Reinsdorf considers moving White Sox out of Guaranteed Rate Field or selling team

[WBWSF]

2 hours ago, The Mighty Mite said:

Big mistake building almost next door the The Trop, residents who live in Tampa and the suburbs and towns north of the city for the most part won’t make the trip down to which is basically south St. Pete.

I agree with you. I thought the present location by the Trop would be the last place  a stadium  would be built. This tells me the Rays owner wants to stay in the same area or he couldn't get another city to help him  with a new stadium.

[GreatScott82]

The Rays lease at Tropicana ends after the 2027 season. Their new stadium should be ready by 2028. That’s about 5 years of building and planning. 
The Sox GRF lease ends after the 2029 season with a potential club option for 2030.

If the White Sox are to purchase a new site, they will likely have to make this decision no later than after the 2025 season. I’m not so sure it’s in the best interest of the city of Chicago, its fanbase and the MLB to let an 89 year old owner make this critical decision. 

[The Mighty Mite]

1 hour ago, WBWSF said:

I agree with you. I thought the present location by the Trop would be the last place  a stadium  would be built. This tells me the Rays owner wants to stay in the same area or he couldn't get another city to help him  with a new stadium.

Rays owner Strernberg has always wanted a stadium near downtown Tampa but has never been able to strike a deal.

Edited September 18, 2023 by The Mighty Mite

[Lip Man 1]

2 hours ago, GreatScott82 said:

The Rays lease at Tropicana ends after the 2027 season. Their new stadium should be ready by 2028. That’s about 5 years of building and planning. 
The Sox GRF lease ends after the 2029 season with a potential club option for 2030.

If the White Sox are to purchase a new site, they will likely have to make this decision no later than after the 2025 season. I’m not so sure it’s in the best interest of the city of Chicago, its fanbase and the MLB to let an 89 year old owner make this critical decision. 

Assuming he is still with us.

[CWSpalehoseCWS]

1 hour ago, Lip Man 1 said:

Assuming he is still with us.

Lucky for us, Father Time remains undefeated.

Edited September 18, 2023 by CWSpalehoseCWS

[South Side Hit Men]

1 hour ago, CWSpalehoseCWS said:

Lucky for us, Father Time remains undefeated.

Perhaps he sold his soul.

Grateful Dead Hour 11-midnight every Monday on 90.9 FM WDCB

Good Jerry on lead vocals.

 

[SCCWS]

6 hours ago, The Mighty Mite said:

The Lightning and the Bucs draw very well as they are located in Tampa which is where the majority of the people in the metro area live, that and St. Pete is a ghost town from May through the holidays. There’s also a populated area east of St. Pete which if people want to go to Rays games either going north or especially south have to go pretty far out of the way what with the Bay itself in the way. Bottom line is that geography does play a big part with the Rays attendance problems.

Just my opinion, but It is 20 miles and 25 minutes between the Trop and Raymond James Stadium. It takes me 42 minutes to drive from SSC Florida to the Trop. It takes an 1hr13 minutes to drive from RI to Fenway. Again ,for  Tampa bay fans to Trop is a walk in the park. Their fans just are not real baseball fans old stadium or new.  Now the Lightning and Bucs fans are real fans and would go to St Pete or Clearwater or where  ever to see their teams. 

[Eminor3rd]

34 minutes ago, SCCWS said:

Just my opinion, but It is 20 miles and 25 minutes between the Trop and Raymond James Stadium. It takes me 42 minutes to drive from SSC Florida to the Trop. It takes an 1hr13 minutes to drive from RI to Fenway. Again ,for  Tampa bay fans to Trop is a walk in the park. Their fans just are not real baseball fans old stadium or new.  Now the Lightning and Bucs fans are real fans and would go to St Pete or Clearwater or where  ever to see their teams. 

I tend to agree. Living in NYC for 5 years,  it never ceased to amaze me to find out what people will put up with to get somewhere they really want to go. It's hard for me to believe it isn't simply a matter of lack of demand, even though it may be a mystery as to why the demand isn't there.

[South Side Hit Men]

22 minutes ago, Eminor3rd said:

I tend to agree. Living in NYC for 5 years,  it never ceased to amaze me to find out what people will put up with to get somewhere they really want to go. It's hard for me to believe it isn't simply a matter of lack of demand, even though it may be a mystery as to why the demand isn't there.

It’s the worst current stadium in baseball. The Metrodome was the only one worse out of the 42 MLB stadiums I visited.

The location is still bad, but if it’s nicer inside, perhaps a retractable roof for the Spring games when it’s still nice would help get more people to attend and support the solid teams they field.

Brewers Stadium II is nice when the roof is open, but it sucks when it’s closed (dark, loud, depressing). That is how the new Rangers Stadium looks on TV. Their prior stadium was a fun park to visit in the Fall and nice weather.

Baseball is made to be played and enjoyed watching outdoors. 

I don’t think Florida in general is a good market for baseball, just CFB and the NFL. Not sure the TV ratings matter down there.

Edited September 19, 2023 by South Side Hit Men

[The Mighty Mite]

26 minutes ago, Eminor3rd said:

I tend to agree. Living in NYC for 5 years,  it never ceased to amaze me to find out what people will put up with to get somewhere they really want to go. It's hard for me to believe it isn't simply a matter of lack of demand, even though it may be a mystery as to why the demand isn't there.

It is a mystery because Tampa and St. Pete have a great history of Spring Training going back many decades. Sox trained in Tampa before their move to Sarasota in the early 60s. 
Still pisses me off and the thousands of Chicago retirees who moved to Sarasota to see the Sox in ST but JR being the jerk he is moves ST to AZ.

 

Edited September 19, 2023 by The Mighty Mite

[WBWSF]

1 hour ago, The Mighty Mite said:

It is a mystery because Tampa and St. Pete have a great history of Spring Training going back many decades. Sox trained in Tampa before their move to Sarasota in the early 60s. 
Still pisses me off and the thousands of Chicago retirees who moved to Sarasota to see the Sox in ST but JR being the jerk he is moves ST to AZ.

 

JR moved the WhiteSox  spring training games from Florida to Tucson Arizona. JR owned the land where the stadium was in Tucson.

[Sarava]

13 hours ago, Lip Man 1 said:

Assuming he is still with us.

Didn't he threaten us a few weeks back in the interview with '10 more years' ?

[The Mighty Mite]

19 hours ago, WBWSF said:

JR moved the WhiteSox  spring training games from Florida to Tucson Arizona. JR owned the land where the stadium was in Tucson.

I knew that but as I stated before was irate along with thousands of retirees who wanted to live out the rest of their lives being able to see their favorite team in Spring Training in Sarasota. At least we get to see them on their annual series in Tropicana Field which BTW will be replaced in 2028 by a new stadium a few blocks away, an announcement is being made today and with from what I just read in the paper the Rays will pick up half of the billion dollar cost.

Edited September 19, 2023 by The Mighty Mite

[South Side Hit Men]

Once Oakland finalizes a stadium somewhere, I hope Jerry tries to right a second wrong and votes to award Montreal an expansion franchise.

#Chicago’sNumberOneExposFan

[Lip Man 1]

5 hours ago, Sarava said:

Didn't he threaten us a few weeks back in the interview with '10 more years' ?

He did however when you are 87 there's only so much you can do and as others have posted Father Time has never lost.

[Balta1701]

54 minutes ago, South Side Hit Men said:

Once Oakland finalizes a stadium somewhere, I hope Jerry tries to right a second wrong and votes to award Montreal an expansion franchise.

#Chicago’sNumberOneExposFan

Money says that Jerry votes against any expansion for the next few years. He needs cities wanting a team so that he can use them as leverage.

[South Side Hit Men]

3 hours ago, Balta1701 said:

Money says that Jerry votes against any expansion for the next few years. He needs cities wanting a team so that he can use them as leverage.

They will be charging a around around a billion each for two teams, so that’s $67M more he is going to want to grab before he passes.

Jerry, Milwaukee and Baltimore can still move somewhere if a different government is willing to pay their capital expenses. Once Nashville and Montreal are gone though, the rest of the US/Canada markets are weaker.

MLB is not going to want to sacrifice additional good markets to satisfy one of these groups. Vegas is not an ideal MLB market (population, TV, number of games, Strip location beyond tourists), so no loss at this point.

If I’m an MLB owner, I’m wanting contraction to share a greater portion of the pie. Pay off two or four owners who will never contribute anything to the league beyond serving as the Washington Generals of MLB. Looking at Miami, Pittsburgh, Oakland/Vegas to start, perhaps an Ohio team.

[Leonard Zelig]

22 hours ago, South Side Hit Men said:

Perhaps he sold his soul.

Grateful Dead Hour 11-midnight every Monday on 90.9 FM WDCB

Good Jerry on lead vocals.

 

24/7 on SiriusXM 

[Stinky Stanky]

8 hours ago, South Side Hit Men said:

Once Oakland finalizes a stadium somewhere, I hope Jerry tries to right a second wrong and votes to award Montreal an expansion franchise.

#Chicago’sNumberOneExposFan

Montreal White Sox.  Has a certain ring to it. ? How come no one mentions the Brewers acting like they have Milwaukee by the unmentionables?  And of course Jerry just buying land on the near west side?

He's not moving the Sox to another city.  If he did he'd have to sell the Bulls who are a cash cow and he's not selling the Bulls.  He only tried to move them once, unlike our hero Veeck, who tried to move them twice.

It'll keep us interested over the long winter and that's good.

 

 

[kitekrazy]

21 hours ago, WBWSF said:

JR moved the WhiteSox  spring training games from Florida to Tucson Arizona. JR owned the land where the stadium was in Tucson.

I don't think there's any spring training facility in Tucson. 

[caulfield12]

https://www.tampabay.com/sports/rays/2023/09/18/stadium-gas-plant-district-2028-tropicana-field-stuart-sternberg/?itm_source=parsely-api

30,000 seats, $1.2 billion, massive area redevelopment plan attached (sounds quite familiar now, KC with the exact same plan that all pretty much attempt to emulate Ricketts/Wrigleyville

[South Side Hit Men]

3 hours ago, Stinky Stanky said:

Montreal White Sox.  Has a certain ring to it. ? How come no one mentions the Brewers acting like they have Milwaukee by the unmentionables?  And of course Jerry just buying land on the near west side?

He's not moving the Sox to another city.  If he did he'd have to sell the Bulls who are a cash cow and he's not selling the Bulls.  He only tried to move them once, unlike our hero Veeck, who tried to move them twice.

It'll keep us interested over the long winter and that's good.

This is the most BS packed in a single post in SoxTalk history. Take a bow.

[Stinky Stanky]

2 hours ago, South Side Hit Men said:

This is the most BS packed in a single post in SoxTalk history. Take a bow.

Can I have an arrow too?  Seriously, I thought you'd like it.

Edited September 20, 2023 by Stinky Stanky

[South Side Hit Men]

21 minutes ago, Stinky Stanky said:

Can I have an arrow too?  Seriously, I thought you'd like it.

Comment was primarily about the Veeck trying to move the White Sox. He was the savior who kept them from moving to Seattle after 1975, had Stanley Cup / Super Bowl champion DeBartolo lined up to keep the team here. I do agree it's less likely he moves the team owning the TV network with likely a similar set up when the current deal is up (Sox + Bulls + Wirtz Team).

The key will be whether the estate will sell the TV rights / package with the team, or keep them separate. A new owner will likely want the TV rights and the team, unless they want to move and then they will just seek the team. That will be the tell if this goes down soon with no stadium deal in place.

I would like Montreal to get their own new team (or the team back from Washington), not steal another which is what happened to them post 1994 and Loria debacles. Montreal is the only city since the two leagues / MLB was formally established in 1901 totally abandoned by the sport in 2023.

[Sleepy Harold]

10 hours ago, kitekrazy said:

I don't think there's any spring training facility in Tucson. 

Not anymore but they used to play in Tucson before all the AZ teams moved in/around the Phoenix area.