Salt Lake City: Official Development News Thread - Part 5

[Stenar]

Originally Posted by Reachforthesky

An NFL Team hosts only 8 Home games a Year. With some at Night, and some games on Monday and Thursdays.

This really puts things in perspective. We could absolutely fill a stadium 8 times a year.

[delts145]

Originally Posted by scottharding

Brief DowntownRising blog about the Convention Center Hotel:

https://downtownslc.org/downtown-eve...tel-first-look

Yes, I like the looks of it in these renderings!





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[meman]

Does anybody out there know why these renderings of the new convention hotel have not appeared (to my knowledge) in the Salt Lake Tribune or The Deseret News? I also have not seen it mentioned on any of the local newscasts?

[Stenar]

Originally Posted by meman

Does anybody out there know why these renderings of the new convention hotel have not appeared (to my knowledge) in the Salt Lake Tribune or The Deseret News? I also have not seen it mentioned on any of the local newscasts?

Local news rarely seem to do development stories any more.

[delts145]

Great Post Reachforthesky. I think the Wasatch Front is more than capable of sustaining an NFL team. As we have discussed in the past, we just need a deep pocketed individual or group to get it off the ground, own and manage the business aspects. Another Larry Miller if you will, but even richer. Probably one of the Tech superstars that are rapidly becoming multi-billion dollar behemoths.

Originally Posted by Reachforthesky

Fox 13 ran an interesting story a bit ago researching what it would take to bring an NFL team to Utah. They did a great job delivering the facts that show having an NFL team in Utah is plausible.

https://fox13now.com/2016/02/05/brin...y-and-why-not/

Contrary to the popular myth, Sundays are not as big of an issue as many think, and there have been multiple sold out Jazz games held on Sundays. Salt Lake County is MAJORITY Non-LDS, as is Salt Lake City. With the state being close to 50/50.

"Not All NFL Home games would be on on a Sunday anyway."

Fox 13 also spoke to Val Hale, Director of the Governors Office of Economic Development. He thinks a Stadium would still fill up, and made a great point as well: An NFL Team hosts only 8 Home games a Year. With some at Night, and some games on Monday and Thursdays.



But, one thing he pointed out as well, is that we lack big corporate headquarters. If you look at a lot of the other NFL cities out there you'll see that they have big title sponsorship's, mainly from big headquartered companies in their area.

Some people seem to think SLC is too small a market to have an NFL team. But that is just NOT true! As of 2019, SLC is the #23rd largest CSA in America. With a population of: 2,559,350. We're LARGER than #26 Las Vegas (Future home of an NFL team, the Raiders) And larger than these Current NFL cities:


Indianapolis
Nashville
Cincinnati
New Orleans
Jacksonville
Buffalo
Green Bay

Sports illustrated: Placed SLC on their list of potential NFL expansion cities. As have others.
https://www.si.com/nfl/2017/08/22/nf...m-draft-cities

I'd love it if we had a team. Not sure how soon that actually happen but,
According to FOX13, they state "Bottom line: If Utah had an owner, and big sponsors, the Wasatch Front is plenty big enough to support an NFL team."
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[ucsbgaucho]

Originally Posted by Stenar

This really puts things in perspective. We could absolutely fill a stadium 8 times a year.

It's not at all about filling a stadium, that's not where teams make their money. It's about corporate sponsorships, PSL's, naming rights, and most importantly, public money. I came here 2 years ago from San Diego, where I grew up. A city that's had the Chargers since the 60s, has mostly sold out every home game in every season, except for the lean years in the 90s, when they didn't sell enough tickets and the game was blacked out locally on TV.

The NFL requires a TON of money to start a franchise. The fee to move the Chargers to LA was around $500 million. The wealthiest person in Utah has a net worth barely over $1 billion, that's FAR down the list of wealthiest in the US.

SLC is definitely not ready to support NFL. Imagine someone coming to the Utah legislature asking for $750 million in public money to build a shiny new stadium.

It works in Buffalo (sort of) and Green Bay and Indy and other smaller cities because they've had these teams for a long time, back when those cities weren't so far down the list. For Green Bay, it's the only thing in town, there's no competition for eyeballs. Salt Lake is the #30 TV market, just behind San Diego and ahead of San Antonio, KC, Cincinnati, Las Vegas, Jacksonville, etc. But for the 2018 Super Bowl (Philly vs NE) SLC was dead last in TV ratings, which is not a good sign for broadcasts of local games.

Corporate sponsorship is a big issue too, even with Qualcomm, San Diego was low on the list of big companies with deep pockets willing to put up big sponsorship money. Then there's the PSL, which each seat costs $15,000 or so, just for the RIGHT to then purchase season tickets for said seat.

NHL would be successful here I think... I assume Vivint could be jointly used for NBA and NHL on a regular basis. It's the right season, you don't need the same attendance as NFL, and Utahns like winter sports (though the Grizzlies only avg a bit over 5,000 per home game, the exhibition NHL game they had here in September drew over 12,000. Still a long ways from sustainable attendance for a successful franchise, but doable.

An NFL stadium would cost $2 billion to build, and there's no local person who could self-fund like Stan Kroenke is doing in LA. I don't see the govt offering up money like Vegas did. But look how successful Vegas was with the Golden Knights, and that's more of an NBA town than an NHL city.

[SLCLvr]

A guy with a Clearwater jacket came into work today so I peppered him with questions. Said Marmalade should break ground in a month. Working through a bond with UDOT right now. Paperbox should start in second half of the year. A parking lot they own by the Dakota Lofts could be a Paperbox Phase 2. (Although there needs to a one before there is a two.)

[bob rulz]

Those renderings of the CCH are really impressive. Much better than I was expecting!

[Comrade]

Originally Posted by ucsbgaucho

It's not at all about filling a stadium, that's not where teams make their money. It's about corporate sponsorships, PSL's, naming rights, and most importantly, public money. I came here 2 years ago from San Diego, where I grew up. A city that's had the Chargers since the 60s, has mostly sold out every home game in every season, except for the lean years in the 90s, when they didn't sell enough tickets and the game was blacked out locally on TV.

The NFL requires a TON of money to start a franchise. The fee to move the Chargers to LA was around $500 million. The wealthiest person in Utah has a net worth barely over $1 billion, that's FAR down the list of wealthiest in the US.

SLC is definitely not ready to support NFL. Imagine someone coming to the Utah legislature asking for $750 million in public money to build a shiny new stadium.

It works in Buffalo (sort of) and Green Bay and Indy and other smaller cities because they've had these teams for a long time, back when those cities weren't so far down the list. For Green Bay, it's the only thing in town, there's no competition for eyeballs. Salt Lake is the #30 TV market, just behind San Diego and ahead of San Antonio, KC, Cincinnati, Las Vegas, Jacksonville, etc. But for the 2018 Super Bowl (Philly vs NE) SLC was dead last in TV ratings, which is not a good sign for broadcasts of local games.

Corporate sponsorship is a big issue too, even with Qualcomm, San Diego was low on the list of big companies with deep pockets willing to put up big sponsorship money. Then there's the PSL, which each seat costs $15,000 or so, just for the RIGHT to then purchase season tickets for said seat.

NHL would be successful here I think... I assume Vivint could be jointly used for NBA and NHL on a regular basis. It's the right season, you don't need the same attendance as NFL, and Utahns like winter sports (though the Grizzlies only avg a bit over 5,000 per home game, the exhibition NHL game they had here in September drew over 12,000. Still a long ways from sustainable attendance for a successful franchise, but doable.

An NFL stadium would cost $2 billion to build, and there's no local person who could self-fund like Stan Kroenke is doing in LA. I don't see the govt offering up money like Vegas did. But look how successful Vegas was with the Golden Knights, and that's more of an NBA town than an NHL city.

You bring up a good point that many people who don't really follow the NFL refuse to understand. I'll also add that it's silly to compare just Salt Lake's population to the other cities who have a NFL team. It's irrelevant mostly because these teams are located in regions much larger than Salt Lake.

Take that list of cities posted above:

Utah has a population of about 3.1 million according to recent figures. That's the level of support the state can pull from. When looking at these regions, you can't just look at the cities.

Indianapolis is in Indiana with a population double Utah's at 6.6 million. That's a far bigger pool of potential fans to draw from.

Nashville is in Tennessee with a population of 6.7 million people. Like with Indiana, a much larger population compared to Utah. Like with Indiana, they're the only NFL team in the state.

Cincinnati is in a state of 11 million people. They have two teams but even then you're looking at a population per team still larger than Utah by a couple million.

New Orleans is in a state with a population of 4.6 million. Maybe the closest to Utah, though still larger by a million.

Jacksonville is in a state of 20 million people and three teams to divvy up between the state.

Buffalo is in a state of 19 million. Very similar to Florida as they have three teams (if you count New Jersey but then you can add New Jersey to the list of fans to get support from).

Green Bay is in a state with 5.7 million people. The town might be small but the Packers are Wisconsin's team.

The Saints and Packers are two teams closest to Utah in terms of population demographics. However, both have had their respective teams for decades (and the Pack are one of the oldest teams in the League). These aren't minor differences. They're huge and why I doubt SLC is high on the list of NFL cities. Maybe in 20 years...but not now.

[Marvland]

MLB OR BUST. NFL is a fading violet and this year was really boring. The TV deals are failing (ESPN is eating shit on their NFL package) and baseball is back in a big way. I would KILL for a team. Our hot summers, amazing sunsets. Delicious. So when RSL went to Sandy, I secretly celebrated. Why? because it didn't occupy the our rightful future MLB team's home AT THE FAIRPARK.

[RC14]

I don't know if there is any precedent for this but I would like to see the Bees become an MLB team. They have the perfect name for a Salt Lake team.

However, I believe Salt Lake City would be able to support an NFL team before an MLB team. It seems to me that it would take a larger city to support an MLB team given that there are far more MLB home games in a given season than NFL games.
Salt Lake City frequently appears on lists of potential NFL expansion markets. However, I don't think the NFL will expand any time soon.

[Hatman]

I think I speak for a great many Utahs:

A football is the one with pointy ends, right?

I'm only mostly kidding.

I don't get sportsball fans in the same way I don't get comic-con attendees. You both pay a lot of money to dress up in costumes and show your loyalty to large corporate entities on a few select days of the year. It's getting to the point where I can't tell if the person wearing facepaint on the train is excited to see an actor or a sporting event.
I don't think I'm alone here - I remember my professor at BYU trying to get us engineering students excited for the big game against someone called the 'Utes.' Most of us - myself included - were from out of state and just stared at him until someone actually raised their hand and said 'who are they?' I think a little piece of our professor died that day. He never brought up sports again.

[i-215]

Originally Posted by Stenar

Local news rarely seem to do d̶e̶v̶e̶l̶o̶p̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ stories any more.

Utahns (and Americans in general) stopped paying for the Deseret News and Salt Lake Tribune during the Great Recession.

As a result, the Deseret News blew out most of their staff in 2010. The Trib did the same last year. We are now a NO NEWS town. Here's the secret: Local TV stations have tiny newsrooms. They generally cover fires, crimes, and PR events. For deeper reporting, they'd read the Trib and then go interview the same people.

With the DN and Trib effectively dead, TV newsrooms are dead, too.

[wrendog]

Originally Posted by Hatman

I think I speak for a great many Utahs:

A football is the one with pointy ends, right?

I'm only mostly kidding.

I don't get sportsball fans in the same way I don't get comic-con attendees. You both pay a lot of money to dress up in costumes and show your loyalty to large corporate entities on a few select days of the year. It's getting to the point where I can't tell if the person wearing facepaint on the train is excited to see an actor or a sporting event.
I don't think I'm alone here - I remember my professor at BYU trying to get us engineering students excited for the big game against someone called the 'Utes.' Most of us - myself included - were from out of state and just stared at him until someone actually raised their hand and said 'who are they?' I think a little piece of our professor died that day. He never brought up sports again.

I love sports. I'm not as obsessed as I was 15-20 years ago, but I still love it.

Just like you don't get sports fans, I don't get musical/theater fans. Just not my thing. At all.

That said, I was a big fan of SLC getting a great broadway style theater. I see the positive benefit for the community for sure. Non sports fans, should want to see sports development in SLC for the same reasons.

[ucsbgaucho]

Originally Posted by wrendog

I love sports. I'm not as obsessed as I was 15-20 years ago, but I still love it.

Just like you don't get sports fans, I don't get musical/theater fans. Just not my thing. At all.

That said, I was a big fan of SLC getting a great broadway style theater. I see the positive benefit for the community for sure. Non sports fans, should want to see sports development in SLC for the same reasons.

Just as a reminder, SLC has 2 teams in the top 5 leagues... Cities with only one major pro sports team: San Diego, Sacramento, Las Vegas, San Antonio, Buffalo, Nashville, Jacksonville, OKC. Cities with only two major teams like SLC: Portland, San Jose, Vancouver, Orlando, St Louis, Tampa, Baltimore, and DC.

So we're not that bad here, I think Orlando is a pretty good comparison because we have the same two pro sports teams. MLB can't really even make it work in Florida in general, both teams there can barely fill their stadiums half-way.

The issue is most leagues, other than the MLS, are not expanding and have no plans to, so you'd have to get a team to move. For the NFL, there's a couple franchises that could move, but SLC wouldn't be a destination. San Diego would get a team again, Jacksonville has been a rumored candidate to move to SD since the city of Jville doesn't really support them, and Buffalo will probably move to Toronto eventually. NFL is also looking at London or maybe Mexico City as future international expansion. MLB is lagging in attendance and ratings, they are both down, so I doubt they'd think expansion would be a good idea to solve that since the cities that don't have a team are all small markets.

[DCRes]

Originally Posted by delts145

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CONFIRMED: The American Plaza building will be torn down and replaced by two snowmen

[JMK]

Sorry if this is a repost

• Video Link

[billbillbillbill]

Originally Posted by DCRes

CONFIRMED: The American Plaza building will be torn down and replaced by two snowmen

RIP Olive Garden

[Old&New]

Originally Posted by ucsbgaucho

Just as a reminder, SLC has 2 teams in the top 5 leagues... Cities with only one major pro sports team: San Diego, Sacramento, Las Vegas, San Antonio, Buffalo, Nashville, Jacksonville, OKC. Cities with only two major teams like SLC: Portland, San Jose, Vancouver, Orlando, St Louis, Tampa, Baltimore, and DC.

So we're not that bad here, I think Orlando is a pretty good comparison because we have the same two pro sports teams. MLB can't really even make it work in Florida in general, both teams there can barely fill their stadiums half-way.

The issue is most leagues, other than the MLS, are not expanding and have no plans to, so you'd have to get a team to move. For the NFL, there's a couple franchises that could move, but SLC wouldn't be a destination. San Diego would get a team again, Jacksonville has been a rumored candidate to move to SD since the city of Jville doesn't really support them, and Buffalo will probably move to Toronto eventually. NFL is also looking at London or maybe Mexico City as future international expansion. MLB is lagging in attendance and ratings, they are both down, so I doubt they'd think expansion would be a good idea to solve that since the cities that don't have a team are all small markets.

Minneapolis has all three, and attendance is definitely not lagging.

[T-Stan]

Originally Posted by Marvland

MLB OR BUST. NFL is a fading violet and this year was really boring. The TV deals are failing (ESPN is eating shit on their NFL package) and baseball is back in a big way. I would KILL for a team. Our hot summers, amazing sunsets. Delicious. So when RSL went to Sandy, I secretly celebrated. Why? because it didn't occupy the our rightful future MLB team's home AT THE FAIRPARK.

Salt Lake City was very close to getting a major league team. I heard an interview with Larry H Miller about 15 years ago and he talked about this. He said that the Minnesota Twins were trying to get a new stadium and had been turned down a few times. SL Buzz (the team name at the time) was the AAA affiliate of the Twins. LHM was approached by the owner of the Twins about moving them to SLC. Smith's Ballpark (Franklin Covey at the time) was still only a few years old and apparently could be easily expanded to 30,000 people as a temporary fix. The Twins were only averaging between 15-20K per game at the time.
LHM said that for a few weeks, he thought we would get the Twins. Everything was in place to move ahead with Major League baseball, all they needed was for the owner to give the thumbs up. In the end, the Twins decided to stick it out and eventually (albeit several years later) got the funding for a new ballpark.
LHM said that he thought Salt Lake would eventually get a MLB team before getting an NHL or NFL team.