Modell Can Go, Browns to Stay

The payoff for scratching, clawing and trying to hang onto an NFL team was set at about $58 million Thursday night.

Los Angeles received only a wave goodbye from the Raiders and the Rams when they departed, but the NFL’s finance and stadium committees unanimously endorsed a plan, which will be voted on by NFL owners today, that will guarantee Cleveland needed funds for a new stadium and a team by the start of the 1999 season.

The city of Cleveland has already set aside $175 million from taxes on alcohol and tobacco for the construction of a 72,000-seat stadium.

The NFL agreed to advance Cleveland up to $48 million for the construction of a new stadium and will insist on Browns’ owner Art Modell chipping in more than $9 million in damages in exchange for letting the team immediately go to Baltimore without threat of continuing legal action.

Modell’s team must leave the Browns’ name and colors behind and adopt a new nickname in Baltimore.

The NFL has promised Cleveland an expansion or relocation team, and in exchange for a very favorable lease to a projected $230-million stadium on the existing site of Cleveland Stadium, the owner of that expansion or relocation team will have to repay the NFL up to $48 million in advance money.

The agreement also stops the NFL from placing a team in Cleveland that has breached its lease elsewhere, thereby eliminating a team such as Seattle. However, any team that is not encumbered by a lease will now have the leverage to force its city to compete with Cleveland. With that in mind, if the Seahawks win their legal release from Seattle and move temporarily into the Rose Bowl, there would be no stopping them from jumping to Cleveland in 1999.

The precedent-setting move should also encourage Seattle to wage the good war to keep the Seahawks, thus setting the stage for a payoff of their own if the team reaches a compromise and moves to Los Angeles.

Such an agreement with Seattle, freeing Ken Behring to come to Los Angeles, would also clear the way for Michael Ovitz, Walt Disney Co. president, to become partners with Behring without fear of retribution from the people of Seattle.

Cleveland Mayor Michael White, who fought to keep the Browns, called the settlement a “victory for the people of Cleveland,” although they won’t have a football team for the next three years.

“There are a few teams in this country that are special--the Green Bay Packers, the Pittsburgh Steelers, the Chicago Bears and the Cleveland Browns,” White said. “We get to keep the Cleveland Browns.”

NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue and Modell did not make themselves available for comment, although John Moag, chairman of the Maryland Stadium Authority, reported Modell was very pleased with the agreement.

“I wish that policy had been around a dozen years ago,” Moag said, referring to the Colts’ move from Baltimore to Indianapolis.

Modell will still have to pay a relocation fee to the league comparable to the $28 million paid by the Rams. Like the Rams, however, Modell will pay that fee from the money raised in the sale of personal seat licenses to the new stadium he will be moving into in 1998.

“As soon as some of this snow starts to go we’ll start building,” Moag said. “I would expect to see the team coming in later this week.”

NFL owners are expected to muster the required 23 votes to approve the move today, and the Cleveland City Council is expected to approve it later this month.

BILL PLASCHKE: NFL owners have plenty of good reasons why the Seattle Seahawks’ proposed move to Southern California will never happen. C10