I am very saddened and upset by today's news. The way that I honestly feel is this: unless one of the owners or chief executive officers of a major corporation in the state of Minnesota is willing to buy the Vikings and keep them in the state of Minnesota, then they will move to Los Angeles or another city. :'(

San Antonio Vikings.

Unless you go to the games in person, does it really matter where your "home" team plays? My Raiders moved to LA in the deep dark past and I watched them on tv like always. San Antonio, LA, Moscow, it doesn't matter where the Vikes move, again, unless you watch them in person.

The latest trial balloon is electronic pull-tabs. Which seems questionable at best as a funding source, since they previously looked at a Vikings dedicated scratch-off game, and that was anticipated to only raise about $9M/year in the first few years, then dropping off.

I also wonder if it will actually increase gambling revenue, since the existence of a new way to gamble probably won't lead to more gambling. It'll just shift people's gambling budget from one form to another. What does the state plan to do when the pull-tabs don't pull in enough money? What program gets cut to pay for the stadium then?

"It'll just shift people's gambling budget from one form to another."

Yes.

"What does the state plan to do when the pull-tabs don't pull in enough money?"

Most probably pull cash out of existing lottery funds. That's the way it went here in Maryland.

This is great news as the deal as currently structured was a huge ripoff for taxpayers. I say that as a lifelong Minnesota resident and Vikings fan.

Team owners have to be made to understand that they are not providing remotely close to enough public good to offset the subsidies they are demanding.

If Wilf wanted the state to build a stadium and then was willing to pay a fair rent ($75 million/year for 20 years with stiff penalties for opting out) that would be one thing. If he was willing to give the state an ownership stake for its massive investment that would be another thing.

But all he wants is a massive handout and he justifies it with some incredibly shoddy math. The economic projections make no sense, and MAYBE justify a government subsidy in the $50-2000 million range, not in the $600-850 million dollar range they are looking for.

Really it is shocking how brazen they are about just rummaging through the state finances latching on to anything that looks like it might be a source of money regardless of whether it makes sense or not.

This is great news as the deal as currently structured was a huge ripoff for taxpayers. I say that as a lifelong Minnesota resident and Vikings fan.

Team owners have to be made to understand that they are not providing remotely close to enough public good to offset the subsidies they are demanding.

If Wilf wanted the state to build a stadium and then was willing to pay a fair rent ($75 million/year for 20 years with stiff penalties for opting out) that would be one thing. If he was willing to give the state an ownership stake for its massive investment that would be another thing.

But all he wants is a massive handout and he justifies it with some incredibly shoddy math. The economic projections make no sense, and MAYBE justify a government subsidy in the $50-2000 million range, not in the $600-850 million dollar range they are looking for.

Really it is shocking how brazen they are about just rummaging through the state finances latching on to anything that looks like it might be a source of money regardless of whether it makes sense or not.

Neil, we need you to re-orient (nice, corporate-y term there I think) your coverage on this one.

1) How far along is U.S.C. in renovating the Coliseum? I can't deal with the Rose Bowl for four years.

2) My guess is that AEG builds the stadium, but then finds a way out of re-building the convention center. How do L.A. pols prevent this?

3) This is just me being cautious, but how do we make sure that the L.A. Vikings do not officially use the locator of Leiweke Anschutz?

Here's a recap of the last link in this post, for those who missed it:

politicsinminnesota.com/2011/10/crying-wilf-minnesota-vikings%e2%80%99-move-out-of-state-is-unlikely/

The Vikings want a 700M subsidy from the state and county? Wow...

Being a 49ers fan it goes show how good of a deal Santa Clara got.

They are on the hook for only 444M and they get revenue devices such as Naming rights and Stadium Builder licenses to pay their share.

While Minnesota taxpayers get stuck with a 700M subsidy trying to pay for it with new sales taxes or worse gambling?

Unbelievable....Let the team move.

It is not worth it for any municipality in this day and age to pay 60%+ of a stadium cost without any revenue devices to help pay for it.

The problem is the article in the last link glosses over the most important fact: the LA Vikings are worth several hundred million (maybe even a billion) more than the Metrodome Vikings. It's just a matter of who (NFL, AEG or Wilf) gets that money.

$444 million from a city of only 117,000 people is **NOT** a good deal for Santa Clara. The city's own consultant estimated we will sustain a 2 to 1 loss on our direct subsidy. And there's no reason for a city to have to raise funds from naming rights and selling personal seat licenses (which was a debacle for Oakland, leaving taxpayers stuck with the bill).

Please note that there is **absolutely no legal requirement for cost disclosure on city-wide ballot measures**, which is how the 49ers, their yes on Measure Jed stadium campaign, and our city council majority of 5 got away with a ballot question and ballot measure that did not disclose the stadium costs to Santa Clarans. The only cost disclosed on the ballot measure was $40 million in redevelopment funds.

There is a legal requirement for cost disclosure for county and state wide ballot measures. Our legislators need to close the loophole and make it a legal requirement for a fiscal analysis (cost disclosure) for all city-wide ballot measures too. Then no other community could be hoodwinked like Santa Clara was.

Our own city attorney, paid by our city taxpayer dollars, argued in court that costs did not need to be included on the stadium ballot measure in Santa Clara because the state does not require cost disclosure for city-wide ballot measures. Our city attorney was simply acting as a puppet for our city council majority and the 49ers stadium campaign. Our city attorney was certainly not representing the best interests of the citizens of Santa Clara.

One of the big reasons the 49ers won the election is that voters were told in the campaign that they were getting a $1 billion stadium essentially for free. That's not true, but the lack of a requirement for cost disclosure on the ballot let the 49ers and our city council majority of 5 get away with that travesty.

See the footballphds dot com website for the latest article on funding an NFL stadium in LA. They are finance guys and they say that neither the Yorks nor Santa Clara has been able to obtain financing for the stadium.

"the LA Vikings are worth several hundred million (maybe even a billion) more than the Metrodome Vikings."

How do you figure, Ben? Almost all revenue in the NFL is evenly shared among the teams, and most of what isn't (suites, etc.) would be diverted in L.A. to pay off the stadium costs. If we were talking about a baseball or basketball team, sure - but that's why L.A. already has two baseball and two basketball teams. The reason it no longer has a football team has everything to do with the fact that NFL team values have far less to do with market size than with stadium leases.

Unfortunately, in his flawed argument above,
Sid is using numbers that over a year old.

See the Santa Clara City Council Agenda report for Item 6B of June 7th, 2011, and watch his "facts" get blown right out of the water.

Out of $1,000,000,000 in total development costs, the 49er's Stadium Company only intends to pay about 15% to 25%...

...making the level of subsidy paid by Santa Clara and its agencies, in fact, nearly equal to what Zygi Wilf expects Minnesotans to pay for his own goofbowl.

Oddly, Sid then admits that the Santa Clara "deal" is completely untenable when he states, "It is not worth it for any municipality in this day and age to pay 60%+ of a stadium cost without any revenue devices to help pay for it."

We'll probably be down for well over 70% of the cost of the Santa Clara stadium. And the revenue streams? Well, the 49ers are making us sell their Personal Seat Licenses for them - and making our Santa Clara Stadium Authority pay the $6 million fee charged by the company that they themselves hand-picked for us.

Bests,
Bill Bailey, Treasurer,
Santa Clara Plays Fair.org

-=0=-

Neil,

According to Forbes, the Metrodome Vikes are worth $796M. The biggest NFL team is worth over $1 billion more than that. Based on these values it's fair to say that the LA Vikings' value increases by at least $500 million due to the AEG stadium and the increased amount of sponsorship, media rights and merchandise revenue they'd see in L.A.

www.forbes.com/lists/2011/30/nfl-valuations-11_land.html

And that's just on day one of the move. Over time the difference in franchise value between a team playing at LA Live and one playing at the Metrodome would become more pronounced.

Yes, AEG is going to suck up some of that increased value, and so will the NFL via a relocation fee. I find it hard to believe that those two entities will be so stubborn as to not let Wilf participate in some of that windfall. If they do, then why would he stay?

There is always a chance that Wilf loves Minny or that he finds it in his heart to sell to some Herb Kohl-like owner, but an LA relocation looks like the likeliest result if the locals keep insisting that the Vikes pay for that stadium.

Media revenues? In the NFL? The only difference between Minneapolis and L.A. would be where Fox would send the check.

Ad revenue and merchandise sales would help a bit (though the latter is also shared in the NFL, no?), but as things stand now, most of that would have to get poured into stadium construction costs. Your question "If they do [keep the windfall from Wilf], then why would he stay?" is exactly the right one, I'd say - but since both AEG and Roski are currently saying that's exactly what they'd do to pay off their stadiums, I think the likely answer is "Wilf would be crazy to move to L.A."

If the L.A. deal changes? Sure. But then you need somebody else to pay for the L.A. stadiums. I know... racinos!

You've got to check out the Forbes numbers. The difference between large and small market revenues is striking. (And by media, I'm talking local radio, preseason TV and possibly exclusives with a RSN.

And yes, of course you're right that if the AEG deal stays as is no move will happen. It won't, though. AEG needs to fill those rooms and they'll give enough to get someone (probably Wilf).

I've looked at the Excel numbers, and plugged them into Excel, and I sure don't see a "striking" correlation between market size and value. Here's the scatter plot:

fieldofschemes.com/charts/NFLvalues.png

Nothing real dramatic there. Correlation coefficient is 0.38, which is a real relationship, but not a crazy strong one.

Taking the slope of the correlation, it tells us that on average, team value rises by $26 for each additional person in the media market. (I used Arbitron radio markets because they were easiest to find, but TV markets shouldn't differ too much for these purposes. This tells us that moving the Vikings to L.A. should increase their value by about $206 million. That's not nothing, but it's nowhere near enough to make up for any kind of lease that AEG is even close to offering.

Beyond the question of whether they make business sense for an NFL owner, has there been any official NFL comment on either of the LA plans? I would think they would have a big problem with any stadium-building ventures that don't involve a major public subsidy. Not exactly the kind of precedent you want to set when extortion is a large part of your business plan.