77 Hitmen

Thank you! The Bears have spent most of the last 3 decades fielding very mediocre and frequently getting embarrassed by their arch rivals. This is only their 7th playoff appearance in 30 years. ...and yet, fans in Chicago are as rabid about the Bears as ever (even before this year's resurgence). Let's get real. While they'd much prefer ending up in Arlington Heights, having a stadium in Gary/Hammond isn't going to slow their popularity.

Kansas City is one of the smallest markets in MLB. Nashville is about the same size and booming. They can probably support a team just as well as KC. The thing about Nashville, though is that the city/state just spent an insane amount of money for the new Titans stadium, so public funding for a MLB park there is questionable. On the other hand, Portland's metro area is bigger than KC's and the state of Oregon has committed $800M in public money toward an MLB stadium. Is it probable that the Royals will move? No. But I don't think the idea is laughable either - especially when there's $800M in public money sitting there. Portland is probably going to miss out on a western expansion team to Salt Lake City, so they'd be more than happy to get an existing team to move there. In the end, I think they'll get a deal done with Missouri. They were already going to offer spending 50% of the stadium costs for both the Royals AND Chiefs. Now that the Chiefs are leaving, more of that money can be directed toward getting a deal done with the Royals. No matter what, I'll be very surprised if the Royals are still playing at Kauffman Stadium after 2031. I just don't see that happening.

The Niners' new stadium is something like 50 miles and a 1 hour drive away from San Francisco and is practically in San Jose. Seems like their brand is surviving just fine.

You could mention a few trigger words if you want to breathe new life into this thread.

It looks like North Kansas City/Clay County, Missouri has closed the book on negotiations for a possible new Royals stadium. That would leave the city of KC, MO as the only viable option for a new ballpark, which is what the team probably ultimately wants anyway. https://fox4kc.com/sports/royals/nkc-royals-ballpark-negotiations-a-closed-chapter-county-commissioner/

The only problem I had with Benetti was too many corny "dad" jokes. Otherwise, he was great - a home-grown "voice of the Sox" announcer who could have been here for decades while getting some national broadcasts too. But, we're Sox fans and can't have good things. At least he didn't jump ship to the Cubs - which would have been yet another PR win for the North Siders as they know how to promote their on-air talent. I wonder how well liked he is in Detroit? Some talk radio blowhard ripping on him doesn't tell me what the fanbase in general thinks of him. Schriffen is simply not watchable. He doesn't belong in a MLB broadcast booth. But Uncle Jerry wants someone there who will tell us we're eating prime rib when in reality they're serving us a s%*# sandwich.

JR driving him away and replacing him with someone who is highly unqualified doesn't impact the play on the field, but it sure typifies how he has run this organization over the last two decades. At least when the decade is out, our team should be under new ownership. When Pope Leo throws out the first pitch at the new ballpark, I don't expect Schriffen to be there unless he bought a ticket to the game.

The Kansas House Speaker confirms that the state is no longer pursuing the Royals. https://www.ksnt.com/news/local-news/kansas-officials-no-longer-pursuing-new-royals-stadium-in-the-sunflower-state/

....and it's reportedly only about $48-50M still owed by ISFA on the stadium as of about a year ago. The debt on Soldier Field is somewhere around half a billion dollars.

I don't disagree with your overall point, but what is owed on New Comiskey is a fraction of what the state still owes for the Soldier Field renovations. Lumping them together is akin to saying the Dodgers owe a total of $765M for the combined contracts of Shohei Ohtani and Teoscar Hernandez.

A new Red Line stop at 15th and Clark was not part of the Fire stadium plan that was approved by the city.

A Kansas lawmaker says time is up for the Royals to accept their stadium deal. https://www.kctv5.com/2025/12/31/times-up-royals-stadium-proposal-kansas-lawmaker-says/ Also, downtown KC, Missouri businesses light up their buildings blue in support of a new downtown Royals stadium. https://fox4kc.com/sports/royals/downtown-kansas-city-lights-up-blue-in-support-of-new-royals-stadium/

I doubt they'd make that a condition. Colts fans in the state would probably not be on board with such a demand.

We'll see when they actually break ground on the facility, which is supposed to be this coming spring.

If you like "Private Equity 102", make sure to also sign up for "Soil Engineering 102".

Here's an interesting look at just how much of a sweetheart deal the new stadium deal is for the Chiefs and how bad it sounds for Kansas taxpayers:

By the time this might even become an issue for the Sox, they'll likely have a new owner. The old JR won't deal with Scott Boras clients concern isn't going to be a factor for anyone drafted in 2026.

Interesting that both Syracuse and Rochester, NY had NBA teams way back in the day.

Yep.....and by the time that 6+ years are up, JR will likely no longer be owner of the team. Even if he's still hanging on at age 96 or 97, the waiting-in-the-wings owner isn't going to let a star player walk just because he has Boras as an agent.

$86M contract? Too rich for our blood. It could go up to $131M? That's getting close to double the Sox biggest contract ever! Hopefully by the time the option year rolls around for this Soderstrom deal where it might surpass the $100M mark, the Sox will be under new ownership and we fans won't be staring in awe at some other team's $131M contract.

After the historically bad 2024 for our favorite team, this year gave us more excitement than I expected (on and off the field). Here's some positive highlights I can think of: - Sox win draft lottery will pick #1 overall next summer - Colson Montgomery hits 21 HRs in 71 games after being called up on July 4 - Sox sign Munetaka Murakami - Local, multibillionaire Justin Ishbia drops his bid to buy the Twins and enters into an agreement to (eventually) be the next owner of the White Sox - A die-hard Sox fan is elected Pope (I bet NOBODY had this on their bingo card!) - The guy in bullet #4 above suggests to the guy in bullet #5 above that the Sox will be getting a new stadium in the near future This isn't an all-inclusive list and please feel free to add to it. And yeah, I know the fact that the new Pope is a Sox fan isn't going to affect the fortunes of this franchise, but we've certainly had a lot of fun with it since the news broke in May.

Ha! I did totally forget about the Buffalo Sabres! You're right - there are 8 MLB/NFL/NBA/NHL teams that currently play in the state of New York. So, NY state has lost 6 teams over the years (w/ 2 of those still playing in the NYC metro), but still have 8 teams playing within the state boundaries. ....and I'm only counting those 4 sports leagues, of course - not MLS, WNBA, etc.

I assume you mean the Buffalo Braves, not the Sabres, but good catch! I had to look them up.....they're the LA Clippers now.

This is an interesting look at the MLB, NFL, NBA, and NHL teams that Missouri has lost over the last 75 years. I can't think of another state that comes close. Maybe New York with the Giants (baseball), Dodgers, Rochester Royals (NBA), and Giants/Jets (NFL), with the last two teams, like the Chiefs, staying in the metro area. But the state of NY still has 7 teams from those 4 sports leagues.

Yeah, it's a sizable amount remaining to be paid for the SF renovations, too - something like $500M. In contrast, there's "only" about $50M still owed on Rate Field, which is about the amount spent on a relief pitcher. I know the McCaskeys don't own Soldier Field, but they're the ones who have benefited from the 2002 renovations and they'll see the valuation of their franchise skyrocket if a stadium complex is built in Arlington Heights. While I can certainly see the Bears ending up in NW Indiana and taking whatever money the IN state govt throws at them, a stadium complex at Arlington Park would be much more valuable to the McCaskeys than any location they'd end up with in NWI. No offense to my fellow Sox fans in NWI, but that Arlington Park location is golden. My guess is that if they worked out a plan for the Bears to pay off that Soldier Field debt, they'd get that infrastructure/property tax deal done with the state fairly quickly.