With the Warriors moving back to San Francisco, that opens up a good deal of real estate to build a replacement Oakland Coliseum for the A's. I think the Raiders will end up sharing Santa Clara or Berkeley for a while and then get their own place, which will end up being so small and cheap as to make Soldier Field look like Jerryworld.

I think you're underestimating the Rams' fanbase in Los Angeles. While it's true that some people want the Raiders and no one wants the Chargers, there's been a pretty big swell of support for the Rams coming home.

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The Chargers will be back in SD within 5 years, if they wind up leaving at all. The NFL loves holding Super Bowls there, they just don't like to pay for the building. San Diego acted like they didn't need no stinkin' NFL (and they dont! Good for San Diego, temporarily) so the NFL packed up and went to Los Angeles.

But there is that little "technicality" about San Diego not being a sure-thing yet. That's the wink while walking out the door.

San Diego will eventually cave. That whole love-fest between the players and fans at the last game was so perfect for creating an emotional argument for public money to build a new stadium for the Chargers it had to have been orchestrated.

I could even imagine some sort of miniature Donald Sterling/Steve Ballmer situation where they bring in someone local and likable to be a hood ornament for "new" ownership/management, even though the shitty Spanos clan will still effectively own the team. That way, the negotiations won't feel quite so hostile, the bridges being burned as they are with the Spanoses. Think "an investment group led by former Chargers great and CSFMB running gag Dan Fouts" or something.

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I don't think there's nearly as much support for the Rams as there is for the Raiders (and the Trojans...and the Bruins...). Maybe enough to make them into LA's team, keep the stadium full enough to build some local buzz and maybe 20 years from now it'll be possible. But in less time than that the NFL will be asking LA to tear down whatever stadium they are building in Englewood now or the Rams will be moving to Fort Worth.

I think the NFL has enough contempt for its fans to just force them to once again love the shitty greedbag owner they rightfully came to hate.

I'm kind of amused that the Chargers owners are actually from fucking Stockton. That would be like if the Cubs ownership were...from...Omaha

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Ive been to Stockton more than a few times. Stockton, just like Fresno, Modesto, Bakersfield, Merced, etc. is basically a midsized Texas city (think Wichita Falls or Waco) dropped in the middle of California. Stockton just manages to be more miserable than the rest, which is quite the accomplishment.

What I'm trying to say is even the inbreds who wandered in from the hinterlands and bought the Cubs come from a better place than Stockton.

I'm kinda surprised the Raiders never, to my knowledge, threatened to move to San Jose. SJ has a larger pop. than SF & Oakland & pretty much shares the same metropolitan area.

The A's tried to then the NFL threw an epic bitch fit. 49ers wound up in Santa Clara, killing everyone else's chances.

The Niners had been squatting on it for a long time, I think. Had their team headquarters there and stuff. Baseball wouldn't let the A's move there because apparently it's the Giants' territory (which is weird because there are no rules like that with NY/LA/Chicago).

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The NFL is taking away our perpetually mediocre and underachieving football team? Oh no! How will we ever cope as a fan base?

Pitchers and Catchers report February 18th.

Ok, we're good.

Fame and fortune is a magnet
It can pull you far away from home
With a dream in your heart you're never alone
Dreams turn into dust and blow away
And there you are without a friend
You pack your car and ride away

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Freedom is our Strength.

This is why you keep your teams happy.

It is easy to proclaim "Why are taxpayers paying for this?" but then they move and it sucks for you. Oh, but congratulations to St. Louis on saving a relatively minor amount of their budget and becoming a two sport city. I'm sure St. Louis will take off and be great because they stood up to the greedy Rams.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Spaulding is going there. Gotta start somewhere.

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Why are you blaming St. Louis? They threw themselves at the Rams, offering them hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer money to build them a new stadium even when they haven't finished paying for the current one. But the team's lease was up, they had already bought the land in Inglewood, and had no intention of staying.

This is what's best for St. Louis. The Rams have been irrelevant for years and the market truly couldn't support the Cardinals, Blues, and Rams, and with how the Blues have had bankruptcy scares since the day they were established, perhaps this will divert corporate money from the Rams to the Blues and help solidify their shitty hockey team. And maybe now instead of paying for two football stadiums at once, the money earmarked for the new stadium can be used in more substantial ways than a football stadium sitting on the riverfront doing nothing for ~350 days a year.

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St. Louis refused to do what was contractually obligated to them which is why the lease came up and the Rams became a prime target to move.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

The contractual obligations to maintain a "first-tier" stadium were some really bad negotiating on the part of the city.

If you wind this whole thing back to the early '90s, you could argue St. Louis was doomed from the start. The original angle was that the new St. Louis-based ownership of the New England Patriots (who were then a total joke that nobody cared about) was going to move the team to St. Louis, but then Bob Kraft swooped in to buy the franchise along with Foxborough Stadium and the rest is history. This is why the seats at the dome are red and blue; they ordered the seats in Pats colors and then never bothered to follow up. Then they applied for an expansion team for 1995 to be called the Stallions (gay), but that bid fell apart and the expansions went to Charlotte and Jacksonville instead. At this point, building a domed stadium on spec and being kinda desperate, St. Louis promised they'd turn a cheap stadium into an expensive stadium very soon if you'll please just come here and love us.

I don't know to what extent people could have foreseen the way NFL stadiums would become the palaces they are now (and also Soldier Field), but limping to the finish line and then overpromising seems like a bad move anyway.

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St. Louis pretty much sucked at having an NFL team.

That is why I am saying that this is why you keep your teams happy throughout. It's really easy to say "Don't do anything. Let the billionaires pay for it all!".

Then you don't have a team. Which is fine, unless you liked having a team, or it is important to your city to have a team.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I have a (gay) St. Louis Stallions shirt somewhere, CH. I grew up not far from St. Louis. Guess I'm glad that never came to fruition. stalliongreg, eh?

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-- source

The only thing that sounds gayer than calling a big muscular man a stud is calling him a stallion.

Weren't their colors supposed to be purple and sort of a dark metallic gold? Basically a cross between the Vikings and the Ravens with a hint of Broncos. Ugh, no wonder Jacksonville got a team instead.

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This, right? I've never even been to St. Louis but there has to be better use of the money (and riverfront land) than some underused facility that they'd be negotiated out of even getting revenues from on the 10 days it was used.

I doubt many people think less of St. Louis after they stop becoming a 'football town', they have a pretty awful reputation as it is.

This is actually a good day for any trend reversing subsidizing stadiums. 2 teams in a big market sharing a mostly privately-financed venue is better than bilking 2 mid-tier markets for public money.

St. Louis is actually hugely into soccer thanks to all its waves of German and Italian immigrants back in the day. A lot of people want an MLS team to play on the riverfront instead, which could be a decent investment if it doubles as a concert venue in the summer like Toyota Park does for us.

They have to do something with that real estate, though. It's a fucking warzone. Here, poke around on Street View: https://www.google.com/maps?ll=38.63886 ... n&t=m&z=15

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Things will really take off for St. Louis if they also let the Blues and Cardinals leave. Imagine all the money they'll save!

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Are the Blues and Cardinals demanding hundreds of millions of dollars for new facilities? Oh, they're not? Disaster averted, I guess.

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Not right now. The Cardinals got over $200 million from the government for the current ballpark(and a loan).

The Blues want money too. The city should let them leave too!

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Actually, it looks like it is more than $200 million but it depends how you count it.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/What+the+public+paid+for+the+Cardinals'+stadium%3A+the+media+never+told...-a0165692019

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

This was a great thread before Rick and CH mucked it up with there back and forth discussion on the topic at hand

This turned out to be right, but even I wasn't banking on Kroenke going above and beyond poisoning the well by writing up a huge report on what a piece of shit St. Louis is and how not only should the Rams leave, but no one else should ever come there after he leaves.

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