Friday, July 20, 2012

Odds & Ends: Stadium Subsidies

Dissapear for a week, miss a lot of headlines. I've actually been in Seattle observing the city's push for a new arena; the similarities between Seattle's stadium saga and Tampa Bay's are striking. There's been a lot of coverage about how much of the $490M bill the public will be footing, as well as the lack of new economic development it is expected to create.

Meanwhile, back on the ranch...

The Tampa Tribune stirs up more talk of a Downtown Tampa stadium with a possible land swap near Channelside, even though "no one mentioned baseball" during a meeting between the property owners and the city. While the idea would certainly help assemble land for a downtown stadium, the article neglects the fact that land isn't the problem in the stadium saga; funding is.

And, for those of you keeping score at home, the Rays' average attendance continues to hang around the same disappointing numbers (20,812). Fortunately, their TV numbers remain very strong and they'll be rewarded for it in the next few years.

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