Caution: LA is coming to steal your NFL team in 2011

[copperfiend]

Unfortunately, the article is already out there in print. People are going to read it and assume it is true.

It was already the general consensus from the 1 million other articles pushing the same angle already out there... at least this time there was a rebuttal. 

And who is going to hear the rebuttal? A few thousand people in Jacksonville as opposed to the millions that read the SI football preview.

[Shwaz]

Unfortunately, the article is already out there in print. People are going to read it and assume it is true.

It was already the general consensus from the 1 million other articles pushing the same angle already out there... at least this time there was a rebuttal. 

And who is going to hear the rebuttal? A few thousand people in Jacksonville as opposed to the millions that read the SI football preview.

Copper did I say 'this local radio-show clip is going to reverse the national image of professional sports in Jacksonville?

I give zero shits what someone in Idaho or anywhere for that matter thinks of the NFL in Jacksonville.

I'm just happy to see a national writer called out for an article detailing the imminent death of a sports team in a city he's never stepped foot in.

[copperfiend]

Copper did I say 'this local radio-show clip is going to reverse the national image of professional sports in Jacksonville?

I never suggested you did.

[Coolyfett]

coredumped..........you have a point! Green Bay dates back to the start and has the fan base to boot! But they also have a tradition of winning to match that time frame! The Jag's have not been around that long and have lots of work to do............but they have to win and establish a winning tradition! This is where we are lacking and we need to win more than we lose.........a record like last year 8 & 6 just won't cut it! We backed into the payoffs and it took help from other teams losing and winning in order for the Jag's to make it into the first round!

I know they also played all their Games in Milwaukee for a LONGGGGGG time in their early years and that helped build their fan base. Thats why I was shocked however everyone kinda dissed us for the idea of playing out of market games in Orlando. Other small markets, including buffalo and Green bay, has done it. Why cant we?

I think the Florida preseason games should be played in orlando. Tb vs Jax, Jax vs Mia & Mia vs Tb should be played there.

[Shwaz]

just playing Debbie Downer then... cause yours obviously downplaying the interview because the  'millions of people that read SI' vs the few thousand that listen to the radio show.

[RockStar]

I'm might have a man crush on Dan Hicken after listening to this clip of him gutting a SI writer aka the national media!
http://www.stationcaster.com/player_skinned.php?s=61&c=367&f=57154

I just listened to that. Have new respect for Hicken. Great stuff.

[fieldafm]

Normally, I can't stomach Hicken and Prosser's show since Boselli left... but today I had the RARE opportunity to go into work late and happened to catch this very segment.

Wow, it was seriously worth all the Gator Homerism to have listened to them totally rake the SI guy over the proverbial coals.

The last thing the guy said was 'point well taken' and Hicken and Prosser split him a new crack and finally hung up on him, LOL.  It really got my day off on the righ foot, and I had a pretty bad day yesterday so I wasn't expecting much from today... until I heard that.  A sincere thanks to FSR for really turning me week around!!

[duvaldude08]

coredumped..........you have a point! Green Bay dates back to the start and has the fan base to boot! But they also have a tradition of winning to match that time frame! The Jag's have not been around that long and have lots of work to do............but they have to win and establish a winning tradition! This is where we are lacking and we need to win more than we lose.........a record like last year 8 & 6 just won't cut it! We backed into the payoffs and it took help from other teams losing and winning in order for the Jag's to make it into the first round!

I know they also played all their Games in Milwaukee for a LONGGGGGG time in their early years and that helped build their fan base. Thats why I was shocked however everyone kinda dissed us for the idea of playing out of market games in Orlando. Other small markets, including buffalo and Green bay, has done it. Why cant we?

The contract between Jacksonville and the Jaguars that runs through 2030 and is a huge hurdle for any prospective owner to overcome and move the team is the reason all home games are played in Jacksonville.

The contract basically states that every home game for the Jaguars has to be played here at the stadium. This excludes us from being designated as the "home" team for London games, as well as any "home" games played in Orlando.
The Citrus Bowl also has too few Luxury Boxes and Club Seating to allow an NFL team to play there.

Per the Business Journal today, they are still trying to make the "out of market" in orlando happen. But they have outlined that there are alot of hurdles and will not be easy. Check it out:

http://jacksonville.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/stories/2010/08/30/daily32.html

[copperfiend]

It didn't say anything about the team trying to make a game in Orlando happen. It had one quote from Dan Edwards and lot of quotes from people in Orlando connected to the tourism industry.

They don't have a stadium capable of hosting NFL football. Huge hurdle. And there is a team playing an hour or so west of Orlando that has bigger ticket issues right now than we do.

[jandar]

T

coredumped..........you have a point! Green Bay dates back to the start and has the fan base to boot! But they also have a tradition of winning to match that time frame! The Jag's have not been around that long and have lots of work to do............but they have to win and establish a winning tradition! This is where we are lacking and we need to win more than we lose.........a record like last year 8 & 6 just won't cut it! We backed into the payoffs and it took help from other teams losing and winning in order for the Jag's to make it into the first round!

I know they also played all their Games in Milwaukee for a LONGGGGGG time in their early years and that helped build their fan base. Thats why I was shocked however everyone kinda dissed us for the idea of playing out of market games in Orlando. Other small markets, including buffalo and Green bay, has done it. Why cant we?

The contract between Jacksonville and the Jaguars that runs through 2030 and is a huge hurdle for any prospective owner to overcome and move the team is the reason all home games are played in Jacksonville.

The contract basically states that every home game for the Jaguars has to be played here at the stadium. This excludes us from being designated as the "home" team for London games, as well as any "home" games played in Orlando.
The Citrus Bowl also has too few Luxury Boxes and Club Seating to allow an NFL team to play there.

Per the Business Journal today, they are still trying to make the "out of market" in orlando happen. But they have outlined that there are alot of hurdles and will not be easy. Check it out:

http://jacksonville.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/stories/2010/08/30/daily32.html

It was written by an Orlando Business Journal, and those are linked to other business journals.
Look at the header:
Jacksonville Business Journal - by Richard Bilbao Orlando Business Journal

Orlando and the Jaguars can talk all they want, but the COJ needs to allow the break in the contract without ramifications.

[copperfiend]

I wonder if that quote from the Jaguars front office guy was even recent or from last fall when this was first casually mentioned.

[Wacca Pilatka]

I think it could be a good thing to play a home game in Orlando every year, even if the stadium is sold out on a season-ticket basis.  I know the initial logic was the same as the Buffalo/Toronto logic, to reduce the local ticket-buying burden (especially if the regular season goes to 18), but expanding the Jaguars' footprint (pawprint?) is a more important consideration.  We have no reliable secondary market.  Metro Buffalo is smaller than Jacksonville but the Bills have secondary market support in Rochester, Syracuse, Erie, and Toronto.  Metro New Orleans is about the same size as Jacksonville, but the Saints draw from other markets in Louisiana and Mississippi.  Green Bay, of course, draws from Milwaukee and the rest of Wisconsin.  Nashville and Indianapolis do not have much bigger metros than Jacksonville but have become statewide draws.  Metro Denver in the 1970s was roughly the size of metro Jacksonville now, but the Broncos already had years of experience of reaching out to secondary markets throughout the Rocky Mountain region.

The massive early success of the Jaguars in just drawing locally may have precluded their making more extensive pushes to pull from secondary markets.  (I notice, for instance, the steady decline in size of the Jaguars' radio network from 1995 to now.)  Reaching out to Daytona and Orlando, or even Savannah and Charleston, should help take the pressure off Jacksonville over time to essentially support the team by itself--something no other small-market NFL city is called upon to do.  Obviously, there is competition from the Falcons to the north, from the Bucs and Dolphins to the south, but the Jaguars probably need to throw their hats into the ring in some of these potential secondary markets.

[Wacca Pilatka]

Of course, the problem is that the Citrus Bowl is not up to NFL standards and the UCF stadium is not NFL-sized.  Maybe a preseason game could shift to the Citrus every year?  The Dolphins used to do it.

[JeffreyS]

What we really need to be doing is advertising in the central Florida market this year for new fans to make some road trips to Jax.  The Jags will be the Florida team on their TVs a lot this year.

[copperfiend]

I still don't understand why an 18 game season would make it more likely that a game could be played in Orlando. When it is approved, the preseason will be shortened to two games. So right now you are buying seasons for 10 games, two preseason and eight regular season. The per game price is the same no matter what. When the 18 game season starts, you will still have season tickets for 10 games, but will be gaining a regular season game. If anything, that will help season ticket sales.