Tag: AutoZone Park

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News The Fly-By

Boardwalk Umpire

CREDIT: Allison Rhoades | Memphis Redbirds

In 1997, the times were a-changin’ when it came to Memphis baseball. The Flyer ran a piece in the January 30th issue regarding a proposed new baseball stadium. At the time, the city’s baseball team was the Memphis Chicks — short for the Chickasaws — before they left after the season for Jackson, Tennessee.

Former Shelby County Mayor Jim Rout had jumped on board with the stadium’s proposed downtown location but with some reservations.

“I personally feel that you probably would get more attendance in a suburban ball field,” Rout told the Flyer in 1997.

Dave Woloshin, a former talk radio host for 600 WREC-AM, had been talking about the issue of whether or not to keep the proposed stadium downtown. (He now works at Sports 56 WHBQ.)

“I’ve been absolutely amazed at the support for downtown,” Woloshin said in the story. “I’ve gone on the air saying it’s the biggest mistake they could make.”

Construction began on the AutoZone Park project in 1998 to the tune of $80 million, mostly paid in bonds, in order to house the new Memphis Redbirds minor-league baseball team. The stadium was built to major league standards with luxury suites and more than 14,000 seats.

The first year AutoZone Park opened, more than 800,000 fans walked through the gates into the downtown stadium. Attendance remained high until 2007 — when the economic recession began to take hold — and a steady decline left the Redbirds with only 462,041 fans going to games in 2010. For the next three years, the minor league team would see a small, but steady, rise in attendance. Last season, the team saw 498,362 fans.

“We’ve got to keep in mind that we’ve got a guy in the form of Dean Jernigan, who brought to the table something no one else brought, a Triple-A franchise, and come to the table with a creative idea that no one else had in the nation [making the new Chicks team a nonprofit],” Rout said in 1997. “And he said that he’s got most of the funding.”

Jernigan, who was one of the major forces behind the development of AutoZone Park and the Memphis Redbirds Baseball Foundation, parted with the Memphis Redbirds in 2009 when the foundation missed a bond payment.

The organization owned both the Redbirds and AutoZone Park until recently, when the St. Louis Cardinals began the process of purchasing the minor league team in November 2013. That deal finally closed last week. The City of Memphis purchased the park in January for $24 million. Before the Memphis City Council voted to approve the city’s $24 million purchase of the park, hundreds gathered at a rally in January at AutoZone Park to show their support for the city takeover.

Now, the Redbirds will move forward with a newfound attachment to the Cardinals and the city, staying put in its mainstay downtown location.

Categories
News The Fly-By

Bah, Humbug!

Christmas — the season in which we have traditionally been bombarded with the concept of giving as the supreme example of our embrace of mankind. However, as a beleaguered Memphis taxpayer, I dare to resurrect the words of Charles Dickens’ Ebenezer Scrooge: “Bah, humbug!” For when it comes to merrily endorsing some of the “pie in the sky” projects proposed by the administration of Mayor A C Wharton, I’m not sure whether the beneficiaries of our collective financial outpouring classify as indigents rivaling the undeniable needs of Dickens’ fictional, heart-tugging Tiny Tim.

Les Smith

This realization was brought home to me in reporting on the chaos of a marathon session of the Memphis City Council earlier this month. A dayside committee meeting began with the abrupt cancellation of a scheduled discussion on the progress the Memphis Police Department is supposed to be making on processing more than 12,000 rape kits accumulated over decades. Since the issue surfaced in August, I’ve taken a particular interest in the results. It’s not because I know or suspect someone I know may have been victimized. As human beings, the savagery of the crime should disturb us all, because it transcends racial and socioeconomic lines.

However, after sounding the gavel, committee chairman Kemp Conrad informed those present that the rape-kit report was going to be delayed for two weeks. We would find out later that the Wharton administration had quietly asked for more time due to the possibility more untested kits had been discovered. In his last appearance before the same committee, Memphis police director Toney Armstrong said the processing and testing would cost $4.6 million to complete. But Wharton strongly indicated the numbers could rise and also put forth the concept that more outside assistance might be needed. Granted, this whole project has “sensitive” written all over it, especially since it involves legal ramifications for potential victims and perpetrators alike. This is probably going to cost taxpayers a lot more than has been reported. However, the truth, at whatever cost, would be welcomed.

That same day, some council members were given a “sneak peek” at plans for the creation of the 20-block “Memphis Heritage Trail” downtown redevelopment project. Armed with an animated depiction of what it’s supposed to look like, city special-projects guru Robert Lipscomb spoke about interactive experiences for visitors and monuments dedicated to Martin Luther King Jr. and a commemoration of the 1968 sanitation workers’ strike.

The presentation was harpooned by Councilwoman Wanda Halbert, who succinctly condensed the doubts Memphis taxpayers have continued to express with Wharton’s still unexplained “vision” for this city’s future. To paraphrase her comments: With so many projects —the Fairgrounds, Bass Pro and the Pinch District, Sears Crosstown, buying Autozone Park — are we spreading ourselves too thin financially? Are we overlooking the things that should count, like paving streets, improving parks, and building sidewalks near schools? And although Halbert didn’t include it, the need to process thousands of untested rape kits.

I know Wharton cares about making his vision of “One Memphis” come true. In a June interview with him, he admitted to me that he had to do a better job communicating with council members. He needs to convey the same sense of purpose and direction to a somewhat bewildered public. I understand this city faces the same financial challenges confronting local governments in nearly every city in America. But I suggest to you, Mr. Mayor, that while grandiose projects have their allure, they are overshadowed by the day-to-day demands of life.

If you want to take guns off the street, go ahead and try. If you want to aggressively clean up neighborhoods, then do so. If you want to achieve the moniker we had in the 1960s of being the “Cleanest City in America,” that would be a worthy and possibly attainable goal.

Yes, other revenue sources have to be explored to get us out of our current and ever-deepening budget dilemma. So, why not start a vigorous collection of the millions of dollars owed in parking fines? Why not collect from the companies that owe this community millions in unpaid property taxes? Until there is a determination shown to address the issues we can and should take care of, then all the governmental “pie in the sky” proposals will invoke the same reaction no matter what season of the year: “Bah, humbug.”

Les Smith is a reporter for Fox News 13.

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Editorial Opinion

Time To Step Up

We like Mayor A C Wharton. We appreciate his unmatchably reassuring presence as the head of city government. We are grateful for the sigh of relief he allowed us to take after the several stormy years we experienced under the latter phase of the Willie Herenton administration. But, increasingly, we find ourselves wondering: Can he govern our city as well as he represents it?

The question has acquired some currency of late, both among citizens at large and in local civic and governmental circles. One city hall denizen surprised a Flyer reporter recently by saying: “If [former Mayor Willie] Herenton announced for mayor tomorrow, I’d go door to door for him.”

There is no likelihood of that happening, of course; the former mayor is wholly invested these days in a charter-school enterprise, which he’s struggling to make work, and he seems to be burned out on electoral politics. Moreover, our confidant was and is no Herenton partisan: His point was that the current mayor, for all his initial promise, seems unable to govern effectively.

To preside over ceremonies, yes. To announce exciting-sounding initiatives, clearly. To churn out resonant and quotable sound-bites, sure. (TV reporters, especially, love him for that.) But to get results? Let’s look at the recent record. There was the extravagant signing ceremony last August, on the eve of the 50th anniversary commemorations of the Martin Luther King-led March on Washington, in which the mayor met the media in the company of AFSCME union representatives and the honorably grizzled veterans of the sanitation strike of 1968. His purpose was to announce, at long last, a pension arrangement for the city’s long-term sanitation workers. The only problem was that he hadn’t disclosed any of this to members of the Memphis City Council, who weren’t on hand for the ceremony, didn’t know the details of the proposed arrangement, and were faced with having to unravel them from scratch. Just last week, the council finally brought the pension matter to a vote but found itself unable to approve the increased user fees involved. And without them there would be no new equipment and none of the savings needed to pay for the pensions that were dependent on them and were actually voted on, and … you get the idea.

Add to this fiasco the several recent development projects brainstormed by city housing chief Robert Lipscomb and ballyhooed by the administration but, once again, without the full revelation to the council of the details, some of them debatable, that could make these projects work. Further, there were few responses to the council’s requests for more information.

Now there’s the matter of a proposed purchase by the city of AutoZone Park. From the administration was heard the usual cry of “Act now! There’s no time to waste!” But the council has been there and done that so many times by now that, once again deprived of all the advance details needed to make a decision, it has wisely chosen to postpone the decision.

Mr. Wharton, we like you, but in the wake of these events, it is now incumbent upon you to demonstrate — especially since you intend to run again — that you know how to work with the council to get things done in a collegial, timely, and fully transparent manner.

Categories
Sports

Right Sizing Memphis Sports and Venues

stadium.JPG

The professional men’s and women’s tennis tournaments could be leaving the Racquet Club of Memphis next year for Rio de Janeiro. Big deal or, as one of our commenters succinctly put it, a big yawn?

In the big picture, this is all about “right-sizing” sports facilities and events, from the Racquet Club to AutoZone Park to Liberty Bowl Stadium to public playing fields, golf courses, and amateur sports complexes like First Tennessee Fields and Snowden Grove in DeSoto County. More on that in a minute.

First though, as someone who has played and watched tennis, racquetball, and squash at the Racquet Club for many years, I guess I should be in the “big deal” camp, but I’m not, at least not without qualifications. Teams and tournaments come and go, and this one is 36 years old and has gone by more names than an inmate in the county jail — U.S. Indoor, Volvo, Kroger, Regions Morgan Keegan to name a few. The women’s tournament, ten years old, was sponsorless this year.

If they are replaced, as seems likely, by a “lower-level” pro tournament, the average fan, not to mention the non-fan, won’t notice the difference. Case in point: Andy Roddick and Milos Raonic have been recent finalists in Memphis (a “500” tournament) and, a week earlier, San Jose (a “250” tournament). Above the satellite-tournament level, the strength of the field is determined by convenience as much as anything, and several big names have either failed to show up in Memphis or made an early exit.

The Racquet Club and the tournament are the legacy of William Dunavant Jr., founder of the club, cotton magnate, tennis player, but no longer actively involved in day-to-day Memphis. He sold the club to Mac Winker, who pledged to keep the tournament in Memphis, as indeed he did. Winker sold the club to Sharks Sports & Entertainment in San Jose, which reportedly plans to sell it to IMG, a sports marketing and management company with global connections.

Winker told me that in his early years as manager of the club, the tournament was supported by the club, but that flipped in the later years, and the tournament supported the club and its declining membership. He said his mantra was to make the tournament an event, with a St. Jude tie-in and as much fanfare and as many sponsors (bannered around the stadium court) as could be mustered. Tennis big-wigs such as Barry McKay and Donald Dell were regulars in the boxes, courtside seats were cherished, there was fancy food in the Walnut Room, and sport jackets and dresses were not uncommon for the packed finals. There was no competition from NBA basketball, and American players like Jimmy Connors, Andre Agassi, Jim Courier, Michael Chang, Brad Gilbert, Todd Martin, and Pete Sampras were among the Memphis champions and in the world Top Five.

There are more foreign players in the tournament these days, although Americans Roddick and Sam Querrey have also been recent winners along with Jurgen Melzer and Tommy Haas. But none of them are as well known as the tennis Big Four of Nadal, Federer, Djokovic, and Murray who dominate the Grand Slams.

The women’s tournament lost Cellular South as its title sponsor, and the prize money is less than the men get. The crowds for the women’s finals have been smaller, with the exception of Venus Williams matches. Overall, I think the twin tournaments suffer from “too much tennis” syndrome when you take into account split day and evening sessions, qualifying matches, singles and doubles, action on multiple courts, and $40-$60 tickets.

There is some fear among members that the Racquet Club itself could now be sold along with the tournaments. Giving credence to that, San Jose is clearly calling the shots. Tournament director Peter Lebedevs and Morgan Keegan managing partner Reggie Barnes both told me they got the news on Monday morning, like everyone else in Memphis. Lebedevs had just returned from a trip to Australia and said he couldn’t comment on a possible sale of the tournament. Allen Morgan Jr., one of the founding partners of Morgan Keegan, committed to the title sponsorship for six years and an additional year to fill the breach after the sale to Raymond James. He noted that he once tried unsuccessfully to buy the pro tournament in Atlanta. After a nine-year absence, the ATP tour returned to Atlanta in 2010, but the event is played in a smaller venue with less prize money than Memphis.

Winker, now retired, said he has been contacted by at least one company interested in putting several million dollars into another southern ATP tournament but declined to identify the company or location.

Racquet Club member and commercial real estate investor and developer Trip Trezevant thinks the future of the club is secure.

“If they (the owners) have $8 million in the club including renovations then that is now, just land cost, of $36 a foot which is too expensive for residential. The owners purchased the club to be a tennis club and I am certain that is what they will do. They have done a great job thus far on improving the club. I think we will end up getting a 250 series tennis tournament and still have the same players that we had for the 500 series and they probably got money selling the 500 series which will go back into the club to improve the club. Just a guess.”

While Winker was owner, some courts along White Station were replaced with housing, leaving the club with 11 indoor courts and 16 outdoor courts used by members and the University of Memphis.

To my eye at least, that may still be too many. I’ve seen too many empty outdoor courts on a beautiful weekend afternoon or empty indoor courts at times when they are being lighted and air-conditioned. The three racquetball courts are lightly used, and racquetball, once a Memphis institution, looks like a dying sport. As for squash, all I will say is that I helped bring the former number-one player in the world to Memphis a month ago and drew about five spectators to a free exhibition. These are not called minor sports for nothing.

It wasn’t my first sports miscalculation. Some years ago I got it in my head that outdoor basketball tournaments were a perfect fit for Memphis, but they died after a year or two downtown. Then I went through a baseball phase when my son was growing up and playing at Snowden Grove, USA Stadium in Millington, and Dulin’s academy. First Tennessee Fields filled that need, and there’s plenty of competition from baseball complexes in Jackson, Tennessee, and Jonesboro, Arkansas and Tipton County, Tennessee. AutoZone Park is too big for the Redbirds much less college or high school teams. I had a brief fling with soccer as an American fan favorite, but last week a game between the United States and El Salvador in Nashville, with an Olympics berth at stake, drew about 8,000 fans. And, briefly, I had hopes for the River Kings hockey team and indoor soccer in the Coliseum. I thought the people who go to meetings about bike lanes on North Parkway and other city streets might actually use them. And surely golfers would flock to T. O. Fuller, Riverside, and Davy Crockett when they were threatened. Nope.

I have counted the house at old Tim McCarver, new AutoZone Park, and the 60,000-seat Liberty Bowl on nights when you couldn’t get to 3,000 without kidding yourself. The only regular near-capacity crowds seem to be at FedEx Forum for the Grizzlies or Tigers. And the amateur sport that never ceases to amaze me with its growth in participation is distance running or walking for some cause.

What’s the deal? Big screen televisions. Too many venues. Ticket prices. Fees. Changing habits. Declining neighborhoods. Fitness machines. Sloth. Boredom. Whatever, tennis isn’t the only sport being right sized.

Categories
From My Seat Sports

FROM MY SEAT: Cardinal Baseball, Memphis Style

Busch Stadium in
St. Louis has never looked more like AutoZone Park in Memphis. It’s not so much
the facade, the concourse, or the downtown setting. Rather, it’s the players in
uniform for the Cardinals, a team surprising experts coast to coast by playing
themselves into contention for a wild-card playoff berth, if not the National
League’s Central Division title. And in a time of crisis (read: Albert Pujols on
the disabled list), Memphis Redbird alumni will play a critical role in
determining how long St. Louis remains in contention.

Over the next
month, we’re very likely to see a Cardinal lineup that consists of the
following: Braden Looper at pitcher, Yadier Molina at catcher (or Bryan
Anderson, should Molina end up on the DL, too, after being hurt in a collision
at home plate Sunday), Chris Duncan at first base, Adam Kennedy at second,
Brendan Ryan at shortstop, Troy Glaus at third, Ryan Ludwick in leftfield, Rick
Ankiel in centerfield, and Skip Schumaker in rightfield. With the sole exception
of Glaus, every one of those players spent significant time refining their craft
at Third and Union in downtown Memphis. Add a few pitchers to the mix — rookie
Chris Perez, Randy Flores, and the just-recalled Anthony Reyes, to name three —
and there will be few Cardinal victories that don’t come via the bats and arms
of players we’ve cheered here in the Bluff City.

What can we make
of all this familiarity up I-55? For one thing, it’s a degree of vindication for
the much-criticized Cardinal minor-league system. Having gone 114-174 over 2006
and 2007, the Redbirds have been unsightly, so much so that local ownership has
stubbornly refused to sign the paperwork that will extend the affiliation with
St. Louis beyond 2008. But the cupboard hasn’t been entirely bare, not when
players like Schumaker and Ryan — hardly marquee names during their days in
Memphis — are now helping to win games in the big leagues. (Ryan may prove to be
Kennedy’s ticket out of town, actually. In the second year of a three-year
contract, Kennedy’s production has nose-dived from the level he displayed over
seven years with the Angels, with whom he was the ALCS MVP in 2002. If the
hyper-kinetic Ryan can find a steady approach to playing the Tony LaRussa Way,
he’ll be an everyday middle-infielder in 2009.)=

For most of this
decade, the Cardinals rode a wave of imports to the kind of perennial success
normally reserved for teams with larger payrolls. Edgar Renteria, Jim Edmonds,
Scott Rolen, Jason Isringhausen, Mike Matheny, and Chris Carpenter were all
critical components to the franchise earning five division titles, two pennants,
and a world championship. And they all cut their minor-league teeth for other
franchises. But with the departure of longtime general manager Walt Jocketty
(now in charge at Cincinnati), the Cardinals appear focused on planting seeds
for homegrown stars who can help win now and provide economic flexibility for
the occasional free-agent splash. Looking at the current Memphis roster, Colby
Rasmus (the organization’s top-ranked prospect), Joe Mather (back from two weeks
in the big leagues), and Mike Parisi (back in the Redbird rotation after a stint
with St. Louis) are just three players all but guaranteed to have two cardinals
on their uniform a year from now.

The Cardinals
showed considerable character last weekend, rebounding from a 20-2 drubbing by
Philadelphia Friday night to win the next two games and take the series from the
Phillies. The big blow in Saturday’s win was a two-run homer by Kennedy (alas,
his first of the season). On Sunday, Reyes earned the win in relief when Ankiel
scored with two outs in the 10th inning on a ball hit by Duncan. The location
was St. Louis and the packed stadium was colored the red of Cardinal Nation. But
the faces and flavor of both wins were distinctly Memphis.

Categories
From My Seat Sports

FROM MY SEAT: Warming by the Hot Stove

• The
matchup for the second annual Civil Rights Game is well nigh perfect. The New
York Mets and Chicago White Sox both have minority managers who happened to be
fine infielders during their playing days. New York’s Willie Randolph has had
his team in contention each of the last two seasons, and Ozzie Guillen led
Chicago to the 2005 world championship. Beyond the two managers, each club
happens to have a minority general manager — Omar Minaya with the Mets and
Kenny Williams with the Sox.

In
historic terms, the franchises fit nicely in Memphis, as each was once the
parent affiliate of the Bluff City’s minor-league outfit. My father (born in
1942) grew up associating the Chicks with the White Sox. Luis Aparicio played in
Memphis before enjoying a Hall of Fame career on Chicago’s South Side. Another
White Sox Hall of Famer — Luke Appling — managed the Chicks to the Southern
Association playoffs in 1952 and 1953.

As for
the Mets, they were affiliated with the Double-A Memphis Blues from 1968 to
1973, a period when the Amazin’s won the 1969 World Series and the 1973 National
League pennant. Presuming the game will be televised nationally, having a New
York team in the mix will do wonders for selling the message of the Civil Rights
Game, not to mention the beauty of AutoZone Park. Lots of televisions in the
five boroughs.

• Among
the charms of the Civil Rights Game are the three Beacon Awards. Last March the
honorees were the late Buck O’Neil (Beacon of Life), Vera Clemente (Beacon of
Hope), and Spike Lee (Beacon of Change). Far be it from me to handpick the 2008
honorees, but I’ll take just enough cyberspace to nominate Bill White. A Gold
Glove first-baseman for the 1964 world champion St. Louis Cardinals, White went
on to become the first African-American league president when he oversaw the
National League from 1989 to 1994. He’d be yet another nice fit in what is,
after all, Cardinal Country.

• What a
mess the 2008 St. Louis Cardinals appear to have. (And it’s still 2007, right?)
Former All-Star Scott Rolen has apparently made it known he won’t share a dugout
with Cardinal manager Tony LaRussa (who just signed a two-year contract
extension). With three years and more than $30 million still owed Rolen on his
current contract, the Cardinals find themselves in a position where they have to
move a disgruntled star coming off his third major surgery over the last five
years. Any takers?

If I
were new St. Louis G.M. John Mozeliak, I’d hold the pouting Rolen to his
contract obligations, at least long enough for him to prove what kind of
post-surgery player he’ll be. At the least, this would remove one variable from
an unfavorable bargaining equation. And come the 2008 All-Star break, teams will
emerge with postseason aspirations that will be more willing to discuss
prospects in a deal for the seven-time Gold Glover.

• Though
it may turn your stomach, imagine yourself a lifelong Minnesota Twins fan. In
Johan Santana, you have the finest pitcher of the decade, one on the fast track
to Cooperstown. A pitcher of Santana’s ilk is the most challenging piece to
place on a championship chess board. And he turns 29 in March, just entering his
prime.

Happy
days, right? Nope. The two-time Cy Young winner is too expensive. So a call goes
out to the only two clubs that can afford this kind of asset: the New York
Yankees and Boston Red Sox. Cultivate that farm system all you like, Twinkies,
but the prize crop will be harvested ultimately in the northeast. (Other clubs
have recently been thrown into the mix, but this is merely bargaining strategy
on Minnesota’s part. Should hike Santana’s asking price for the Yanks or Bosox.)

It’s
hardly news that the greenback shapes major-league rosters far more than actual
personnel needs or fan loyalty might, but this kind of team-hopping makes a
mockery of baseball’s class system. Until the sport devises a salary cap — in
one form or another — the haves will distance themselves from the have-nots. And
Twin fans still have garbage bags in their outfield.

Categories
News

PETA Names AutoZone Park In Top 10 List for Vegetarians

Each year, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) ranks major league ball parks according to how much vegetarian fare is offered at the concession stands.

This year, they also surveyed over 130 minor league parks. AutoZone Park came in at number five for most veg-friendly stadium thanks to an abundance of meat-free options.

Redbirds fans can choose between veggie dogs, grilled vegetable panini, roasted corn on the cob, fresh salads, and of course Cracker Jacks and peanuts. And oh and don’t forget those big ass beers — those are vegetarian too.

“When it comes to meeting fans’ demand for healthy, delicious, meat-free food, the Redbirds always have a winning record,” says PETA Assistant Director Dan Shannon. “AutoZone Park’s great vegetarian selection benefits both animals and the health of fans, who will be less likely to keel over from a meat-induced heart attack as they cheer the next Redbirds home run.”

For a list of all veg-friendly parks, go to the PETA website.