Charlotte MLB Team Speculation

[Hushpuppy321]

22 hours ago, #1Son said:

Charlotte A's just rolls of the tongue 

As does Carolina Devil Rays...

[smeagolsfree]

7 hours ago, DownEast said:

Bristol is the most popular track in NASCAR. No way it moves to Nashville. Nashville may get a race, but it won't be at Bristol's expense. Perhaps Martinsville or Dover.

They are not proposing moving but adding 4 races and pumping like 65 million into the track at the Nashville Fairgrounds.

[a2theb]

14 hours ago, smeagolsfree said:

They are not proposing moving but adding 4 races and pumping like 65 million into the track at the Nashville Fairgrounds.

Ahh yes the drivers would love to add another 4 races to the schedule on top of moving the all star race and losing their back to back weeks at home...

[Blue_Devil]

On 5/11/2021 at 3:05 PM, kermit said:

Seems like we lack an obvious set of local owners who have a properly sized checkbook. Perhaps a soon-to-be AvidExchange billionaire likes baseball?

 

Tepper would get involved most likely. Building his Charlotte Sports Empire. 

[InSouthPark]

On 5/17/2021 at 4:22 PM, Blue_Devil said:

Tepper would get involved most likely. Building his Charlotte Sports Empire. 

I don't think there is any chance Tepper puts  1/3+ of his wealth into Major League sports.  A baseball team and stadium would be $2+ billion.  That would put him around $5 billion and still needs to build a new NFL/MLS stadium which is going to cost another billion.   NFL is a no-brainer investment.  MLS is a "low cost" gamble that fits into his current and future stadium.  MLB would be a huge gamble in a small market.   Could he afford it? Sure.  Is he wiling to put that much money into three different sports? Highly unlikely IMHO.

[atlrvr]

OPM - other people's money - tax dollars

Tepper will buy the Ray's - I've been making this crazy accurate statement for a few years.  Stadium will go where current Panther stadium is.  

[Blue_Devil]

7 hours ago, InSouthPark said:

I don't think there is any chance Tepper puts  1/3+ of his wealth into Major League sports.  A baseball team and stadium would be $2+ billion.  That would put him around $5 billion and still needs to build a new NFL/MLS stadium which is going to cost another billion.   NFL is a no-brainer investment.  MLS is a "low cost" gamble that fits into his current and future stadium.  MLB would be a huge gamble in a small market.   Could he afford it? Sure.  Is he wiling to put that much money into three different sports? Highly unlikely IMHO.

I mean, any major league team is a great investment, baseball is no different. Tepper has stated he wants to build an entertainment district. 80 home games in a urban environment could help with that.

[Hushpuppy321]

20 hours ago, atlrvr said:

OPM - other people's money - tax dollars

Tepper will buy the Ray's - I've been making this crazy accurate statement for a few years.  Stadium will go where current Panther stadium is.  

Sounds great but I think it's a long-shot at best.  Tepper is intensely focused on establishing  his current teams and then securing the Land Parcel for a New Stadium.  Taxpayer funding to go towards that end (New Stadium Construction) isn't a given at all much less that He (Tepper) would pay for a MLB Stadium and whatever Expansion or Purchase price of the Devil Rays would be 10+ years from now.  Just too many moving parts for my little mind to comprehend.  I am more worried of being struck by lightning than this scenario playing out - just far fetched IMHO....

[atlrvr]

Should have clarified, Rays are legally and financially locked into Tropicana Field until 2027.  Relocation won't happen until 2028, at which point the Panthers will already be in their new stadium on the Charlotte Pipe site, and the Panther stadium will be demo'd rebuilt for baseball.

You can see here how it will all work, with a large "promenade" version of a rail-trail connecting the two stadium sites, and CATS current preferred alternative station location above Morehead.

[Blue_Devil]

9 hours ago, Hushpuppy321 said:

Sounds great but I think it's a long-shot at best.  Tepper is intensely focused on establishing  his current teams and then securing the Land Parcel for a New Stadium.  Taxpayer funding to go towards that end (New Stadium Construction) isn't a given at all much less that He (Tepper) would pay for a MLB Stadium and whatever Expansion or Purchase price of the Devil Rays would be 10+ years from now.  Just too many moving parts for my little mind to comprehend.  I am more worried of being struck by lightning than this scenario playing out - just far fetched IMHO....

I thought Tepper already bought the pipe site. 

[jednc]

MLB seems to be in the earliest stages of planning their next expansion. Who would be the most likely owner or leader of an ownership group for a Charlotte team? At what point do they need to begin a campaign to coax MLB to Charlotte?

BTW, if you don't think Charlotte is ready for MLB, then this question is obviously not for you.

[JRCLT]

MLB seems to be in the earliest stages of planning their next expansion. Who would be the most likely owner or leader of an ownership group for a Charlotte team? At what point do they need to begin a campaign to coax MLB to Charlotte?
BTW, if you don't think Charlotte is ready for MLB, then this question is obviously not for you.

NFL


NBA


MLS


NHL


MLB

Carolinas has a gap and the braves are all alone dominating most of the southeast. I think MLB would have a place in Charlotte. +More entertainment options. The knights games get regular attendance and I have seen it leads Minor league in attendance. If it were MLB then I’m sure the viability is there, perhaps the concern is…who will be willing to bring it, whether that is Tepper which would seem logical as he tries to build a sports entertainment district or someone else? Though the idea of putting the MLB Stadium on the BofA Stadium once the new one is built makes a lot of sense.

[carolinaboy]

Not sure about ownership but there are a lot of good candidate cities for MLB expansion:

Charlotte, Nashville, New Orleans, Louisville, Austin, San Antonio, Salt Lake City, Las Vegas, Indianapolis, OK City, Raleigh.

If they expand by 2 I could see Las Vegas and Charlotte or Nashville.

[KJHburg]

How much would a MLB team cost these days?  they are numerous people that may could afford to do it in the Carolinas in Charlotte.  I dont think Mr Tepper would be one of them as he has his hands full with NFL and MLS. 

San Antonio/Austin  and Charlotte would be my 2 picks.  Las Vegas metro  has less people than Charlotte but within 100 miles of Charlotte there is a much greater number as Vegas has deserts in every direction.  

[J-Rob]

16 minutes ago, KJHburg said:

How much would a MLB team cost these days?

I've seen a few reports suggesting the expansion fee would be $2B to $2.5B. I saw an article just a few days ago, but can't find it. There were several outlets that reported the $2B+ fee last year.

https://www.si.com/mlb/2021/04/27/rob-manfred-mlb-expansion-fee-over-2-billion

I can't think of anyone besides Tepper with deep Charlotte ties with that kind of discretionary money.  My guess is that it would have to be a group of investors. The Smith family could potentially lead a group, but we know how their MLS bid worked out (it was a little haphazard). I hate to say it, but I think some of the cities like Portland and Nashville that have already put together investor groups have a leg up for expansion.

My uninformed opinion is that Charlotte's better chance at landing an MLB team would be through a relocation with an existing owner, but Oakland has been tied to Las Vegas, and Tampa Bay has been tied to Montreal.  I  have also heard some factions of the family that owns the Orioles wants to move to Nashville.

Despite the naysayers, I would love an MLB team in Charlotte. My guess is that some of the other cities have a better chance because there are already connections and interested investors in those cities. Hopefully I am wrong!

Edited July 12, 2022 by J-Rob

[KJHburg]

There are several tech billionaires in the Triangle area (EPIC Games CEO, SAS execs) and a couple in Charleston (including the person who lost out to Tepper on Panthers)  but not sure they have an interest in a team.   As Mr Tepper proves does not have to be a local person. 

[J-Rob]

14 hours ago, KJHburg said:

There are several tech billionaires in the Triangle area (EPIC Games CEO, SAS execs) and a couple in Charleston (including the person who lost out to Tepper on Panthers)  but not sure they have an interest in a team.   As Mr Tepper proves does not have to be a local person. 

Agreed, my assumption on the Triangle tech billionaires is that they could push for Raleigh over Charlotte. I neglected to mention that point about Raleigh, but I agree with the sentiment.

Tepper was not local, but the team was already here.  I just wonder if the more advanced investor groups have the upper hand.

Edited July 13, 2022 by J-Rob

[Bolt]

Wake County DC United country.   Never will be Charlotte territory.

[kayman]

On 7/15/2022 at 6:29 PM, Bolt said:

Wake County DC United country.   Never will be Charlotte territory.

Well, tell that to the Raleigh-Durham-Fayetteville DMA television stations with news operations. They report on the Charlotte FC MLS games especially Disney-owned, ABC11, WTVD. 

[Hushpuppy321]

Not sure how well MLB would do in Carolina but I think the best shot would be in Charlotte since you could get more SC residents to the games.  Not sure how many from SC currently go to Raleigh for Hurricanes Games.

[jednc]

I don't have a good answer to the question about potential owners. At one time I thought Tepper might at least be a possibility. I guess he still is, I'm just not sure he would be viewed as an asset to the other MLB owners. He has fumbled in his ownership of the Panthers and it seemed like maybe Charlotte FC too (with the front office changes). I'm not sure if any of that would matter to other MLB owners. I do agree that an owner from outside Charlotte is certainly a possibility.

I'm mostly posting to suggest that out of Portland, Nashville, Las Vegas, San Antonio and Charlotte, that Charlotte makes the most sense to me. It combines a large population with filling a geographic hole in MLB's footprint. Other cities might also fill holes, but Charlotte's population pushes it to the front of that pack. For the purpose of this argument, I'm using the 75mi and 100mi radial populations of the potential cities.

I'm also making some assumptions about who would attend games. I know many MLB games are played through the week and therefore not a large percentage of people will travel far for a game. However, you don't need a large percentage of people to travel far for a game when you are dealing with a very large population base. We are also not talking about the same size crowds as the NFL. The smallest MLB park seats just over 30,000 I believe. The largest seats just over 51,000. If Charlotte built something in between (around 40,000 seats), I think we'd be able to comfortably support that if our team was competitive. For the first few years we wouldn't need to be competitive because people would be caught up in the newness of the team.

I think Charlotte is ready for MLB.  Here are the numbers calculated using the site https://www.statsamerica.org/radius/big.aspx. According to the site, these are 2021 numbers.

City	75 Mile	100 Mile
Las Vegas	2,346,000	2,564,000
Nashville	3,191,000	4,210,000
Portland	3,495,000	3,619,000
San Antonio	4,355,000	5,311,000
Charlotte	4,826,000	8,071,000
Atlanta (for comparison)	7,407,000	9,076,000

[kermit]

On 7/18/2022 at 2:44 PM, jednc said:

I'm mostly posting to suggest that out of Portland, Nashville, Las Vegas, San Antonio and Charlotte, that Charlotte makes the most sense to me. It combines a large population with filling a geographic hole in MLB's footprint. 

City	75 Mile	100 Mile
Las Vegas	2,346,000	2,564,000
Nashville	3,191,000	4,210,000
Portland	3,495,000	3,619,000
San Antonio	4,355,000	5,311,000
Charlotte	4,826,000	8,071,000
Atlanta (for comparison)	7,407,000

I’ll add that I doubt Portland would be willing to fund -any- public investment in a stadium. While folks in Vegas might have the money, the would certainly need a domed stadium which would drive the cost to stratospheric levels (and baseball really isn’t a great gambling sport, despite what Pete Rose might think). Finally, Nashville city government feels very dysfunctional at the moment so any stadium funding efforts would be difficult to pull off in parallel with Nissan stadium renovations, particularly with Tennessee politics overlapping with the local (e.g. no income tax and very high sales tax).

While Tepper could certainly afford a new toy, It does not feel like he is having much fun with his first two teams.

Edited July 20, 2022 by kermit

[jednc]

Charlotte (along with others) gets a mention in this latest MLB expansion article.

CBS Sports: MLB expansion? MLBPA chief Tony Clark hopeful league can get to 'a world of 32 teams'.
https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/mlb-expansion-mlbpa-chief-tony-clark-hopeful-league-can-get-to-a-world-of-32-teams/

[Rick Dalton]

[jednc]

12 minutes ago, natethegreat said:

I think if someone stepped forward and pursued MLB like Tepper did MLS, Charlotte's odds would greatly improve.