If you’d happen to be walking past Spreckles Theater in downtown San Diego on Oct. 28 around 7:10 p.m., you may have thought a riot was happening inside due to the boos and angry yells of San Diego Charger fans as Mark Fabiani walked out on stage to address the crowd. For those of you who are lost at this point, Fabiani is the Chargers appointed special counsel in charge of relocating the team.
The Chargers are one of three teams considering leaving their cities to reap the riches of an untapped NFL market in Los Angeles because their current cities no longer fill the executives pockets with enough cash. Fabiani has been at this for 14 years and judging by the crowd’s reaction to his presence, he hasn’t been favored by the fans.
San Diego City Councilman Scott Sherman put Fabiani on blast saying, “I hear Mr. Fabiani talking about 14 years and not being able to get anything done in the city of San Diego, well you know what? The management of the NFL has changed. The management of the team has changed. City leaders have come and gone. There’s been only one constant in that 14 years, and that’s Mr. Fabiani’s employment with the San Diego Chargers. He has been nothing but negative the entire time.”
After Fabiani left the stage, fans were allowed to step of to a microphone and address the four NFL reps. The head being Eric Grubman, who is the NFL’s executive vice president. A larger majority of the fans that spoke brought up warm family stories, at an attempt to melt the icy heart of any NFL executive, saying that they grew up with the team and how their family has been season ticket holders since the 60’s and it brought their family closer together. Other fans brought up valid points that the NFL should consider.
First, don’t build a stadium in a dump, literally they bought landfill property to build a stadium in LA County and then put two teams in it that are a divisional rival. It’s sad to say but, people have died at sporting events because of some fan who is pissed that their team lost. It’s a hazard to the safety of the other fans around!
Second, the NFL wants to expand its horizons outside of the U.S. boundary. The U.K. already has a couple NFL games each year and is expecting more to come. There was rumor of reaching out south of the border and bringing the NFL to Mexico and what better way to do it by using the team you already have established 20 minutes north of the border. That would greatly expand the Charger fan base and solve the main issue of them not reeling in enough money.
Thirdly, many from Los Angeles don’t want the Charger, they want the St. Louis Rams (The Rams were Los Angeles from 1946-1979) and that the fan base for Rams greatly outweighs any Charger fan base. Interestingly, the fans and the city know what they want yet none of the NFL executives are willing to budge.
And finally, Los Angeles is a lucrative market and having a team there would be greatly beneficial, but why jump team from place to place and take away from the die hard fans who’ve stuck with their team through good times and bad? Could all of this just be a scare tactic by owners and NFL to the force the city’s hand into using tax money to build a new stadium instead of dipping into their own pockets and spending their not-so-hard-earned money. Put an expansion team in Los Angeles or they should go buy “Madden ’16” and select the “move to L.A.” option if they want a team there so badly