Pro Football : Subsidizing Teams Is a Must These Days

For the last half-century, it has been up to the politicians of Los Angeles City and County to decide whether there’s a National Football League team in a county that is one of America’s largest.

These officials--the Los Angeles County supervisors, the city’s mayor, and the city council members--control six of the nine votes on the Coliseum Commission.

Here’s a message that might interest some of them:

Despite the depressed Texas economy, the city of Houston and the county authorities there have spent $40 million this year to keep NFL football.

Although the Houston Oilers have been unsuccessful more often than not in the last quarter-century, the area’s politicians agree with those in Sacramento, Oakland and Irwindale--among many other U.S. communities--that an NFL team brings in so many outside dollars every season that it’s worth subsidizing.

Houston has subsidized the Oilers again this year by adding 10,000 seats to the Astrodome, a project that has cost $40 million so far and could run higher.

Why would Houston do this when the oil slump has disengaged so many Texas taxpayers?

The answer is that rival cities were threatening to steal the Oilers. Specifically, Jacksonville, Fla., made the Oilers an offer they couldn’t refuse.

They couldn’t, that is, until Houston made them a better offer.

Like it or not, that’s what’s happening in the real world today.

In Los Angeles, there is very little evidence that the county supervisors care deeply whether pro football remains in the Coliseum. The one supervisor who is strongly in favor, Kenneth Hahn, has been ill.

The leader of the others, Pete Schabarum, keeps talking about protecting the citizens. So does a Coliseum Commission attorney.

No responsible city or county leader in Los Angeles has suggested that the mere existence of big league franchises in a big city has proved, elsewhere, to be protection enough.

The financial value of such a franchise--to the community, not the club owner--has been confirmed repeatedly in New York, Chicago, Oakland and many other cities. Consider:

--Although Chicago is a Cubs’ town, the citizens there are subsidizing a new stadium for the other team, the White Sox.

--New York woke up after losing the baseball Giants and saved the Yankees by investing taxpayer millions in Yankee Stadium.

--Oakland woke up a little late to save the Raiders in 1981, but it is wide awake now.

Why do you think Oakland wants the Raiders back? As a toy for its heartbroken sports fans?

You’ll have to think again.

The answer is in whatever pocket you keep your money.

The Raiders are down now, having made some foolish decisions in recent years. But in the cyclical business that football is, the history of the franchise leads to but one conclusion: They’ll come back.

The coaching change from Mike Shanahan to Art Shell this week was a signal that owner Al Davis blames Shanahan instead of Davis for the club’s slump. But in time, Davis will accept the responsibility. He will see that he is the only one who can fix the wagon, and his long record suggests that he will.

For Los Angeles sports fans, the question that matters is this: Will Davis win his fourth Super Bowl in Sacramento, Oakland, Irwindale, Paducah or Los Angeles?

One reason Raider halfback Marcus Allen held out this summer is getting another airing this week in Alabama, or wherever Bo Jackson is hunting and fishing.

Although he’s through playing baseball this year and although his 1989 Raider salary is larger than Allen’s, Jackson is taking a leisurely week or two off before resuming his NFL hobby.

Then, no doubt, he’ll take another week or two to get in shape.

Meanwhile, bruised or not, broken bones or not, Allen is out there playing football every Sunday.

Aside from financial considerations, Jackson’s whole reason for participating in both football and baseball--as he has often said--is personal: To prove that it can be done.

Raider fans, who have already sat through three losses in the first four weeks, are paying a lot to see a great athlete indulge himself in a personal venture.

But then, nobody forced the Raiders to sign him to that lucrative contract.

The NFL’s top eight ground-gainers of all time are household names in most sports-minded households. Starting with Walter Payton, Tony Dorsett and Jim Brown, the list also includes Franco Harris, John Riggins, O. J. Simpson, Eric Dickerson and Earl Campbell.

The identity of the next two in the top 10 may be a bit harder to guess. They are Ottis Anderson and Jim Taylor.

Another surprise, possibly, is that Anderson, like Dickerson, is still active. The NFL’s 1979 rookie of the year when he was with the St. Louis Cardinals, Anderson, now with the New York Giants, is the 1989 graybeard of the year.

At 32, he is the league’s oldest starting running back.

“Don’t talk to me about age,” he said again this week. “It’s production that matters, not age.”

In Dallas last week, Anderson produced his 8,615th NFL yard, slipping past Hall of Famer Taylor in the top 10.

The Cardinals, who moved from St. Louis to Phoenix last year, apparently are already in trouble in Arizona. They attracted only 44,201 for the San Diego Chargers game last Sunday in a stadium that seats 74,724.

There are three problems: the Arizona heat, the steep ticket prices and a .500 team.

“We don’t have any plans to (lower) ticket prices (again),” owner Bill Bidwill told Phoenix reporters this week.

Bidwill has already made one sacrifice, dropping the cost of the average ticket from a league-leading $38 last year to $36--which still leads the league. “I can’t afford to bring my family,” said Cardinal kick returner Vai Sikahema, a two-time Pro Bowl player. “And I’m making good money.”

Quote Dept.:

--Cedric Jones, New England wide receiver, on quarterback Doug Flutie’s first game back as a starter: “He made a lot of plays when there wasn’t anything there. He wouldn’t let the team quit on offense. And he gave us a spark.”

--Sam Wyche, Cincinnati coach, on Kansas City’s rookie linebacker, Derrick Thomas of Alabama: “We didn’t stop him once all day.”

--Allen Pinkett, running back for the bad-boy Houston Oilers on his 10-yard touchdown run that poured it on Miami at the end, 39-7: “When I get an opportunity to score, I’m going to do it. I’ve always believed that when you’ve got a dog down, you kick it.”

--Al Harris, Philadelphia linebacker, on defensive end Reggie White: “(He) is the best physical specimen I’ve ever seen in a defensive line.”

--Bubby Brister, Pittsburgh quarterback who leads the league in most sacks with 23, on late hits against him: “I’ll bet if it was Elway or Marino or Montana, (the officials) wouldn’t let it happen. I’m just a nobody.”