NFL commissioner Roger Goodell once again expressed a desire to keep the Raiders and Chargers in their current cities Wednesday, but he admitted that neither Oakland nor San Diego has made much progress toward a new stadium.
“There’s not a stadium proposal on the table that we think addresses the long-term issues of the club that’s in those communities. So we need to continue to work at it,” said Goodell (via Eric D. Williams of ESPN.com).
Raiders owner Mark Davis plans to relocate the franchise to Las Vegas, and though Goodell would reportedly like to prevent that from happening, he spoke favorably of Sin City on Wednesday.
“There are some real strengths to the Las Vegas market,” Goodell said. “It’s clear that the Las Vegas market has become a more diversified market, more broadly involved with entertainment and hosting big events.”
Goodell also indicated that “there is a growth” to the Las Vegas market, which is much smaller than the Raiders’ current home in the Bay Area. In an effort to keep the Raiders from leaving the Bay Area, officials from the city of Oakland and the Ronnie Lott-led Fortress Investment Group have proposed a $1.3 billion stadium to replace the Oakland Coliseum. Both the Alameda County board of supervisors and Oakland city council voted to approve that plan Tuesday, per Lorenzo Reyes of USA Today. However, there’s little optimism it’ll lead anywhere, with one league executive calling the bid a “carbon copy” of previous failed attempts.
The Raiders’ relocation window is set to open Jan. 2, but the date will move back until the actual end of their season, per Ian Rapoport of NFL.com (Twitter link). That means the likely playoff-bound club won’t have the opportunity to vie for relocation until February if it makes the Super Bowl, and the deadline to file is Feb. 15. Regardless of how far the Raiders go this season, Steelers chairman Art Rooney II doesn’t expect the league to vote on their relocation plan until March, per Judy Battista of NFL.com (Twitter link). Fellow owner Jim Irsay, who runs the Colts, seems to think relocation for the Raiders and Chargers is a mere formality.
“There just isn’t any opportunity in Oakland or San Diego,” Irsay said. “As owners, we’re aware of that. It’s unfortunate. You don’t like to see it. But it’s reality.”
Owners unanimously approved the Chargers’ nearly year-old agreement to share the Los Angeles market with the Rams on Wednesday. They also signed off on allowing the Bolts to use a debt waiver to finance part of the $650MM relocation fee. Chargers owner Dean Spanos has until Jan. 15 to decide whether to take his franchise to LA, and while he could perhaps extend that deadline, Irsay argues that there wouldn’t be a purpose.
“This process has been going on for a very, very long time in San Diego,” Irsay said. “That being said, to extend it, I think, would be fruitless. I really do.”
Spanos, meanwhile, reiterated that he won’t make a choice until 2017.
“I’m not going to make any decisions until after the first of the year,” he told Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune. “That’s really all I have to say.”
Why is it always Irsay to comment about this stuff dudes a pill addict nothing he says holds merit
He’s an owner and like it or not that does hold merit. He votes on issues like any other owner so therefor his opinion on things like relocation have value and merit.
Who cares about the chargers, their done.
Idiot..
Why is it that Goodall states he will try and block the Raiders from going to Las Vegas but when faceing Wally World owner Kronke he give in and allows him to do what he wants. Goodall your more of a push-over and less of a True Commissioner. Your just a puppet to Billionaires. GET OUT
He will try to block the Raiders move because of market size same reason he did’t stop the Rams Move to LA. Oakland is a larger market compared to Vegas as is LA compared to St. Louis
Feel bad for the Bolts fans. I think the mood of the country foreshadows more problems for the NFL in getting expensive stadiums built. The NFL should work with markets to build basic no frills stadiums. The team and corporate partners could then be responsible costs in making these stadiums palaces. NFL needs to be proactive in this area. I’m sure they have great people working on it. The money is just not there in most communities for the monetary contribution the NFL demands.
The stadiums are a sad joke. Their size and expense only make business sense when they are massively subsidized by public funds. All these conservative owners get very liberal when it comes to having the public finance their businesses. They should be building stadiums that can be economically supported by the team and other uses of the stadium. All the bells and whistles make more revenue for the owners but not enough to warrant paying for them outright.
Some simple math: $1.8b stadium, 20 years @ 8 games a year = 160 games, say 175 to be safe with 65k fans a game, have to get ~ $160 per attendee to just recoup the cost of the stadium, not counting stadium maintenance costs, profit or anything else. Now if the cost to the owner is a fraction of that, then sure it makes sense to them, but no way government money should be subsidizing it.
Ticket sales are not the sole basis of revenue.
Obviously there are millions to be made off of advertising and other events held in these “palaces”.
Plus revenue sharing,TV money,etc
Leave please you have ruined my sons life by letting players go year in and out only to dangle this carrot. If you wanted this stadium so bad why didn’t you buy land 10 years ago downtown and invest in this sport taking off in America called soccer. This tells me you are not a sportsman but a pure business man who doesn’t have the right people around you to forecast these simpleton projections. I swear you leave our colors and name and go tank in LA oops I mean the graveyard. I blame you not the city. You are supposed to be ahead of the game but you waited and could have had all this done for premises in the dollar but snoozed and lost. Bu bye!!!! L.A. Prawns.