who cares? i can't understand how people who bash the texans so much for their ineptitude can be proud of being an Oiler fan. what did the Oilers ever give us besides choke jobs year after year?
and I am saying he was part of it....maybe even the culprit, but it took alot of people for that to happen. I have to agree with the other poster, I'm glad it happened. The Titans haven't done anything since, and the Oilers did nothing while they were here. I know the Texans suck right now and the Titans are looking good, but I love the Texans, I am a bigger fan of KC for sure, but I'm not gonna pissed about Tenn wearing the Columbia Blue. It will bring back some great memories. I made a bet about 3 years ago with my brother, Texans will win a Super Bowl before Tennessee. I'm stickin with the Texans.
it was different for me because the Oilers were ALWAYS my team. i grew up with them....the same reason I love the 'stros and the Rockets. The Texans didn't come around until I was an adult. So while the Oilers were chokers...they were my chokers they also were INFINITELY more interesting than the Texans have been. Infinitely more interesting. And they were in the mix for about 8 straight seasons when i was growing up...still waiting for the Texans to put together one "in the mix" season.
Do you know why McLane was the real culprit? Do you know why Adams had almost no choice but to leave (it was either that, or sell the team)?
It's depressing for the Texans. For all the Oilers' embarrassments, better to have loved and lost in skull-crushing fashion in the playoffs, than to have never loved at all.... ....which is why that Tennessee Oilers display is depressing.
I feel ya man, but that's usually how it goes. The history follows the "team". Ask folks from Minnesota or Baltimore....and they had championships. Things really didn't change until the Browns got their sweetheart deal...IIRC.
The Texans should get them as their alternates. I would probably swoon at the awesomeness of seeing the Texans in Oilers gear. A part of me wishes that we had been able to keep the name for the new team, ala the Browns.
The Astrodome is owned by Harris County The prior owner of the Astros sold the team to Drayton McLane prior to the 1992-93 season. With the team, McLane also got the entire lease to the Astrodome - every venue that uses the Dome, including the rodeo, the Oilers, Monster Trucks... ANYTHNG...had to pay rent to McLane, who was subletting the dome to those venues. Now, Mclane's cost to lease from the county was unbelievable low: $808,728.47 per year (plus, 30 days after each lease year, either $125,000 or 2 percent of parking revenue, whichever is greater). The rent that Adams was having to pay McLane was more than double that - he was not only paying McLane's Dome rent for him, he was putting millions of dollars of cash into McLane's pocket. THAT'S why Adams wanted a new stadium. He wanted to pay rent directly to the county instead of getting raped by McLane year after year. But guess who blocked the new football stadium? Drayton McLane (of course!). to quote him, "The Astrodome is still a magnificent facility. It was the first one ever built. If we are allowed to remodel it -- the cost would be about $95 million -- we can make it the premier sports facility in the world." .... well of course he wants to fix up the dome instead of build a new football stadium. He'd lose the Oilers' rent, the rodeo rent... of course he'd want to block that. Here are some direct quotes from McLane: "One thing I know is for sure: No city in the world needs two domed stadiums for athletic facilities." (brilliant, eh? ) "Sure, [the Oilers are] a big part of our income. [But] if they build another stadium, it's not just the loss of the Oilers. They would attract other events that we have now. We would probably lose 30 to 40 percent of our business. It's just not fair for them to build another domed stadium to play basically football in, and have it competing with the Astrodome." Oh, and by the way: every time you ate a hot dog or drank a beer or parked at an Oilers game... that money went to Drayton McLane. Bud Adams had three options: 1) Continue to let McLane rape him on the rent (and concessions!) at the dome, eating away at his team's income 2) try to sell the team to some other poor sap who will soon discover that he's being raped by McLane... which wouldn't happen - nobody would be stupid enough to buy the team knowing the messed-up lease situation. 3) move the team to a city that will deal directly with his ball club. What would you have done?
The only problem that I have with is the 50 years of History and Tradition. That's BS. It's only ten years of tradition for you. If you want to say 50 years of Football, yeah, i got no problem with that.
Oh, and this thread is going to blow up into a piss filled thread, so I better get in my take before it gets r****ded, and get's all "SAME OLD ****TED" up.
Wrong. Houston wanted NOTHING to do with the Oilers or their name. If Houston cared about keeping the Oilers, they would have put up some semblance of a fight. The fact is they were tired of being disappointed, so they didn't care that they left. Please stop perpetuating the myth that Houston would still have the Oilers like Cleveland kept the "Browns" if not for Bud Adams. It's pure crap. Oh, and thanks droxford for the info. Very interesting.
If only the city of Houston was so lucky. Yeah I recall the story behind the Astrodome. Bud Adams is the real culprit. You can also blame then Mayor Bob Lanier who had a disdain for Bud. You can blame Drayton and the Astrodome fiasco but he was just looking out for himself. Anyone remember the all in one stadium he proposed? Of course Drayton didn't go along with that, no way Les went for it either. Bud Adams, quite simply, wore out his welcome. Oh, and Drayton may have publicly vetoed a proposed new stadium for the Oilers, but he wasn't the real reason Bud didn't get his stadium, it was Lanier (and the public tax payer voters) mainly. The Oilers lease on the Astrodome was expiring in a few years anyways so he coud have renegotiated the lease terms with the Astrodome. But of course he wanted his own toy stadium to play with.
Don't forget Bob McNair. Bottom line, Bud Adams offered to pay $69 million of his own money to help build the stadium, and at the end of the day to get the Texans and pro football back to Houston, they had to pay 3-5 times more money, than it would have cost to keep the Oilers. Droxford......you and I see eye to eye...at the end of the day, for the city of Houston..... Bad business decision. DD
