Speaker 1: Thirty here I fifty five KERSD talk station normally doing
Speaker 1: a Daniel Davis deep dive. We thought that was gonna
Speaker 1: happen today. Hey know, they had some vacation and if
Speaker 1: people didn't let us know about that. But we do
Speaker 1: have a wonderful substitute today. Haven't talked to Jason Williams
Speaker 1: from the Cincinni Inquirer and quite some time. We used
Speaker 1: to have regular college conversations back when it did his
Speaker 1: politics extra column. But he does a wonderful job as
Speaker 1: a sports writer for the Cincinni Inquirer. Jason, welcome back.
Speaker 1: I'm laughing about your column, man. I I was just
Speaker 1: telling my listeners I ran in a Moeggar yesterday. We
Speaker 1: were both at a golf outing. It's a charity golf outing,
Speaker 1: and I was talking to mo about the new locker
Speaker 1: room at Pey Course Stadium. I said it looks like
Speaker 1: a discothech and he started laughing and he said, you
Speaker 1: know the thing about it, he is the players didn't
Speaker 1: even really seem to care, and they put all this
Speaker 1: money into new locker room. And the players that were
Speaker 1: interviewed were like, yeah, okay, like whatever, you know, it's
Speaker 1: got a place to hang nice stuff and take a shower.
Speaker 1: That's all I need. I mean, they could use a
Speaker 1: high school locker room and it had the same overall
Speaker 1: value as the discotheque that they have now. Anyway, should
Speaker 1: the sub should Cincinnati Bengals follow Brown's lead, look at
Speaker 1: stadium in suburbs, Let's ditch pay Course Stadium and run away. Jason,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry to laugh about it, but we're talking about
Speaker 1: a two billion dollar price tag, which also is in
Speaker 1: and of itself comical.
Speaker 2: Well very much so, you know. I mean, that's that's
Speaker 2: that's the trend though in the NFL right now are
Speaker 2: people looking at building new stadiums. Obviously in Cleveland, they're
Speaker 2: actually going to build a new stadium. In Nashville, in
Speaker 2: their stadium there's only a year older than pay Corpse Stadium.
Speaker 2: They're building a new stadium in Buffalo. They in fairness,
Speaker 2: they need one. I mean, that's a fifty over a
Speaker 2: fifty year old stadium or over fifty years old. But
Speaker 2: that's kind of the thing right now. For all these
Speaker 2: stadiums that came in in the late nineties early two thousands,
Speaker 2: you're looking at uh nearly a billion dollar price tag
Speaker 2: for overhauling them or do you look at building a
Speaker 2: new stadium. So I literally I just saw some buzz
Speaker 2: about it. I heard a little bit about it again,
Speaker 2: just people talking about it. I was just kind of like,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna I mean, could this even ever happen and
Speaker 2: just raise the question about it? Really? Really? Uh, I
Speaker 2: mean it would It would be pretty crazy to think
Speaker 2: all the money it's been put in the pay Corse
Speaker 2: Stadium and but this is just it's not a far
Speaker 2: such thing to think about. Again because of what I
Speaker 2: just said. But at the end of the day, I
Speaker 2: just don't see it happening because you know, really, the
Speaker 2: Brown family, uh there, they're gonna be really they're gonna
Speaker 2: be asked to put up a lot of money for this,
Speaker 2: and they're gonna be asked to put up a lot
Speaker 2: of money for the overhaul pay Corpse Stadium. But I
Speaker 2: just don't. I think I think that's where the conversation
Speaker 2: would start and stop right there is I just don't.
Speaker 2: I can't see them willing to put in kind of
Speaker 2: money that's going to take to build a new stadium.
Speaker 1: Well, let me ask you this, just being practical as
Speaker 1: I am here, why do we feel the need generally
Speaker 1: the so called the owners of the teams or or
Speaker 1: whatever whot is demanding all of these so called upgrades
Speaker 1: that are so damned costly a billion dollars. I understand
Speaker 1: taking care of what you own. It's something I really
Speaker 1: implore the City of Cincinnati elected officials to do with
Speaker 1: regard to our roads before they go building more stuff
Speaker 1: and things. But a road works if you keep it maintained.
Speaker 1: It doesn't need to be changed or altered. It provides
Speaker 1: the core function, which is to serve for my car
Speaker 1: to drive down. The pay Corpse stadium works. You can
Speaker 1: play football there, you can buy stuff there outrageously priced, yes,
Speaker 1: twelve dollars for a beer and seven dollars for a
Speaker 1: cheese cony. But it works. What's so wrong with it
Speaker 1: that it needs all kinds of huge upgrades maintenance improvements?
Speaker 1: Are people no longer going to attend a football game
Speaker 1: because we don't have a bigger jumbo tron or a
Speaker 1: better locker room? This all seems so superficial and shallow
Speaker 1: air frankly pointless.
Speaker 2: Well, at the end of the day, it really is.
Speaker 2: I'm oh, yeah, I agree. I think a lot of
Speaker 2: this is just like it's just the price. It's it's
Speaker 2: what it's what the NFL wants, it's what the demands
Speaker 2: across the NFL. So any of these I mean at
Speaker 2: the end of the day, like if the lease is
Speaker 2: coming up in twenty six, so the Bengals have the
Speaker 2: leverage here to say, Okay, well this is what's happened
Speaker 2: across the NFL, and all these stadiums that were built
Speaker 2: in a similar time, well, their leases are coming up too,
Speaker 2: and this is what all their peers are asking for.
Speaker 2: And you know, in new stadium stadium upgrades. But a lot,
Speaker 2: a lot of this is a lot of this is
Speaker 2: window dressing. I guess it's not. It's not hardcore, Like yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: there are I guess. I guess again, Like, you know,
Speaker 2: for a thirty year old what is it twenty five
Speaker 2: it was build in two thousand, so twenty four year
Speaker 2: old building, Like you know, are there some things that
Speaker 2: need to be upgraded? Like yeah, but is it anything
Speaker 2: massively wrong with the building that it requires like up
Speaker 2: toward a billion dollars worth of uh, you know, overhaul
Speaker 2: and bell A lot a lot of that stuff would
Speaker 2: be bells and whistles types of things like you know,
Speaker 2: they just pump up thirty nine million dollars into I think,
Speaker 2: you know, just new They put new new seats in
Speaker 2: the club level, and then they're redoing, like they expanded
Speaker 2: the bridge outside the stadium. I mean a lot of
Speaker 2: that stuff. Did you really have to have the bridge expanded?
Speaker 2: Did you really really have to? I mean, I mean really,
Speaker 2: I mean it's gonna alleviate some pedestrian traffic, you know,
Speaker 2: eight days a year, but uh, did you you know
Speaker 2: you mean no? Right? I mean right, I mean you know,
Speaker 2: what is there like eight eight, nine, ten games in
Speaker 2: a couple of concerts, I mean, you know, a dozen
Speaker 2: dozen days a year? Sorry for my math there, Yeah, right, Like,
Speaker 2: but that's really what this. I mean, how many years
Speaker 2: did Riverfront Stadium go? And like did they rip out
Speaker 2: all the infrastructure inside and redo all of it over
Speaker 2: the years? I don't, I don't remember, but yeah, right,
Speaker 2: I'm just saying, like this is this whole wave of Okay,
Speaker 2: well you got all your new stadiums twenty twenty five
Speaker 2: years ago, and now here comes the wave again of like,
Speaker 2: well it's either a new stadium or it's a really
Speaker 2: really overhauled stadium and construction costs. That costs even more
Speaker 2: to build the original thing. It's just really crazy. It's
Speaker 2: it's not just going on here. I think it's a
Speaker 2: little more of a touchy issue here because of how
Speaker 2: much money the pack taxpayers have paid versus some other
Speaker 2: places the taxpayers didn't have to bear it as big
Speaker 2: of a burden, and some other NFL cities so hearly
Speaker 2: certainly have.
Speaker 1: Jason Williams was one of the great points you made
Speaker 1: in the article. The Brown family, apparently this is their
Speaker 1: sole source of revenue. They're not multi multi billionaires like
Speaker 1: so many the other NFL team owners. Those guys or
Speaker 1: ladies as the case may be, or corporations or groups
Speaker 1: of individuals can afford to put their own money where
Speaker 1: their mouth is and pay for it themselves since they're
Speaker 1: the ones that reap the financial benefit of the ball
Speaker 1: the game's being played there. Fine, that's private industry and market.
Speaker 1: That's the way it's supposed to be. The idea that
Speaker 1: a private entity, a sports team is calling on the public,
Speaker 1: the taxpayer, to shoulder the burden of all these crazy upgrades,
Speaker 1: and I think you and I agree, most of which
Speaker 1: are completely unnecessary. Bells and whistles just to keep up
Speaker 1: with the other guy. Kind of like a small Genitalia
Speaker 1: thing going on here, Jason. But that is what is
Speaker 1: bothersome and troubling to me. And I think to most people,
Speaker 1: they're still going to go to the football games if
Speaker 1: they love the Bengals health. I think they go to
Speaker 1: the Cincinnati Gardens if it still existed, if the football
Speaker 1: if Bengals are going to play there, that's fan loyalty
Speaker 1: to play.
Speaker 2: But if the Bengals are going to win, it's all
Speaker 2: about winning. Bryant, Well, how about games winning? No one cares,
Speaker 2: No one cares really where they're playing.
Speaker 1: Well, they're paying Joe Burrow a lot of money. Maybe
Speaker 1: they should put their resources into paying more, bigger salaries
Speaker 1: and recruiting better talent. I don't know, Jason, I don't
Speaker 1: disagree with that.
Speaker 2: Hmm.
Speaker 1: Maybe that's a better expenditure of money. Oh my, it's anyway. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I just want.
Speaker 2: To add, like I do I you know, really, I've
Speaker 2: been around the NFL and I've seen some of these places.
Speaker 2: I've been to Buffalo, I've been to Kansas City, and honestly,
Speaker 2: like if you could go back twenty five years old,
Speaker 2: longer than that in the mid nineties, and if there
Speaker 2: would have been more of a vision cast, like the
Speaker 2: stadium probably would have been better off, you know, building
Speaker 2: in the suburbs somewhere, And of course that would of
Speaker 2: there would have been a whole other wave of people,
Speaker 2: you know, complaining and oh, we're losing the Bengals to
Speaker 2: Warren County. And you know, I know it's there's always
Speaker 2: going to be adversity or a fight on any side
Speaker 2: of this that you would go. But I think for
Speaker 2: some reason, for some reason, the Bengals said we're going
Speaker 2: to move to Warren County by the Tennis Center, I'm
Speaker 2: just choosing that. I don't know if that's enough plot
Speaker 2: of land, but I honestly don't think. I mean, there
Speaker 2: would be some Hamilton County politicians or political insider type,
Speaker 2: so it'd be like, oh, no, we can't let this happen.
Speaker 2: But I think for the most part, certainly Hamilton County
Speaker 2: taxpayers and fans, I don't think with care. Then of
Speaker 2: course you got Warren County taxpayers might be pretty upset,
Speaker 2: but at least I think it would be a zero
Speaker 2: it'd be a zero sum game and it wouldn't be
Speaker 2: this big. I don't think it would be this enormous,
Speaker 2: like oh my gosh, we're losing the Bengals or anything
Speaker 2: like that.
Speaker 1: No, I and I agree with you on that. Hell,
Speaker 1: if they could building in northern Kentucky, the Greater Cincinnati
Speaker 1: Airport is in Kentucky. Parenthetically, it doesn't get people from
Speaker 1: going there or laying claim to it. The Cincinnati Bengals
Speaker 1: could be in any part of the general tri state
Speaker 1: area and they'd still be the Cincinnati Bengals and people
Speaker 1: wouldn't feel like they got stabbed in the back because
Speaker 1: of a threat to take the ball and run away
Speaker 1: to some other with it like some of the other
Speaker 1: teams have done. That does not show any respect for
Speaker 1: the fan. It is a complete nuking of the goodwill
Speaker 1: that they might otherwise have, as is demanding the taxpayers
Speaker 1: pay for all these bells and whistles and upgrades that
Speaker 1: really aren't necessary to play the game. Jason Williams Cincinnati
Speaker 1: dot COM's where you find Jason. He's a wonderful sports ride.
Speaker 1: You should follow what he writes on in the enquiry.
Speaker 1: Do that at Cincinnati dot Com. Jason, you know you're
Speaker 1: always welcome on the program. I enjoy our conversations. I
Speaker 1: just appreciate the lighthearted nature of this one. And in
Speaker 1: spite of the practical financial reality that's going on here,
Speaker 1: take care of my friend. We'll talk again soon. Ho
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