NBA to Kansas City

[DColeKC]

I think if a soccer team can have success here, an NBA team would be successful as well. Yes, I know soccer is the most popular sport in the world but it is the 5th most popular sport in this country.

[AlkaliAxel]

There's definitely a market for NBA in KC. The new excuse nowadays is "KC doesn't have a billionaire for the NBA" but what people fail to think about is that it doesn't have to be a billionaire from KC to get this done. The Hunt's are from Dallas. If we're in the market for a relocation team, we just need to appeal as a market and a new owner would take advantage of it if it's better and more viable.

[mgsports]

Tampa Bay had the Raptors this year that's a plus. Silver did talk about Expansion before Game 1 but not what your suggesting. Quebec City,Houston have been mentioned as cities that want a NHL Team. Orlando should get one.

[AlkaliAxel]

Tampa Bay had the Raptors this year that's a plus. Silver did talk about Expansion before Game 1 but not what your suggesting. Quebec City,Houston have been mentioned as cities that want a NHL Team. Orlando should get one.

They're not gonna indicate they're expanding publicly. Private sources have said the league is gonna act tepid on it for now and then open it up in summer of 2022.

From NBC Sports last month: "While the league will have to officially approve this idea, likely in the summer of 2022, the wheels are in motion to bring two new expansion teams into the NBA. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said not only suggested expansion is on the table but also has discussed a possible $2.5 billion per team expansion fee for the two clubs. That massive fee will more than offset the losses owners took during the pandemic with empty buildings."

[GRID]

I just don't see any buzz for NBA in KC. I would be willing to bet that KC is one of the lowest rated markets for TV ratings for NBA, all of our semi pro basketball ventures that start in KC fail miserably. Only way we get a team is if we have an amazing local ownership group that includes people like Mahomes, Kelce, and someone else with deeper pockets (Dropbox Founder?)

The NBA wouldn’t be the draw, it would be a sports team DT. This town has never had the ability to go to a restaurant, see the game and go out for drinks after. It would be the young professional team for this city. Once it’s shown to be wildly successful, the other sports teams would be clamoring to move DT as well.

Exactly. I think just having a sports team and a reason to regularly go downtown like that would be enough of a draw by itself. The team winning would only be icing on the cake.

Still not sure a downtown ballpark is a great idea anymore. I just don't think there are any good locations for one anymore and large stadiums like that (even baseball) just don't work well unless the area is VERY urban and transit is very good. As much as I would like KC to have a downtown baseball stadium, I don't think it will be a good fit for the city now. Even baseball has a strong tailgating atmosphere in KC.

Move the MLS stadium downtown and bring in a NBA or NHL team. Those are both perfect venues for a downtown. Build light rail to Blue Springs with a stop at the sports complex and redevelop that area with TOD apartments etc.

[AlkaliAxel]

I just don't see any buzz for NBA in KC. I would be willing to bet that KC is one of the lowest rated markets for TV ratings for NBA, all of our semi pro basketball ventures that start in KC fail miserably. Only way we get a team is if we have an amazing local ownership group that includes people like Mahomes, Kelce, and someone else with deeper pockets (Dropbox Founder?)

The NBA wouldn’t be the draw, it would be a sports team DT. This town has never had the ability to go to a restaurant, see the game and go out for drinks after. It would be the young professional team for this city. Once it’s shown to be wildly successful, the other sports teams would be clamoring to move DT as well.

Exactly. I think just having a sports team and a reason to regularly go downtown like that would be enough of a draw by itself. The team winning would only be icing on the cake.

Still not sure a downtown ballpark is a great idea anymore. I just don't think there are any good locations for one anymore and large stadiums like that (even baseball) just don't work well unless the area is VERY urban and transit is very good. As much as I would like KC to have a downtown baseball stadium, I don't think it will be a good fit for the city now. Even baseball has a strong tailgating atmosphere in KC.

Move the MLS stadium downtown and bring in a NBA or NHL team. Those are both perfect venues for a downtown. Build light rail to Blue Springs with a stop at the sports complex and redevelop that area with TOD apartments etc.

Not to take us off topic of NBA to KC..but I have to take disagreement to this. Royals should absolutely go downtown and they should go to the East Village. It's a 9-10 minute walk from there to the streetcar, and it's about a 15-20 minute walk from the lots at Truman.

But overall my main argument (among many) for Royals moving downtown is that it will get people to go to games who don't normally go because it would be more of an experience. It should increase the attendance.

[GRID]

I honestly am not so sure. The crowds at royals games are a very "chiefs" demographic. I was at the game Friday (largest crowd of the year) and most of the crowd and people out tailgating etc is your suburban/rural types that I just don't think will adapt well to a downtown park. And like it or not, that's most of the KC sports market.

So while KC would gain fans from the city, people staying at hotels and people wanting take in a baseball game in a more urban environment, I think you would probably discourage many fans that go now from going. So attendance would be a wash at best.

My point is you don't put a stadium downtown for an attendance boost. Especially in KC. Look at Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Cincy, Seattle, Baltimore etc. They don't draw any better than KC, Milwaukee, Philly etc. A winning team is the only thing that will consistently draw fans.

I agree, walking to a downtown ballpark is much easier and often much shorter and often can even be much cheaper or free. You are forced to walk a ways and forced to pay whatever the teams want to charge in KC.

But....the streetcar is not going to do much for a baseball stadium. Trams every ten minutes would never be able to keep up with even a tiny portion of fans going to a baseball game. And downtown streets would never be able to support peak traffic volumes for a venue that large in that location without massive modifications to the streets and freeway system.

Finally, parking. The streetcar is nice, but it's an urban tram, not mass transit, and especially not regional mass transit. All things considered, it's basically a downtown bus route. It really has little to no impact. A stadium would require a lot of parking and make parking lots much more valuable. Parking lots would probably pop up all over the place east of the loop for the stadium. And once in the stadium, you would not even have a view of anything. The view east out of east village would be worse than the TSC.

If you put one anywhere downtown I think somewhere near the 18th and Vine District is the best best bet to get it away from the freeway loop. I still think the IRS complex would be the best place ever for a baseball stadium. But east crossroads would work too.

[AlkaliAxel]

The NBA wouldn’t be the draw, it would be a sports team DT. This town has never had the ability to go to a restaurant, see the game and go out for drinks after. It would be the young professional team for this city. Once it’s shown to be wildly successful, the other sports teams would be clamoring to move DT as well.

Exactly. I think just having a sports team and a reason to regularly go downtown like that would be enough of a draw by itself. The team winning would only be icing on the cake.

Still not sure a downtown ballpark is a great idea anymore. I just don't think there are any good locations for one anymore and large stadiums like that (even baseball) just don't work well unless the area is VERY urban and transit is very good. As much as I would like KC to have a downtown baseball stadium, I don't think it will be a good fit for the city now. Even baseball has a strong tailgating atmosphere in KC.

Move the MLS stadium downtown and bring in a NBA or NHL team. Those are both perfect venues for a downtown. Build light rail to Blue Springs with a stop at the sports complex and redevelop that area with TOD apartments etc.

Not to take us off topic of NBA to KC..but I have to take disagreement to this. Royals should absolutely go downtown and they should go to the East Village. It's a 9-10 minute walk from there to the streetcar, and it's about a 15-20 minute walk from the lots at Truman.

But overall my main argument (among many) for Royals moving downtown is that it will get people to go to games who don't normally go because it would be more of an experience. It should increase the attendance.

They'll probably build up around the stadium so it wouldn't be the current view you have today. The suburbanites will grow to accept the downtown stadium and use it.

[GRID]

And that would be great too. So long as royals stay in kcmo.

[KC_JAYHAWK]

And that would be great too. So long as royals stay in kcmo.

Or the Chiefs. I'm sure JoCo residents would love a baseball stadium at 151st and whatever

[StL_Dan]

And that would be great too. So long as royals stay in kcmo.

Or the Chiefs. I'm sure JoCo residents would love a baseball stadium at 151st and whatever

Comments like that…smh

[brewcrew1000]

And that would be great too. So long as royals stay in kcmo.

Or the Chiefs. I'm sure JoCo residents would love a baseball stadium at 151st and whatever

With the Braves moving from downtown to the burbs to be "Closer to its fan base" wonder if we will see even more of a shift from downtown parks to suburbs.

Cardinals, Dbacks, Astros, Indians, White Sox, Orioles, Tigers would all be prime candidates to move out to the burbs based on the age of the stadium

[StL_Dan]

Not sure about other stadiums mentioned, but Busch Stadium isn’t even 20 years old.

Yet, it’s still ready to be replaced?

Why?

[brewcrew1000]

Cardinals most likely will not move away from downtown, they just seem like the perfect "let's move to the suburbs" candidate based on where it's fanbase lives

[AlkaliAxel]

And that would be great too. So long as royals stay in kcmo.

Or the Chiefs. I'm sure JoCo residents would love a baseball stadium at 151st and whatever

East Village is my choice because 1) it has the right amount of land and it's literally a dump.

We can talk and talk about putting up building in East Village, but that's so far away we'd probably all be dead before that happens. Instead of letting that area sit like a dump, let's build a stadium district. I can guarantee you'll get the buildings put up in East Village faster by putting the stadium there than waiting around for hell to freeze.

[flyingember]

And that would be great too. So long as royals stay in kcmo.

Or the Chiefs. I'm sure JoCo residents would love a baseball stadium at 151st and whatever

East Village is my choice because 1) it has the right amount of land and it's literally a dump.

We can talk and talk about putting up building in East Village, but that's so far away we'd probably all be dead before that happens. Instead of letting that area sit like a dump, let's build a stadium district. I can guarantee you'll get the buildings put up in East Village faster by putting the stadium there than waiting around for hell to freeze.

There already has been multiple buildings go up in it.

Granted, it’s been slow in general but ignoring reality isn’t constructive.

[AlkaliAxel]

Or the Chiefs. I'm sure JoCo residents would love a baseball stadium at 151st and whatever

East Village is my choice because 1) it has the right amount of land and it's literally a dump.

We can talk and talk about putting up building in East Village, but that's so far away we'd probably all be dead before that happens. Instead of letting that area sit like a dump, let's build a stadium district. I can guarantee you'll get the buildings put up in East Village faster by putting the stadium there than waiting around for hell to freeze.

There already has been multiple buildings go up in it.

Granted, it’s been slow in general but ignoring reality isn’t constructive.

I don't mind whatever they're doing there as long as can still plant a stadium and a district there.

[mgsports]

Other cities for NBA would be cities that have NHL team but no NBA one yet.

[AlkaliAxel]

Other cities for NBA would be cities that have NHL team but no NBA one yet.

Of the mid-market cities available for NBA that aren't currently hosting NHL in the winter, you have:
Kansas City, San Diego, Tampa, Cincinnati, Louisville, Austin

All of these cities are too close to an existing team except for San Diego, except they don't have a viable stadium. It really does only leave KC once Vegas and Seattle expand.

[beautyfromashes]

I'm kind of surprised Omaha is never mentioned as trying a long shot play for an NBA team. They have no professional teams, the would have political backing as the only team in the state and it would boost their credibility as a city, like has somewhat happened with OKC.