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Your money, Zell’s pocket
Thursday, Mar 13, 2008 - Posted by Rich Miller * The Sun-Times’ lead editorial today hits the Wrigley Field issue out of the park…
This deal isn’t about anything except padding Sam Zell’s bottom line. He didn’t approach Gov. Blagojevich about the state buying Wrigley Field in order to help him sell the team. He did it so he can make more money off the sale - the whole being worth less than the sum of its parts. If we’re gonna help out a kabillionaire (and I’m not at all saying we should), shouldn’t that kabillionaire be the new owner instead of Sam Zell, who is dumping the team and doesn’t seem to care much about what happens to the park except that he finds a way to make the most possible money? * Meanwhile, the Wrigley Company is keeping its cards close to its vest. Zell has floated the idea of selling naming rights to Wrigley Field, which some insiders claim is a hardball tactic to extract big bucks from Wrigley Co. But chairman of Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co. was cagey at a shareholders meeting yesterday…
* Related…
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- Ghost - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 10:09 am:
Looks like Zell is trying to give Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co. something to chew on, but it does not appear tey are biting.
The State, economic good times or bad, should have nothing to do with the park! How about building some more State owned office buildings and get us out of the multimillion dollar lease game before we buy a ballpark.
- wordslinger - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 10:12 am:
Perfect issue for the Sun-Times. They’re right on the merits and they get to smack around the suits at Battleship Tribune.
Wrigley’s playing it smart. Just like people buy Crest or Tide and not Procter and Gamble, people buy Juicy Fruit and Big Red. It’ll always be Wrigley Field, anyway.
- Flounder - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 10:17 am:
Wrigley Field and the Cubs in the hands of Blagojevich and his cronies is a frightening thought.
Future headline “CUBS Scandal”.
- tom73 - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 10:27 am:
We can’t get a cap program, or really work toward resolving our deep financial problems, but hey, we can trip all over ourselves to help a rich person make more money.
Where oh where did the free market go?
- plutocrat03 - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 10:28 am:
If you are already buying an airport that no one wants, why not add a baseball stadium which taxpayers don’t need to own?
- Pot calling kettle - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 10:45 am:
I’m with Tom73.
When, if ever, the state has its fiscal house in order, then, maybe we can talk about buying an old ballpark.
How can we even talk about this when there are bridges on the cusp of condemnation, the pension plans are in desperate need of cash, the state is a couple of billion behind in its bills, etc. (RANT…RANT…RANT…)
- jerry 101 - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 10:49 am:
Plutocrat-
and while you’re doing that, lets get in the game of selling valuable public assets that were created with taxpayer money for the benefit of taxpayers.
The lottery? Who needs the income flows in perpituity from that? Lets just get a chunk of change now.
Midway Airport? So what if we just spent hundreds of millions of dollars rebuilding and modernizing it? Lets sell it for a billion or two now. Who cares about the fees that we can get down the line?
The Skyway? Hey, we can sell that for a billion and let a private company charge $3 or $4 for a toll after we spent hundreds of millions rebuilding it. I mean, hey, the city couldn’t just charge excessively high tolls.
The RTA? ahhhhhhh…nah, we don’t have the money to rebuild and expand.
Yup, your city and state government, helping the rich get richer while the rest of us are told to go to heck.
- Jack Leyhane - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 11:35 am:
What Mr. Zell really wants is an excuse to tear down Wrigley… but there’s that darned landmark problem. The team will get him hundreds of millions with or without Wrigley, but he looks at the field and sees condos and townhomes and retail opportunities.
My conspiracy theory? The talk of the sale to the State is to establish that there’s tremendous rehab cost involved — so onerous, of course, that the State eventually backs away. And that’s the first shot in the battle to get rid of the landmark status and ultimately the stadium with it.
What do you think?
- plutocrat03 - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 11:56 am:
I can agree with Jerry 101 on everything but the Skyway.
The Skyway was a loser its entire existence. (http://www.authorstream.com/Presentation/Haylee-29995-Walt-Knorr-Lease-Chicago-Skyway-SkywayPublic-Policy-Issues-Template-Asset-Privatization-Origin-History-of-the-as-Entertainment-ppt-powerpoint/) The costs to maintain it and collect the tolls as a governmental project were never going to work. Operations by a private entity have streamlined the operation and toll collection, while putting it into much better physical shape.
It is profitable at a much lower per unit toll costs than it would have ever been under city control.
No other public property passes the white elephant test. Keep Midway and the Illinois lottery and hire management/consultants who will maximize the ongoing value of the assets.
- Anon - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 12:45 pm:
Zell’s playing with fire. “Wrigley Field” is a mainstay of the Cubs brand, which has that element of quaint anachronism. I have friends and relatives around the country who drool at the prospect of seeing a single game at Wrigley, and not from being Cubs fans, because they are not Cubs fans. It’s just “Wrigley Field”.
The idiots who want to slap their corporate name on Wrigley are playing with fire, too. There will be a backlash.
Screw with the brand, screw with your money.
- ZC - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 12:57 pm:
Stadiums change names. Renaming Wrigley after one large corporation instead of another large corporation doesn’t strike me as the end of the world. If that brings in more money to help renovate the place and keep its special architecture, I’m not opposed to that.
- Roosevelt - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 1:22 pm:
What about this proposal? Humor me, if you will:
End baseball at Wrigley, move the Cubs to another facility, and refashion the park as a baseball museum. A Cooperstown West, if you will, which would be a lot easier for fans to visit than the real C’town. For the naming rights to the Cubs franchise, some company/FPO can build a new, MODERN baseball park farther out in the city. (What about tearing down all those miserable six-flat slums out around Cumberland off the Kennedy? Blue Line access is right there…) Fans in Wrigleyville are eternally grateful for the loss of massive traffic congestion every summer, good riddance to the drunken lout parade after every game, and constant sniping over what “they” will do to Wrigley. Wrigley keeps its landmark status.
Oh, and before you cry foul, I am a Northsider, which makes me an unfortunate soul indeed (because as decreed by birth, I must be a Cubs fan).
- Anon - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 7:41 pm:
ZC-
Let’s see what might work out . . .
Playtex Park?
Oberweis Field?
Ben & Jerry’s Stadium?
- ZC - Thursday, Mar 13, 08 @ 9:01 pm:
Give it 90+ years, and people will be railing about changing the sacred name of “Oberweis field.” As much as it hurts to write that. I expect by that time the Mad Milkman will be a historical asterisk in Illinois political history.
Pingback Your money, Zell’s pocket — IRA 401k - Friday, Mar 14, 08 @ 12:56 am:
[…] Baruch wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThere is, then, not a single good reason the State of Illinois should buy Wrigley Field, a scheme now roaring forward that would put our tax money at risk, to ensure the ballpark’s survival. Beautiful as it is, Wrigley Field […] […]