play intermediary, as 360 architecture’s George Heinlein did with the New Meadowlands Stadium. Sure, it makes sense. It’s not, however, without its issues. As long as LA remains a tantalizing option for both teams (and the Bolts, Jags, and Vikes) there may be little progress on this front.
The plan is to enact a “Neighborhood Protection Plan” that works in a two-way manner. Not only does it prevent stadium users from driving from the stadium area to the residential area, it also prevents anyone from using back roads into the residential area from parking and then walking to the stadium area. The plan is helped by the street grid, in which there are limited access points to the Weibel neighborhood on the opposite side of 680 (so named because of the area elementary school). It remains to be seen how residents will react to the plan and the additional inconvenience that may come with it.
Some residents south of the stadium site (Warm Springs/Mission) are more concerned about the single north-south artery between 680 and 880, Warm Springs Blvd., being clogged on game days. Only the traffic study will have any real answers, as it will probably take into account situations in which normal traffic flows and signaling can be compared with gameday situations in which police will be called upon to control traffic.
What next? We’re about a month away from the next City Council meeting to review the plan. Until then, stay tuned.
I received a note this morning from Jim Pappas, KTRB’s VP and GM. The station has FCC and FAA approval to construct a new transmitter in Sonoma County. The 50,000-watt facility would seriously augment coverage in the North Bay and Sacramento. By now you’ve seen the existing coverage map:
The new Sonoma Daytime transmitter map (exclusive of existing transmitter) looks like this:
Much better, right? It is a Daytime transmitter, and Nighttime operation is in the works as well, though it would come later (application with the FCC already on file). For those who believe in miracles, don’t expect the transmitter to be ready in time for Opening Day. It’s not like building a skyscraper in terms of complexity, but it’s still quite tall and requires proper preparation and testing. Maybe before the end of the season. The deal between the A’s and KTRB is only for one season, but this gives you an indication of where both parties would like the relationship to go. Both want to be serious Bay Area radio players, and they want to do it together.
This is where you come in. Construction of the transmitter is wholly dependent on approval by Sonoma County’s Board of Zoning Adjustments. KTRB is ready to build pending approval. The transmitter has not yet come up for review by the BZA. When it does, KTRB will draft to request fan support. I’ll post it here. The board usually meets twice a month, and like the EIR process in Fremont, it is open to public comment. You can go to the meeting at 2550 Ventura Avenue, Santa Rosa, CA, 95403, or send written comments to that address.
In a move that should delight listeners all over the bay, the A’s are moving to 50,000-watt KTRB-AM 860. KTRB’s transmitter is located in the Diablo Range east of Sunol, which is a big improvement over the three transmitter locations it used two years ago. Check out the maps below for a better idea of the service area.
Day:
Night:
See any difference there? I don’t. That’s a good thing for both the A’s and A’s fans.
KTRB’s programming is a mishmash of talk, with high profile slots taken by syndicated conservative hosts such as Glenn Beck and Neal Boortz. Bay Area veteran Ron Barr has his sportstalk show in the 7-10 slot, which would be pre-empted by most of the A’s weeknight games and related pregame and postgame shows. Ironically, the partnership with KTRB is the first time in years that the A’s will be on a station with compatible sports programming.
Readers, I’d much appreciate if you could at some point during the day flip on your AM radios and tune to 860. Then drop a comment and let me know how the signal comes in, specifying your location. Thanks.
ESPN’s Chris Mortensen reports that the Raiders are in talks to sell at least 10% of team to a group of LA-based investors. As usual, Raider management has steadfastly denied the rumor.
The real issue here is that of controlling interest of the team, which has been in Al Davis’s hands for more than three decades. It’s difficult to see Davis as a figurehead given his penchant for meddling in everything from personnel moves and gameplans to stadium deals, even with his somewhat advanced age and health concerns.
Unfortunately for Davis, he doesn’t hold many cards. The chances of Davis getting a stadium deal in the LA area without ceding control are slim. The NFL’s G3 loan program has dried up and talk of a new fund has been tabled as the league bundles up for a cold economic winter. There are no Irwindales out there willing to give him a fat check, and the only stadium deal on the horizon is Ed Roski’s plan in City of Industry, which would be privately financed. Roski, according to the LA Times, is quietly pursuing a team. Couple that with Roger Goodell’s curious December visit to Oakland, and it would appear that something is happening behind the scenes.
While Roski and his SoCal cohorts get their affairs in order, talks continue between the Raiders, Oakland, and the Coliseum Authority. Of course, if Davis needed a cash infusion to keep the team going, how would he have the cash needed to get a Coliseum revamp or new stadium started?
Our two local NFL teams are in a similar position economically. They won’t admit it, but either would love the other to leave posthaste as it would help crystallize support for their own local stadium efforts. Yet they must both look at Roski’s vision and see dollar signs. Both ownership groups want to hold on with a death grip, but may not be able to in order to move or even get a stadium deal done locally without ceding control. And both teams have been woefully mismanaged over the past decade. There’s a race here, but I’m not sure what it’s for.
The AL champion Tampa Rays, in conjunction with a coalition called “A Baseball Community,” released a two-part study (PDF: Part I/Part II) on seven possible future ballpark sites. The sites, all within St. Petersburg city limits, range from the downtown waterfront site upon which the Rays had previously planned a new ballpark to a 250-acre inactive landfill curiously named “Toytown.” A map is available showing all seven sites:
The report is worth the read and could be considered an executive summary-type synopsis of what we normally see in California in our EIR/EIS documents.
Population is the real eyebrow-raiser here. The Carillon site has twice the in-radius population as Al Lang. Still, at 1.2 million, there remains a question of sustainability in the market. To put that in perspective, even that total is less than the population of Alameda County (1.45 million) and further less than Santa Clara County (1.7 million). Going with a smaller, cheaper ballpark regardless of site is a good move there.
Everyone saw it coming. The Bronx Bombers, who need to fill their new palace in 2009 every night and get back into the playoffs, had to make a big splash. So they made three in signing C.C. Sabathia, A.J. Burnett, and M.C. Teixeira. Yes, we will now take our customary roles of railing against the Yanks and against the system. In these troubled economic times, it may feel a bit cathartic.
Way back in March 2006, when the economy was a wee bit healthier, I advocated for MLB to impose a salary cap. The twist would be that the cap talk shouldn’t be initiated by the owners, but rather the players’ union. I argued that the percentage of revenue the players received was inferior to that of the other three major sports, and that the players could be richer (on average) with a more equitably distributed system. Confirmation came last week, as it came out that MLB players as a whole received 52% of league revenues, compared to 59%, 57%, and 56.7% for NFL, NBA, and NHL players respectively.
Now I realize that the owners, whose laissez faire approach to baseball economics is practically out of the Ayn Rand playbook, have little interest in imposing new restrictions on their little confederacy. To show what those restrictions look like, here’s a comparison of the four leagues and their team payroll models:
MLB does better than the mighty NFL without a salary cap. The 52% figure fits neatly within a range of 51-54% throughout the current CBA. If they’re getting more out of their deal than the NFL, why would they want a cap? It may be that the only thing that could change their minds would be a sustained, massive drop in annual revenues. In such a scenario, the hardest hit teams would be the small market clubs. A sort of class warfare could ensue between the big and small market teams, but only if revenue sharing failed to shore up the have-nots’ balance sheets. To date there’s no evidence of such a problem. The only issue for the have-nots is their inability to compete, and as we’ve seen from the A’s, Twins, and this year’s Rays, they can compete for short periods if the franchises are run well. History has shown that a lack of competition isn’t enough to cause serious tension in the ranks.
Both the NFL and NHL are headed for labor strife, albeit in different ways. In May NFL owners voted to opt out of the current CBA early, creating a situation in which the teams would operate without a salary cap in 2010 and perhaps 2011 – with a lockout even more likely in 2011. There’s a good chance that if the NFL and NFLPA are unable to negotiate a new CBA, the hard cap seen in the NFL will be gone forever, to be replaced by something resembling either the NBA or MLB labor pacts. Four teams remain without new stadium deals, and small market teams like Cincinnati and Buffalo make $80 million less than their rich brethren in Dallas and Washington. Hockey, despite its post-lockout covenant, is facing a troubling economic future. Revenue growth, guaranteed contracts, and looming free agency have created a potentially toxic soup of unsustainable economic conditions. Some recent Sun Belt expansion teams are struggling to survive, bringing up talks of franchise relocation.
Hoops and hardball appear to be in good stead comparatively. David Stern has what he wants most in a post-Jordan era, the return of Lakers vs. Celtics – and don’t think he won’t pull strings to maintain the rivalry to its fullest. There’s a similar Sun Belt expansion problem to that seen in the NHL, but it won’t impact league health. Bud Selig had Bob DuPuy on the Marlins’ ballpark talks like a flea on a dog, and all the attention appears to have paid off. Only two teams lack a new or upgraded stadium deal. You can bet that if Fremont doesn’t pan out, Selig will send DuPuy out here to give the A’s predicament the same treatment as Miami. Despite this, Selig can look at his counterpart Roger Goodell and think, “The only cap baseball needs is the kind worn on a head.” For those of us looking for financial parity, that isn’t an encouraging sentiment.
So here’s the question for the day: If you could implement a salary cap in baseball, what would it look like? Feel free to be as brief or verbose as you like.
In an effort to resolve the impasse between the A’s and the big box triumvirate of Costco, Lowe’s, and Kohl’s, Fremont Mayor Bob Wasserman spoke to the retailers last week. The A’s were not directly involved in the discussions. Via Matthew Artz in the Argus’s Tri City Beat blog:
Wasserman said he and ProLogis talked about a couple of proposals to put the stadium a little further from the stores, one idea would be to put it closer to Interstate 880, and the other further south from the stores, which, admittedly wouldn’t have the best freeway access.
The “closer to 880” option may be the simplest since it involves land the A’s already own, particularly the 8-acre concrete plant next to the freeway. Then they’d have to redesign the village and residential areas to work with the new ballpark site. Integration of the village and the ballpark wouldn’t be as good because the ballpark can’t face west, which would be the best direction to have the ballpark face into the village as it does in the original plan.
Pushing the ballpark to the southern edge of the project area is likely a nonstarter for environmental reasons. The combination of light, noise, and a heavy supply of congealed nacho cheese sauce don’t make for a healthy environment for all of the critters in the wetland preserve next door.
Are you looking for little baseball fix? If so, tune to Comcast Digital channel 412 or DirecTV channel 213. MLB Network is now broadcasting there in preparation for its official launch on New Year’s Day. The programming is all pre-recorded, including season retrospectives for the most part.
I heard a while back that MLB worked out a deal to be carried on basic cable, but it appears that MLB Network will stay on 412 with the three sports networks (NBA TV, NFL Network, NHL Network) as part of the digital sports tier. DirecTV will carry HD broadcasts, while no Comcast appears to be a no go for now. MLBN is scheduled to broadcast Thursday night games and the World Baseball Classic.
newballpark.org 