Sports and business journalist Evan Weiner wrote an interesting article yesterday for the SportsTalkFlorida website. Entitled "Thirty-Year Lease Dilemma, Why Stu Sternberg Should Read This", Weiner discusses the history of the Rays lease with City of St. Petersburg and why they might be stuck in Tropicana Field until 2027.
Weiner makes some good points about the predicament 30-year leases put teams in. He goes in depth about the New York Islanders, who are finally escaping the shackles of their own 30-year lease on an outdated, dilapidated facility in Nassau County, Long Island. Starting in 2015, the Islanders will be moving to Brooklyn's new Barclays Center.
According to Weiner,
The New York Islanders National Hockey League franchise is probably the poster child for everything that can go wrong with a bad lease. The franchise is finishing up the lease in 2014-15 and then will move west to Brooklyn and it is a relocation that has excited a good many people within the National Hockey League including the National Hockey League Players Association Executive Director Donald Fehr who thinks the rebranding of the franchise in Brooklyn will do wonders for the league and the team.Sound familiar?
Brooklyn’s arena is really close to Wall Street and corporate wealth. The New York Islanders present location in Uniondale has some wealthy people nearby but the team has been awful for decades and some of that can be blamed on a 30 year lease signed by owner John O. Pickett in 1985. Pickett’s mistake was giving much of the revenue generated in the building away to Nassau County and the management company running the Nassau Coliseum and signing language that made it almost impossible to relocate the franchise.
But there is one major difference between the Rays and the Islanders. Weiner states the eventual Islanders' departure will lead to a new fanbase closer to Brooklyn and that Long Island fans will be either too far or priced out of going to games. That wouldn't be the case in Tampa Bay as even the furthest west Rays fans would still be within an hour's distance from a downtown Tampa baseball stadium. If that ever happens.
Although it enlightened me a bit as to the history, despite Weiner's title, Stu Sternberg does not need to read his article. I'm sure Stu Sternberg did his homework in years ago and knew all about the Rays lease. Sternberg isn't dumb. He made millions in the stock market, knowing when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em, as the Kenny Rogers' tune goes. A team of Goldman Sachs traders doesn't make bad investments.
That's why I am not worried about the Rays moving prior to 2027. As long as the ownership makes money, which they do, they are happy. The Rays are profitable. They might not be as profitable as possible, but Stu Sternberg's bottom line does alright. And I doubt the Rays are the only investment he has.