St. Louis Rams Research Paper

Not only is the National Football League (NFL) the most popular sports league in America, it also draws in the highest revenue of any sporting league in the United States. Los Angeles holds the second largest GDP of any city in the United States, and the NFL runs on a model of revenue sharing among its owners and franchises. Therefore, the lack of an NFL franchise in the city of Los Angeles is certainly a glaring omission, as the opportunity to host an NFL team in Los Angeles would benefit the entire league economically. That being said, the San Diego Chargers and the Oakland Raiders present viable alternatives to the St. Louis Rams in placing an NFL team in Los Angeles. The lack of an NFL franchise in one of the America’s greatest cities is

Louis offers the opportunity to build a state-of-the-art stadium in place of the Edward Jones Dome, there is no reason why the Rams should be chosen as a team to move to Los Angeles. Stan Kroenke, sports mogul and current owner of the St. Louis Rams, has pitched a self-financed, two billion dollar stadium in Inglewood, CA to be the new site of a Los Angeles Rams franchise (Brandt, 2015). In contrast, Kroenke has made no such offer to the city of St. Louis. The Edward Jones Dome is known as one of the NFL’s worst facilities, despite the fact that it is only twenty years old. However, in contrast to San Diego and Oakland, the city of St. Louis has shown its strong desire and commitment to keep the franchise by pitching a one billion dollar stadium to keep ahold of the Rams. St. Louis is also one of America’s greatest sports towns and the city is widely known for its loyal fanbase. The city also has a strong economic structure that it is not often given credit for, especially in comparison to other cities that host an NFL franchise. Additionally, the city has shown its willingness to keep the Rams by being flexible towards both the city itself and the franchise. St. Louis, unlike San Diego and Oakland, is offering a new stadium to Kroenke that is partially publicly financed. Lastly, with the reasonable alternatives able to move to Los Angeles, coupled with the new stadium proposal in St. Louis, it is clear that the Rams belong in St.

Louis, the NFL, and California conversing about the two proposed Rams stadiums. One arena is on the riverfront of the Mississippi and the other is in Inglewood, CA. There are many stakeholders that will be affected if the team decides to stay in Missouri or move to California. The main stakeholder is the Rams sole owner Stan Kroenke. Kroenke wants to move the team to California because of the potential giant financial benefits, and to one day host a Super Bowl in his brand new stadium. According to an article by Daniel Leritz, Kroenke’s “dream has been to host a Super Bowl to hold his head up there with other major NFL owners and tout his team’s facilities to the world” (Leritz, 2015). The city of St. Louis also has a stake in this agenda because of the fans who have support their home team through the ups and downs over the past 25 years. Rams fan Ron Kruszewski said, “We need to be an NFL city. I don’t care what people say” (Kirn, 2015). NFL owners also play a major role in this decision because the location directly affects the income for other teams like the Oakland Raiders and the San Diego Chargers with revenue sharing. Residents in Los Angeles will heavily be affected by the Rams decision as well because ever since the Rams left in 1995, they have been requesting an NFL franchise. Other stakeholders that some tend to forget are the business owners that have businesses located near the new proposed stadium