The man known as Silent Stan said plenty early Monday, with Rams owner Stan Kroenke announcing his intentions to build a football stadium in Los Angeles. The powers-that-be in St. Louis don’t seem to be fazed by his all-in play.
“The news today is another reminder of how much competition there can be for National Football League franchises and projects that include NFL stadiums, but it does not change our timeline or approach,” said Dave Peacock and Bob Blitz, two of the folks responsible for coming up with a plan for keeping the Rams in St. Louis, via Daniel Kaplan of SportsBusiness Journal. “It is important to remember this will be a long-term process, but one that the State of Missouri and the St. Louis region are fully pledged to seeing through. We are ready to demonstrate our commitment to keeping the NFL here, and to continue to illustrate why St. Louis has been and will always be a strong NFL market. We will present a plan to Governor Nixon this Friday as scheduled, and we expect that it will meet his criteria, thereby allowing us to share our vision with the public shortly thereafter. In the meantime, we will continue to have discussions with the NFL, as well as Rams leadership.”
On the surface, the timing of Kroenke’s announcement seems odd. It could be that he fears St. Louis will make an attractive offer that at least nine other owners would consider to be fair and appropriate (all it takes is nine to block a move), and that he hopes the announcement will get St. Louis to give up. Or maybe Kroenke is simply hoping to squeeze the best possible deal out of St. Louis by making it clear that he’s willing and ready and anxious to leave.
Either way, it creates an awkward situation for the Rams in 2015 -- unless St. Louis does enough to persuade Kroenke to stay put.