Shaq Teams With Ovitz on NFL Bid

Shaquille O’Neal, former nose tackle, tight end and wide receiver, now following Magic Johnson’s advice to “own things,” has joined Michael Ovitz’s bid to bring the NFL to Carson.

O’Neal, who will be appearing on “Good Morning, America,” “The Howard Stern Show” and other broadcast opportunities this week to promote Ovitz’s plan and his fifth rap album, “Respect,” will join a football ownership group that already includes his boss, Laker Executive Vice President Jerry West, and Johnson.

“I love football; it’s the first sport I ever played,” said O’Neal, who makes his living dunking basketballs for the Lakers. “I remember intercepting a pass my freshman year in high school and returning it for a touchdown and then someone hitting me in the knee late. That was it for my football career.

“But who wouldn’t want to own a football team and be working with someone like Michael Ovitz? Me, wanting to be an entrepreneur, I look at Ovitz and he’s already had that dream career.”

O’Neal called Ovitz, a former Hollywood agent and high-level Disney executive, and asked to sign on after hearing of the project.

“When I first met Magic Johnson, before he had even said hi to me, he told me all this fame and getting your picture taken stuff is fine, but you need to start owning things,” O’Neal said. “As a 17-, 18-year-old kid I didn’t know what he was talking about at the time, but now I do realize what he was saying, and it’s why I have begun to get involved in so many opportunities.”

O’Neal’s involvement adds yet another spark to an Ovitz campaign that has NFL officials for the first time seriously considering a return to Los Angeles, although a city-unified effort from Houston remains a serious opponent. Ovitz will be making a critical one-hour presentation to NFL owners in Kansas City on Oct. 27, asking the NFL to award him an expansion franchise to begin play at the Rose Bowl in 2001 until a stadium can be built in Carson.

Plans for the Hacienda, a 78,000-seat stadium to be surrounded by an entertainment mall, will be unveiled to the people of Los Angeles about 10 days before they are given to NFL owners for their scrutiny in Kansas City.

“This is one of the best cities in the world and it’s time for us to get a team,” O’Neal said. “The ownership group that Ovitz has put together consists of some very interesting, fun and classy guys, and I think it’s a group that can make this idea more real as it’s brought before the NFL.

“I’ve seen the plans, and they’re great, with an arena right beside the highway, a free museum between the arena and mall and a place where families can come 365 days a year.”

O’Neal soon will learn that in football there are no arenas--they are stadiums. But someone else can tell the big guy.

“At our initial meeting, Shaquille just blew me away with his interest,” Ovitz said. “In observing him . . . I think he just personifies everything we’re trying to do with this project. He’s extraordinary with kids, very committed to charitable work, and most important, he is very much into this city and area right now.”

Ovitz’s powerhouse ownership group, which now numbers 10, dwarfs the New Coliseum Partners, which cannot even get its primary money man, Philip Anschutz, to speak out on behalf of the project.

“Phil is still involved with us and we will present our story to the owners and show them everything is in line to do the project at the Coliseum,” said Ed Roski of the Coliseum group. “We’re working to have more [owners] involved, but we’re approaching it a little differently than Ovitz. Ours is a business approach to the process.”

Although Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan has not gone out of his way to help the New Coliseum cause, as the mayor in Houston has done in visiting with NFL owners, Roski said, “I expect the mayor will be going with us to Kansas City. He’s not there 100% yet, but I see no reason why he wouldn’t be there for us.”

Roski and associate John Semcken visited Cowboy owner Jerry Jones in Dallas last week, and they have hired a new finance team and new architect to develop yet another new stadium--in response to Ovitz’s eye-catching plans--that will rely on Coliseum history, much like baseball did in building an old-style stadium at Camden Yards in Baltimore.

“We can build a stadium for $150-200 million less than anywhere else,” Roski said. “And given the [high] franchise fee in Cleveland, if somebody can do the same project, but a lot cheaper, they have a definite advantage.”