A couple of folks responded last week to Steven Hale's post about the Sounds not having any "skin in the game" with regards to the new stadium.
They said, "What's a 30-year lease and $700,000 per year in rent?"
About 16 percent.
It pales in comparison to the 55 percent of a $675 million major league stadium in suburban Atlanta that the Braves will pony up. The city of Richmond is building a stadium for the minor league Flying Squirrels. The team's contribution? Almost half ($1.7 million of $3.5 million in annual debt service). Even in Memphis, the team's portion of the costs in a new deal is expected to exceed 50 percent.
So, why are the Sounds in for so little?
A City Paper story from when Metro studied alternatives points to the fact that this site has never been the preferred site by the club.
“The possibility of a site on the east bank of the river is clearly the site that has the most interest by the Sounds,” said Sounds attorney and lobbyist Tom White, adding that the Sounds must now look at financing possibilities, with help from Metro, for a new ballpark to replace outdated Greer Stadium. “There is extremely limited interest by the Sounds in the other two sites,” White added.
Was that posturing by White? Maybe. But it's easy to see how "extremely limited interest" translates into limited participation in the overall cost of the park.
Metro is still on the hook for hundreds of thousands of dollars per year in the current Sulphur Dell scenario. Even if you factor in the development and all of the attendant tax money it will generate — something Metro concedes was getting done with or without a new stadium — this deal isn't revenue neutral. And the Sounds ownership has no contractual obligation to anything beyond the stadium lease.
So if the Sounds wanted to be elsewhere, is their lack of financial participation the cost of Mayor Dean pushing the stadium to Sulphur Dell?
As one commenter pointed out on Twitter last week, maybe the Sounds actually do have some "skin in the game." About a hangnail's worth.
