Good thing the team didn’t move to the suburbs or an Illinois farm field. To you naysayers: you know they would have had city and state not made the deal for a new stadium happen!
>>Good thing the team didn’t move to the suburbs or an Illinois farm field.<<
Well, that’s certainly the “card” the blackmailing billionaires played in order to get their collective snoots into the public trough. Worked like a charm. It certainly shows their sincere dedication to and appreciation for St. Louis and its Cardinal fans, doesn’t it?
I just heard on the news that Bud Selig is paid $18,000,000 per year as commissioner of MLB. There is no doubt that baseball is corrupted by $$$. Personally, I prefer watching high school and minor league baseball. By the time they get to the big leagues, it’s $9 beers, prima donna players, and spoiled managers, team personnel, and MLB officials.
Yes, the Cardinals blackmailed St. Louis and the state of Missouri. Would they have left downtown if they couldn’t get a new stadium deal? There is no doubt about it. Both Illinois and St. Louis County were ready to make a deal if the city/state couldn’t keep the team downtown.
Is downtown better for having the new stadium, 80+ nights of action per year, and all the hotel and restaurant trade that comes with it? Absolutely.
Just imagine this Allstar game if the stadium was out in Riverport, St. Charles County, or at I-55/255 in Illinois. Downtown would have been a lonely place. Would they have held Fanfest at the Family Arena, or the Collinsville Holiday Inn? What a joke that would have been.
We’re all better off for the Cardinals to be playing in downtown, and Bud Selig is a joke of a commission. $18,000,000 to run a league with all the controversies of MLB? Gimme a break.
After the Allstar game, people need to start looking at some of the penalty provisions of the Ballpark Village deal. Ballpark Village was supposed to be open in time for the Allstar Game. So now that the Cardinals have failed to deliver on that commitment, what should the community do about it?
IMAGE enhancement is done, over with by 9 Wednesday morning, and time to go back to the SOS. Enjoy it while it lasts, budget problems to become the new reality. Time to start cheerleading for the Music Man. Got your pom poms ready Steve?
Proof that Selig is a joke? When asked if MLB should rethink its finances, Selig states that MLB has a current labor agreement and that they’ll see how things look by the end of the season. Meanwhile, the news is reporting that the Chicago Cubs, one of MLB’s most storied and popular franchises, is considering bankruptcy and that another storied team, the Oakland Athletics (unable to work out their own stadium extortion deal), may be eliminated through “contraction”. Great work, Bud!
MLB contraction story. And we haven’t even started talking about the ham-handed way Selig has dealt with the steroids controversy. $18 mil a year. (shakes head). Why can’t we all get gigs like that.
Oh, and what about that sweetheart deal of moving Selig’s team, the Brewers, from the AL to the NL. It’s like Mel Brooks said in History of the World, “It’s good to be the king!”
He is one of the worst. He tried to extort the Twins too and take their team and
the fans rebeled. The premise that an owner (and really still a backdoor owner through
his daughter) should be allowed to be the commisioner too is absurd.
>>So now that the Cardinals have failed to deliver on that commitment, what should the community do about it?<<
The “community” is not in a position to do anything about it. If there was any will to penalize the Cardinals for nonperformance regarding Ball Park Mirage, there would have to have been will to tell them to build their own damn stadium in the first place. Well, there isn’t. And there wasn’t. And here we are. And here we’ll be.
Would they have really moved to St. Charles county or Illinois? The bluff was enough, so we’ll never know for sure. They were able to bend the City of St. Louis over in the showers by pointing out what a whistling hole their departure would leave downtown, but what sort of governmental subsidies could the blackmailing billionaires have mooched from their fellow Repubs who run St. Charles County..? True, St. Charles County’s metastasis over the years would have been impossible without huge taxpayer subsidy, but still…its pols give lip service to the whole Repub “private market” schtick, which always cracks me up.
How would residents of greater Illinois have felt about subsidizing some down state blackmailing billionaires in order to produce the Alton Cardinals in their new stadium? Not too great, I bet. Cubs fans wouldn’t dig it.
Moments of high tragicomedy: when the Cardinals’ “leadership” opined publicly that St. Louis fans were the “greatest in the nation” while simultaneously saying that they were “looking at Illinois”. Unbelievable.
Well, for what it’s worth…this St. Louis Neighbor hasn’t attended one Cardinal game all season, and won’t miss a thing if we don’t go all year. The place has turned into casual day for corporate suits dressed down to Polo golf shirts and yuppies from the burbs.
If government spends your tax dollars on something you support (a new baseball stadium, Metrolink, Forest Park or the Highway 64 rebuild), then it’s “good”. If the government “wastes” it on something you don’t support, it’s “bad”. As for the economic impact, I look at the long term trends, not the short-term numbers. Sure, the All Star Game increased hotel revenues for a few days and sold more meals and souveniers to the visitors. But what’s the long-term benefit? Were there any more people hired, “permanently”, in Hampton Village or the U City Loop? It’s still too early to tell, but how many development deals were closed at or because of the game? How many local residents actually got to go to the game in person? If you, like most of us, watched it on TV, it really doesn’t matter if it were at Busch Stadium or Yankee Stadium (except we got to put up with the local road closures)! And quick, where was the All Star Game held three years ago? What’s the residual benefit to that city? So yeah, while it’s good to see a few days of increased activity, what’s really needed is 300+ days of increased, sustained activity . . .
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Good times.
As I predicted, Ball Park Village is the home to some big white tents but no real buildings . . .
Good thing the team didn’t move to the suburbs or an Illinois farm field. To you naysayers: you know they would have had city and state not made the deal for a new stadium happen!
>>Good thing the team didn’t move to the suburbs or an Illinois farm field.<<
Well, that’s certainly the “card” the blackmailing billionaires played in order to get their collective snoots into the public trough. Worked like a charm. It certainly shows their sincere dedication to and appreciation for St. Louis and its Cardinal fans, doesn’t it?
I just heard on the news that Bud Selig is paid $18,000,000 per year as commissioner of MLB. There is no doubt that baseball is corrupted by $$$. Personally, I prefer watching high school and minor league baseball. By the time they get to the big leagues, it’s $9 beers, prima donna players, and spoiled managers, team personnel, and MLB officials.
Yes, the Cardinals blackmailed St. Louis and the state of Missouri. Would they have left downtown if they couldn’t get a new stadium deal? There is no doubt about it. Both Illinois and St. Louis County were ready to make a deal if the city/state couldn’t keep the team downtown.
Is downtown better for having the new stadium, 80+ nights of action per year, and all the hotel and restaurant trade that comes with it? Absolutely.
Just imagine this Allstar game if the stadium was out in Riverport, St. Charles County, or at I-55/255 in Illinois. Downtown would have been a lonely place. Would they have held Fanfest at the Family Arena, or the Collinsville Holiday Inn? What a joke that would have been.
We’re all better off for the Cardinals to be playing in downtown, and Bud Selig is a joke of a commission. $18,000,000 to run a league with all the controversies of MLB? Gimme a break.
After the Allstar game, people need to start looking at some of the penalty provisions of the Ballpark Village deal. Ballpark Village was supposed to be open in time for the Allstar Game. So now that the Cardinals have failed to deliver on that commitment, what should the community do about it?
IMAGE enhancement is done, over with by 9 Wednesday morning, and time to go back to the SOS. Enjoy it while it lasts, budget problems to become the new reality. Time to start cheerleading for the Music Man. Got your pom poms ready Steve?
Proof that Selig is a joke? When asked if MLB should rethink its finances, Selig states that MLB has a current labor agreement and that they’ll see how things look by the end of the season. Meanwhile, the news is reporting that the Chicago Cubs, one of MLB’s most storied and popular franchises, is considering bankruptcy and that another storied team, the Oakland Athletics (unable to work out their own stadium extortion deal), may be eliminated through “contraction”. Great work, Bud!
MLB contraction story. And we haven’t even started talking about the ham-handed way Selig has dealt with the steroids controversy. $18 mil a year. (shakes head). Why can’t we all get gigs like that.
Oh, and what about that sweetheart deal of moving Selig’s team, the Brewers, from the AL to the NL. It’s like Mel Brooks said in History of the World, “It’s good to be the king!”
He is one of the worst. He tried to extort the Twins too and take their team and
the fans rebeled. The premise that an owner (and really still a backdoor owner through
his daughter) should be allowed to be the commisioner too is absurd.
Bob Costas or George Will should be named Commissioner of MLB.
>>So now that the Cardinals have failed to deliver on that commitment, what should the community do about it?<<
The “community” is not in a position to do anything about it. If there was any will to penalize the Cardinals for nonperformance regarding Ball Park Mirage, there would have to have been will to tell them to build their own damn stadium in the first place. Well, there isn’t. And there wasn’t. And here we are. And here we’ll be.
Would they have really moved to St. Charles county or Illinois? The bluff was enough, so we’ll never know for sure. They were able to bend the City of St. Louis over in the showers by pointing out what a whistling hole their departure would leave downtown, but what sort of governmental subsidies could the blackmailing billionaires have mooched from their fellow Repubs who run St. Charles County..? True, St. Charles County’s metastasis over the years would have been impossible without huge taxpayer subsidy, but still…its pols give lip service to the whole Repub “private market” schtick, which always cracks me up.
How would residents of greater Illinois have felt about subsidizing some down state blackmailing billionaires in order to produce the Alton Cardinals in their new stadium? Not too great, I bet. Cubs fans wouldn’t dig it.
Moments of high tragicomedy: when the Cardinals’ “leadership” opined publicly that St. Louis fans were the “greatest in the nation” while simultaneously saying that they were “looking at Illinois”. Unbelievable.
Studs Lonigan – couldna said it better myself.
Well, for what it’s worth…this St. Louis Neighbor hasn’t attended one Cardinal game all season, and won’t miss a thing if we don’t go all year. The place has turned into casual day for corporate suits dressed down to Polo golf shirts and yuppies from the burbs.
Bud Selig > Gary Bettman
If government spends your tax dollars on something you support (a new baseball stadium, Metrolink, Forest Park or the Highway 64 rebuild), then it’s “good”. If the government “wastes” it on something you don’t support, it’s “bad”. As for the economic impact, I look at the long term trends, not the short-term numbers. Sure, the All Star Game increased hotel revenues for a few days and sold more meals and souveniers to the visitors. But what’s the long-term benefit? Were there any more people hired, “permanently”, in Hampton Village or the U City Loop? It’s still too early to tell, but how many development deals were closed at or because of the game? How many local residents actually got to go to the game in person? If you, like most of us, watched it on TV, it really doesn’t matter if it were at Busch Stadium or Yankee Stadium (except we got to put up with the local road closures)! And quick, where was the All Star Game held three years ago? What’s the residual benefit to that city? So yeah, while it’s good to see a few days of increased activity, what’s really needed is 300+ days of increased, sustained activity . . .