(11-03-2019, 01:19 AM)nate Wrote: I've missed one game since 2003, when they removed 4 inches of my intestine via emergency surgery. There are a ton of others with similar dedication. Thousands.
Perhaps, but there's the difference between Jacksonville and Green Bay or Pittsburgh. If one of our thousands drops out, the Packers or Steelers have ten other people lined up at the gate to take that seat. Jacksonville doesn't.
I don't see Jacksonville ponying up hundreds of millions for a new stadium, nor do I see Khan funding it himself--at least, not until he has a viable downtown and a fanbase that will actually buy tickets. And even if they do replace the stadium, Regency Square, while as good a location as any, isn't going to happen. Why would Khan sink so much into revitalizing downtown then take his crown gem into the gang-infested ghetto that part of town has become?
I think the significance of Khan saying that the market can't sell out eight games is being lost a bit here. What he's saying in the next few sentences without actually saying it is that the revenue to operate a stadium isn't there without coming up with something for the hot dog vendor to do. That's not a healthy market, and as a businessman with billions invested in his product, Khan understandably and realistically needs to know that his investment isn't hinging on the ability to bring big musical acts to the stadium that his team can't sell out.
That said, I'm not joining the "they're leaving" brigade. I do think that the next London contract will see the team take a second home game per year overseas as soon as the Jags are contractually able to do so. And yes, it will be a home game that goes. I've seen the one home, one away idea, and I would love to be in the owners meeting when Khan suggests giving the Jaguars a schedule with what amounts to nine home games. To be brutally honest about it, London is Jacksonville's life support while Jacksonville figures out if it wants a team or not. Moving a second home game over there would help the revenue situation, but ultimately it's going to come down to the city. If the fans start selling out the stadium, and if the downtown revitalization projects finally do something other than look pretty on paper, and if the second London game adds enough revenue to subsidize Jacksonville without adding so much than Khan decides it's worth the time and money to figure out how the hell a full-time team would work over there...lots of ifs. And here's the biggest if of all--if the big-market team owners decide during this CBA to stiff the small-market teams and that shared revenue stream dries up to a large extent, suddenly those long-term viability questions become very, very short-term.
