Downtown Baseball Stadium

[Metro]

It's a shame some of you are getting paid 0 to be a Royals mouthpiece. Sly James is getting 700k for it

[aknowledgeableperson]

It's exhausting. It really shows the lack of understand many people have about wealth in general.

I wonder if they thought in everyday people terms if it would help. If I own a $500,000 dollar house and have a few paid off cars, I'm worth say $600k but does that mean I have 600k available to go build something? Of course not. Do we really expect most of these owners to pay for these things in full themselves? People see big numbers but not the real numbers. Sure, a few MLB teams make 400 million a year in revenue but that's top line revenue and we don't see what the bottom line nets out to. The sports teams I've worked with see a very small net profit each year, less than 3 million in fact. So to pretend these guys are getting rich off the team and can afford to build expensive stadiums alone is a joke.

They borrow the money much like they did for that $500,000 house and 2 cars, and buying stocks on margin, and to keep their business open.
I know that is a simplistic reply but usually the rent the teams pay for the arena/stadium doesn't cover the cost to reimburse the taxpayer.

And BTW the value of the teams keep going up that is how the owners get rich. Very few team owners are in it for the good of the community like Ewing Kauffman. The owners get into the game for many different reasons but to lose money isn't one of them.

[DColeKC]

It's a shame some of you are getting paid 0 to be a Royals mouthpiece. Sly James is getting 700k for it

Yeah. Divide that by ten. He’s getting 70k and my payment is watching our city grow.

[DColeKC]

It's exhausting. It really shows the lack of understand many people have about wealth in general.

I wonder if they thought in everyday people terms if it would help. If I own a $500,000 dollar house and have a few paid off cars, I'm worth say $600k but does that mean I have 600k available to go build something? Of course not. Do we really expect most of these owners to pay for these things in full themselves? People see big numbers but not the real numbers. Sure, a few MLB teams make 400 million a year in revenue but that's top line revenue and we don't see what the bottom line nets out to. The sports teams I've worked with see a very small net profit each year, less than 3 million in fact. So to pretend these guys are getting rich off the team and can afford to build expensive stadiums alone is a joke.

They borrow the money much like they did for that $500,000 house and 2 cars, and buying stocks on margin, and to keep their business open.
I know that is a simplistic reply but usually the rent the teams pay for the arena/stadium doesn't cover the cost to reimburse the taxpayer.

And BTW the value of the teams keep going up that is how the owners get rich. Very few team owners are in it for the good of the community like Ewing Kauffman. The owners get into the game for many different reasons but to lose money isn't one of them.

Yes but the valuation is meaningless until they go to sell which doesn’t happen often. Flipping mlb teams isn’t common. What I’m saying is why would a billionaire leverage the entirely of his assets to build something that he only profits off of when it sells? I’m also over simplifying this but basically saying most mlb owners simply can’t honestly afford to do this without public help.

[Highlander]

It's exhausting. It really shows the lack of understand many people have about wealth in general.

I wonder if they thought in everyday people terms if it would help. If I own a $500,000 dollar house and have a few paid off cars, I'm worth say $600k but does that mean I have 600k available to go build something? Of course not. Do we really expect most of these owners to pay for these things in full themselves? People see big numbers but not the real numbers. Sure, a few MLB teams make 400 million a year in revenue but that's top line revenue and we don't see what the bottom line nets out to. The sports teams I've worked with see a very small net profit each year, less than 3 million in fact. So to pretend these guys are getting rich off the team and can afford to build expensive stadiums alone is a joke.

They borrow the money much like they did for that $500,000 house and 2 cars, and buying stocks on margin, and to keep their business open.
I know that is a simplistic reply but usually the rent the teams pay for the arena/stadium doesn't cover the cost to reimburse the taxpayer.

And BTW the value of the teams keep going up that is how the owners get rich. Very few team owners are in it for the good of the community like Ewing Kauffman. The owners get into the game for many different reasons but to lose money isn't one of them.

Yes but the valuation is meaningless until they go to sell which doesn’t happen often. Flipping mlb teams isn’t common. What I’m saying is why would a billionaire leverage the entirely of his assets to build something that he only profits off of when it sells? I’m also over simplifying this but basically saying most mlb owners simply can’t honestly afford to do this without public help.

Forbes puts the value of the Royals at 1.2 billion. Sherman paid 1 billion for the Royals 5 years ago. So that's a 4% return on his investment annually if he sold it at that value to another KC ownership group. He would have done better investing his money elsewhere. He would get a substantially better return if he sold it to an out of KC ownership group as the Royals have one of the lowest values of any MLB teams. Even if he sold the Royals to an ownership from a similar sized metro like Nashville or Austin (both of which are growing much faster than KC), he could probably get 1.6 billion given the valuation of some of the better performing small market teams. It's not like he's in this for the money.

[KCPowercat]

Don't feed trolls.

[Metro]

It's a shame some of you are getting paid 0 to be a Royals mouthpiece. Sly James is getting 700k for it

Yeah. Divide that by ten. He’s getting 70k and my payment is watching our city grow.

Except the core isn't growing

[DColeKC]

It's a shame some of you are getting paid 0 to be a Royals mouthpiece. Sly James is getting 700k for it

Yeah. Divide that by ten. He’s getting 70k and my payment is watching our city grow.

Except the core isn't growing

If Downtown were its own town, it would be the fastest-growing municipality in the metro area. 4,000 people have moved downtown since 2020.

[Metro]

Yeah. Divide that by ten. He’s getting 70k and my payment is watching our city grow.

Except the core isn't growing

If Downtown were its own town, it would be the fastest-growing municipality in the metro area. 4,000 people have moved downtown since 2020.

https://www.kcur.org/news/2023-04-03/di ... nties-grow

[beautyfromashes]

^^^
The East Side 3rd district has largely emptied out with African American populations moving to Raytown and Lees Sunmit-type suburbs for better schools and less crime. West side districts and downtown proper have seen significant growth. I think you’ll see much more eastern movement of home renovations and development as prices in Midtown/Brookside/Waldo etc become more expensive. The next census growth will be dramatic.

[moderne]

This discussion is off topic but it takes a while to effectively do a heart transplant on a city.

[DColeKC]

Except the core isn't growing

If Downtown were its own town, it would be the fastest-growing municipality in the metro area. 4,000 people have moved downtown since 2020.

https://www.kcur.org/news/2023-04-03/di ... nties-grow

Downtown growth is great and when I say downtown, that's generally considered to be River Market, West Bottoms, Columbus Park, the Central Business District (CBD), Crossroads, Westside, Crown Center, Union Hill and Hospital Hill neighborhoods.

It jumped 30% from 2010 to 2021 and we've added over 4,000 in the last three years. The rest of Kansas City grew at 10% during the same time period.

To get us back on topic, a baseball stadium will only help this growth.

[SouthKC_Citizen]

Interesting preview of an interview from KMBC with John Sherman.

https://youtu.be/BKOzjisZxXk?si=1IeJfIWtqMz-Uwkx

When asked if “exploring all options” includes leaving the market Sherman said that it was never on his radar and that he had never said that. I’m assuming that this means that even if the vote on the 2nd is no, the Royals are going to continue to work with the city and county to get a new stadium (perhaps a retry on the fall ballot), and if not then they might look elsewhere, but within the metro.

[TheUrbanRoo]

It's a shame some of you are getting paid 0 to be a Royals mouthpiece. Sly James is getting 700k for it

Yeah. Divide that by ten. He’s getting 70k and my payment is watching our city grow.

Except the core isn't growing

The core actually grew, according to the 2020 census, for the first time since 1950!

[im2kull]

If the Royals were smart they would de-couple the K from their ask for a tax to support a downtown stadium plan. The "Save the K" crowd would instantly be mooted if there was no indication that the K was "Going away". The county preparing a demo RFP and the Royals indicating that the K will face demolition regardless of the vote were idiotic moves to win a vote.

Why would we keep the K if we have a downtown ballpark?

The impression I get from Kull's post is that if they had to do this again, squash any indication that a demise is imminent for the K. Make the sales pitch solely for a new stadium and leave the discussion for what happens to K for a later time.

Precisely.

[DColeKC]

John Sherman said today that the Royals would be putting between 300m and 400m into the stadium project.

[beautyfromashes]

John Sherman said today that the Royals would be putting between 300m and 400m into the stadium project.

What happened to the $1B?

[DColeKC]

John Sherman said today that the Royals would be putting between 300m and 400m into the stadium project.

What happened to the $1B?

They've always said they're going to put "over a billion" into the village development but today was the first day he said specifics about how much money the team would put towards the stadium specifically.

[beautyfromashes]

John Sherman said today that the Royals would be putting between 300m and 400m into the stadium project.

What happened to the $1B?

They've always said they're going to put "over a billion" into the village development but today was the first day he said specifics about how much money the team would put towards the stadium specifically.

He said specifically that they're putting 300-400m into the stadium specifically or "stadium project" because I'm worried this project is getting pared down and the village portion will be close to nonexistent. I don't think they have the votes from the council that they once thought and city money will be hard to get. I think they take the vote money, their own and some money from the state to get to $1m and build the stadium and the hotel and entertainment dies. There are hotels in the area to take the demand including the city-funded Loews on the new park and P&L gets the entertainment piece. That's really what they wanted in the first place with this location.

[dnweava]

I scaled municipal stadium onto the crossroads site. A stadium that has almost the exact same number of seats as what they are proposing. Oak doesn't even need a road diet to make a stadium fit. Sure a new stadium is going to have wider concourses, more bathrooms and amenities, but the site can easily work while keeping Oak open and even saving most of the surrounding buildings.