The Nats are...For Sale?!?

[imref]

https://www.talknats.com/2022/04/12/go-terrible-people-might-actually-see-bad-baseball-owner-nationalssource/

[JCA-CrystalCity]

His erections are all over Crystal city.

[Smithian]

Where the hell did this "Nationals Park is 15 years old" storyline begin? What am I missing? It is a large park, it is jam packed with luxury seating on multiple levels, and just last year it was one of the most expensive tickets in baseball.

Every Park needs a facelift overtime. New lights, new scoreboard, items like that in a few years. But there's no universe where Nationals Park is a liability, especially when Maryland isn't going to try to get the Nationals and Virginia is falling all over itself for the new Commanders Stadium. This is dumb.

Crime is an issue, but that's a thread for Uncensored.

[machpost]

Where the hell did this "Nationals Park is 15 years old" storyline begin? What am I missing? It is a large park, it is jam packed with luxury seating on multiple levels, and just last year it was one of the most expensive tickets in baseball.

Every Park needs a facelift overtime. New lights, new scoreboard, items like that in a few years. But there's no universe where Nationals Park is a liability, especially when Maryland isn't going to try to get the Nationals and Virginia is falling all over itself for the new Commanders Stadium. This is dumber

I agree that it's dumb and that the place is probably due for a facelift if not a good deep cleaning and paint job, but ownership probably wants us to believe that it only has ten more years of usefulness since the Rangers and the Braves have set that precedent.

[JCA-CrystalCity]

It wasn't a great looking park to begin with, but it was and is a very good place to see the game. Concessions are easy access and plentiful.  Sight lines are terrific - not just good or acceptable.  Ramps and elevators work.  Plumbing seems to function. Any shortcomings on Metro access is really on Metro, outside of maybe the early closings during the playoffs.  I don't see anything superior in another location. As for parking, that's always going to happen when you build in a city and there's development around a park.  This isn't Atlanta, our transportation infrastructure is different, and a suburban location would be a big failure (look at Fed Ex, which has  metro and several highways, once a weekend games, and still is miserable to get to).

[Smithian]

It wasn't a great looking park to begin with, but it was and is a very good place to see the game. Concessions are easy access and plentiful.  Sight lines are terrific - not just good or acceptable.  Ramps and elevators work.  Plumbing seems to function. Any shortcomings on Metro access is really on Metro, outside of maybe the early closings during the playoffs.  I don't see anything superior in another location. As for parking, that's always going to happen when you build in a city and there's development around a park.  This isn't Atlanta, our transportation infrastructure is different, and a suburban location would be a big failure (look at Fed Ex, which has  metro and several highways, once a weekend games, and still is miserable to get to).

Exactly.

I know machpost is right on their thinking, but this is already making me mad. The Braves played in a stadium not built for baseball. The Rangers had no dome in a horrible climate. They at least had some argument.

I hope this storyline passes like a fart in the wind. It has no logical basis.

[HalfSmokes]

New owners wanting new stadiums/parks isn't a new thing. I think the bigger issue is crime around the park. If suburbanites stop feeling safe coming to and leaving the park, the Nats (and united) are screwed.

[bluestreak]

They are in their 30s. Just because they are "grandkids" doesn't make them ill equipped to run a sports team.

Maybe not, but it makes them much more likely to be bad at the job. Look at the history of second generation business owners. 

[UMDNats]

https://www.talknats.com/2022/04/12/go-terrible-people-might-actually-see-bad-baseball-owner-nationalssource/

I love that the #5 reason they may sell is...

"DC crime is up"

[JCA-CrystalCity]

I love that the #5 reason they may sell is...

"DC crime is up"

ooh, that'll really attract a buyer. "price is down because there's a perception of crime being up.  Why don't I buy a depreciating asset?"

[Five Banners]

Crime is an issue, but that's a thread for Uncensored.

Overall crime, methods of dealing with it in general, political implications, and so forth could be an uncensored matter. Discussing news of incidents impacting the area around the park, how that might be perceived by potential ballpark patrons, and such seems to be something can and has be broached without veering into political football, “it’s so and so’s fault“ territory

[UMDNats]

Imagine thinking billionaires make decisions on buying or selling sports teams because there's some murders in the city they play in

DC is one of the top cities in the WORLD and a sports team is a complete cash cow AND the Navy Yard neighborhood is one of the hottest in the city. Just complete stupidity to even include that, unreal.

Citi Field is surrounded by auto repair (i.e. money laundering/scrapyards/chop shops) and there was just a shooting on the NYC subway. Could Steve Cohen be looking to sell? The Yankees play in the South Bronx - seems like a bad idea to own them imo.

[HalfSmokes]

Imagine thinking billionaires make decisions on buying or selling sports teams because there's some murders in the city they play in

DC is one of the top cities in the WORLD and a sports team is a complete cash cow AND the Navy Yard neighborhood is one of the hottest in the city. Just complete stupidity to even include that, unreal.

Citi Field is surrounded by auto repair (i.e. money laundering/scrapyards/chop shops) and there was just a shooting on the NYC subway. Could Steve Cohen be looking to sell? The Yankees play in the South Bronx - seems like a bad idea to own them imo.

Most fans aren't coming from the city, they're coming from NOVA. Shootings outside of the stadium during games are not going to help attendance

[UMDNats]

Most fans aren't coming from the city, they're coming from NOVA. Shootings outside of the stadium during games are not going to help attendance

someone who thinks navy yard is a crime-filled wasteland is already not coming to a nationals game anyways. no one is passing on a nats-phillies playoff game because there was a shooting outside nats park a few years ago. i went to work in the south bronx every day for almost 5 years, yankees packed that place all the time even though it's a running joke that the south bx is a freaking disaster zone.

if Karen and her 3 kids don't want to make the trek to Nats park they probably already don't spend the money that would require the nats to GAF about them. Truthfully the only fans sports teams care about are the ones who load up on suites and luxury clubs anyways and those people have drivers or generally don't care. it's completely laughable to think a billionaire would even consider crime in DC as a reason to sell/not buy/etc.

FFS the lerners put a team in navy yard when there was literally nothing around the stadium! now there's a whole foods!

[HalfSmokes]

someone who thinks navy yard is a crime-filled wasteland is already not coming to a nationals game anyways. no one is passing on a nats-phillies playoff game because there was a shooting outside nats park a few years ago. i went to work in the south bronx every day for almost 5 years, yankees packed that place all the time even though it's a running joke that the south bx is a freaking disaster zone.

if Karen and her 3 kids don't want to make the trek to Nats park they probably already don't spend the money that would require the nats to GAF about them. Truthfully the only fans sports teams care about are the ones who load up on suites and luxury clubs anyways and those people have drivers or generally don't care. it's completely laughable to think a billionaire would even consider crime in DC as a reason to sell/not buy/etc.

FFS the lerners put a team in navy yard when there was literally nothing around the stadium! now there's a whole foods!

try a few days ago, and the fans driving in from McLean and North Arlington are the fans using the suites their companies pay for as perks. If they stop using them, it's an easy expense to cut.

[Natsinpwc]

someone who thinks navy yard is a crime-filled wasteland is already not coming to a nationals game anyways. no one is passing on a nats-phillies playoff game because there was a shooting outside nats park a few years ago. i went to work in the south bronx every day for almost 5 years, yankees packed that place all the time even though it's a running joke that the south bx is a freaking disaster zone.

if Karen and her 3 kids don't want to make the trek to Nats park they probably already don't spend the money that would require the nats to GAF about them. Truthfully the only fans sports teams care about are the ones who load up on suites and luxury clubs anyways and those people have drivers or generally don't care. it's completely laughable to think a billionaire would even consider crime in DC as a reason to sell/not buy/etc.

FFS the lerners put a team in navy yard when there was literally nothing around the stadium! now there's a whole foods!

People from the area know what the situation is in that area in general but the facts are that there was a shooting right outside the stadium during a game last year which caused a panic. And now another shooting not too far from the park. So it’s getting worse. The current owners and any future ownership need to address the situation with the DC police. 

[UMDNats]

try a few days ago, and the fans driving in from McLean and North Arlington are the fans using the suites their companies pay for as perks. If they stop using them, it's an easy expense to cut.

People from the area know what the situation is in that area in general but the facts are that there was a shooting right outside the stadium during a game last year which caused a panic. And now another shooting not too far from the park. So it’s getting worse. The current owners and any future ownership need to address the situation with the DC police. 

Stuff like this doesn't move the needle. Your big dog consulting firm cuts the expense because the team sucks and no one wants to go spend 3 hours watching the Mets run train on our pitching staff, not because there was gunfire around the stadium.

And again, to my point, a billionaire doesn't GAF about these things. Mark Lerner isn't sitting in his office going, "You know, this neighborhood has gone to hell. I'm selling this crap." Billionaires don't become billionaires thinking like that. Navy Yard is one of the hottest areas in town. Random shootings around the ballpark are literally and figuratively noise and simply some lobbying for more police to hang out around the ballpark, or even just hiring cops for more security.

There's a lot of crime around Verizon Center too so maybe Leonsis should ditch his teams.

[Smithian]

I don’t think crime is a deciding issue. I think it is a single issue among many larger and smaller ones. No one is claiming a new ownership group will be more worried about crime than they are about MASN, deferred contracts, and the Soto extension, but the possibility of having violence affect fans is one new owners may down the line face, even if solving that violence isn’t their job.

[English Natsie]

Adds a whole new meaning to the Nationals being bigshots in the baseball industry...

[Smithian]

Am I only person who feels like the new ownership will be announced pretty quickly?

I doubt anything in past few months changed minds. I feel like they probably had this going for a while and it got leaked after some initial conversations.

I don’t feel like selling a baseball team is a situation where you need a public call to scrounge up interest.

[bluestreak]

Am I only person who feels like the new ownership will be announced pretty quickly?

I doubt anything in past few months changed minds. I feel like they probably had this going for a while and it got leaked after some initial conversations.

I don’t feel like selling a baseball team is a situation where you need a public call to scrounge up interest.

I think this is probably the answer. You only announce this if you have a plan already.

[HalfSmokes]

I could see it dragging based on valuation. Between MASN and RSNs in general, putting a number on a baseball team isn’t exactly east right now

[HalfSmokes]

I think this is probably the answer. You only announce this if you have a plan already.

was it announced or leaked?

[catocony]

MCI Center was built in a dump of a neighborhood.  I remember coming out of the Gallery Place Metro to walk up 7th st to near New York Ave. and there were needles, condoms, empty liquor bottles and the occasional crack pipe lying around the sidewalks.  That was in 1994-95 too.  Now it's a ritzy area.  Remember all of the crack houses up on Rhode Island Ave around North Capitol St?  What was a flophouse shooting gallery will now cost you some serious coin.  Remember the danger around the old bus station a few blocks up 1st St NE from Union Station?  It looks like Reston Town Center now with little white kids riding bikes up and down the streets. 

The area around Nats Park was a dump before the stadium was built.  It's now a pretty safe area.  The days of security guards at the Navy Yard warning Marines going up to the Barracks to be careful walking at night are long since gone.  The area is pretty safe.  It's not McLean but I haven't heard of any fans getting mugged or anything.  Certainly not shot at.

[bluestreak]

was it announced or leaked?

Mark Lerner, Ted Lerner’s son who now serves as the club’s managing principal owner, told The Washington Post in a statement Monday that the family has hired New York investment bank Allen & Company to research potential investors, and possibly buyers, for the Nationals.