Play to Win, NFL

Make no mistake about this: It would be great to see a National Football League team in Los Angeles again, and many local power brokers are doing all they can to make that happen. The Times continues to back the effort, for what it can mean to the region and to downtown revitalization. But as the days slip toward a supposed hard and fast September deadline set by the NFL’s owners, it becomes apparent that the league continues to be unrelenting in its demands for more public money to bring a team here. This is a no-win strategy.

The league is hoping that someone prominent will cave in, even though it really does need Los Angeles more than the city needs pro football. The NFL wants a quick groundswell of support to boost the already stunning amount of money that it would reap.

Here’s one more effort to explain why that isn’t going to happen here.

The owners need only look at what occurred in 1997 during the process of acquiring a sports arena in downtown Los Angeles, and at what happened when the press for public money got out of hand. City Councilman Joel Wachs saw a political wave and hitched a ride. He forced through a clause that tightened the contract negotiations and stifled the public money pitch by threatening to take the matter directly to the voters.

Wachs had something to say Friday after NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue was dismissive of a $150-million public money package from the state-appointed negotiator, Bill Chadwick. “I’m waiting in the wings,” the councilman responded.

There’s more. The league says more local investment is needed to make a Los Angeles franchise healthy and competitive. But everyone west of the Rockies knows how the NFL really makes its money: with $17-billion television contracts and through the insane rise in the cost it imposes for a new team. In 1995, the NFL’s Philadelphia team was bought for about $185 million, according to state officials. Here, the stadium and team figure to go for $900 million. And the league wants more public money than the hundreds of millions of public dollars that have been committed through improvements in the nearby freeways, Exposition Park structures and the Coliseum. Using tax money generated by ticket sales or by the development itself is one thing, but expecting government to open up the public coffers is another.

California isn’t like other places. While this region is not willing to hand over lots of public funding as others have, the league knows that what Los Angeles does offer is what will be most valuable in the future: the nation’s second-biggest media market, one that’s growing.

We want professional football to return to Los Angeles. To make that happen, the NFL, the Los Angeles ownership group and various public officials must play smart in this negotiation. That means not making demands that alienate the most important members of the team--the fans.