Props to Spanos

[al gambala]

OTE=21and500;4748771]Props to the Spanos family

Not a hot-take

For all the criticism they get (mostly deservedly), they also have shown some uncharacteristically bold backbone in simply GOING to LA when NOBODY wanted them to.
Dean, the NFL’s good solider, kept it cool in Houston and methodically went to work on the relocation.

Hell have no fury like a Spanos scorned.
Like Marty Schottenheimer said about being fired—something had to be done, and im glad Dean finally made a decision.
Spanos chose, and he chose to risk being public enemy number 1 in SD to make his money and whether or not you agree with that, as a business venture, you have to recognize fortitude THAT obvious.
Dean chose this route over tripping himself, apologizing to a san diego fan base that he could/would never win over. They chose being the rich bad guys in LA over the pushover mom&pop shop owners that never get respect, even if it were due.

And is anyone naïve enough to believe that the Spanos family would ever be accepted by the inner circle of league owners? Maras, Rooneys, Jerry Jones?
Imo, even if the spanos family did everything right, they wouldn’t be respected because they’re not REAL FOOTBALL PEOPLE—they’re outsiders
Spanos family are OBVIOUSLY not and have never been, “football-people”
That’s why they have to hire HELP to point them in the right direction, and they still got shafted by Ron Wolfe---WOLFE!
Are you kidding me? Now THAT dude needs to be held accountable for signing off on a Mike McCoy
I can understand Dean not being able to recognize a fraud, but RON WOLFE??

im not saying anyone should LIKE what the Spanos’ have done, but I am saying that if you’re a charger fan, you should ROOT for the Spanos to become better owners and support their efforts in making the Chargers brand one of the NFL’s most popular and powerful.
Now if the Spanos family can just get out of their own way, and allow football people run their franchise, I think they can do just that.
FWIW, im rooting for Spanos kids to find a way to bully our chargers into the elite status of the NFL
And if they need help, by all means, BUY ALL THE HELP YOU CAN AFFORD
Imo, the early signing of Mike Williams is likely evidence of LT’s influence.
And geez LT.
For a runningback that did everything ON the field, he’s now sticking his legacy on the line in an effort to lead the Chargers out of being an NFL punchline. As good as they paycheck is, I doubt many former HOFers would have the courage, confidence and ability to take on such as risky proposition.
LT said he needed only 500 SD Charger fans to remain loyal and build a fanbase.
He’s got one in me, and hopefully 499 more.
We’ll all be part of an LA CHARGERS DYNASTY after Rivers retires with 2 superbowl rings and become THE NFL team in LA

Who’s with me in supporting these clueless Spanos kids in building a winner??[/QUOTE]

[21and500]

Originally Posted by AFboltfan

I can stand by the premise of what your saying and support the Chargers. But unless you have some inside knowledge or are close to the organization, it seems like you are assuming a lot in your thread.

I am definitely making assumptions
But some pretty safe ones imo.
Moral of the story is that it's easy (and justified)
To continually pick on the Spanos family
But to be fair, they deserve SOME credit as well
Even if it's just for having the fortitude to break character
You can only go to the same kid for their lunch money
Before he decides to chin check you one day
Whether we like it or not, he IS our owner
And imo EVERY "Chargers fan" should be rooting for the family to become
Bigger and better owners
We should be wishing their vision is greater than ours and that
They build an empire to compete with the megabrands of the NFL

Giving credit where it's due is a start

[AFBoltFan]

Originally Posted by 21and500

I am definitely making assumptions
But some pretty safe ones imo.
Moral of the story is that it's easy (and justified)
To continually pick on the Spanos family
But to be fair, they deserve SOME credit as well
Even if it's just for having the fortitude to break character
You can only go to the same kid for their lunch money
Before he decides to chin check you one day
Whether we like it or not, he IS our owner
And imo EVERY "Chargers fan" should be rooting for the family to become
Bigger and better owners
We should be wishing their vision is greater than ours and that
They build an empire to compete with the megabrands of the NFL

Giving credit where it's due is a start

I do agree with most of that. The city of San Diego had a chance to become a great football city but they failed. Spanos is just doing what any american business man would do in his situation.

Still not going to give him "props" for leaving San Diego, just not going to happen.

Supporting the team however is something I can do.

[ltinabottle]

Spanos left for bigger market in a temporarily much smaller venue. Intimate is what they say? Overall, a sound dollar decision. He continues though to have the absence of building a shiny new stadium to call his own. He will continue to lack pride of owning a new home which all of the top owners have.

Spanos will pay his rent diligently in the new stadium for a few years but at some point their will be a point of contention about money with King Kronke. This assumption is based on past behavior over the long tenure of Spanos ownership. This has been observed through contract negotiations with talented young and veteran players.

If the Chargers can chalk up several winning seasons leading to negotiating a new lease deal, then they will have some leverage. If they continue to have losing or even mediocre seasons, then things may get interesting. At this time, I've been a long time fan and can't help but be attached to the players. I don't have much respect for $panos and I don't think his colleagues around the league think highly of him either.

[AFBoltFan]

One more thing... Props to Spanos and TT for making better moves than the Rams in the "Fight for LA"... At least that is a plus...

[21and500]

Originally Posted by AFboltfan

One more thing... Props to Spanos and TT for making better moves than the Rams in the "Fight for LA"... At least that is a plus...

Right on!

[dlibert]

Spanos had an opportunity to build a vision here in SD. A vision for a facility to house Bowl games, Aztec football and soccer, both international and MSL level - this facility could ahem had events every week - draw from Mexico as well as the US and be the BIG fish in a city that people want to come to. Instead he got tired of being dissed - and took the road of least conflict. This has been his pattern with everything he has done - from 1994 on. Bobby ross v Bobby B. - he choose the GM even though the GM was screwing up with bad picks - on and on and on - not signing players. Even Butler was not really that great - except he had a good star that made some good picks early on. It was AJ who really changed the franchise but AJ was a cheap option to hire as he was from within and a Butler staffer for ever. I can't think of much where Dean has driven an agenda out front and put his money up for risk. He could have gotten a loan out of Goldman to build in SD but the way to do it was with a vision to add Soccer to the ticket and go FIFA level big. he could ahem built a partner ship with FCBArcelona to build a school in SD and get that team to play a friendly in the summer once in awhile but if they had an academy here that would lead to and MSL team and other league coming in. Even US national team partnership to play some many games here would have been possible. SD has the highest rating for soccer than almost anywhere in the US when it comes to watching FIFA and european leagues - these are the things that other us owners are doing - The Tampa Bay owner has bought into a team in the English league( Manchester United ?) as has Warner(ex-padre ownership group from the firesale days and TV comedies) with the redsox buying into Liverpool. Even Kroenke owns Asenal and built that stadium in LONDON for gosh sakes. The point is SD could be a soccer and Football mecca - in beautiful SO Cal - but he had to build relationships and sell the idea out to the county and put up his equity. His franchise grew from an 80 mil investment to almost a Billion just being here in SD and being a part of the NFL.
I think his plan was LA all the way unless he was given free range and free what ever.
Had they built the beginning idea in 2002 - the collapse of the economy in 2008 and the application of economic socialism on us all would have really put a strain on that plan. He was almost lucky not to have built all that was planned. It better form to just rent and not have the risk with the almost certain level of gain for being in LA - or so it seems - mostly because of what the Clippers were sold for - but the Chargers are not worth more than Real Madrid or Barcelona - those clubs in the 3 billion range I believe. Putting the Chargers at 3 billion just because they are in LA seems really out there to me - but what do I know right? In the end I think the sale of the team will occur and they will come back.
SO much has negatively been impacted because of this - individuals who lost work and have been forced to make choices they didn't want to make as well as the total closing off of the SD market by the NFL - there has been 0 reach out to us. Why should we stay with the NFL now? they didn't want us - when they had all the power to make a vision and create the venue of the next 50 years. Kroenke did this in LA - why could they do that here?
BTW my first game was in 1965 and had season tix in every decade. My heart was crushed by this…

[ltinabottle]

Unfortunately, the Spanos family sadly didn't share your vision of a multipurpose stadium. It was published that he was looking at demographics in Orange County as part of his so called 25% of NFL revenue. No doubt the effort wasn't there to engender a vision that was inclusive of this community.

San Diego is not only a top military town but a diverse community. I've worked in the school system in El Cajon which at the time was the number 2 Chaldean/ Arabic community in the United States. The Filipino American community is the top Asian group in San Diego. The nearby town of Linda Vista has thriving Vietnamese and Laotian community. Of course, the Q has had the Mexico futbol club and national team play with a huge following so we all know they are a thriving group in the South Bay area.

Growing up playing CYSA and high school soccer, the town has a definite demographic for an MSL team. Dean was short sighted in including them in his vision. It was always about a single minded pursuit for a football stadium.

San Diego State aims to be a top 50 university within the next 5-10 years. They definitely want to shape the 166 acres of land for a higher educational purpose. This appears to be imminent once a change in leadership is made this summer.

Question is will they have the funding to make this vision happen? A large sum of capital has to be raised. There is a void there for an NFL team to fill. I just don't see it happening anytime soon.

Originally Posted by dlibert

Spanos had an opportunity to build a vision here in SD. A vision for a facility to house Bowl games, Aztec football and soccer, both international and MSL level - this facility could ahem had events every week - draw from Mexico as well as the US and be the BIG fish in a city that people want to come to. Instead he got tired of being dissed - and took the road of least conflict. This has been his pattern with everything he has done - from 1994 on. Bobby ross v Bobby B. - he choose the GM even though the GM was screwing up with bad picks - on and on and on - not signing players. Even Butler was not really that great - except he had a good star that made some good picks early on. It was AJ who really changed the franchise but AJ was a cheap option to hire as he was from within and a Butler staffer for ever. I can't think of much where Dean has driven an agenda out front and put his money up for risk. He could have gotten a loan out of Goldman to build in SD but the way to do it was with a vision to add Soccer to the ticket and go FIFA level big. he could ahem built a partner ship with FCBArcelona to build a school in SD and get that team to play a friendly in the summer once in awhile but if they had an academy here that would lead to and MSL team and other league coming in. Even US national team partnership to play some many games here would have been possible. SD has the highest rating for soccer than almost anywhere in the US when it comes to watching FIFA and european leagues - these are the things that other us owners are doing - The Tampa Bay owner has bought into a team in the English league( Manchester United ?) as has Warner(ex-padre ownership group from the firesale days and TV comedies) with the redsox buying into Liverpool. Even Kroenke owns Asenal and built that stadium in LONDON for gosh sakes. The point is SD could be a soccer and Football mecca - in beautiful SO Cal - but he had to build relationships and sell the idea out to the county and put up his equity. His franchise grew from an 80 mil investment to almost a Billion just being here in SD and being a part of the NFL.
I think his plan was LA all the way unless he was given free range and free what ever.
Had they built the beginning idea in 2002 - the collapse of the economy in 2008 and the application of economic socialism on us all would have really put a strain on that plan. He was almost lucky not to have built all that was planned. It better form to just rent and not have the risk with the almost certain level of gain for being in LA - or so it seems - mostly because of what the Clippers were sold for - but the Chargers are not worth more than Real Madrid or Barcelona - those clubs in the 3 billion range I believe. Putting the Chargers at 3 billion just because they are in LA seems really out there to me - but what do I know right? In the end I think the sale of the team will occur and they will come back.
SO much has negatively been impacted because of this - individuals who lost work and have been forced to make choices they didn't want to make as well as the total closing off of the SD market by the NFL - there has been 0 reach out to us. Why should we stay with the NFL now? they didn't want us - when they had all the power to make a vision and create the venue of the next 50 years. Kroenke did this in LA - why could they do that here?
BTW my first game was in 1965 and had season tix in every decade. My heart was crushed by this…

[Blu858]

Man, I was really hoping this "Props" thread was some good old sarcasm of the most bitter quality.

Props? PROPS? PROPS?!!! Don't talk to me about props! Let's see if we can win a game first.
(that's a Coach Mora meltdown impression for those slow like me due to no AC and a brain on slow broil)
Seriously though, why would any self respecting San Diego Bolt's fan have props in the same sentence as Spanos? For that matter, even mention the word on the same day you muttered the Owner's name. I can think of a lot of colorful words, but believe me props is not among them.

Props is what I give a real man like Tony Gwynn who turned down big $ ( ok bigger $) towards the end of his career, wishing to remain a Padre, playing for and in front of San Diego Padre fans all the way through his glorious career!
Sir, let me ask you something- Did you give Eli props after his announced refusal to play in San Diego as a Charger minutes after he posed with a Charger's jersey and a cheesy smile having just been drafted #1 overall, because at least he had the balls? Not if you have both pride in the Chargers and at least a modicum of pride in our fair city. Spanos deserves a lot from San Diego however props is not on the list! And it does not matter in the least what the mayor and/or his cronies did. If the man would have honored his word "to do everything possible" to stay in our beautiful, awesome city, DESPITE tremendous challenges, that story would have come out and we would have loved and respected him for that, forever. For- Ever man. Instead he broke our hearts. He let down a lot of good folks. Why? For money? How much money does he need?
I believe in the old proverb, "where there's a will, there's a way". Apparently Spanos thought it was "where there's a will, there's a highway"

Hey, I've been wanting to start a thread on this topic, is there a mod that can tell me if I could post it in general discussions? GD is described simply as "all things Chargers". Thanks!

[LongTimeOCBolts]

The walls of text on this page hurt my brain.