10,800

[smazza]

if tampa wins a championship and fields a competitive team year afte ryear the fans will come and than a new stadium would be justified

[SRQ]

this is three years of a competitive team and it ain't happening.

[Bull-by-Marriage]

Hillsborough doesn't have the money, the people of Pinellas **** near rioted when the idea was thrown on the table 2 years ago.

The Rays are going to have to wait to get a new stadium and that is going to be awhile.

I guarentee they start playing hardball this offseason. New stadium or we're looking elsewhere.

Hillsborough actually does have the money it's just earmarked for other priorities....because no one in Hills has made this a priority.  The tax that paid for RayJay is about to expire, and could be extended to pay for a new stadium.  St. Petersburg would love to keep the Rays to keep from making their city completely irrelevant from the Tampa metro landscape.

The problem this area is running into is every darn study clearly says there is no good home for the Rays in south pinellas.  The ownership now has bought into this and really is refusing to consider anything in pinellas.  So this will get ugly before it gets pretty, and they will play hardball.  Given the circumstances this could become real testy since it's becoming clear the ownership wants to be in Tampa, Tampa people are starting to want them in Tampa, and Pinellas residents are starting to resent such talks but yet can't find a concensus on where to put it.  The issue that's going to come into play is moving to another Pinellas site the Rays could probably sell the land of the trop and contribute to the building of a new site...but moving to Tampa...they'd probably have to leave that site to Pinellas and walk-away with nothing, thus Hillsborough and tampa would need to carry more weight, a lot more weight, which could hurt their bid.

Hillsborough has land near the fair grounds, and supposedly a downtown Tampa site has recently been assembled (this would be the pancea downtown tampa needs to complete invigorate the downtown, 82 baseball games in downtown to bring 25-30k down almost nightly.

Like this area needed another reason for Hills and Pinellas County officials to dislike one another.  It will set back the mass transit talks 20 years.

I know that H.C. doesn't have money for a stadium. All of the money from the CIT is slotted for much more important uses such as Fire stations and the such. Even if they did have the money, there's the extremely sticky issue of tampering. The downtown land has not been assembled, if you use google earth and measure the footprint for a small BB stadium, you'll find that it's next to  impossible without some serious moving/demolition of buildings, and then it may affect the Selmon expressway. There's barely enough parking for downtown employees now, and that's after RIF's and layoffs. It seems that people think that the local governments have more money than they actually do.

[RichmondBull]

They need to have a major league team in Richmond.  The people here love baseball.  They pack the AA stadium which is actually big.

They lost the AAA Richmond Braves due to poor attendance and crappy facilities and just now got AA baseball back up there.

The Diamond is actually a pretty sweet stadium. That old Brave statue climbing out of the stadium was classic.

Attendance wasn't the issue with the Braves

[SattyBull]

They need to have a major league team in Richmond.  The people here love baseball.  They pack the AA stadium which is actually big.

They lost the AAA Richmond Braves due to poor attendance and crappy facilities and just now got AA baseball back up there.

The Diamond is actually a pretty sweet stadium. That old Brave statue climbing out of the stadium was classic.

Attendance wasn't the issue with the Braves

You sure about that? Their final 5 years in Richmond.....

2004: 6,250 10th out of 14 in the league

2005: 6,014 10th out of 14

2006: 4,731 12th out of 14

2007: 4,945 12th out of 14

2008: 4,454 14th out of 14.

[SattyBull]

I really hate that I can't edit posts on here....what's the point of that?

And I realize that you're saying attendance wasn't the sole reason, because facilities were the final deciding factor. But your claim that they pack the house in Richmond doesn't hold a ton of validity. I know the new team there is averaging 6k so far, but those are inflated because the opening series averaged 9k a game and after that it dropped off down to 2-3k for the remaining homestand.

[Bull94]

watching grown men play a kids game for millions of dollars is not a priority when the local economy is in the dumps.

high unemployment.

double digit increases in property insurance.

double digit increases in health insurance.

double digit increases in college tuition.

home values cut in half.

a good bit of the local economy was residential and commercial development as well as businesses that are directly affected by that industry. builders, laborers, real estate agents, inspectors, furniture salesmen,etc.

MLB is pricing out joe sixpack. without local corporate help, they are DOA. It cost me $200 to take a family of four to a game and sit in the left field bleachers.I had a screeching, teenage yankee fan behind me the whole time. that's not entertainment. I'll sit at home and watch it in the comfort of my own living room on my HD big screen and save enough to pay my cable, phone and internet bill for almost 2 months.

personally I hope the rays leave before the community builds them another stadium. the last one isn't even paid for.

L.A. has it right by rejecting to pay for a professional football stadium.

It's time these billionaire owners pay for their own place of business. The federal government needs to step in and make it illegal for these monopolies to use state and local government money to build these billion dollar palaces. let the leagues take their teams out of the country for all I care.

[Bullpride08]

Hillsborough doesn't have the money, the people of Pinellas **** near rioted when the idea was thrown on the table 2 years ago.

The Rays are going to have to wait to get a new stadium and that is going to be awhile.

I guarentee they start playing hardball this offseason. New stadium or we're looking elsewhere.

Hillsborough actually does have the money it's just earmarked for other priorities....because no one in Hills has made this a priority.  The tax that paid for RayJay is about to expire, and could be extended to pay for a new stadium.  St. Petersburg would love to keep the Rays to keep from making their city completely irrelevant from the Tampa metro landscape.

The problem this area is running into is every darn study clearly says there is no good home for the Rays in south pinellas.  The ownership now has bought into this and really is refusing to consider anything in pinellas.  So this will get ugly before it gets pretty, and they will play hardball.  Given the circumstances this could become real testy since it's becoming clear the ownership wants to be in Tampa, Tampa people are starting to want them in Tampa, and Pinellas residents are starting to resent such talks but yet can't find a concensus on where to put it.  The issue that's going to come into play is moving to another Pinellas site the Rays could probably sell the land of the trop and contribute to the building of a new site...but moving to Tampa...they'd probably have to leave that site to Pinellas and walk-away with nothing, thus Hillsborough and tampa would need to carry more weight, a lot more weight, which could hurt their bid.

Hillsborough has land near the fair grounds, and supposedly a downtown Tampa site has recently been assembled (this would be the pancea downtown tampa needs to complete invigorate the downtown, 82 baseball games in downtown to bring 25-30k down almost nightly.

Like this area needed another reason for Hills and Pinellas County officials to dislike one another.  It will set back the mass transit talks 20 years.

I know that H.C. doesn't have money for a stadium. All of the money from the CIT is slotted for much more important uses such as Fire stations and the such. Even if they did have the money, there's the extremely sticky issue of tampering. The downtown land has not been assembled, if you use google earth and measure the footprint for a small BB stadium, you'll find that it's next to  impossible without some serious moving/demolition of buildings, and then it may affect the Selmon expressway. There's barely enough parking for downtown employees now, and that's after RIF's and layoffs. It seems that people think that the local governments have more money than they actually do.

Hillsborough actually does have the money it's just earmarked for other priorities....because no one in Hills has made this a priority.

Do you not read or just have a 'know it all wannabe' complex.  The money is earmarked elsewhere but could be switched if it received necessary votes.  A big IF, but still available.  I said essentially the same thing thanks for reiterating...And there is enough land...your 'sophisticated' google earth concept doesn't include the proposed demo'ing of some existing property which I've been explained.  A few prominent real estate developers have already received tentative commitments in downtown, and near the fairgrounds.  The fairgrounds site although could go to a major hotel developer if this takes to long for a decision.

[Joe]

If it's earmarked for other priorities...then they don't have the money.

A $500 million stadium would virtually wipe out all other priorities.

[SattyBull]

It cost me $200 to take a family of four to a game and sit in the left field bleachers.I had a screeching, teenage yankee fan behind me the whole time. that's not entertainment. I'll sit at home and watch it in the comfort of my own living room on my HD big screen and save enough to pay my cable, phone and internet bill for almost 2 months.

p

That's your own fault, going to a game against the Yankees.