Rams’ Move To St. Louis Approved Football Team Sweetened Deal For Nfl, And Owners Voted To Let Franchise Relocate
St. Louis finally got the Rams. The threat of a long, expensive lawsuit can do such things. So can an additional $17 million payoff, with possibly many more millions to come.
A month after barring the move from Southern California, owners voted 23-6 on Wednesday to allow the relocation to St. Louis, the first time an NFL team has left the West Coast.
The Rams, St. Louis officials and even the Missouri attorney general threatened to sue the league if it blocked the move.
“The game is over and I won’t say we won but … well, I guess we won one,” Rams owner Georgia Frontiere said. “I think we all won.”
The vote reflected an unwillingness by the league to take on the Rams in court. Last month, owners voted 21-3 with six abstentions against the move.
This time, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Washington, Phoenix and both New York teams voted against the move. Los Angeles Raiders owner Al Davis abstained, as he did a month ago.
“The decision to have peace and not to have war was a big factor,” NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue said.
The Rams also had considered leaving Southern California without approval, daring the league to sue them.
“There were options there and those options had been explored,” said Stan Kroenke, the Columbia, Mo., businessman who was approved as 30-percent Rams owner at a cost of $60 million. “We had some things in the wings, but it doesn’t serve anyone to talk about that now. We were successful.”
The owners’ turnaround apparently was tied to the construction of a stadium for the Raiders adjacent to Hollywood Park racetrack, which would guarantee an NFL franchise in the area. The Raiders, who moved from Oakland in 1982, had been hinting they might move.
The Los Angeles Times, citing unidentified sources, said if the Rams’ move were approved, the issue of the Hollywood Park stadium will also be brought before the owners and likely be approved. Owners discussed the Raiders’ situation Wednesday, but did not take action.
The agreement could cost the Rams as much as $73 million. On top of a $29 million relocation fee, the Rams agreed to pay $17 million from the proceeds of personal seat licenses. They will share equally with the NFL the cost of any rebate made to the Fox network for any revenue loss from leaving the No. 2 television market for the 18th.
The rebate could cost them as much as $12.5 million. Plus, the Rams agreed to waive a $13.5-million payment they would receive as their cut of the next round of expansion.
Representatives of FANS Inc., the St. Louis group that wooed the Rams, had a bottom-line view. As part of Wednesday’s agreement, FANS Inc. will have to come up with another $2.5 million. That’s on top of the $74 million in personal seat licenses it sold to finance the move, and a $250,000 annual lease it gave the Rams to play in the new $260 million domed stadium.