Let’s End Stadium Stamps for the Rich

by Gary Shelton on April 8, 2015 · 7 comments

in general

Wednesday, 6:03 p.m.

 Guest Column

By Scott Myers

Scott Myers is a sports fan who has lived in Tampa Bay for the last 24 years. He is married with four children and recently retired from a 44 year IT career. Email him at: ascott.myers@gmail.com

Incredible volumes of conversation, dialogue, and arguments have been going on for months in the Tampa Bay area via newspapers and blogs regarding the Tampa Bay Rays’ quest for a new stadium.  Very little, if anything, has been resolved, clarified or honestly discussed.

A recent example of woefully incomplete information came during an interview with Stu Sternberg at Tropicana Field on opening day (4/6/2015) of the Rays 2015 season.  Here is an excerpt from Gary Shelton’s blog at http://www.saintpetersblog.com/archives/224860 :

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“I get exasperated because it makes it more difficult to get done on the field what we I’d like to get done. And what  I think the franchise has earned, the employees have earned and the fans have earned.  Not just scrimp and save and trade guys off. To spend a little money willy nilly, which we don’t get to do ever. We probably have the lowest,  or the second-lowest, payroll in baseball. At 70 million, that’s a level that’s uncomfortable. It puts us squarely in the red again.’’

Sternberg maintains that if his team could get to a stadium where the attendance would rise to, say, the middle of the pack, then the payroll would do the same.

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How refreshing it would have been for Stu Sternberg to have explicitly said how many dollars in additional profit the new stadium would bring, after deducting for cost of the new stadium and how many dollars he would then add to payroll.  He shares none of that, and regrettably no one ask him for that information.

So let’s start with the basics:

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