You know, I wasn’t going to write about this Athletic article interviewing Kansas City Royals owner John Sherman about his plans for the team and a possible new downtown stadium, because it really doesn’t contain any news at all. But I just can’t get over these opening paragraphs:
SURPRISE, Ariz. — John Sherman once took a woman on a first date to a ballgame at Kauffman Stadium. Her name was Marny and they showed up to watch the Kansas City Royals take on the Yankees. If he remembers correctly, more than four decades later, Lou Piniella was playing left field for New York.
“My wife is embarrassed when I tell that story,” Sherman recounted Monday. “But it went OK. We’ve been married for 40 years.”
What do you think was going through Royals beat writer Alec Lewis’s head when he wrote this? That a story about once taking his now-wife on a date to a Royals game somehow shows that Sherman, as Lewis writes, “understands the long haul”? (Because he’s stayed married for 40 years? Because he remembers who Lou Piniella was?) That this was a cute story and more interesting than anything else Sherman said, and totally doesn’t risk allowing Sherman to spin himself as just a regular-guy Royals fan and not a billionaire propane baron who is seeking taxpayer money for a new stadium just 15 years after getting taxpayer money to renovate his old stadium? That it’s only March and there’s a long season of writing about Royals losses ahead, best to just write the first thing that comes into your head and move along? So many possibilities.
As for the stadium stuff, Sherman didn’t really say much in detail, other than that a downtown stadium would be a “public-private partnership” and “we’ll be big investors in that partnership,” which is a reasonably clever way of framing asking for a bunch of public money as generosity for putting in any of your own money at all. Also this:
“We’re one of only 25 cities in the United States with a Major League Baseball franchise,” Sherman said. “Four cities have two, and there’s one in Canada. These are really valuable assets for a community, so I’m interested: Why shouldn’t we want to optimize the value of this asset on behalf of our community?”
Is that a move threat? An argument that the Royals would be more valuable (to “the community,” not just to Sherman) if they played in a new taxpayer-financed home? A flex of his geography skills?
There are many, many followup questions that Lewis could have, and should have, asked — or, for that matter, any of the assembled sportswriters on hand could have asked, as this was a press gaggle during spring training that for some reason every Royals beat reporter felt obligated to write up at length. Let’s see how other news outlets handled it. The Kansas City Star:
Kansas City Royals chairman and CEO John Sherman seemingly still likes to look at himself as another longtime Royals fan. He’s also abundantly aware that he’s a fan who currently has more say in the fate of the franchise than anyone else who’s ever sat in a seat at Kauffman Stadium with emotions riding on every pitch.
MLB.com, which probably shouldn’t be considered a news outlet since it’s owned by the people it’s writing about, but anyway:
SURPRISE, Ariz. — As the Royals speed toward Opening Day with just over two weeks to go until they are Kansas City bound, team owner John Sherman feels optimistic about the state of his team and organization as he embarks on his third full season as the CEO and chairman of the club.
You get the picture. In short, a wealthy sports team owner deigned to speak to the ink-stained wretches of the sportswriting corps about his stadium plans (and dating history), and everyone just sat there with their recorders and went straight back to their laptops to bang out their daily stenography to power.
The K.C. Star article, in fact, is such devoted stenography that it’s mostly just unedited quotes from Sherman, which includes the entirety of what he said about his long-ago first date:
Look, my first date with my wife was a Royals-Yankees game in the late 70s.
What the? Did the Star leave out the bit about Lou Piniella? Did Lewis approach Sherman after the group interview to press for more details about his date? Please give generously to Field of Schemes so that I can assign a beat writer on Royals beat writers, to get to the bottom of exactly what’s going on here and who’s been smoking what.
Yes, the Wretches could ask difficult questions. Do you think they could keep their jobs if they did? I don’t think “news outlets” regard tough questions as part of a sports writers job.
And why not?
Ridiculous. A classic park with history that was also rebuilt fully and has every bell and whistle necessary.
KC media has been pushing this narrative since before Kauffman was renovated and basically immediately afterward, I assume downtown would be more convenient/fun for sportswriters.
I know there’s a lot to unpack but can we also take a sec to appreciate him calling San Francisco and Oakland one city
Clearly I spoke too soon about the geography flex.
Well if we want to go that route they are also considering LA and Anaheim as one city as well and those stadiums are much further apart that Oakland and San Francisco’s
The sad thing about this sort of stenonalism is that it works. I know this because I remember Tom Ricketts introduction to the (then) faithful about 15 years ago (hey! Right about the time Kauffman was being renovated with public money!!! Synergy!!!)
Paraphrased as my memory is not as good as it once was/should be:
Cubs stenouncer: “Mr Ricketts, could you tell us how you first came to be a Cub fan?”
TR: “Well, I took my girlfriend – now wife – to a game and we sat in the bleachers. I had wanted to bring her for so long because I was born a Cub fan but we were so poor, I mean we couldn’t even afford bleacher seats. So finally, I saved and saved and saved and…”
CS: “Who were they playing?”
TR: “Ahhh, um. I think. Um, ahhh.”
CS: “Was it a good pitching matchup, do you remember who started for the Cubs?”
TR: “Well, uhhhhh”. I remember I proposed to my wife that afternoon outside the stadium”
Way to change the topic Tom! You were never in the bleachers, and I bet you didn’t pay for your own ticket either!
Seriously… if you are fan of any sports team and saved up to buy a ticket to your first ever game… you not only remember who was playing but you probably still have the ticket stub and box score from the next day’s paper tucked away somewhere.
BTW, if the conversation above sound a little like the time Ferris Bueller took his girlfriend to the game, I doubt it’s an accident. Long time Cub fans will remember the day Matthew Broderick joined Caray and Stone in the booth in 1984 to discuss filming their new movie at the stadium the next week.
Maybe Tommie remembers that too…
Wait a freaking minute. Tom Ricketts’ dad the founder of TD Ameritrade. He is a billionaire. The idea that his U of Chicago attending spawn was so poor that he had trouble scraping up the cost of 2 bleacher seats is laughable.
I remember the time that I paid my first set of property taxes with my now wife.
That is fine and lart of the societal social contract. I do not wish them to go to a for profit-organization.
Downside for the Royals of a downtown stadium-loss of those 19,000 parking spaces. The only spaces within miles of Kaufman Stadium.
I get a sense there is no sense of urgency on a new royals park. The pols not the owner would be the chief booster
Kauffman Stadium is a beautiful ballpark and I personally rank it towards the top of all ballparks. The ballpark appears to be well maintained and I see no reason to build a new one.
I forgot, it is not downtown and with all of the advertising and now adds on uniforms and helmets, the owners still need to squeeze every dollar they can with someone paying for their ballpark district.