The take that keeps on taking: M's want $180 million of taxpayer money for Safeco Field. (Seattle: apartment, renting)

[87112]

Screw helping the Mariners. Any business that can give out 240 million dollar contracts ( Cano) does not need handouts. If some other city needs them at any cost let them leave.

[pnwguy2]

Why do pro teams do this? Because they can. The sad part is they can because fans don't want to lose the team. The Mariners are indeed important to Seattle, and do well from a revenue standpoint. At some point the fans just need to say "No". If the Mariner organization was actually struggling with revenue, then it would be a concern. I don't see that scenerio right now. It is simply an initial fishing expedition that probably won't reel anything of significance in.

[JonasW]

Definitely a fishing expedition and I’d bet they’ll get one. Sportsball teams are the biggest sham and almost always get what they want as people are sheep to sports. Let the Mariners go find a better stadium than Safeco, ain’t going to happen and they know it - however they also know Seattle will do anything not to lose another team, sadly.

[Botev1912]

Originally Posted by LuvsCruisin

I don't even think we can consider it a good season. The Mariners have already blown what? The 6 game lead they had in the wild card and are now sinking faster than the Titanic having already been bumped to 3rd place by Oakland.


Not that I'm surprised... flawed teams generally get exposed and the Mariners league leading record in 1 run victories just proves how lucky they've gotten over the course of the season.

It was an 11-game lead in mid June.

[wutitiz]

Originally Posted by phoenixmike11

in case you can not read the seattle times article due to their paywall (or do not want to take the time to read the whole article)- a blogger who speciializes in writng about what a bad investment sports stadiums are for the public wrote a good summary of the Mariners situation
Mariners seeking $180m in public money to buy $501 toasters, less frumpy luxury suites | Field of Schemes

Good link, thanks. From your link:

In other words, it looks like the consultants put together a wish list of things either other newer stadiums have — they say they visited San Francisco, Denver, Washington, and Pittsburgh “as a resource for developing the matrix” — or the Mariners owners had a particular jones for, and said right, that’s what’s needed

I never forget watching Robert Mak interview Sonics GM Wally Walker when the Sonics were pushing for a new stadium. It was maybe around 2003, and KeyArena had just been completely gutted and rebuilt in 1995. Walker said that with the advent of the M's and Seahawks stadiums (both built around 2000), the Sonics had lost many of their luxury box clientele because the corp crowd was going to the new venues.

It's like the old spy vs. spy cartoons where they would just keep escalating until they were nuking each other.

[CrazyDonkey]

http://douglas-sma.com/wp-content/up..._Draft_III.pdf

The primary objective of this assignment was to identify the cost of necessary capital improvements required to maintain Safeco Field in a first-class manner through this timeframe.

The existing 20-year Lease between the PFD and Mariners is effective through December 31, 2018. The agreement contains a base rent payment of $700,000 per year, which is adjusted to account for inflation. For 2016, the base rent was just above $1 million. In addition, the Mariners are solely responsible for all operating expenses, routine and preventative maintenance, and capital repairs and replacement, with PFD participation in defined circumstances (see below). In return for these obligations, the Mariners retain all ballpark related revenues.

Under the Lease, the Mariners are responsible for ensuring the ballpark is “operated, maintained, equipped, and periodically renewed in a manner consistent with the Applicable Standard.” The Applicable Standard is defined as maintaining and operating the ballpark in a “first class manner, taking into account the age of the Ballpark and any special needs or limitations resulting from the Ballpark’s design and construction.” As such, the Mariners are generally responsible for all capital investment associated with achieving this standard over the term of the lease.

https://deadspin.com/mariners-demand...-wo-1827920723

The Mariners’ ballpark cost $517 million in 1999 dollars and was paid for mostly with public money. The Mariners do pay rent, but it’s a fraction of what they’re asking for: $55 million in rent payments over the 25-year lease, vs. the $180 million they’re demanding. Majority owner John Stanton is a billionaire.

The question is what are "necessary capital improvements required to maintain Safeco Field in a first-class manner," without which attendance, and eventually revenues, would suffer over the life of the facility, versus operational improvements that simply accrue to the Mariners' current bottom line.

[phoenixmike11]

This is another post from the same blog related to the Mariners stadium situation and how Seattle does better than some other cities when it comes to not getting totally ripped off on subsidizing sports stadiums
FoS 20: Nick Licata on how to fight for fairer stadium deals | Field of Schemes

[Botev1912]

The city rejected 100% privatetly funded arena due to political corruption.

[rjshae]

Originally Posted by Botev1912

The city rejected 100% privatetly funded arena due to political corruption.

The main parties opposed to the SoDo arena were the Port of Seattle, Seattle Mariners and the ILWU. You believe one of these groups were able to corrupt the city council?

[Botev1912]

If city council were not corrupt, they would have never rejected the best deal the city could ever get. Some of the city council members couldn't even give a logical explanation why they did a 180 just before the vote.