University to Move to Houston to Be Closer to Dynamo
In yet another blow to San Jose’s fragile psyche, plans by developer Lew Wolff to return professional soccer to San Jose by building a new $80 million stadium on the campus of San Jose State University were dealt a blow yesterday as SJSU President Don Kassing announced that the university would be relocating to Houston.
In a brutally ironic twist, the success of the Houston Dynamos has prompted the team’s owners, Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), to purchase the San Jose college with plans to build a campus next to the Dynamo’s stadium. “It just makes sense,” said an AEG spokeswoman. “The university’s athletic program will provide event dates, students will provide ticket revenue and the naming rights alone could pay for the entire construction of the campus.”
Those close to the deal confirm that naming rights could be very lucrative to AEG. “Many companies would love to brand themselves or their products with a major university,” said Donny Deutsch, Madison Avenue ad guru. “This could be ConocoPhillips University, Halliburton Tech, or Viagra State U.”
Earthquakes Soccer LLC, the group put together by Mr. Wolff to return professional soccer to San Jose, was surprised by the news, but undaunted. “I guess we will change our priorities from building a stadium to searching for a school first,” he said. “How does ‘San Jose State Gators’ sound?”
Funny, nice work.
Obviously you jest about the Gators, but you bring up a good point – the old debate about funds allocated to athletic programs vs academics.
It has been my long time belief, that if a school could allocate enough funds to build a competitive program, with scholarships and facilities, the school wins from national publicity that equates to more interest from potential students, a bigger pool in which to choose, and therefore better academic performance
Florida is a good example. State should follow the example of Boise State and Santa Clara should concentrate on making their basketball team a national power like Gonzaga. You don’t think kids would rather go to Gonzaga to be a part of something special on a basketball court rather than on SCU’s soccer fields. People don’t care about soccer, and it has been debated on Single Gal’s blog, soccer success doesn’t translate into anything. Nil.
The idea that “no one cares about soccer” is absolute nonsense. Look around you. More kids are playing it than any other sport. Any idiot can see that it’s only going to grow and grow.
There was enough juvenile soccer bashing in the other thread. Why can’t you just shut up about it?
Nice job John.
San Jose lost UOP to Stockton, lost Notre Dam to Belmont, why not SJS to Huston? History repeats itself.
#2:
“People don’t care about soccer, and it has been debated on Single Gal’s blog, soccer success doesn’t translate into anything. Nil.”
Gee wiz, rocket scientist!!! That settles it then, doesn’t it?
With sources of such authority, who could disagree? Should I get Sepp Blatter on the phone then? It’s time to shut down MLS and move it to Andorra. Let me setup a conference call between you, me and Sepp Blatter for 4 PM later today and get all the logistics worked out.
#2. OK, you don’t think soccer would be a big draw. We’ll count that as one vote against.
Meanwhile let’s face some facts:
1. The A’s are going to Fremont, not San Jose.
2. The 49ers are negotiating with Santa Clara, not San Jose.
3. San Jose already has an NHL franchise.
4. An NBA franchise would be great but there doesn’t seem to be any serious movement to make it happen.
That said, even if you don’t like soccer there really aren’t many major pro sports opportunities left for San Jose. Given soccers growing appeal the Earthquakes should not have much trouble filling up a brand new, state-of-the-art 22,000 seat stadium.
This is a shocking news flash to be sure.
I read a comment, (you read correctly – an actual comment) posted to Rich’s blog re Al Gore’s plans to set up a Global Warming Madrassa on the soon to be abandoned SJSU campus? Anyone know anything about this?
One thing I know for sure, there’s a lot of heat on this stadium thing. But what’s completely missing from the dialog is marketing savvy.
Take the name “Earthquakes”. It’s so last century and has such negative energy.
“Carbon-friendly quakes” is much more with the times and sure to capture the imagination of our sizable Whole Foods eating constituency.
Consider…
– local pigeons helping with the field striping
– player uni’s woven with wool from the llamas that keep the playing field nicely clipped between tests.
– and as if that wasn’t enough to start you up… a halftime simulcast of the Democrat leadership with Cheap Trick singing “Surrender”.
Lew Wolff – have your people contact my people.
I hate to be a spoilsport about soccer – but here’s my question: If millions of kids play this game (and they have for a couple of decades now), why aren’t any of them coming to the games in droves and buying season tix? MLS still draws no better than a successful AAA baseball franchise – which is fine if you’re a AAA sport, but it’s lacking for anything that refers to itself as “Major League”.
And if MLS was really “Major League” – they would be building major league size stadiums, not 22k seaters like what’s talked about here in SJ and already built in Carson and Chicago etc….
You know, 22k seats is approximately the size of the AAA baseball stadiums in places like Omaha, Buffalo and Rochester…
#8 (Mark): In response to your “spoilsport” questions about a 22,000 seat stadium being in effect minor league:
First, although the Mercury News has reported that discusssions between Lew Wolff and SJSU involve a 22,000 seat stadium expandable to 30,000, there is nothing magic about these numbers and, purportedly, the talks are preliminary, so give them a chance.
Further, the soccer stadium in Carson (suburban LA) seats 27,000—not 22,000 as you say. And the Earthquakes regularly drew beyond 22,000 seats, so the potential is there for many large (sellout) soccer crowds, especially with proper marketing by the team and adequate coverage in the Mercury News—both of which were previously absent.
Also, by definition, ALL college football is “minor league,” following as it does behind professional football. On the other hand, although the 11-year-old MLS may not (yet) be the top soccer league in the world, it is indisputably the best in America and, thus, by definition, major league. So your charge against soccer is purely pejorative.
Additionally, as I’ve said before on this blog, the new thinking in sports stadiums is that “smaller is better.” Smaller stadiums (with more amenities) build a scarcity of and more demand for tickets. Notably, according to the Mercury News, the new stadium for the A’s to be built in Fremont will be the smallest in major league baseball.
Finally, the AAA minor league baseball stadium in Buffalo you allude to, which was built for the Bisons in the 1980s, was specifically designed by world class sports architects HOK for 20,000 seats with a built in redesign for doubling-in-size to 40,000 in the event Buffalo were ever awarded a MLB franchise. (It’s a beautiful ballpark, even at only 20,000 seats.) The same thing can be done in San Jose: build in plan to expand the stadium when in a few years, more or less, the Earthquakes and/or SJSU are ready for a much larger facility.
The thing about major league soccer for San Jose is that, unlike MLB or the NFL or the NBA, it’s do-able (and without a public subsidy). Moreover, like a good tech stock, the potential upside return of the world’s favorite sport in an increasingly globalized world is stratospheric. That’s why the smart money—Lew Wolff—is betting on it. San Jose, which is located in the top soccer-playing area in the US, should as well.
#9
Don – I’m sorry, but if the Earthquakes, as you say, “regularly drew beyond 22,000 seats,” then there is no way they would have left San Jose, for that would mean that people would have had to sit in the upper deck at Spartan Stadium every time that (e.g. drawing beyond 22,000) happened. That level of crowd support probably would have prevented AEG from moving the team to Houston in the first place.
In fact, up to the 2005 season, the top average crowd was in the first “Clash” season at 17,232 per game. Their last season, in 2005, had an average of 13,037 per game, down 0.5% from the previous season. In 2005, there was only one game that factored into the Earthquakes ‘top ten’ historical crowds, that being a playoff game in August against Galaxy, at 24,112. (Source: Kenn Tomasch, http://www.kenn.com/soccer/mls/sanjose.html).
Furthermore, the facilities in Sandy (RSL), Bridgeview (CHI), Frisco (FCD) and Harrison (NYRB) have all involved massive amounts of public money going into the construction of those stadia, some with an approval vote, some without. The project for San Jose, as currently proposed by Mr. Wolff, is quite similar to the project that resulted in the Home Depot Center, which is located on the campus grounds of CSU-Dominguez Hills. Only Columbus Crew Stadium was built entirely with private funds, though placed on public property (source – various wiki articles and team stadium home pages).
While I appreciate the enthusiasm shown by Mr. Gagliardi and his cohorts on this issue, fudging the facts will not serve to bring anyone anywhere closer to consensus.
I will freely state that, at this time, I do not believe that any scarce financial or land resources belonging to SJSU should be expended to the benefit of a league that is not serious about its intended purpose (developing US talent for the U.S. Nats), nor should those resources be expended on a league that has yet to be profitable, which cannot support itself on its advo and box office receipts and thus requires massive subsidies from Guvmintal entities to construct its facilities, and which IMHO is doomed to failure just like its predecessor for just those reasons.
Again, I confine my objections to this deal strictly to the use of the assets of San Jose State University (of which I am an alumnus and supporter). However, should some other entity (C/o San Jose, c/o Santa Clara, Santa Clara County, etc.) wish to take that plunge, then good luck and God bless. I’m not a constituent of either of those entities, and I don’t have a say in the matter.
Why and the heck are we still talking about soccer?!! All this happy talk regarding MLS is getting a bit old. Anyhow, DG states “The Earthquakes regularly drew beyond 22,000 seats.” NO THEY DIDN’T!! Here’s proof!:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/sports/soccer/20060927-9999-lz1s27goal.html
These inflated MLS figures are pretty depressing, don’t you think. Here’s food for thought; there are a lot more youth and teenagers playing soccer than full-contact football across this great country of ours (soccer’s a wonderful sport to learn team work, stay fit, and doesn’t include bone-jarring hits). Yet which sport is more popular in the good ole US of A? You could double, even triple, the amount of kids playing soccer in this country, and guess what? MLS will never be NFL, MLB, NBA, or NHL! By the way, great post Mark!
Don,
No pejorative intended – but the facts do speak for themselves. Millions of kids play soccer in this country and have for over 3 decades now and that has still not translated into box office success for the MLS. The legitimate question to ask is:
Why not?
Secondly, there’s truth that a smaller venue can drive up demand (if the demand exists or is building) but I’m afraid that Wolfe is actually going too small with both the football/soccer and baseball venues.
Since I mentioned it, I’ll continue on that string: “As costs continue to rise in MLB, how will the A’s make a “living” competing with the Yanks and others with a 32k seat stadium?” And don’t anyone compare Oakland to the Red Sox and their small ball park – the TV and Radio rights revenues in New England will long continue to drawf anything the A’s will ever do in the bay area.
Back to soccer – True college football is “minor” league, but we weren’t talking about that – No one in college football has ever tried to call it “major league”. MLS on the other hand….is really a high AAA product – and that’s being generous. My German ex-brother-in-law went to a few Quakes games and dismissed it out of hand as “too expensive for the product on the field”. I’ve had other foriegn-born soccer fans tell me that the only thing “Major League” about the MLS was its ticket prices and that Americans were paying Major League prices for a minor league product.
Look, there are enuf ex-patriate foriegners in this country who love futbol that the MLS COULD BE A HUGE SUCCESS – IF THE PRODUCT WAS OF THE QUALITY OF WHAT PEOPLE IN SPAIN, ENGLAND, ITALY, BRAZIL, MEXICO, ET AL are used to watching on a regular basis.
IT AIN’T and that’s why people don’t go to the games.
Finally, the mls business plan even admits this. Part and parcel in their way of doing business is the insistence that new soccer-specific-stadiums be built with acres of youth soccer and practice fields attached that the local MLS team runs and seeks revenues from. MLS does this because even they realize they cannot make a living off their ticket revenue.
One of the fundamental rules of any business venture is that the basic product has to be able to pay the bills. Everything else is “whipped cream and a cherry on top”.
Look haven’t we kicked this subject to death!
let’s move the line here people, this topic is boring.
#10 (JD): The Quakes owner did not move the team because of lack of attendance or fan support. That is a myth. The owner, AEG, left because Houston offered (in its mind) a better opportunity to get a publicly-finded stadium deal in which AEG could control concert revenues.
And as for your charge that I’m “fudging the facts,” I stand by my statement that the team regularly drew in excess of 22,000. Not always, of course. AVERAGE attendance was a little over 13,000 the last two years, so the large crowds were obviously balanced by some small ones. But even you admit that there was a 24,000-crowd game in 2005. Crowds in excess of 22,000 happened regularly in games against the Quakes top rival, the LA Galaxy. Further, an independent report commissioned by the City of San Jose Sports Facilities Task Force, which is accessible on the Soccer Silicon Valley website, projects that with proper marketing to the entire Bay Area, which the team did not get with its previous ownership, the Quakes would AVERAGE at least 19,000 fans per game—a nearly 50 percent increase.
Moreover, SJSU has had only eleven crowds in excess of 22,000 in its vastly longer history than the Earthquakes. So there is absolutely no track record to suggest a larger stadium is required for SJSU. But the program is on the upswing, you say. Fine, but so too is professional soccer in this country.
Finally, as for SJSU expending scarce resources on a stadium, my understanding of the Mercury News reports is that SJSU gets a brand new stadium and a parking garage for no money and no net loss of land—which is already being occupied by an antique stadium.
#14:
Don, with all due respect, nice try but no donut.
Again: I am attempting to confine my commentary to areas directly regarding SJSU, but some things need to be pointed out.
In your post #9, you said: “And the Earthquakes regularly drew beyond 22,000 seats, so the potential is there for many large (sellout) soccer crowds, especially with proper marketing by the team and adequate coverage in the Mercury News—both of which were previously absent.”
Now, when we consult our dictionary, we find that “regularly” is an adverb form of the word “regular”, which is usually defined with the following terms: Customary, usual, normal or common.
I wasn’t aware that in QuakeWorld “regularly” now constitutes occasional happenstances involving only one opponent amongst a group of nine or ten. Perhaps you mistyped in that prior post, but based on any fair-minded reading of the above, my interpretation of fact fudging is entirely correct and appropriate, and I stand by it as well. And quite bluntly, I have the numbers to back me up on it.
Furthermore, since you have made the assertion that the Earthquakes “regularly” draw beyond 22,000, I wonder if you can back that up with some hard numbers rather than a marketing survey.
True to the form of the SJSU bashers on this issue, you quote back SJSU’s previously anemic football attendance figures (you are correct – they could be better) and attempt to draw a direct contrast with the MLS attendance numbers at the stadium. However, what you failed to acknowledge is that SJSU athletics is not at the professional level; it does not have the bottom-line fiduciary requirement to carry a positive bottom line.
That’s where the difference lies. MLS, as a professional league, has proven itself to be truly professional at only two things: 1) Losing money; and 2) Making Little Stadiums.
FWIW – you said, “Finally, as for SJSU expending scarce resources on a stadium, my understanding of the Mercury News reports is that SJSU gets a brand new stadium and a parking garage for no money and no net loss of land—which is already being occupied by an antique stadium. “
Were a stadium to be placed on the 10th street side of the existing stadium, with a parking structure occupying the existing stadium footprint, as you state, there would be a loss of field space for SJSU intramural sports, the loss of the playing field for club sports like rugby or lacrosse, loss of the use of the field for tailgating at stadium events, the loss of the main practice area for the Spartan Marching Band, etc., etc., etc. Not much of a loss for the MLS-niks, but why does SJSU have to pay the price for the whims of soccer fans who are now trying for their FOURTH shot at a mens professional soccer team?
If MLS is the upcoming be-all and end-all, then cities would be lining up to bid on a new stadium for the Bay Area re-entry into the league, but they’re not. Why?
If professional soccer is on the upswing in this country, as you state, then why do suburban cities have to provide massive public support to construct stadiums for the teams?
Facts are indeed stubborn things, Don.
#15 (JD): I don’t generally consult a dictionary when typing on a blog, but let’s accept for sake of discussion in regards to the Quakes “regularly” drawing in excess of 22,000 to mean “more often than San Jose State” did during the same time frame. But that’s a side issue and immaterial to the discussion. I think that there’s reason to assume that both a re-born Quakes team and revitalized SJSU football program will draw significantly better in the future—and I have been and will be rooting for both. So I don’t see the need to pull out a dictionary in an effort to score collateral debating points.
I think your real issue is whether the supposed deal reported by the Mercury News as being bandied about in preliminary terms by Lew Wolff and the SJSU administration would be good for SJSU. From my perspective it appears it would be.
Under the reported talks, SJSU would get a new stadium, which it would certainly not otherwise get, paid for by someone else. Without an eventual new football stadium to replace the ever-crumbling and antiquated old dowager Spartan, there sooner-or-later would be no football program. So from my limited vantage-point this may be SJSU’s last, best opportunity to assure the long-term retention of its football team. Remember, it was only a little over two years ago, in fall 2004, that there was serious discussion of discontinuing football altogether. It was SJSU president Don Kassing, the same guy talking with Wolff, who decided that the university would save and build the football program. Therefore, some deference to him from SJSU alums, that he has the university’s interests at heart in his talks with Wolff, would seem merited.
SJSU would also get a parking garage, which it has been seeking for quite awhile, not just for the stadium but as satellite parking for students and faculty for the main campus.
Also, as I understand the reports, there will be new athletic fields surrounding all of this on SJSU land (not merely at Kelley Park). This would benefit not only SJSU students but also the surrounding Spartan-Keyes neighborhood residents, which have had to make do with a rather decrepit-looking Bud Winter Field. So I’m not sure why you believe that SJSU intramurals or club sports will suffer.
As for the loss of tailgating, I’m with you there, and I know that Quakes fans share the view that the loss of the grassy area for tailgating immediately adjacent to the existing stadium would be very sad. But I’m hoping a grassy tailgating area can be built into the plans somewhere (perhaps in a re-sodded Bud Winter Field?).
If massive public stadium subsidies are a sign of a league in trouble, then the NFL is doomed.
JD, its admirable that you are so concerned about Lew Wolff throwing away roughly million dollars on what you see as a doomed venture. He obviously feels differently, but that doesnt seem to be your concern.
The primary question for an SJSU supporter on this would be what is the better, realistic option for the football program? If the university had $100 million sitting around to build a stadium of appropriate capacity for their football program, I doubt they would be talking to Wolff. Spartan Stadium isnt a realistic venue for a D1 team with any ambition. So while a 22k capable of being expanded to 30k is hardly ideal for SJSU football, what is the better alternative?