Josh Peter, USA TODAY Sports 10:10 a.m. EDT March 25, 2015
LOS ANGELES -- Tumbleweeds might as well have rolled down the 405 freeway that runs through this city as far as the NFL was concerned for the last two decades.
But suddenly the city that seemed an afterthought is being touted by the league as …
The gateway to Asia.
The hub of NFL West.
The home of two teams as early as 2016.
Previous rumblings of the NFL returning to Los Angeles ultimately went nowhere. But there has been a more specific message
this week at the NFL owners meetings in Phoenix, where owners and league officials have discussed their hopes and dreams
for a return to the country's second-largest metropolitan area.
"The probability that we will get something done in Los Angeles has gone up," said Eric Grubman, executive vice president of NFL ventures/business operations.
"My estimation is there is a good possibility of 2016."
A consultant with the league — one who assisted the Raiders and Rams in their exodus from Southern California after the 1994 season —
sees another possibility for Los Angeles a year from now: Nothing. Again.
That's right, zero teams for Los Angeles.
St. Louis holds on to the Rams, Oakland keeps the Raiders and San Diego retains the Chargers after those cities deliver sweet deals by the fall —
now widely seen as the NFL's deadline — to help build stadiums for their respective teams.
"It is conceivable," Marc Ganis, president of consulting firm Sportscorp Ltd., told USA TODAY Sports.
"The likelihood that it happens isn't great because of the individual challenges each community has. But it is conceivable."
Therein lies the biggest remaining hurdle for Los Angeles: Its odds of getting a team depend on the actions of three other cities,
simply because the NFL has always placed great importance on keeping teams in their markets.
THREE OWNERS
The owners of the three teams viewed as contenders — the Rams' Stan Kroenke, the Raiders' Mark Davis and the Chargers' Dean Spanos —
have accelerated their lobbying efforts as they seek support for a possible move.
Davis said things could get awkward when he, Kroenke and Spanos participate in meetings on other league matters.
"It's an elephant in the room, and it shouldn't be," Davis said. "But that's how the process has played out. I don't understand it,
to be honest with you. To me, I think the three of us should be in the same room, talk it out. 'Who's going to do it?
Where are they going to do it? And let's take care of the third team.'"
The NFL has mastered the art of squeezing stadium deals out of cities over the last two decades,
and the goal is for the three teams to get new homes, whether it be in Los Angeles or their current cities.
In the Los Angeles area, the options are a proposed stadium on the former site of Hollywood Park in Inglewood,
with Kroenke owning 60 acres of a 298-acre development plan, and a proposed stadium in Carson where the Chargers and Raiders would play.
"There are three teams, and only two are going to go there," Davis said. "But I think all three teams are still working on their home markets, trying to get something done. ...
That's what I want to get done. Something in Oakland."
Ganis, who speaks regularly to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and is friendly with many owners, agrees that keeping teams in their current cities is the priority.
So Tuesday, when owners and league executives said one or two teams could relocate before the 2016 season, Ganis said it was not an idle threat.
"Putting communities on notice publicly and privately is spelled out in the (NFL) relocation rules and the right thing to do," Ganis said.
"This is offering a road map as to how to retain the teams on a long-term basis. Knowing that this is what they need to do,
generally by when they need to do it and that there are credible and viable options for the team if it doesn't happen
is the responsible way to inform and assist the existing home territories to retain their teams."
The memory of Al Davis defying the NFL in the early 1980s when he moved the Raiders to Los Angeles
from Oakland has stoked fears of Kroenke doing the same with the Rams.
After all, it's hard to believe Kroenke is planning a $2 billion stadium in Inglewood without an expectation that his Rams will play in it.
But Ganis said if a proposed $985 million stadium in St. Louis secures funding, "It'd be very hard, if not impossible, following the league's relocation rules,
for that not to be approved by the NFL. And I have absolutely no doubt the NFL will enforce its rules regarding relocation."
Though a governor-appointed task force in Missouri presented a stadium project, the funding —
about $350 million to come from the extension of bonds that would need approval from the state legislature and/or voters —
remains uncertain. A spokesman for Gov. Jay Nixon said the task force was waiting on the NFL and Kroenke to make a financial commitment,
and the group's recommendation calls on the NFL and team to contribute $450 million.
"The governor has been clear that for any stadium proposal to move forward it must involve a significant financial commitment from the NFL and its local franchise,"
spokesman Channing Ansley said via e-mail. "Once this and other criteria are met, a determination about the financing mechanism can be made."
NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy said in an e-mail the league was working with the task force "to assemble a project that works for all sides, including a financing plan that will draw NFL support."
Rams spokesman Artis Twyman declined to comment Tuesday, and Kroenke has been noticeably silent and absent from that process. However, he recently revealed the proposed stadium in Inglewood would be able to accommodate two home teams.
IN SEARCH OF CERTAINTY
Funding is even more uncertain in Oakland and San Diego.
Davis has pledged $400 million toward a stadium, which has no price tag and has not been designed. Businessman Floyd Kephart, who is helping broker a deal, said there would be no public funds and money would be generated from a 200-acre parcel on which the stadium would be built and some land would be sold to private developers.
"I personally believe that if you do not have a definite plan approved for development and financing tied to it by the middle of September, then I think all of these teams that are involved in the various transactions will apply for a move under the NFL rules," Kephart said.
Davis denied using his interest in the Carson site as leverage against Oakland and maintained his preference was to stay there
if it found a way to generate money to help pay for the stadium. The Raiders share O.co Coliseum with baseball's Athletics.
"I've never used any other place as leverage," Davis said. "I've always said that Oakland is No.1, and I've always meant that.
I know that value wise, the Oakland market is not as valuable as far as revenue streams and all that stuff. We'll make do."
In San Diego, the mayor has set a May 20 deadline to get a stadium funding proposal from an advisory group.
The group has talked about using revenue that typically belongs to the team, said Jason Riggs, head of the San Diego Stadium Coalition,
which is consulting with the stakeholders.
But fancy stadium designs and creative financing proposals might not be enough as the game of stadium musical chairs enters a crucial period.
"Certainty is absolutely a requirement," Ganis said. "If San Diego comes up with a plan that they think in two years will work or has to go to a voter referendum,
but this is the only window for the Chargers to be able to get into Los Angeles, that's a bad solution. That is a solution that by its own terms won't go forward."
Jarrett Bell : Phoenix
March 25, 2014
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/2015/03/24/los-angeles-st-louis-rams-san-diego-chargers-oakland-raiders-stan-kroenke/70404784/
