SPORTS
December 1, 2009 | By Chuck Culpepper
If the Russian metal magnate Mikhail Prokhorov's bid for 80% of the New Jersey Nets seems landmark for its foreignness, just gaze at the motherland. In a United Kingdom whose churning internationalism can make the United States seem cloistered by contrast, foreign ownership of the 20 soccer clubs in the globally towering English Premier League has reached quite a juncture: half. "I'm almost losing track," said Michael Brunskill of the watchdog group Football Supporters' Federation.
SPORTS
July 1, 2009 | By Bill Shaikin
The Lakers just won the NBA championship, and Southern California celebrated with them, with hundreds of thousands of fans attracted to a parade down Figueroa Street and a rally at the Coliseum. There are 122 teams in the NBA, NFL, NHL and Major League Baseball. And Southern California is home to the team that best repays its fans "for all the emotion, money and time fans invest," according to an ESPN study to be unveiled today. That team is not the Lakers. That team is the Angels.
SPORTS
January 27, 2009 | By SAM FARMER
The NFL is willing to consider a return to its Los Angeles roots. Evidently, so are the San Diego Chargers. While the league is kicking around the notion of playing the 50th Super Bowl in L.A. -- where the first one took place -- the onetime L.A. Chargers appear to be inching closer to a possible return to their birthplace. As is always the case with the on-again, off-again saga of the NFL's flirtation with the nation's second-largest market, nothing is written in stone.
SPORTS
April 17, 2008 | By Bill Shaikin
The Angels did not land a lavish new television contract last winter. They did not unveil new luxury suites. They did raise ticket prices but only modestly in comparison with other major league teams in prime markets. And yet their franchise value shot up, way up. The Angels jumped from 13th to sixth in the annual Forbes rankings, in a year no other club jumped more than three spots.
SPORTS
April 17, 2008 | By Sam Farmer
Convinced he can succeed where so many before him have failed, billionaire developer Ed Roski today will unveil plans for a proposed NFL stadium in the City of Industry, aimed at luring the league back to the Los Angeles area. NFL executives have already visited the site, which is near the intersection of the 57 and 60 freeways, and have had several conversations with Roski.
SPORTS
November 9, 2007 | By Sam Farmer
When is Los Angeles getting an NFL team? The answer is simple: It isn't -- not as long as the Coliseum fancies itself an option. It's as clear-cut as that. The league has no interest in moving forward with that stadium, and yet realizes that moving forward on any other project here would be too much of a political headache as long as the publicly owned Coliseum is being promoted as viable. The cost estimates of a Coliseum renovation range from $600 million to more than $1 billion.
SPORTS
October 30, 2007 | By T.J. Simers
Land developer Ed Roski Jr., who was instrumental in the building of Staples Center, has 600 acres, a plan for a new stadium in the City of Industry, and experience in dealing with the confounding folks who run the NFL. Maintaining he's not "nuts" for resuming his NFL quest after the frustrating and fruitless try to win an expansion team for the Coliseum a few years ago, Roski said Monday he will meet with NFL officials soon.
SPORTS
October 23, 2007 | By David Wharton and Sam Farmer
The NFL will send a staff contingent to Southern California within the next month to investigate potential stadium sites that do not include the Coliseum or Anaheim, according to sources inside and outside the league. League officials are known to be interested in Chavez Ravine and believed to be considering an undisclosed location in the City of Industry.
SPORTS
August 23, 2007 | By Lisa Dillman
LAS VEGAS -- Would AEG and Harrah's Entertainment form a partnership for a privately financed $500-million arena project set to open here in 2010 without a commitment from the NBA or NHL? Yes . . . and no. Turns out, it depends on how you want to define commitment.
SPORTS
June 6, 2007 | By Sam Farmer
The commission in charge of the Memorial Coliseum seems at a crossroads: should it keep chasing its NFL dream, or sign a long-term deal with USC? That will be the focus of today's monthly meeting, its last before summer break. Clearly, there are divergent opinions on the nine-member commission, with some not ready to give up on pro football returning, and others fed up with the flirtations that have dragged on since the Raiders left after the 1994 season.