Lightning Owner Jeff Vinik yesterday "finally unveiled his vision for transforming" downtown Tampa with a $1B project that would "add nearly 3 million square feet of space for people to 'live, work, stay and play,'" according to Jamal Thalji of the TAMPA BAY TIMES. Vinik officials said that two of the three new office towers "they want to build won't start construction until they've signed up tenants." The "broad strokes of Vinik's vision have been known for some time: to build a new urban waterfront business district and neighborhood on 24 empty acres he owns around" Amalie Arena. He wants to "create an entertainment district stretching from the Tampa Convention Center on one end of downtown to the Florida Aquarium on the other road." But "beneath that vision is a serious business plan: to create a vibrant economic zone that can provide the corporate and consumer support that Vinik's hockey team has lacked since he bought the Lightning" in '10. However, the plan "has some oddities." The city allowed a working flour mill that employs 35 people and ships 1.5 million pounds of flour a day "to stay long ago, but now looks sorely out of place amid all the new condo owners." But if the flour mill "were to be somehow relocated, that would free up the factory's 3.5 acres and another 6.5 acres of rail lines north of Vinik's development." Thalji: "Were that to ever happen, expect the downtown baseball stadium rumor mill to start anew" (TAMPABAY.com, 12/17). In Tampa, Robert Trigaux writes it was a "feel-great day" for the city. Vinik "is not just another real estate developer," and he has a "powerful team behind him." Microsoft Founder Bill Gates, via his Cascade Investments firm, also "is a major backer" (TAMPA BAY TIMES, 12/18).
INCREASING INFLUENCE: SPORTSNET.ca's Damien Cox wrote despite the Lightning still losing money, upwards of $10M a season, fans "sure get the feeling Jeff Vinik is in the process of changing all that." Vinik said, "I've always operated under the belief that you have to question the status quo. Just because something is thought of in a particular way doesn’t mean it has to be that way. Our mission is to be one of the top franchises in the NHL, and perhaps we will change perception about the non-traditional markets and how they’re viewed." Cox: "You’d be an idiot to bet against Vinik turning the Lightning into an NHL franchise that truly matters." The Lightning are the "one team down South with all kinds of upside." Even more so as the 55-year-old Vinik "tries to engineer a massive, game-changing real estate development in downtown Tampa." Vinik: “Financially, we’re on a much more solid base. The team had been losing a considerable amount of money. Now those losses are down to a much smaller amount." But Cox wrote Vinik "matters as an owner more these days" beyond just the club, and his views "increasingly ... matter in NHL circles." As the league "contemplates new opportunities in Las Vegas, Seattle, and Quebec City, he's now a member" of NHL Commssioner Gary Bettman's exec committee, and "was brought in during the NHL labour dispute two years ago to try and broker a deal with the players when the talks were going nowhere." His views "increasingly ... matter in NHL circles" (SPORTSNET.ca, 12/12).
