Crap ... what's going to happen to that surge of NFL interest in Jacksonville?

They never left. They started going to USC football games for a long time, and moved over to Dodger Stadium for the last few years.

 

No team is going to be viable playing in the current stadium in Oakland.

 

I can't believe the Vikings would leave, that franchise is too deeply connected to the culture of that state.

The Chargers seem like a logical candidate to me. Their stadium's a pit, they ain't getting a new one, they're already in the So Cal market, already have an established So Cal fan base, they'd just have to move operation up the interstate a couple hours. And LA is where their franchise started, they could spin it as returning home.

 

Re: Crap ... what's going to happen to that surge of NFL interest in Jacksonvill

Actually, this isn't strictly true. While playing one of the Sporcle games that's on another thread, I discovered that Jacksonville has a population of more than 800,000, which places it as the 11th largest city in the U.S.

That's more than double the population of Miami and Pittsburgh, and more than three times the population of Buffalo, which has the smallest population of any city in the NFL.

The problem Jacksonville has, I think, is there isn't a lot of metropolitan sprawl there. The city of Jacksonville pretty much IS the metro area.

 

Oh c'mon. I'd think folks here would understand that official city limit population statistics mean next to nothing. That's largely just a measure of how each municipality decides to draw it's boundaries. Rather, it's metro area studies that provide an immeasurably more accurate representation of how big a city is. And Jax Metro only ranks about 40th, not even remotely close to the likes of Miami and Pittsburgh;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_of_United_States_Metropolitan_Statistical_Areas

 

Agreed, it's the overall metro area that is significant. Some cities just define their boundaries differently.

I said at the time that the NFL made a big mistake in 1993 in awarding expanison franchises to Carolina and Jacksonville when Baltimore, Memphis and St. Louis were available. Could have prevented a lot of the subsequent franchise moves, too.

I don't know whether Los Angeles will ever get its stadium act together, however.

 

Memphis?

 

Yes, Memphis. Memphis had been begging for a team for years. They tried to get the WFL franchise into the NFL after the former folded. When the Oilers announced they were coming in to be carpetbaggers for two years, the fans were pissed. They didn't do all that work to be a pit stop for a team on the move and the apathy toward the team forced Bud Adams to go ahead and play at Vanderbilt for a year instead of staying at the Liberty Bowl for a second season. The Oilers' year in Memphis made Jacksonville look like a football Mecca.

I'm not sure but I don't think the Oilers/Titans even had a radio affiliate in Memphis for a while after going on to Nashville.

 

Got a hunch something will happen on that in a few years. Either the A's will be allowed to move to San Jose by Selig, Wolfe will sell (perhaps involuntarily) or money will be found to build them a new yard via either source. That'll let Davis and his heirs remake the Masoleum in their own image.

I get the feeling that this is one of those "lets throw it against the wall and see what sticks" stories, but if not, the Chargers are the most likely candidate, followed by the Jags.

 

Re: Crap ... what's going to happen to that surge of NFL interest in Jacksonvill

Jacksonville has huge self-esteem issues, which is why it allowed itself to be used by every franchise angling for a better stadium deal before it was awarded its own team. It is forever promoting The Players Championship as the fifth major and used to try to sell the Gator Bowl as the fifth major bowl, right behind the Rose, Orange, Sugar and Cotton. Its attendance issues, which are a little overblown, are much more a matter of market size and bad economy than apathy. A large part of the community would be devastated if the team left.

 

Like apeman said, Memphis was a prime candidate for an expansion franchise back in the 1990s. This was long before the NBA's Grizzlies moved in.

Baltimore had been without a team for almost a decade, St. Louis since 1988. Both expected to get an expansion team. Once the NFL passed on them, they went out to steal another city's team. If 2 of those 3 (Memphis, St. Louis, Baltimore) get teams in 1993, it's likely the Browns, Rams and Oilers don't move and the league stays at 30 teams for a while.

 

The NFL owners can make a lot more money from putting an expansion franchise in LA than having an existing team relocate there. The franchise fee for the LA market will be astronomical.

But the mere possibility of relocating to LA is also a powerful chip for owners to use to get the taxpayers in their market to provide a new stadium.