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Jerry Reinsdorf Will Basically Bribe DePaul To Move To The United Center
Barry Petchesky

DePaul's in the market for a new basketball arena. Currently they're way out at the Allstate Arena, next to the airport, but they'd really like to be closer to campus, or at least somewhere in Chicago. Rocky Wirtz and (especially) Jerry Reinsdorf want them to make the United Center their home, and they're making the deal as sweet as possible.

According to Crain's Chicago Business, ownership made a presentation to DePaul, and offered:

• A customized court to add DePaul and Big East logos and decals for games.
• A DePaul team store.
• The Bulls' staff would help the school sell tickets.
• The Blue Demons would get to use the Bulls' locker room.
• DePaul would get to hang its banners in the arena.
• The school gets the United Center free for fundraising events.
• Best of all, 10 years of free rent.

DePaul's other option is to come up with $75 million to help build its own arena. The United Center's deal is looking pretty cushy.

The crazy part is, Jerry Reinsdorf doesn't even particularly want DePaul games. But it's worth it to him just to block the competition. The university's first-choice is a new 12,000-seat arena, as part of a development on Chicago's near South Side. Reinsdorf reportedly fears that the United Center would stand to lose out on concert and convention business if the arena gets built—and the project needs DePaul to get started.

Crain's reports that DePaul is still leaning toward the new arena, because it would prefer to own rather than rent, and because it wouldn't run up against scheduling conflicts. Still, sometimes it's nice to be a pawn in the schemes of rich people. DePaul's not the only Big East program to learn that lesson.

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This is better for the big picture than adding another arena that nobody needs and nobody can get to.

They'll really need that Pink Line L stop at Madison if they do this, though.

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I agree with what conns' thoughts. I really couldn't have said it better myself.

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They got a funny way of showing it. If their endowment had that deep a pockets, they would have cleared out the land they bought and built their own arena years ago.

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CSFMB: Home of the small minded

I find it hard to believe that DePaul makes any money on its athletic department. Maybe they should just cut sports all together.

They prefer to own rather than rent when they're getting tax dollars to build what they'll own. Because I know when I think of infrastructure where tax dollars should go in the city of Chicago, the first thing that comes to mind is "a medium-sized arena that will be the fourth or fifth in the market for a Catholic school's Division-I-in-name-only basketball team."

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POTY candidate. Well done.

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CSFMB: Home of the small minded

I took an athlete on a visit their once. It was embarrassing to take a tour of their athletic facilities. When EIU makes you look second rate, you have issues.

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I am trying to find the logic behind this Mc Cormick Place proposal. The stadium is equally inaccessible to students and the local fan base isn't going to increase by moving to the south side over the northwest suburbs.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

it is a terrible usage of arie crown

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

The only thing that seems weird about this proposal is letting them use the Bulls locker room. I can't see the Bulls being pleased as punch with some college team using their locker room. Aren't there auxiliary locker rooms in the bowels of the building? Surely there must be.

Other than that, it really does make sense for them to move to the United Center, with select games on campus in case of immovable conflicts. Seems like the path of least resistance here.

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My question: what impact will moving to the UC have on the program? Can you keep Purnell and sell playing in an NBA stadium to recruits?

It doesn't take all that long to turn around a hoops program and--yes--DePaul has screwed up on the personnel front over the past two decade; BUT the facility issue has got to be a huge sticking point for recruitment.

I really don't understand the McCormick Place idea from DePaul's standpoint. I don't think they are savvy enough to use the threat of a McCormick Place arena as a gambit to get better terms from Reinsdorf--but that is the way it is appearing.

I don't think playing at the United Center is a selling point unto itself. I mean, St. John's plays games at Madison Square Garden, and there's not a mile-long line to go play for St. John's. If anything, DePaul's continuing irrelevance, twinned with the move to a 21,000-seat arena, could make the atmosphere worse. Now, if they also get to use the new Berto Center that's going up somewhere in the Parking Ocean, then that could be big, both in access to NBA-forefront training facilities and to the perception of being, in some sense, right there with the Chicago Bulls.


The idea that DePaul can or should get its own new taxpayer-funded arena is galling, quite frankly. There's another sports team out there that tried for years to get out of its dated suburban arena to no avail. There just wasn't enough money lying around for sports construction, and the now-mismanaged team's glory days were too far in the rear-view for anyone to feel the team were owed anything. Finally, they exhausted all their options and had no choice but to move in with the local NBA team. Even though it meant extra driving and train rides for the fanbase, the terms were favorable, and ultimately it really was that or nothing. That team, of course, is the Brooklyn-bound four-time-champion New York Islanders, and if the Isles can be made to drag their most passionate of fans out to Brooklyn for games just to keep their fans from having to go to Seattle instead, then this pissant college basketball program can use the Bulls' arena and like it.

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Been on this story for 10 years! except it was the NEW soldier field not having a dome and as long as that happened, Jerry got the McCaskeys the funding they needed.

Of course even though Jerrys "fear" is being reported, it probably isn't real, just ask Frank?

And if Jerry has a fear of a 12,000 seat arena taking his business away...imagine a 70,000 seat arena?

It is simply one of the great political crimes of the century and cost the city and state, millions.

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

Jerry Reinsdorf is an all-time shitheel, but the only thing that would've been worse than Parthenon Spaceship Soldier Field blighting the lakefront was Maybe-Retractable-Roof Convention Center Soldier Field blighting the lakefront.

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explain to me how it could be much worse than the crap they built. Not only is it an eye sore, it was terribly designed, entries suck, bathrooms sucks, traffic flows sucks, food stands suck. It was what happens when the driving force of a project is making sure who gets the kickbacks and what comes from it, doesnt matter!

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"That's what the internet is for. Slandering others anonymously." Banky
“Been that way since one monkey looked at the sun and told the other monkey ‘He said for you to give me your fuckin’ share.’”

Well, I'm sure it would have had all the same glaring design flaws, plus a roof and astroturf.

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I believe a different location was scouted out for a new built stadium. I thought it was to be on the land that still remains vacant below Randolph at the river. It has good access points to the Kennedy, Ryan, Eisenhower, Stephenson and LSD. It has nearly direct access to public transportation. They probably could have even incorporated a water access element to it.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Even worse, passage of the legislation raised Ted Phillips' status from back office bean counter to front office executive with the resulting problems caused by his involvment in football decisions.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.