One of the big reasons the Rams are considering a move is the state of the Edward Jones Dome, which opened in 1995 but has become woefully outdated by NFL standards.
Advertisement
Nixon said regardless of what happens, the city and state feel good about the future of the NFL in St. Louis.
Along with the Rams, the San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders are involved in this three-horse carousel to determine what team or teams will wind up in LA.
“The competition here is to make sure you keep your facilities and fan base so it is NFL ready, so that has been our mantra”, Nixon said after visiting a Chiefs practice, via the Associated Press.
There are other issues in St. Louis at the moment including the unrest in Ferguson following the one-year anniversary of the death of teenager Michael Brown, unrest among many involving police-related issues and an increased murder rate.
But he’s still hopeful for the NFL remaining in St. Louis.
St. Louis has countered with a stadium proposal of its own, a $998 million, open-air facility that would be built along the riverfront. How would it be paid for? NFL owners discuss teams in L.A.
That optimism from the St. Louis stadium task force is rooted in the belief that they’ll be able to clear the hurdles necessary to put together an actionable financing plan and accumulate the land needed to make saying no to St. Louis an extremely hard task for the NFL’s owners. Roughly half that money would come from the state and local funds, while the NFL owner and the league’s loan program would cover the other half. “They do that, I think it’s great for NFL fans in St. Louis”, he told ESPN.
“A source said the Rams (contingent) spent some of their time on why St. Louis did not work for the club”, Kaplan says.
Advertisement
But if not the Rams, they think it will be enough to have someone want to play there.
