This is the single most astounding sports business figure I may ever have seen: "We lost $100 million last year," (President of the Portland Trail Blazers Steve) Patterson said in The Business Journal. "The only reason we are still in Portland is because Paul Allen has agreed to subsidize it." http://www.oregonlive.com/sports/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/sports/1077541092169720.xml Paul Allen employees say franchise wouldn't survive in Portland 02/23/04 JOHN HUNT Trail Blazers president Steve Patterson's "power breakfast" last week left many Portland baseball proponents with a bad taste. Patterson and fellow Paul Allen employee Lance Lopes of the NFL's Seattle Seahawks spoke at The Business Journal of Portland breakfast Thursday. Both said major league baseball would not fly in Portland and Patterson said it has been nearly impossible for the Blazers to survive. "We lost $100 million last year," Patterson said in The Business Journal. "The only reason we are still in Portland is because Paul Allen has agreed to subsidize it." Added Lopes: "Baseball's economic model is so broken, to put a team in a town this size, it would have to be greatly subsidized." Patterson and Lopes were being loyal employees, protecting Allen's Portland sporting monopoly, but the statements did raise questions. Just how big is Portland? The factoid tossed around by baseball proponents is that Portland is the largest market in the country with just one professional sports team. A recent study by The Sports Business Journal said Portland was the third-most appealing market, behind Los Angeles and New York, in terms of population base per franchise. So what happens if you add a franchise? Portland would become the second-biggest market in the nation with just two franchises. It would trail only San Diego and be comfortably ahead of Cincinnati, Kansas City, Indianapolis, Charlotte and New Orleans. "The population is large enough, the income is high enough, there's a small issue in terms of closeness to Seattle, but that kind of proximity exists in other markets," sports economist Andrew Zimbalist said. "How viable it is will depend upon the ownership, as is true in so many other cities." According to Forbes Magazine, the Blazers lost $85.1 million last season -- by far the worst among NBA franchises -- mainly because of a bloated payroll. "They can put the Blazers up for sale and I'll find them a buyer tomorrow," said Lynn Lashbrook, a backer of baseball in Portland. "We're not Allentown." This is the second time Patterson has spoken publicly about the viability of major league baseball in Portland. The first was during the journey of Senate Bill 5 in Salem last August. Lashbrook, who said he fought the Blazers and then-president Marshall Glickman in the early days of the Portland baseball movement, said the timing is no accident. The city still is trying to scrape together local stadium financing, the biggest component of which is the business license fee. If Patterson and Lopes can convince business owners that baseball would not work in Portland, then Allen keeps more of the corporate pie. "It all comes from one company, and I hope most people read between the lines," Lashbrook said. Katz ready to make call: Mayor Vera Katz plans on meeting with baseball proponents and city officials this week to help her reach a final decision: Is the stadium finance plan doable this year, in time to lure the Montreal Expos, or is this an episode to be continued? City facilities manager David Logsdon is still hopeful the finance plan can be fleshed out by April, but Katz wants to know whether baseball could be her legacy or whether it will be on the next mayor's plate. Work on the issue at City Hall has been slowed by the still-unresolved ownership issues of the Triple A Portland Beavers and by the fall in projected revenue from Senate Bill 5, from $150 million to $100 million. John Hunt: 503-294-7643; johnhunt@news.oregonian.com
