OT: All-Purpose Expos Return Speculation Topic

[GSP2018]

I wish this thread would be about basketball coming in MTL and not baseball

Ewwwe worse then soccer if that’s possible.

 

[HabsWhiteKnightLOL]

Ewwwe worse then soccer if that’s possible.

can tell u never watch any games

 

[Runner77]

Another Expo I liked was Mack Jones

Lots of early Expos are remembered fondly.

The Expos did a poor job of bringing back retired players, especially in the Brochu years.

For now, just looking forward to seeing what the prospective location and what the projected stadium will look like.

 

[LeHab]

Didn’t live in Montreal that long, but I also don’t get the Olympic stadium excuse. I went to many expos game and I always found it convenient. Subway right under it, not all that far from everything.... it’s not downtown, but it’s not exactly like it’s in kanata or anything....

Someone explain it to me in a way that doesn’t sound like laziness

Location was only one of factors. When you have potential season ticket holders attending up to 81 home games that extra time can add quickly. If you want to attract business community you have to go where they are and that is downtown, something Impact is struggling with now as well.

Outdated, indoor stadium outside of downtown hosting a farm team for other franchises is not a recipe for success. Montreal will remain a farm team unless baseball embraces more parity however at least a better stad will improve overall experience.

 

[Runner77]

Location was only one of factors. When you have potential season ticket holders attending up to 81 home games that extra time can add quickly. If you want to attract business community you have to go where they are and that is downtown, something Impact is struggling with now as well.

Outdated, indoor stadium outside of downtown hosting a farm team for other franchises is not a recipe for success. Montreal will remain a farm team unless baseball embraces more parity however at least a better stad will improve overall experience.

The Big O was never intended as a ballpark -- the Expos never played in a real MLB stadium. Jarry was at best a AAA stadium, however, I would have still preferred it over the Owe.

So the stadium and location were part of the problem. The even bigger issue was shortsighted ownership who sold off the team's best players never allowed fans to experience continuity and a sense of identification. Imagine the Habs being run that way, it wouldn't be long before fans stopped buying the product.

 

[BLONG7]

Just curious guys, what is your gut feeling.....expansion, or a relocation? ( Tampa )

 

[LeHab]

The Big O was never intended as a ballpark -- the Expos never played in a real MLB stadium. Jarry was at best a AAA stadium, however, I would have still preferred it over the Owe.

So the stadium and location were part of the problem. The even bigger issue was shortsighted ownership who sold off the team's best players never allowed fans to experience continuity and a sense of identification. Imagine the Habs being run that way, it wouldn't be long before fans stopped buying the product.

Yeah, an MLB stadium is an important part of the overall experience since baseball is a slow game with a lot of interruptions. A single purpose outdoor stadium is a must as people want to enjoy those short Spring/Summer times. With a view of Montreal nice skyline as Sun is setting down would add to the experience. What I hear is a possible multipurpose and retractable roof which gives me mixed feelings. Didn't realize how inferior Big O is for baseball until I saw a couple games down South of the border.

Looking forward to the plan.

 

[Runner77]

Just curious guys, what is your gut feeling.....expansion, or a relocation? ( Tampa )

FWIW, my gut tells me a relocation is more likely. I'm also pretty confident that Montreal is on top of the list and Tampa has been doing nothing to shun away relocation talk. I get the impression that Stephen Bronfman and Mitch Garber have been playing their cards right and have been saying all the right things to the Commissioner's office, the fanbase at large and public officials. There are no guarantees of course but unlike prior ownership groups, you get the impression of a serious, methodical and credible approach.

 

[Laurentide]

Didn’t live in Montreal that long, but I also don’t get the Olympic stadium excuse. I went to many expos game and I always found it convenient. Subway right under it, not all that far from everything.... it’s not downtown, but it’s not exactly like it’s in kanata or anything....

Someone explain it to me in a way that doesn’t sound like laziness

I went to lots of games in the 80's too but despite the Metro it was still a hassle if you lived on the west side or the West Island. I was in NDG which meant that a trip to the Big O would entail taking the 105 bus down Sherbrooke from Elmhurst to Vendome Metro, taking the orange line either to Lionel Groulx or Berri UQAM then switching to the green line all the way to Pie IX. That was a solid hour of my life each way, if not more. Now multiply that 2+ hour commute for multiple games. And on weeknights when you work 8 hours that makes for a long long day. The people who lived within walking distance of the stadium wouldn't know a baseball from a badminton racquet and couldn't care less. I dont even want to contemplate what fans from the West Island had to go through just to see a game.

The location of the Big O, like everything else about it, was based on political rather than practical considerations and the needs of the Expos and Alouettes were never a consideration at all, which is why both franchises died there.

 

[GSP2018]

Just curious guys, what is your gut feeling.....expansion, or a relocation? ( Tampa )

Ill go with what Bronfman said. Expansion

 

[MasterDecoy]

I went to lots of games in the 80's too but despite the Metro it was still a hassle if you lived on the west side or the West Island. I was in NDG which meant that a trip to the Big O would entail taking the 105 bus down Sherbrooke from Elmhurst to Vendome Metro, taking the orange line either to Lionel Groulx or Berri UQAM then switching to the green line all the way to Pie IX. That was a solid hour of my life each way, if not more. Now multiply that 2+ hour commute for multiple games. And on weeknights when you work 8 hours that makes for a long long day. The people who lived within walking distance of the stadium wouldn't know a baseball from a badminton racquet and couldn't care less. I dont even want to contemplate what fans from the West Island had to go through just to see a game.

The location of the Big O, like everything else about it, was based on political rather than practical considerations and the needs of the Expos and Alouettes were never a consideration at all, which is why both franchises died there.

Alright, that explanation makes a lot more sense, thanks

 

[Harry22]

Location was one thing. People could not just walk out from the office on a nice summer evening and go to games. They had to take a crowded long ass metro to go to a part of town where no one cared about baseball to watch a game in an over-sized, ugly, unappealing, indoor crap hole. Who wants to spend summer in Montreal watching a shitty team in a crummy indoor stadium?

Walk ups are a big part of the attendance during regular season games and especially weekday games. If you want to average over 20,000 per game on weekdays, you need a great stadium in a great location.

I think the goal for the team would be around 20K for weekday games and over 30K for weekend games.

 

[Braun]

 

[donghabs98]

FWIW, my gut tells me a relocation is more likely. I'm also pretty confident that Montreal is on top of the list and Tampa has been doing nothing to shun away relocation talk. I get the impression that Stephen Bronfman and Mitch Garber have been playing their cards right and have been saying all the right things to the Commissioner's office, the fanbase at large and public officials. There are no guarantees of course but unlike prior ownership groups, you get the impression of a serious, methodical and credible approach.

I get the sense Bronfman is going the Mark Chipman route by getting on the league's good side and prepared to make Montreal a viable option when needed whether through Tampa or expansion which is the smart thing to do.

My gut tells me relocation is the most likely root for a few reasons

-Both the league and the Rays ownership are seemingly on their last ropes with Tampa officials,, the negative PR we have seen from both the MLB and Rays is bound to continue and coupled with the lack of urgency from city officials I cant see something being worked out
-Relocating to Montreal would be relatively simple and beneficial for whomever is owner as a stadium is ready to go for the short term, a notable brand and loyal fanbase is in place and natural rivals would quickly form with Toronto and Boston. Not to mention geograohically Montreal aligns better with the AL East than Tampa

 

[InglewoodJack]

Didn’t live in Montreal that long, but I also don’t get the Olympic stadium excuse. I went to many expos game and I always found it convenient. Subway right under it, not all that far from everything.... it’s not downtown, but it’s not exactly like it’s in kanata or anything....

Someone explain it to me in a way that doesn’t sound like laziness

that's all it is- an excuse. pie ix station is about 10 minutes down the green line from downtown, you don't have to go outside to access it, and if you were like me, coming from the suburbs, you can drop your car off at one of the many metro parking lots along the line. A concern was that hochelaga doesn't really have much of a nightlife for people to do anything after the game, and the area was kinda seedy- which shouldn't be a major issue considering where yankee stadium is/was. Besides, my friends who are Impact Ultras do down there and party after games all the time, so I figure it's changed since '04.

the biggest issue with the expos was that the team usually sucked, so no one is gonna go to montreal east to watch a team lose 90 games a year. I've seen the Big O packed on opening day, closing day, when the team was on a hot streak, etc., so people do show up, it's just that people won't show up for a losing product, especially since if we want to see a perennially mediocre team in Montreal, the bell centre is a 5 minute walk from downtown.

 

[Runner77]

What's this going to do? It makes no sense.

 

[MasterDecoy]

What's this going to do? It makes no sense.

That doesn’t sound like a team relocating anytime soon to me

 

[Runner77]

That doesn’t sound like a team relocating anytime soon to me

Reduce seating and charge more for certain other seating, with minor cosmetic upgrades. Who is going to want to pay more for "premium" seats?

The proposed changes don't sound like a very onerous investment.

The approach however, is odd by MLB standards. That's one small capacity crowd, assuming they fill it.

 

[LeHab]

That doesn’t sound like a team relocating anytime soon to me

No major media seriously speculated on an imminent relocation of Tampa except for Montreal to sell a few clicks.

Rays relocation is not imminent
The reason the Rays aren't relocating ties into the team's stadium deal with St. Petersburg. The Rays never signed a traditional lease. Rather, they signed a Use Agreement, which prevents the team from moving out of Tropicana Field and calls for potentially catastrophic monetary damages should the Rays abandon the stadium before the deal is up in 2027. This is in stark contrast to a traditional lease, where a tenant owes the landlord what’s left on that lease after breaking it.
On top of that, the Use Agreement provides the city with the right to ask for something called specific performance, which in a nutshell means that it could ask a court to force the Rays to stay and play at Tropicana Field. However, this is generally a very difficult thing to get a court to grant when damages can be quantified, so that remedy seems unlikely.

The Tampa Bay Rays Are Not Moving To Montreal Anytime Soon

 

[Runner77]

No major media seriously speculated on an imminent relocation of Tampa except for Montreal to sell a few clicks.



The Tampa Bay Rays Are Not Moving To Montreal Anytime Soon

We're not going to get a reliable legal opinion out of a sports piece based on generalities.

I love and respect Macramella, but he doesn't practice law in Florida.

Any MLB team that is facing relocation has recourses. Reality is that we don't really know how courts will deal with them.

What I do know is that the jurisdiction of the courts that are designated to hear a lawsuit is important. Florida courts are not NY courts. There is a reason a significant number of major contracts choose NY as their jurisdiction to hear litigation -- NY courts are much more inclined to award high damages and to not detract from the letter of an agreement. Macramella doesn't draw a distinction, nor does he provide background info on this critical aspect. He's arguing the letter of the agreement but how it is going to be interpreted and disposed of is a whole other ballgame.

Also, assuming Florida law applies, there are precedents from sports law and other related industries that could help circumscribe the matter. Of course, there is no legal opinion provided from the firm Macramalla works for cause they weren't mandated to draw one up. There'd be no money in it for them evidently since Expos potential ownership has not retained them. So Macramalla resorts to general principles of contract law to come up with general guidelines.

Bottom line -- Tampa remains a relocation target. And a potential ownership group won't have to wait until 2027 to make it happen. Damages can be quantified and negotiated upon as a cost of doing business. Macramalla's piece doesn't change that in the least.

 

[LeHab]

We're not going to get a reliable legal opinion out of a sports piece based on generalities.

I love and respect Macramella, but he doesn't practice law in Florida.

Any MLB team that is facing relocation has recourses. Reality is that we don't really know how courts will deal with them.

What I do know is that the jurisdiction of the courts that are designated to hear a lawsuit is important. Florida courts are not NY courts. There is a reason a significant number of major contracts choose NY as their jurisdiction to hear litigation -- NY courts are much more inclined to award high damages and to not detract from the letter of an agreement. Macramella doesn't draw a distinction, nor does he provide background info on this critical aspect. He's arguing the letter of the agreement but how it is going to be interpreted and disposed of is a whole other ballgame.

Also, assuming Florida law applies, there are precedents from sports law and other related industries that could help circumscribe the matter. Of course, there is no legal opinion provided from the firm Macramalla works for cause they weren't mandated to draw one up. There'd be no money in it for them evidently since Expos potential ownership has not retained them. So Macramalla resorts to general principles of contract law to come up with general guidelines.

Bottom line -- Tampa remains a relocation target. And a potential ownership group won't have to wait until 2027 to make it happen. Damages can be quantified and negotiated upon as a cost of doing business. Macramalla's piece doesn't change that in the least.

Sure there is a lot of speculation on his part and it is not impossible a move wont happen to Montreal however truth is a lot of stars need to align for this to happen. Current owners are still officially committed to Tampa area despite stadium setback. We may be closer but it does not mean imminent or a likely move unlike what seems to be reported in local Media.

 

[Scriptor]

We're not going to get a reliable legal opinion out of a sports piece based on generalities.

I love and respect Macramella, but he doesn't practice law in Florida.

Any MLB team that is facing relocation has recourses. Reality is that we don't really know how courts will deal with them.

What I do know is that the jurisdiction of the courts that are designated to hear a lawsuit is important. Florida courts are not NY courts. There is a reason a significant number of major contracts choose NY as their jurisdiction to hear litigation -- NY courts are much more inclined to award high damages and to not detract from the letter of an agreement. Macramella doesn't draw a distinction, nor does he provide background info on this critical aspect. He's arguing the letter of the agreement but how it is going to be interpreted and disposed of is a whole other ballgame.

Also, assuming Florida law applies, there are precedents from sports law and other related industries that could help circumscribe the matter. Of course, there is no legal opinion provided from the firm Macramalla works for cause they weren't mandated to draw one up. There'd be no money in it for them evidently since Expos potential ownership has not retained them. So Macramalla resorts to general principles of contract law to come up with general guidelines.

Bottom line -- Tampa remains a relocation target. And a potential ownership group won't have to wait until 2027 to make it happen. Damages can be quantified and negotiated upon as a cost of doing business. Macramalla's piece doesn't change that in the least.

Obviously, the contract for Use of Tropicana Field could be a financial hurdle in any relocation of the Devil rays, but I don't consider it different than when you buy a house that is advertised for 1Million. If the house is in a state of disrepair, as a potential buyer, I can negotiate the price down when offering to buy the house, allowing for the mandatory renovations to truly establish the home's worth at 1Million.

In 2004, the current managing partner, Stuart Sternberg paid 200M for 48% of the shares of the team and became managing general partner in 2005. The team was valued at 152M and, after the change in managing general partner, jumped to 209M in value.

14 years later, the team is valued at 850M, which isn't necessarily the price at which it can be sold for, as we saw with Sternberg paying 200M for a 48% share of the team worth (soon thereafter) no more than 209M at the time.

It's tricky business and Sternberg could well expect as much as the Florida Marlins who recently sold for 1.2 Billion. If that's the case, Bronfman could well settle with Sternberg for 1 Billion, taking into account the 200M in penalties for not honouring the contract with Tropicana Field until 2027, if those are truly the penalties awarded by a court, in the end.

Nothing doing, it would still cost Bronfman and his group 1.2 Billion for The Rays, but considering the structure already built up for the team, including the players on the payroll, the farm teams, etc., buying an existing franchise to relocate like The Rays may well provide Montreal fans with a quality product on the field quicker than going through the expansion process and make the exercise worth the added cost (likely 200M).

Anything is possible as long as the money is there for the rendez-vous with destiny.

 

[Runner77]

Sure there is a lot of speculation on his part and it is not impossible a move wont happen to Montreal however truth is a lot of stars need to align for this to happen. Current owners are still officially committed to Tampa area despite stadium setback. We may be closer but it does not mean imminent or a likely move unlike what seems to be reported in local Media.

I don't know that current owners's commitment matters at this point, they're dealing with a dinosaur slated for extinction -- there is only so much they can do. And they certainly have not been able to get several of many proposed new stadium projects off the ground over the past few years.

Local media has been reporting what Bronfman and Garber have been saying and both are very credible. Neither has made baseless comments and both have done their homework. There are enough factors and data points favoring Montreal getting a franchise that it looks to be sooner rather than later. Of course, anything can happen but right now, there is a great deal of momentum favoring Montreal and there is nothing wrong with the media reporting on that IMHO.

 

[Laurentide]

What's this going to do? It makes no sense.

You should repeat that to the Alouettes who are doing the same thing at Molson Stadium just a few years after getting an upper deck built. It makes zero sense. The problem with the Ray's isnt that they have too many tickets to sell, it's that they have tickets to sell at all. Nobody wants them, even for free.

 

[Grate n Colorful Oz]

that's all it is- an excuse. pie ix station is about 10 minutes down the green line from downtown, you don't have to go outside to access it, and if you were like me, coming from the suburbs, you can drop your car off at one of the many metro parking lots along the line. A concern was that hochelaga doesn't really have much of a nightlife for people to do anything after the game, and the area was kinda seedy- which shouldn't be a major issue considering where yankee stadium is/was. Besides, my friends who are Impact Ultras do down there and party after games all the time, so I figure it's changed since '04.

the biggest issue with the expos was that the team usually sucked, so no one is gonna go to montreal east to watch a team lose 90 games a year. I've seen the Big O packed on opening day, closing day, when the team was on a hot streak, etc., so people do show up, it's just that people won't show up for a losing product, especially since if we want to see a perennially mediocre team in Montreal, the bell centre is a 5 minute walk from downtown.

I lived in Longue Pointe for a decade. That part of town has such crappy roads. It's bleak.

I'm a pragmatic utilitarian by nature, but even I can see the need for aesthetics in terms of attracting AS MANY people as possible for the long term viability of the project. And there's nothing like an open stadium in a beautiful setting (view on Mount Royal and downtown) on a summer night.