Going, Going, Back, Back to Cali

12 Jan, 2016

The Rams are moving back to Los Angeles, maybe with company.

The San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders might end up staying put, although the leadership of both teams didn’t come close to making that commitment Tuesday night. Or one of them could be headed to L.A.,too.

A long day of votes and re-votes ended with 30 of 32 NFL owners approving Rams owner Stan Kroenke’s ambitious plan to move his team from St. Louis to the site of the old Hollywood Park racetrack in Inglewood, California, about 10 miles from downtown LA. The Chargers have a yearlong option to join the Rams, followed by the Raiders if the San Diego franchise declines.

The Raiders and Chargers had a competing proposal to share a new stadium in nearby Carson, but neither option got the 24 votes needed for approval. After another negotiating session in the afternoon, Kroenke’s $1.8 billion project prevailed.

The decision ends the NFL’s 21-year absence from the nation’s second-largest media market.

“I often said over those 21 years what we need is a great facility,” Commissioner Roger Goodell said at a news conference about 11 hours after the meetings began. “I think what happened over the last years is we had two outstanding opportunities, both of these stadium projects were outstanding.”

Chargers chairman Dean Spanos was asked if he intended to play in Los Angeles in 2016.

“I’m going to take a day off tomorrow I think,” Chargers chairman Dean Spanos said. “This has really been excruciating for everyone. It’s very difficult to say right now I’m going to do this or do that.”

Oakland is still in debt from a renovation 20 years ago when the Raiders moved back from Los Angeles. City officials have said they won’t seek help from taxpayers with a new stadium, and asked the NFL for more time to develop a project in a response to the Raiders’ relocation plan. The NFL gave it to them.

“We’ll see where the Raider nation ends up here,” said owner Mark Davis, who was equally noncommittal in comments to reporters outside the news conference. “We’ll be working really hard to find us a home. So for our fans and everything else, don’t feel bad. We’ll get it right.”

The Chargers play 120 miles south of Inglewood in aging Qualcomm Stadium. The Raiders played in Los Angeles from 1982-94 and currently split a facility with baseball’s Athletics, the last remaining combination stadium.

The Rams – based in the LA area from 1946-94 – will likely have a temporary home at the Los Angeles Coliseum until the new stadium is ready in 2019. It’s unclear where the Chargers would play if they move.

St. Louis had a plan for an open-air, $1.1 billion stadium along the Mississippi River north of the Gateway Arch to replace the Edward Jones Dome. But Kroenke mostly ignored the city’s overtures, and Goodell said the requirement of at least $200 million from the NFL was double what league policy allowed.

Kroenke also has said St. Louis’ economy makes it difficult for an NFL franchise to thrive there.

AP

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