Tag Archives: stadiums

Why would Mayor Daley want a second NFL team? Sounds like he wants prestige, economic development

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Chicago’s former Mayor Daley said he wants a second NFL team for Chicago and a new stadium:

“I really believe we could get a second football team,” the former mayor said. “I’ve always believed — the Chicago Cardinals, Bears — why is it that New York has two? Florida has three, San Francisco has two. Now you think of that, we could easily take — Chicago loves sports and we could get a second team in here.

“You could build a new stadium, you could have huge international soccer teams come in, you could do the Final Four, you could do anything you wanted with a brand new stadium.”

Many in Chicago believe the city should have a stadium with a retractable roof to be able to host events like the Super Bowl and the Final Four. Renovations to Solider Field left the stadium as the second smallest in the NFL. That, coupled with the lack of a roof, makes it a longshot to host a Super Bowl…

“It would be privately funded, the government could help a little bit,” Daley said. “But I’ve always believed we could take a second team. And every Sunday we would have a team playing in the National Football League. That would be unbelievable.”

If I had to guess, here is what I think is behind these comments:

1. This is about prestige and status. Chicago is a world-class city yet other cities, including less notable ones like San Francisco/Oakland, have two teams and Chicago does not. Having another NFL team would generate more attention in and for Chicago plus allow other major events to be held in the new stadium. Chicago could become a center for all sports and grab away some of the business places like Indianapolis, New Orleans, Atlanta, and other places get because of having closed stadiums. Mayor Daley is also old enough to remember the days when Chicago did have a second team, the Chicago Cardinals, that ended up leaving for the Sunbelt. Arguments against this line of thinking: is there really fan interest in a second team? Would Chicagoans easily adapt to a team moving to the city from somewhere else (like the Vikings, Chargers, etc.)? Los Angeles is a world-class city and does not have any team – just because a city has a certain population doesn’t necessarily mean it has to have a certain number of NFL teams.

2. This is about economic growth. Having a second team would bring in more money and more events. A new stadium could be viewed as an economic boon. However, research clearly shows that publicly funded stadiums don’t return money to taxpayers and residents will spend their money on other entertainment options if a sports team is not available. Plus, a new stadium would likely have to be located in a suburban locale (the Bears threatened at various points to move to the northwest suburbs or to Warrenville on what later became the Cantera site) so the economic benefits would be spread throughout the region rather than directly in the city of Chicago.

From a social science perspective, I don’t find the second reason compelling. Government officials tend to justify stadium spending by arguing it will bring economic benefits but I think it is also really about prestige: it helps put or keep the city on the map and also attracts more media attention. The same politicians that don’t want to be the ones held responsible for a favorite team leaving the city would also like to take the credit for adding a new team.

The rise of “Seven Nation Army” to sports folk song

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Deadspin has the story of how the song “Seven Nation Army” became ubiquitous at sporting events around the world. Here are a few of the important steps in the rise of the song:

The march toward musical empire began on Oct. 22, 2003, in a bar in Milan, Italy, 4,300 miles away from Detroit. Fans of Club Brugge K.V., in town for their team’s group-stage UEFA Champions League clash against European giant A.C. Milan, gathered to knock back some pre-match beers. Over a stereo blared seven notes: Da…da-DA-da da DAAH DAAH, the signature riff of a minor American hit song…

But in Milan, at the beginning, it was purely spontaneous and local. Kickoff was coming. The visiting Belgians moved out into the city center, still singing. They kept chanting it in the stands of the San Siro—Oh…oh-OH-oh oh OHH OHH—as Peruvian striker Andres Mendoza stunned Milan with a goal in the 33rd minute and Brugge made it hold up for a shocking 1-0 upset. Filing out of the stadium, they continued to belt it out.

The song traveled back to Belgium with them, and the Brugge crowd began singing it at home games. The club itself eventually started blasting “Seven Nation Army” through the stadium speakers after goals.

Then, on Feb. 15, 2006, Club Brugge hosted A.S. Roma in a UEFA Cup match. The visitors won, 2-1, and the Roma supporters apparently picked up the song from their hosts…

“Seven Nation Army” made a beachhead in American sports in State College, Penn. According to a 2006 story in the Harrisburg Patriot-News, Penn State spokesperson Guido D’Elia—who is still the director of communications and branding for the embattled football program—was inspired by hearing a Public Radio International story about A.S. Roma’s use of the song. D’Elia, who also introduced the now unavoidable German techno track “Kernkraft 400” to Nittany Lions fans, had found something new…

By the middle of the 2006 season, “Seven Nation Army” was a Beaver Stadium staple. (This year, as Penn State students gathered on Nov. 8 outside the university administration building, they began singing Joe Paterno’s first name over the riff.)

Is this what globalization looks like? The song was recorded by Americans, found its way into bars and soccer stadiums in Belgium and Italy, and then back to the United States as a marching band piece. Along the way, the song crossed national and language boundaries as well as musical instruments.

I bet there could be some interesting musical analysis regarding why this song has become so popular. It doesn’t require words to be sung, particularly helpful for large crowds of (rowdy?) people at sporting events. It only includes seven notes. It has a particular minor edge to it, described in this story as a sound of “doom” which is no doubt helpful in celebrations as the scoring team’s fans want to celebrate as well as taunt the other side.

I would be interested to know how much in royalties Jack White is getting from all of these plays…

The Chicago Fire and Bridgeview: another case when building a sports stadium is not a good investment

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Residents of the southwest Chicago suburb of Bridgeview are not happy about reports that Toyota Park, built to be the home of the Chicago Fire, has created a lot of debt for the community:

The exchange came Wednesday night at Bridgeview’s first Village Board meeting since the Tribune published a report detailing the small southwest suburb’s financial woes tied to its biggest bet, the 20,000-seat Toyota Park.

The taxpayer-owned home of the Chicago Fire has come up millions of dollars short of making its debt payments since opening in 2006. Meanwhile, the town has nearly tripled property taxes in less than a decade, even as the town offset some of the financial sting by taking out more loans to help make payments.

In all, the blue-collar suburb is now more than $200 million in debt.

In comparing towns’ debt to property values, the Tribune found Bridgeview had the highest debt rate in the Chicago area. Much of the debt is tied to a stadium deal in which the newspaper found insiders landed contracts and town officials enriched their political funds with stadium vendor donations.

The stadium might have helped put Bridgeview on the map (leading to higher status/prestige) as it is the only suburban facility in the Chicago area that is home to a major sports team (despite arguments in the past from the Bears and White Sox that they might move to the suburbs). But this level of debt seems insurmountable for a village of 16,500 people who have a median household income of $42,073, below the national average.

This should be a reminder for many communities, small suburbs or big cities: sports stadiums are not the deals they may be made out to be. Yes, it could bring or keep a major sports team. But, the public debt may take decades to repay, can lead to higher tax burdens for residents who are likely not all attending the games, doesn’t necessarily mean that a host of entertainment businesses will open up nearby to serve stadium patrons, and the primary people who benefit are the sports teams (who get new stadiums for which they don’t have to pay the whole bill) and a small number of local leaders and businesses. It may be nice to mentioned on TV every once in a while (if you can find the more minor channels the Fire tend to be relegated to) and be the politician who helped bring the major team to town but it often isn’t a great deal for the whole community.

“85% of economists agree that local and state governments should not subsidize professional sports”

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The Freakonomics blog has a discussion about whether cities and states should help pay for professional sports arenas and the weight of academic evidence says no:

So we have two perspectives and one question: Do sports generate jobs and economic growth?

This is a question that has been addressed numerous times by economists.  And these studies – summarized by economists Rob Baade and Victor Matheson — tend to reveal two answers.  When the study is completed by paid consultants prior to the public money being spent, the benefits from sports are numerous are large. However, when independent researchers – who are not paid by professional sports teams or leagues – look for these benefits after the fact, evidence of more jobs and economic growth are hard to find…

Given these three effects, the empirical evidence suggests quite strongly that sports do not create many jobs or generate much economic growth.  And such evidence has proven to be quite persuasive.  In fact, a survey of economists by Gregory Mankiw noted that 85% of economists agree that local and state governments should not subsidize professional sports. Mankiw also notes that only five issues have more agreement among economists.

But with all of this evidence, why would the city of Sacramento recently vote to spend money to build a new arena so that the Sacramento Kings would stay in the city?

Such a story clearly suggests that the Kings used the threat of re-location to elicit a substantial subsidy from the people of Sacramento.  Although the Kings do not have much economic impact on Sacramento, the Kings do make basketball fans happy.  And if they departed, those same people would be very unhappy with Kevin Johnson.  Consequently, the Mayor has an incentive to do what he can to keep the Kings in Sacramento (although it not entirely clear if making the non-basketball fans unhappy is good politics).

I think this is correct: no one want to be the politician that allows the popular local sports franchise to leave town. The stakes are even higher in places like Sacramento where the Kings are the only professional franchise so if they left, the city isn’t even on the professional sports map. A politician who let this happen might be punished by opponents and by voters (though they too would then have to go against all of the evidence from studies). I think this is similar logic to what happens in tax breaks debates like the one recently in Illinois: while it is hard to justify giving wealthy corporations a tax break to stay in Illinois, who wants to be the politician who let several thousand good jobs go to another state?

I also think that while this can be studied in economic terms, i.e., does helping to build a stadium lead to economic benefits for the city, or in political terms, this misses some of the point: having a sports team is also about status. It makes a city feel like a major league city. While perhaps we could argue that Sacramento has enough going on being the state capital of the country’s largest state, the average citizen might connect more to the sports team. When national TV crews come to televise a game, fans feel like they are being recognized (see this post as an example of this). With a sports teams, politicians and business people can take big wigs to games, signalling that their city is really part of the big time, even if the economic data doesn’t necessarily bear this out. While I am skeptical of arguments that people in Cleveland are worse off because their sports teams haven’t won, having a big sports team can mask other issues or at least help people ignore them. This is more difficult to measure than economic benefits but this cultural dimension still matters when these decisions are made.

(This post was prompted by part of a TrueHoop post from yesterday.)

Why cities bid to host the Super Bowl (hint: it’s not just about the immediate money)

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A story about how cities win the opportunity to host the Super Bowl has this explanation of why cities bid in the first place:

The NFL looks at the Super Bowl location as a kind of carrot to reward cities that are expanding the NFL’s sphere of influence, either by fielding a winning team, building a fancy stadium, or, ideally, both. Cities bid for the honor of hosting the Super Bowl because it brings in tourist dollars and prestige.

How much money is the subject of some debate. The NFL maintains that the Super Bowl brings in hundreds of millions of dollars to local economies. An article from the Indianapolis Business Journal says, “The NFL estimates Indianapolis will draw 100,000 to 150,000 visitors who could spend $200 million over a 10-day span.”

However, some find that number to be misleading. An academic paper from Holy Cross titled “Economics of the Super Bowl” argues that these numbers are “‘padded’ at least as well as the players on the field.”

Philip Porter, an economics professor from the University of South Florida, attempted to figure out the Super Bowl’s financial impact in 2007. The Sun-Sentinel reports that “he said he examined data from the Florida Department of Revenue showing expenditures in Miami-Dade County were $3.318 billion in February 2006 and $3.308 billion in February 2007.”

Regardless, there are some tangible benefits for citizens of Super Bowl cities. In the case of Indianapolis, “the city pledged to build a practice facility downtown that will be left in place for local residents to use.” There is also an increase in jobs (even if the jobs are temporary).

It sounds like the NFL pushes the economic argument: host the Super Bowl fans plus teams plus the media plus celebrities will spend lots of money. In addition, the temporary jobs that are created helps the Super Bowl bring money into a city. However, I wonder if this falls into a similar territory of the sports team who argues the city or state should spend taxpayer dollars to help build a new stadium or the team will leave. Studies show that these arguments are bogus: taxpayers end up spending money that owners profit because few cities can “afford” to let the big team go. Also, the article also suggests that a new stadium had to be built for the Colts for this bid to have any success and this cost money (some from the Colts, the rest from a food and drink tax). It sounds like it might be fairly easy to look at the economic data across Super Bowls.

My guess is that prestige, status, and the attention the Super Bowl draws and the money that this can lead to down the road is more important here. This helps put Indianapolis on the map and hopefully is not just a one-time event but rather helps lead to other big conventions and events (the city is already known as a sport town since it is home to the NCAA, hosts the Indianapolis 500) as well as attracting businesses who might otherwise not have a reason to visit the city. The immediate economic benefits may be nice to tout but this event gives a lot of air time and from what I have heard, media people have been impressed by the way Indy has rolled out the red carpet and also made all of the necessary locations within walking distance of each other. Wouldn’t it be great to be the mayor or other elected official who can claim that you helped bring the Super Bowl to Indianapolis? Wouldn’t it be even better to say that hosting the big game helped bring in more long-term revenue into the city? The real pull here is not the practice facility that is left behind but rather the fact that Indy is capable of hosting the biggest game in the United States.

Innovative solution to homelessness: taxpayer funded stadiums in Florida have to host homeless

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It sounds like this idea has a long way to go in the Florida legislature but it is an innovative attempt to deal with homelessness: insist that owners of taxpayer funded stadiums host homeless residents.

As reported by the Miami Herald, state legislators have unearthed an obscure law that has not been enforced since it was adopted in 1988. It states that any ballpark or stadium that receives taxpayer money shall serve as a homeless shelter on the dates that it is not in use.

Now, a new bill would punish owners of teams who play in publicly-funded stadiums if they don’t provide a haven for the homeless. Affected ballparks would include the Miami Marlins’ new ballpark in Miami’s Little Havana, the Tampa Bay Rays’ Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg and several spring training facilities. It also includes the homes of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Tampa Bay Lightning, Miami Heat, Jacksonville Jaguars and Florida Panthers.

The newspaper estimates that owners might have to return $30 million in benefits that were already bestowed if the bill passes and they can’t prove they were running homeless shelters (to the newspaper’s knowledge, no teams have been).

I think the overriding concern here based on one thing: governments (and others) are lacking money. This could be an innovative solution: use an existing structure that often sits empty which then cuts costs for building/renting other homeless shelters. Lawmakers have some leverage here because they helped secure funding for these stadiums. A growing body of research suggest that these taxpayer funded stadiums are not boons to the local community. Research suggests that taxpayer funded stadiums don’t help out communities as much as help line the pockets of owners. In other words, communities don’t get the money back that they put into stadiums in the form of taxes and team owners reap the benefits. Also, when teams leave, certain businesses may suffer but eventually residents spend their entertainment dollars elsewhere in the city so the city doesn’t lose out in the long run. Why shouldn’t stadium owners have to give back a little bit more?

I wouldn’t be surprised if more cities try to pursue similar ideas that attach more strings to accessing public funding.

The conservative musical selections at Chicago Bulls games

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While I think this Chicago Tribune piece about the DJs at Chicago Bulls games was supposed to provide a behind-the-scenes look at how musical selections are made, the real crux of the story seems to be that the music selections are quite conservative:

Every Bulls game at the United Center has its own soundtrack. Just as each game is different, roller coasters of emotions and shifting fortunes, the music and sound effects roll with the changes. A team of about 20 technicians plays DJ each night at the United Center, accenting the ebbs and surges on the floor.

The head DJ is Jeff Wohlschlaeger, the Bulls’ senior director of game operations, who sits courtside and communicates on a headset to music and scoreboard operators to wed sounds and game action. There are cavalry-charge bugle calls and countless ways of imploring “De-Fense,” but there are also more than 1,000 songs and song snippets available to enhance every movement and mood…

When the home team has the ball, just about anything goes. Nothing is explicitly banned, but all teams know they’re programming for a family-friendly event, so songs deemed the least bit salacious or provocative won’t be tolerated, the NBA says. Teams that bend the rules often end up paying for it. The NBA’s “Game Operations” department monitors every game; one source in the office said that at least two NBA franchises were fined in the last month for inappropriate sound and video while the visiting team was on offense.

The Bulls don’t push the envelope by design, Wohlschlaeger says. The music selections are “conservative,” reflecting a mix of classic rock and contemporary pop hits that is determined by audience surveys. During Game 2 of the Hawks series, songs leading out of timeouts designed to get the crowd pumped included the Beastie Boys’ “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Party!),” AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck,” John Mellencamp’s “Authority Song” and Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels’ “Devil With a Blue Dress On.”…

Mostly, it’s about what the paying customers want, Wohlschlaeger says, “tried and true stuff that you or I would never listen to in a car, but that gets a positive reaction from the fans.”

On one hand, the article suggests that the DJs have a lot of music and sound effects at their disposal and try to respond to the action on the floor. On the other hand, it sounds clear that the actual music/effects played is quite limited in order to please the NBA and the fans. I can’t quite say why I find this depressing: it still sounds like an intriguing job but at the same time, much of it sounds scripted. For example, the article mentions the playing of U2’s “Where the Streets Have No Name” which every Bulls fan who has watched a game this year or in recent years knows is played during a timeout with about 4-6 minutes left in the game. So all of this is simply canned, fan-friendly entertainment?

I wonder if there are any pro sports teams who are known for pushing the envelope a bit more in their musical selections. Does everyone play the same stuff that the DJs “would never listen to in a car” but they think is safe for fans? Having attended a number of San Francisco Giants games over the last 10 years or so, I know they play a lot more salsa music, fitting in with the atmosphere of the Bay Area. Some baseball stadiums have music for individual home team players when they come up to the plate. There may not be the same opportunities for other sports though perhaps music could be introduced in situations when they make a reception or step up to the free throw line or at other points.

Of course, perhaps this is just good business: don’t alienate your fan base that can afford to go to NBA basketball games. Change up the music too much or make it too edgy

A common tale regarding taxpayer funded stadiums

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Jeff Passan summarizes how the Florida Marlins misled the public about their profits in order to secure more taxpayer funding for a new baseball stadium to open in 2012.

There is a good amount of academic research that shows that large-scale sports stadiums rarely help the local economy in the way the owners suggest they will. Often, local taxpayers are stuck paying the bill while private owners profit.

Of course, do you want to be the mayor/public official that lets the beloved local team get away?

Beware of stadium food

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Yahoo reports on ESPN’s findings about stadium food. There were some noteworthy health violations and this little tidbit about Chicago stadiums in a discussion about how inspection practices differ by state:

Chicago stadiums had the lowest percentage of vendors with critical violations; that could be because city inspectors make their visits when the stadiums are empty and no employee is handling or serving food. (Gotta lova that Chicago political machine.)

In the last ten or twenty years, stadium food has improved in quality – from nachos with fake cheese to sushi, premium sandwiches, and more. However, perhaps a lot of it wasn’t very clean…