OT: All-Purpose Expos Return Speculation Topic -- Part Deux

[dinodebino]

Gillette also got the city to reduce its municipal taxes levied towards the team.

I remember at one point, the Habs were paying over 11 million a year in city taxes while another market like Detroit was paying 75k.

Uncle George was actually a good owner on and off the ice.

George was a genius at getting financial leverage for his businesses. He was great (most of the time, as he went bankrupt at least once) at buying low, adding some lipstick and selling high. Did the same in all of his business ventures over the years. Habs weren’t different.

Not saying he wasn’t good for the brand, he was! But he wasn’t in this for the long haul. Lipstick and sell high. And he did. Kudos to him.

 

[JianYang]

George was a genius at getting financial leverage for his businesses. He was great (most of the time, as he went bankrupt at least once) at buying low, adding some lipstick and selling high. Did the same in all of his business ventures over the years. Habs weren’t different.

Not saying he wasn’t good for the brand, he was! But he wasn’t in this for the long haul. Lipstick and sell high. And he did. Kudos to him.

I think he was genuinely upset when he had to sell the habs.

He needed the cash flow at the time to rectify his messy Liverpool investment, and he was very emotional when it came time to sell... Maybe they were crocodile tears but it didn't seem like it to me.

I think uncle George got emotionally attached to the Habs brand.

 

[HuGort]

Gillette also got the city to reduce its municipal taxes levied towards the team.

I remember at one point, the Habs were paying over 11 million a year in city taxes while another market like Detroit was paying 75k.

Uncle George was actually a good owner on and off the ice.

Gov't wouldn't help the Expos. Parti Quebecois. Lucien Bouchard said he wouldn't put any of his tax dollars to employ two dozen Americans. Clearly they never had no vision. Jays bring in over 120 million USA alone in tv revenue. Labatt Stadium would have held 35,000 fans at $40 a pop, for 81 home games. On top of 120 million in tv money. Even You can add it up. Baseball is very financially profitable.

Federal govt helped. Bought the Expos a piece of land down town. Wonder what is in that land today?

 

[salbutera]

Gov't wouldn't help the Expos. Parti Quebecois. Lucien Bouchard said he wouldn't put any of his tax dollars to employ two dozen Americans. Clearly they never had no vision. Jays bring in over 120 million USA alone in tv revenue. Labatt Stadium would have held 35,000 fans at $40 a pop, for 81 home games. On top of 120 million in tv money. Even You can add it up. Baseball is very financially profitable.

Federal govt helped. Bought the Expos a piece of land down town. Wonder what is in that land today?

Condo complexes - down the street & diagonally across from Bell Centre.

BTW - 35,000 stadium would’ve done diddly squat, the consortium were either stupid, drunk or both - many felt they could operate w a $50M payroll and be competitive vs their $37M, atvthe same time NYY, Bos, La, TX, Chi & Blow Jays etc were spending $100M+

Baseball never was / would never be successful in Mtl because high end TV revenue was impossible due to Bronfman’s major blunder w exclusivity rights back in 1976, and gate revenue was no longer viable after the early 80s exodus.

Expos were never going to maintain the minimum required 2-2.5M per season. Mtl simply isn’t a baseball city, there’s a segment of the population that’s as diehard & knowledgeable about the game as any place else, but that population subset is very small vs it’s peer MLB cities

 

[HuGort]

Condo complexes - down the street & diagonally across from Bell Centre.

BTW - 35,000 stadium would’ve done diddly squat, the consortium were either stupid, drunk or both - many felt they could operate w a $50M payroll and be competitive vs their $37M, atvthe same time NYY, Bos, La, TX, Chi & Blow Jays etc were spending $100M+

Baseball never was / would never be successful in Mtl because high end TV revenue was impossible due to Bronfman’s major blunder w exclusivity rights back in 1976, and gate revenue was no longer viable after the early 80s exodus.

Expos were never going to maintain the minimum required 2-2.5M per season. Mtl simply isn’t a baseball city, there’s a segment of the population that’s as diehard & knowledgeable about the game as any place else, but that population subset is very small vs it’s peer MLB cities

MLB tv money is divided up evenly among all teams. Hasn't nothing to do with Bronfman. Blue Jays get around 120 million yearly. If you don't know what you are talking about why post? Instead of putting false info on here.

Why you call them Blow Jays? Jealously or something? Jays are a cash cow. They draw from fan base of 38 million people. Have One of biggest payrolls in baseball.

Expos had 50 million payroll back then but that is equal to 100-120 million today. Not equal to Yankees or Dodgers no, but a midmarket payroll.

Nothing in your post is truth. Montreal has a long and steep baseball tradition. Not like it was in 80s but can raise 35,000 fans out of 2 million people. Not like you try to say it has vanished. Labatt Stadium at 35,000 a game, $40 average ticket price is 113 million in gate revenue. Why wouldn't it be successful? Land was free.

 

[salbutera]

MLB tv money is divided up evenly among all teams. Hasn't nothing to do with Bronfman. Blue Jays get around 120 million yearly. If you don't know what you are talking about why post? Instead of putting false info on here.

Why you call them Blow Jays? Jealously or something? Jays are a cash cow. They draw from fan base of 38 million people. Have One of biggest payrolls in baseball.

Expos had 50 million payroll back then but that is equal to 100-120 million today. Not equal to Yankees or Dodgers no, but a midmarket payroll.

Nothing in your post is truth. Montreal has a long and steep baseball tradition. Not like it was in 80s but can raise 35,000 fans out of 2 million people. Not like you try to say it has vanished. Labatt Stadium at 35,000 a game, $40 average ticket price is 113 million in gate revenue. Why wouldn't it be successful? Land was free.

Maybe you should do some research, in 1976 Blow Jays (Paul Beeston) approached Bronfman about CDN TV rights prior to start of their inaugural season, Bronfman wouldn’t allow penetration into Quebec (Mtl) market (which was the largest in Canada at the time) and the agreement provided Blow Jays exclusive rights from Brampton westwards for radio & TV w Expos holding exclusive rights for Quebec eastwards.

MLB national TV revenue is shared but local TV is not… that’s where the $ are at. Dodgers & Yankees for example make close to $230M just in cable TV revenue - top US market make upwards of $100M+ to this day in radio revenue. MLB national TV revenue share is approx $60M per team, and every MLB team earns at least $40M presently. Expos were paying RDS / TSN to broadcast games in the 90’s onwards…

Without access to lucrative Southern Ontario golden horseshoe, no one was going to offer any TV $ to Expos. Why do you think Bronfman bailed in 1990? He saw the incoming tsunami of skyrocketing salaries + cable TV revenue that other teams were going to be getting in the 90s onward which Mtl couldn’t hope to match

FYI, Expos had a $35M payroll back around 2000 timeframe when Federal govt was willing to provide the land - consortium refused to allow payroll increase and only went up to $35M after being forced by Loria. Team salary only moved to $50M when MLB took ownership of the team in 2002

Major League Baseball Team Payrolls 1998-2024

Major League Baseball opening day team payrolls and salary figures for the years 1998-2024 and player salary statistics through 2024

www.stevetheump.com

BTW - I grew up & I’m a Mtler at heart even though I’ve lived in US for a while now, T-dot can go f*ck itself, only became legitimized as a city because of Mtl exodus, not because of any of its own doing.

I grew up in NDG at the peak of the Expos in early 80s, baseball was huge in West end Mtl, dare I say even bigger than Habs: we had a 14-team league in NDG, Coté-des-Neiges had a 26-team league playing at Van Horne park. Cote St.Luc & Hampstead had a 10-team league.

All baseball diamonds in Mtl are now soccer pitches. With predominant immigration from la francophonie over last 40-years there’s zero affinity to baseball - baseball in its Mtl heyday was deeply penetrated in the Anglo / Allophone community but unfortunately not so for francophone community even though there were diehards

Curious did you ever actually live in Mtl?

 

[Runner77]

 

[Catanddogguitarrr]

Maybe you should do some research, in 1976 Blow Jays (Paul Beeston) approached Bronfman about CDN TV rights prior to start of their inaugural season, Bronfman wouldn’t allow penetration into Quebec (Mtl) market (which was the largest in Canada at the time) and the agreement provided Blow Jays exclusive rights from Brampton westwards for radio & TV w Expos holding exclusive rights for Quebec eastwards.

MLB national TV revenue is shared but local TV is not… that’s where the $ are at. Dodgers & Yankees for example make close to $230M just in cable TV revenue - top US market make upwards of $100M+ to this day in radio revenue. MLB national TV revenue share is approx $60M per team, and every MLB team earns at least $40M presently. Expos were paying RDS / TSN to broadcast games in the 90’s onwards…

Without access to lucrative Southern Ontario golden horseshoe, no one was going to offer any TV $ to Expos. Why do you think Bronfman bailed in 1990? He saw the incoming tsunami of skyrocketing salaries + cable TV revenue that other teams were going to be getting in the 90s onward which Mtl couldn’t hope to match

FYI, Expos had a $35M payroll back around 2000 timeframe when Federal govt was willing to provide the land - consortium refused to allow payroll increase and only went up to $35M after being forced by Loria. Team salary only moved to $50M when MLB took ownership of the team in 2002

Major League Baseball Team Payrolls 1998-2024

Major League Baseball opening day team payrolls and salary figures for the years 1998-2024 and player salary statistics through 2024

www.stevetheump.com

BTW - I grew up & I’m a Mtler at heart even though I’ve lived in US for a while now, T-dot can go f*ck itself, only became legitimized as a city because of Mtl exodus, not because of any of its own doing.

I grew up in NDG at the peak of the Expos in early 80s, baseball was huge in West end Mtl, dare I say even bigger than Habs: we had a 14-team league in NDG, Coté-des-Neiges had a 26-team league playing at Van Horne park. Cote St.Luc & Hampstead had a 10-team league.

All baseball diamonds in Mtl are now soccer pitches. With predominant immigration from la francophonie over last 40-years there’s zero affinity to baseball - baseball in its Mtl heyday was deeply penetrated in the Anglo / Allophone community but unfortunately not so for francophone community even though there were diehards

Curious did you ever actually live in Mtl?

You seem to be well informed about the topic Salbutera. There was an hype about the return of baseball in Mtl when mayor Coderre was in charge. He tryed and some business people tryed with him. There has been debates but the numbers don't lie. There has been studies pro and cons. The cons won. If I remember it was because the salaries and other rights have exploded. There has been years of austerity with the provincial gvrment, not only parti quebecois but liberals of Charest.

I think when a city lose his major sport team, it's almost impossible to get it back. Ask the Nordiques of Quebec. Winnipeg Jets were lucky to have ot back. It happened fast and I've read the major investor had contacts and was willing to pay whatever the price.

I did a quick research on baseball in europ like UK, France, Spain and Germany and they all have baseball teams. On the map the teams are spread and I could say it's a third interrest sport, if not less. It always mentioned it was introduced by americans solders after the second war. But americans are not very popular in Maroc and Algeria, I could almost say they are hatred. There is a national baseball team in Maroc but no indication where to play locally.

Most of the francophone immigration comes from Maroc and Algeria. They are 100% football there, or soccer to mention the north american name. Despite all the american movies related to baseball and the fact that this sport is cheap in equipment, it's not popular. It's sad because this sport is so fun to play and watch.

 

[Runner77]

Still amazing to watch.

 

[donghabs98]

Still would love to see the Expos come back within the next decade but would require a few things to go right.

-Building of a stadium funded by the private sector
-The Rays and As situation cleaning up
-MLB granting another team to Canada over American markets.

It could happen but Im definitely less optimistic than I was a few years ago.

 

[peate]

Still amazing to watch.

I remember that game; one of the most dominant pitching performances you`ve ever seen, but sadly, he lost his perfect game in the 10th.

 

[HuGort]

They ain't coming back. Just waste of time to talk about them returning

 

[Runner77]

 

[Runner77]

Kind of odd for me to hear the name Mac Jones, the New England Patriots’s QB.

As some are aware, we had a similarly-named (save for the “k” in his first name) Mack Jones on the first edition of the Expos and he was the team’s first favorite player. They baptized the left field bleachers “Jonesville” in honor of left fielder Jones and dubbed him the “Mayor of Jonesville.”

Jones’ heroics allowed the team to win its first ever home opener. It went like this:

Leadoff hitter Don Bosch led off with a single to right. After Maury Wills forced Bosch at second for the first out, Briles walked Rusty Staub, then gave up Jones’s home run to straightaway center field to give the Expos a 3-0 lead. Mayor Jones increased the Expos’ lead in the bottom of the second, tripling home Wills and Staub, who had both singled, putting the Expos up 5-0. A hero was born.

“When I got back to the hotel, I had something like 150 phone calls from the hour of 12:00 to 6:00 the next morning,” recalled Jones. “And it was all females. I think I got the record for that.”

April 14, 1969: Mack lays claim to Jonesville in Expos’ first home opener – Society for American Baseball Research​

I don’t know how it would have played out in another city but according to Jones, Montreal ladies responded in a manner that surprised him. Vive la différence.

 

[HuGort]

Times have changed a lot since then. There is no interest in baseball around the city now. Hardly anybody wants the Expos back. The World Series nobody cares in Montreal. I remember the '79 We are Family World Series, people going home to watch game 5 Bert Byeleven pitch. His wicked curve they use to say. Or the Dodgers/Yankees WS of late 70s. The Reggie Game. Ask people around town, 1 in 10 couldn't tell you the teams in this WS

 

[JianYang]

Times have changed a lot since then. There is no interest in baseball around the city now. Hardly anybody wants the Expos back. The World Series nobody cares in Montreal. I remember the '79 We are Family World Series, people going home to watch game 5 Bert Byeleven pitch. His wicked curve they use to say. Or the Dodgers/Yankees WS of late 70s. The Reggie Game. Ask people around town, 1 in 10 couldn't tell you the teams in this WS

In my area, I grew up seeing baseball diamonds in the local parks. These have slowly but surely been taken out and replaced by cricket fields.

I'm not sure how many people can name the world series participants out here on the West coast either. Truth be told, I didn't know either except that I was at a bar where the game happened to be on a small screen while the main screen had the Canucks game.

You might catch a buzz within a niche group if the blue Jays or Mariners are involved. Otherwise, the mlb is pretty much an afterthought here.

 

[Grate n Colorful Oz]

George was a genius at getting financial leverage for his businesses. He was great (most of the time, as he went bankrupt at least once) at buying low, adding some lipstick and selling high. Did the same in all of his business ventures over the years. Habs weren’t different.

Not saying he wasn’t good for the brand, he was! But he wasn’t in this for the long haul. Lipstick and sell high. And he did. Kudos to him.

More than lipstick. He and Boivin modernized the organizational structure, finances and marketing of the habs.

It's more akin to pimping up your pig to be some well-dressed, well-trained, all-singing and all-dancing circus act.

 

[Boss Man Hughes]

In my area, I grew up seeing baseball diamonds in the local parks. These have slowly but surely been taken out and replaced by cricket fields.

I'm not sure how many people can name the world series participants out here on the West coast either. Truth be told, I didn't know either except that I was at a bar where the game happened to be on a small screen while the main screen had the Canucks game.

You might catch a buzz within a niche group if the blue Jays or Mariners are involved. Otherwise, the mlb is pretty much an afterthought here.

Oh for the good old days when the only sports in North America that were covered were hockey, football, baseball and horse racing in North America and no one cared about crap like basketball, cricket, soccer.

 

[salbutera]

Still would love to see the Expos come back within the next decade but would require a few things to go right.

-Building of a stadium funded by the private sector
-The Rays and As situation cleaning up
-MLB granting another team to Canada over American markets.

It could happen but Im definitely less optimistic than I was a few years ago.

For Mtl, it’s all about the owner - if Jeff Bezos tells MLB I want to buy a team & move it to Mtl, it’ll be unanimously approved by ownership board, with red carpet rolled out

Unfortunately neither Bezos or anyone of his pedigree has any interest in doing so.

 

[HuGort]

In my area, I grew up seeing baseball diamonds in the local parks. These have slowly but surely been taken out and replaced by cricket fields.

I'm not sure how many people can name the world series participants out here on the West coast either. Truth be told, I didn't know either except that I was at a bar where the game happened to be on a small screen while the main screen had the Canucks game.

You might catch a buzz within a niche group if the blue Jays or Mariners are involved. Otherwise, the mlb is pretty much an afterthought here.

Just no interest in baseball in Montreal. It's a by-gone era. Expos are dead for good.

 

[Chili]

Claude Raymond has a book coming out, was interesting listening to him talk about his career on Radio Canada. A real gentleman.

 

[Runner77]

Claude Raymond has a book coming out, was interesting listening to him talk about his career on Radio Canada. A real gentleman.

Just saw him interviewed on Spanre.

One of the genuinely nice guys whether it be as a player, broadcaster or public figure. He looks and sounds nothing like his 85 years.

He’s part of a select club of players who played in the Bigs for over 10 years.

I’ll never forget the last game of the Expos at the Big O. Following the game, several Expos were on the field and saluted the fans for the longest time. And as they left the field progressively heading for the dugout, there stood Claude Raymond on the mound, crying. It just broke my heart.

 

[Tyson]

Just saw him interviewed on Spanre.

One of the genuinely nice guys whether it be as a player, broadcaster or public figure. He looks and sounds nothing like his 85 years.

He’s part of a select club of players who played in the Bigs for over 10 years.

I’ll never forget the last game of the Expos at the Big O. Following the game, several Expos were on the field and saluted the fans for the longest time. And as they left the field progressively heading for the dugout, there stood Claude Raymond on the mound, crying. It just broke my heart.

I saw Claude Raymond pitch many times at Parc Jarry. Great memories.

 

[Runner77]

I saw Claude Raymond pitch many times at Parc Jarry. Great memories.

That scoreboard at Jarry Park, tho.

So primitive but still provided moments of fun. Like the chicken cartoon that used to pop up with a loud cluck, whenever Larry Lintz was drawing a throw at first base.

I hate how it all ended, I often think of what could have been. Sigh.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

If the Expos do come back, we better immediately have dibs on Vlad Guerrero.