Limbaugh Dropped From Rams Bid
Last week Rush Limbaugh was dropped the group seeking to take over the St. Louis Rams. Opposition was mounting locally, nationally and even within the NFL. Here is the poll question, answers and the final tally:
Q: Rush Limbaugh & Dave Checketts have bid on the St. Louis Rams. Reaction?
- I don’t like Limbaugh and this would make it easier to stay away from the Rams: 77 (30%)
- I don’t care who owns the team as long as it remains in St. Louis: 63 (24%)
- I don’t like Limbaugh, used to support the Rams, but will stop if he becomes an owner: 39 (15%)
- I don’t like Limbaugh but I would continue supporting the Rams: 32 (12%)
- I like Limbaugh and the Rams, great match: 19 (7%)
- I don’t have an opinion on Limbaugh buying the Rams: 15 (6%)
- I like Limbaugh but not the Rams/football: 8 (3%)
- I like Limbaugh so I might start supporting the Rams: 6 (2%)
What we can take away from these results is most of the readers here are Rams fans, or at least want them to stay in St. Louis. 134 of the 259 votes (52%) showed a positive view toward the Rams/NFL. Conversely, nearly as many are not really interested in the Rams/NFL. More of those voting dislike Limbaugh than those that do like him. With Limbaugh out of the picture the focus shifts back to the region’s willingness to pay up to keep the Edwards Jones Dome among the NFL’s best:
The Rams lease agreement with the St. Louis Convention & Visitors Commission (CVC) requires the Edward Jones Dome rank among the top eight stadiums in the 32-team NFL on the Dome’s 20th birthday in 2015. If first-tier status is not met, the Rams lease would switch to year-to-year terms a decade ahead of schedule and the team would have the option to leave St. Louis. (Source: St. Louis Business Journal, 5/16/08, Edward Jones Dome challenged to measure up)
Renovations to the dome will likely cost more in the coming years than the dome cost to build. Estimates are in the hundreds of millions. The hotel room tax doesn’t collect enough to fund the renovations that will be needed. 2015 will be here soon. Can we assume that if Dave Checketts and his partners are successful in buying a controlling interest in the Rams that they wouldn’t move the team out of the region? Maybe. Expect to hear much more about this over the next 5-6 years.
The best part is we won’t be hearing from Rush Limbaugh as a team owner.
– Steve Patterson
“The best part”, you say, is that someone will not be allowed to engage in a certain line of business because of his political beliefs.
You mean because of his racist beliefs, right? Tino, you’re not suggesting that Limbaugh’s racist views can be discounted as merely “political views”, are you?
Don’t believe he’s a racist? Then how do you explain his “Bo Snerdley, Official Obama Criticizer” sketches? You know the ones, where he hands the show over to “Snerdley”, who speaks candidly to Barack and Michelle Obama, in heavy black dialect, with lots of ghetto terminology and African American slang. These bits go on for a good five or so minutes. Then “Snerdley” hands the show back to Limabaugh.
Classic, “hands clean” racist tactic. Limbaugh maintains plausible deniability, while his puppet, “Snerdley”, makes racially charged statements about the First Family.
Seeing people get their panties in a knot over this has been the best part of the whole deal… 🙂
Many people did not like Rush’s involvement with an NFL team so the group seeking to buy the Rams dropped him. It was a good business decision plain and simple. No one has infringed upon his rights to own anything. It was proposed and the market responded unfavorably. Isn’t that exactly what he espouses?
It seems to me that all the negative vibes this blowhard (Rush Hudson Limbaugh A.KA. Jeff Christie) has been spewing over these many years has come back to blow back on his face (A classic “Blow Backâ€). He always tries to give off the airs that he can have anything he wants but as we all witness those with more money and more influence tossed him aside like sack of potatoes and the ultimate insult was that it was done in public (money don’t buy you everything butterball).
Now of course he blames everyone else (Michael J. Fox, Perez Hilton, Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Sonia Sotomayor, Hillary Clinton, Olympia Snowe, ESPN, NFL, the media, basically people of color, the handicapped, women and gays) when of course all you have to do is listen to his show and plainly hear his daily prejudices filled sermons. So NFL, I salute you decision, job well done. And to the whaling cry baby perched on his self made pedestal, quit your whining it was your own fault. You are reaping what he has sowed, KARMA, “Palin and simple” like his followers. Don’t we all feel better?
http://www.chasingevil.org/2009/10/rush-limbaugh-in-his-own-words.html
I would not support the Rams at all if some left wing idiot like Keith Olbermann bought them, so I guess I can see why people wouldn’t support if Limbaugh bought them.
Of much more importance (and Dallas this
week opens its new downtown performing
arts center) of much more importance for ALL..
left, right, center, up, down, whatever..
is the reopening of Kiel Opera House, by far
to outperform at least the Rams and
the Blues in year round economic impact.
No contest…not even close.
Dave..get you eyes back on the Ball
on Market between 14th and 15th
The more important issue here is what they are going to have to do to the Jones dome so the Rams will stay… Is it a matter of ownership funding the effort to re-build/renovate a more sophisticated stadium – or will it need the help of tax financing … we can all look at the Cardinals on how the situation of BallPark village turned out.
Can the Bottle District become a reality…? Is this still in the works??? …Combined with a setting near the existing stadium – creating an fantastic, tailgating, BBQing gameday experience? Does the city have a population to support the team at all?
This sideshow lets the region avoid the bigger question once again, what will the state, region, county and city willing to do to keep the Rams? In other word, where to draw the line. Or do we just hope that Jacksonville Jaguars go to LA first
The political and financial reality is that the city can’t provide what the NFL will want let alone any new owners nor will they get any help. That means it will be a new open air stadium in either the county (I picture the old Chrysler Plant in Fenton getting bulldozed for a new stadium in the name of economic development) or Illinois coming to the plate to put a stadium on the river in East St. Louis. Mayor Slay should at least try to get political committments for supporting a soccer stadium as well as keeping the Presidents casino’s license downtown in return for supporting the Rams leaving the Edwards Dome.
The NFL decides who becomes an owner not the other way around.
All this blowhard (Rush Hudson Limbaugh A.KA. Jeff Christie) has to offer is his money and his opinions, which in my opinion are on the fringes of racism (one mans opinion). There are many more groups biding for the Rams, not just his group. Lets face it there are more men with money that will gladly fill the slot and the Rams will win or lose depending on how well the team works together and not on whether or not Rush is an owner.
As for Vick, well he is a player (he has talent not like you, Rush or I, unless you are a NFL player?) and he served his time and the NFL decided we live in the land of second chances, so why not (I personally don’t like it but, oh well). Life has never been fair (NEWS FLASH!)
Now as to the “Free Speech†argument, I guess many of you like myself heard Rush on Thursday “Almost in tearsâ€, priceless. But the last two days he now is in his normal ranting and will continue until someone surpasses him, “Free Speech†continues, so quit your whining.
http://www.chasingevil.org/2009/10/rush-limbaugh-in-his-own-words.html
On a peripheral note, it always strikes me how far in the foreground sports (and sports soap opera drama) are in St. Louis. I’m not sure that people living there even realize that this is “St. Louis Normal” — not a universal part of life in other places like it is in St. Louis. There are fans everywhere, but in St. Louis, sports are so very integral to the community fabric. Why is that?
I’m not saying that the Rush/Rams story isn’t a story — it was national news. But it makes me realize (again) how much a part of St. Louis life the local teams play.