We already know that St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke seems to be willing to do anything to move his team back to Southern California.
And while there are still a ton of hurdles left in the way of a possible relocation to Los Angeles, there are some around the National Football League who are quietly applauding Kroenke’s efforts.
These efforts include a plan to build a state of the art NFL venue in Inglewood, California. The Rams owner bought a 60-acre plot of land in the Southern California city last January, which is approved for a NFL stadium, but the 238-acre lot surrounding it isn’t. That plot of land is owned by Stockbridge Capital Group, who is working with Kroenke to build the new venue.
This plan has reportedly been met with applause around league circles.
“It’s a bold move by Stan,” a league source told NFL Media’s Albert Breer. “Whether it results in a stadium at the site billed by the parties, whether it’s the Rams going in, or a different team, or two teams, that much we don’t know.”
Kroenke originally laid out the plan to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell at an owners meeting in December. And for his part, the commissioner had decided at that point to focus on possible relocation to Southern California after working on the league’s new personal conduct policy, which was obviously placed on the front burner at that time.
As Breer notes, the next two steps are rather simple in nature. The Rams need to provide notice to the city of St. Louis that they are going to a year-be-year lease at the Edward Jones Dome by Wednesday, after which they will likely present the city of Inglewood the 8,500 votes necessary to set up a vote on the project.
While there are still a ton of different obstacles in the way here, the NFL Media Insider did indicate that a potential move by the Rams to Southern California in 2016 or 2017 is “trending towards a likelihood.”
Reports have previously indicated that Kroenke could bypass a league-wide vote that would require 24 owners to approve the move. Based on this new information, that might not be necessary.
The other aspect that Breer points out is that the Rams would be open to playing at Dodger Stadium or the Rose Bowl until a new stadium is finished. And for his part, Kroenke isn’t against sharing the potential venue with another NFL team.
As we have indicated in numerous articles in the past, the momentum clearly seems to be here for a NFL team to move to Los Angeles in the not-so-distant future. It now appears that the Rams are the clear front-runners at this point.
Photo: USA Today