Steelers Question of the Week: The Steelers Franchise
Training camp: The place where it's time to get down to business. The place where sweat waters the lawn better than the sprinkler system. The place to prove your worth. The place where, if it wasn't so hot and humid, you could almost reach out and touch the crisp air that accompanies the arrival of October. The on-ramp to the road to Tampa Bay, and Super Bowl XLIII.
Alright, that's enough literary imagery for one day.
As with any training camp, there are many position battles that could be questioned and contested in the Steelers QOTW, but I decided to take a different approach. Mostly because these types of questions are being beaten to death by the media. Instead, I think there's a bigger question to answer. What exactly is going to happen with the Steelers franchise. As you all know, four of the five Rooney's want out of their part of the Steelers' ownership. What's more problematic is that if ownership changes hands, the Steelers as an organization will be forced to pay the money it took to build "The Ketchup Bottle" back to the local and state government. Here's the worst part, and a highly unlikely resolution to the problem, but nevertheless, still a part of the equation. The Steelers change ownership, the new ownership does NOT sign the contract keeping the Steelers in Pittsburgh for the next 75 years, and then, the new ownership moves the Steelers to a new town. Again, that is an extremely long shot, and I'm not saying that's going to happen, but it could. My question is as follows, what do you think is the best course of action for the current Steelers ownership, and if the four Rooney's other than Dan the Man decide to sell their shares, who do you think should get those shares of the team, thus taking over the franchise?
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Well...
Best we can hope for is that Dan some how gets enough capital to buy out two more shares to put him over 50%. But that is probably not realistic. If not him, then I’m fine with Druckenmiller. If he’s a real fan that should keep them in Pittsburgh as long as he owns them. The motto will always be Just Win Baby. Cause if you win, you stay and you make money. Since Dan’s shown he can in fact maintain a winning team any business man that buys it will probably be smart enough to trust his judgement.
However all that said, it was cool watching the last 2 minutes of the Arena Football finals and Bon Jovi’s team won it all. We could be living on a prayer!
by Chicago Steeler on
Jul 28, 2008 3:45 PM EDT
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Pie in the SKY idea
This is not a possibility, but I’d love it if they sold the shares to the Steeler faithful out there – like one per person or something – I’ve already been asking all friends and relatives if they want to go in on some shares, but we’re all short a few bucks.
Seriously though this thing looks like a quagmire, and I just hated to see all the junk coming out. I hope that one or more of the other Rooneys gets a pang of sentiment and sells off their bit to Dan, but that might be even more unlikely than the other idea.
I guess I would sum it up – for whoever owns them:
Stay in Pittsburgh, No Steely McBeam (could have been the downfall there), No domes, Stay tough, & See your enemies driven before you. Amen.
by SCSteeler on
Jul 28, 2008 7:05 PM EDT
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oh man
how sweet would that be? I would do it in a heartbeat.
by steelerark on
Jul 29, 2008 1:17 PM EDT
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The plan
The issue seems to be the team value, and therefore the value of the shares. The brothers should work out some deal where Dan and Art II can buy out two of them and then he would only need another 2.1% to be majority owner. He could buy that 2.1% from one of the other brothers and let them sell the rest to someone minority owner(s). That way Dan wouldn’t have to buy them all out at a lower value, but he’d still retain control of the team.
Other than that, what is the league going to do, force them to sell to another owner like Druckenmiller? I don’t think they would force that. But eventually, the other brothers may sell a majority share out from under Dan. Well, it is pretty much a mess, isn’t it?
by WolfpackSteelersFan on
Jul 29, 2008 3:37 PM EDT
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