Ovitz, Burkle Pass on Land at Hollywood Park

The final football chapter appears to have been written at Hollywood Park, with Michael Ovitz and Ron Burkle choosing Friday not to purchase a potential stadium site for $55 million.

“The land will now be sold to real estate developers for a housing project,” said R.D. Hubbard, chief operating officer for Hollywood Park.

After the NFL’s decision Wednesday to award an expansion team to Houston, Ovitz and Burkle had hoped to gain league assistance in financing the purchase of 97 acres at Hollywood Park and the cost of carrying the land on the books until developed.

Hubbard, who had not charged Ovitz or Burkle for holding the option on the land the last week, had granted the pair’s request to extend Friday’s deadline to early next week to provide more time for conversations with the league.

But after further deliberation Friday, the extension was deemed unnecessary.

“We’re not going to execute the option,” Ovitz said. “We expect some day to bring a team to L.A., but we couldn’t find a way to make this work as a good business decision without assurances of getting a team from the league.”

Hubbard, consistently flexible in trying to accommodate both the NFL and those courting league favor the last four years, said it had reached the point, “where I could probably care less.

“Realistically, all this should have been done five years ago here,” he added. “It was the right place.”

The NFL said it asked Hubbard what he had planned for the land, with a passing thought to assume the $250,000 option on the property if still available, or purchase it at some later date, but Hubbard said he had three parties ready to buy the property.

“We’ve made our decision and it’s time to get on,” said an NFL official. “I think it’s probably good for everyone involved to just let things settle down for a while.”

What might have been: Four years ago, a press conference was called to announce a deal for a new football stadium at Hollywood Park, which would have served as home to the Los Angeles Raiders. At the last moment, however, there was a breakdown in negotiations, which Raider owner Al Davis blames on the NFL and which is the subject of a lawsuit to be heard in court sometime next year.

Davis announced his team’s move to Oakland shortly afterward and is now suing Oakland for failing to make good on promises that he said lured him there. That trial begins in Sacramento in January.

After the Raiders’ departure, a hotel standing on the southeast corner of Prairie Avenue and 90th Street, across from the Great Western Forum, was imploded to make way for the construction of a new stadium, the expectation being that it would entice an existing NFL team to move to Inglewood.

That never happened, although Hollywood Park was ready to build, having filed an Environmental Impact Report and been promised public money from the city of Inglewood.

Interest in Hollywood Park resurfaced only in the last few weeks, after the NFL had turned away from the Coliseum and begun courting billionaire Marvin Davis as a prospective owner. When Davis failed to make good on promises to several NFL owners, Ovitz tried to make the deal work, by assuming Davis’ option on the Hollywood Park land, only to fall $300 million shy of Houston’s best offer.

“I thought all along this was the right place,” Hubbard said. “But I think Los Angeles messed up in this process, and I think the NFL messed up. And now I don’t think we will have a football team in Los Angeles for a long time.”