Greetings from my undisclosed location! I have time for an abbreviated news roundup this week:
- Colorado Springs may use tax increment financing to build a new stadium for its Switchbacks USL team (if you think that’s an odd name, just look at what the city’s minor-league baseball team is going to be called), and the mayor previously campaigned saying he’d require a public vote on any stadium funding, but now says nah, not gonna happen.
- The Columbus Crew fan group Save the Crew released renderings of a downtown soccer stadium it’s proposing, which would have some sort of translucent roof supported by full-stadium-width beams and 30-foot-wide stairways and an enormous video board taking up one corner and you know, these are renderings by a fan group, so I really won’t make fun of them. Much.
- St. Petersburg has started mapping out plans for the Tropicana Field site when and if the Rays move to a new stadium, with talk of a mixed-use project called the Gas Plant District, which the Tampa Bay Times notes “harkens to the African-American neighborhood the city bulldozed decades ago to build the then-Florida Suncoast Dome.” That’s maybe not the tribute the African-American former residents would prefer? (Also not the proper use of “harken“; the Times means “hark back to.”)
- The New York Times’ Michael Powell notes what we all knew already, which is that LeBron James is gone from Cleveland but the Cavaliers‘ publicly funded arena renovations are still going forward. Though he does add: “City and county leaders plan to use a portion of the tax on Cavaliers playoff tickets to help pay off the arena bonds. That looks like a dodgy bet right now as the Cavaliers, shorn of James, may not even make the playoffs.” Whoops! The Cavs are apparently offering to loan the city and county the money if there’s any shortfall; Powell doesn’t say if they’ll charge interest.
- Anthony Precourt’s lawyer says some of the Austin MLS stadium amendments proposed by the city council contain “poison pills,” though he’s also pushing for a final vote to be taken today instead of being postponed to next week so councilmembers can read over all the proposals, so that’s exactly what you’d expect him to say. I’ll likely be offline when the vote does or doesn’t happen today, so somebody please update in comments, thanks!
Austin vote delayed to next Wednesday: https://www.statesman.com/sports/pro-sports/win-loss-just-another-delay-for-austin-soccer-stadium-deal/AXETxIu2BfYkT2oL5ks9yH/
The TB Times also accidentally refers to the Gas Plant District as the Gas Light District. Freudian slip much?
Interesting.
Generally when a team holds a “name the franchise” contest, there are a bunch of loser names which are obviously going to be discarded and one which the owner slips in which s/he actually wants. This is what passes for “fan input” today.
The Sky Sox (what was wrong with that name?) appear to have eschewed any non-ridiculous option this time around…
All professional sports teams seeking public funding for facilities (and often as not, some form of direct or indirect operating subsidy to play in the stadium they didn’t pay for) should be named “Leeches”
I live in Colorado Springs and there are two prevailing theories regarding the crazy names.
1. It’s just a marketing ploy to get attention and that ownership will reject all of those names at the last minute in favor of something else.
2. Since this new team will be a rookie league club taking the place of the departing AAA team (a huge dropoff in talent level plus the rookie league season is super-short starting in mid June) ownership believes a crazy name is the only way to drum up any interest.
I’d believe either (or both) Jeff. I guess we aren’t yet past the era when team owners believe having teams named after/dressed as transformers or superheroes (you know it’s next…) is the only way to get youngsters into the seats and bring their parents…
…. and I see that one of the exterior images of the proposed new downtown(ish) stadium includes what appears to be a mugging in progress.
Hmmn. Insert your own joke here.
To be fair, I believe there have been a “Sky Sox” in Colorado Springs before, so I think the name has some history.
“Sky Sox” would be fine. But that’s not one of the options.
Imagine if Austin approves the stadium funding but Columbus wins their Model Law case…
Check on proposition “one”.
www.kxan.com/video/plans-for-mls-stadium-in-north-austin-moves-forward-after-austin-city-council-vote_20180815221423/1373634057