Giants, Jets Refuse To Pay For Roof At Meadowlands Stadium

Jets, Giants Not Willing To Revisit Meadowlands Deal With New Jersey

NFL Giants Exec VP & COO John Mara and Jets Owner Woody Johnson “adamantly refused Friday to pay for a retractable roof” on the new Meadowlands stadium, setting up a “possible confrontation” with Meadowlands Sports Complex officials, according to John Brennan of the Bergen RECORD. Mara and Johnson also said that they “won’t accept other revisions in their preliminary agreement” with the state of New Jersey, including a “major boost” in the $5M yearly rent and paying the $30M in infrastructure costs “the state had agreed to pay.” Mara: “I would rather walk away from this deal than be required to put a roof on it. We’re already north of $1[B] in cost (without a roof), and the numbers don’t support it. It’s a bad investment.” NJSEA Chair Carl Goldberg said he and NJSEA President & CEO George Zoffinger “feel passionately about the importance of a roof. If we have a chance to bring Super Bowls and NCAA Final Fours to New Jersey on a regular basis, I think it would be nothing short of criminal for us not to take advantage of the opportunity. It would be hugely embarrassing to everyone involved if five or six years from now we looked back on a completed stadium, and it didn’t have a retractable roof.” Goldberg added NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue “told me that regardless of what teams said, it was the league’s intention to put this facility into a regular Super Bowl rotation.” But Tagliabue clarified those comments by saying, “I said that if a roof was financed with public money, that I would have no objection to it.” Tagliabue also dismissed Goldberg’s point that he would “lobby other owners to provide up to $300[M] in construction loans if the Jets and Giants agreed to spend at least half that amount on a roof.” He said that the loans “are made to finance only profit centers, such as premium seating -– not items like roofs” (Bergen RECORD, 3/11). Mara said that the roof “would cost nearly $300[M], making the ... stadium project prohibitively expensive because the facility would never be able to attract enough additional business to offset the roof costs” (Newark STAR-LEDGER, 3/11).

EDITORIALS: A STAR-LEDGER editorial stated that the state does not have the right “to reopen negotiations simply because it now believes it deserves a bigger chunk of that money.” The Jets and Giants “have proceeded in good faith, moving ahead on a contract they thought was settled. Trying to renegotiate aspects now is not good business practice. Moreover, it sends a terrible signal to others who want to do business with New Jersey” (STAR-LEDGER, 3/12). A Bergen RECORD editorial stated New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine should “examine the stadium agreement down to the smallest detail, to ensure that state taxpayers get the best deal they can. But unless major problems are found, this deal needs to

Forstmann To Make Personal Pitch To Broker Naming-Rights Deal

move forward as soon as possible” (Bergen RECORD, 3/12).

GET IN LINE: SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL’s Mullen & Kaplan report IMG Owner & CEO Ted Forstmann has asked to “personally make a pitch” to the Giants and Jets in the company’s bid to sell the stadium’s naming rights. Sources said that Wasserman Media Group (WMG) “is the front-runner for the naming-rights deal,” as Giants Exec VP Steve Tisch is a “close friend” of WMG Chair & CEO Casey Wasserman. Tisch also has a personal friendship with Forstmann, but he has “downplayed the importance of those relationships in helping either IMG or WMG to seal a deal.” Tisch said, “(Wasserman) is a friend, but I have a lot of friends I do business with.” 16W Marketing Partner Frank Vuono said that his company is also bidding (SBJ, 3/13 issue).