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<\/picture>\nErin Hooley\/AP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
The bottom line is that Ishbia, with a net worth valued at $4.3 billion by Forbes, has far more financial wherewithal to help the Sox build a new Chicago stadium, which Reinsdorf has said is essential to keep the team in the city.<\/p>\n
In an interview with Crain\u2019s last year, Reinsdorf, now 89, warned that his son Michael would be obligated to do what\u2019s best for Sox investors when he dies, which \u201clikely means putting the team up for sale.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reinsdorf said at the time that the way to get the most money for the team would\u2019ve been to move it to Nashville, where he had already met with the mayor.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe team will be worth more out of town,\u201d Reinsdorf was quoted as saying.<\/p>\n
Ishbia, 47, got his law degree from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, and is on the board of his law school alma mater. But because his business interests are in Chicago and his home is in the north suburbs, he is far more likely to try first to keep the Sox in Chicago.<\/p>\n
Unless Ishbia is willing to remain at Rate Field \u2014 the 34-year-old publicly owned stadium at 35th and Shields that Reinsdorf has wanted to jettison \u2014 he is likely to consider one of two mega-sites: the South Loop parcel known as The 78, or the old Michael Reese Hospital site in Bronzeville.<\/p>\n
The Chicago Fire have first dibs on The 78 at Roosevelt and Clark, having announced earlier this week that billionaire owner Joe Mansueto has agreed to build a $650 million privately financed soccer-only stadium on nine acres there.<\/p>\n
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<\/picture>\nBrian Ernst\/Sun-Times<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
That doesn\u2019t preclude the Sox from shoehorning their own stadium into that same site. But the South Loop community may be reluctant to welcome two stadiums on a site long promised as Chicago\u2019s 78th neighborhood.<\/p>\n
That leaves the Reese site near 31st Street and the lakefront as the most likely Chicago contender in the Sox stadium sweepstakes.<\/p>\n
The developers of the Reese site recently tried to lure the Bears with a Hail Mary proposal to build a stadium \u2014 with an expansive lawn extending over Du Sable Lake Shore Drive. But the Bears have dismissed the site as too narrow and have turned their focus to Arlington Heights.<\/p>\n
After striking out with the Bears, Reese developers set their sights on the Sox and the Stars of the National Women\u2019s Soccer League.<\/p>\n
State Rep. Kam Buckner, the South Side Democrat whose district includes Bronzeville, urged Ishbia to consider the Reese site, which will remain stuck in neutral until a major anchor can be found.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a gateway between downtown and communities like mine: Bronzeville and Bridgeport and Chinatown. It would serve as a beautiful backdrop for a baseball stadium. I also think that there\u2019s a real opportunity to create some economic activity in Bronzeville and the surrounding Near South Side in a way that sports teams should be doing,\u201d Buckner said.<\/p>\n
Ald. Lamont Robinson (4th), whose ward includes the Reese site, said the 48.6-acre parcel acquired by the city for an Olympic Village that was never built would be a great stadium site. He warned it will sit fallow for years to come without a catalyst.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter years of this project not moving, we have to get it developed. If it is the Bears, which is a priority, or if it\u2019s the White Sox, it will allow us to have retail and a 365-day-a-year environment like Navy Pier. We need that on the South Side. We need retail and housing and places for people to go and have a good time in a safe environment with their families,\u201d Robinson said.<\/p>\n
Robinson joined Buckner in urging Ishbia to consider the Reese parcel, calling it \u201ca great site in a great community that can lift the boats of the South Side.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom the Reese project to the quantum center [at the old U.S. Steel South Works], these would be great bookends for a jolt of economic development on the South Side. It\u2019s a two-fer: it\u2019s a great location, but it will also be a huge benefit to the South Side of Chicago,\u201d Robinson said.<\/p>\n
Last year, Reinsdorf made a show of going to Springfield to pitch lawmakers on publicly financing a new Sox stadium at The 78. He followed up by inviting legislators to tour a makeshift baseball diamond on the site to give them a taste of what a new stadium would look like with a dramatic view of the Chicago skyline.<\/p>\n
Reinsdorf\u2019s plan never got off the ground.<\/p>\n
The man who convinced then-Gov. Jim Thompson to stop the legislative clock and muscle what is now Rate Field through the General Assembly in 1988 to stave off a move to Florida struck out.<\/p>\n
Reinsdorf never said how much money Sox ownership was willing to contribute to The 78 proposal.<\/p>\n
Ishbia has far deeper pockets that could potentially improve the team\u2019s odds in Springfield.<\/p>\n
But Chicago stadium consultant Marc Ganis stressed that a baseball stadium could cost triple the $650 million Mansueto has offered up for his soccer stadium. That puts the potential price tag at around $2 billion.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere will be other markets that are growing that are going to want the White Sox, and the economics of baseball are very different today than they used to be,\u201d Ganis said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to take some public money to keep the White Sox in town one way or another. The economics of baseball are such that the value of being in a large television market have become far less relevant.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even so, Ganis said having a wealthier owner like Ishbia improves the Sox chances of finally rounding the bases to a stadium in a neighborhood instead of the parking lot desert around Rate Field.<\/p>\n
Although the complete ownership transition could be years away, Ganis said it \u201ccertainly is good to have young, well capitalized\u2026 future ownership already decided.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere will be a transition that is already known, and the transition is to somebody who already has a business and a home here in Chicago. That\u2019s all to the good,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
As a new face on the Chicago sports ownership scene, Ishbia starts with a clean slate.<\/p>\n
He will not be encumbered by the political baggage that Reinsdorf created for himself by threatening to move the team to St. Petersburg, Fla.<\/p>\n
When Reinsdorf cracked the door open to moving the team to Nashville last year, lawmakers were not intimidated. They viewed the Sox chairman as the baseball version of the boy who cried wolf.<\/p>\n
As the Bears proved yet again by striking out in the spring legislative session in Springfield, the politics of stadium projects have also changed dramatically since 1988, when Thompson worked his magic to replace Comiskey Park.<\/p>\n
Lawmakers who used an $800 million package of tax increases to help close a $1 billion budget gap, adjourned their spring session without tackling a $771 million fiscal cliff looming for Chicago area transit agencies. Stadium financing for any of Chicago\u2019s sports teams was not on the radar.<\/p>\n
\u201cPublic dollars for a private stadium without public benefit is problematic. We have to shake ourselves loose from that addiction,\u201d Buckner said. \u201cWhen we\u2019ve had these stadium conversations in the last few years, way too often it\u2019s talking about public funding, but owners have not put enough skin in the game\u2026To quote the great American poet Snoop Dogg, `Everybody\u2019s got their cut, but they ain\u2019t chipped in.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sox chairman-in-waiting Justin Ishbia is a private equity billionaire with far more financial wherewithal than Jerry Reinsdorf did to help the Sox build a new Chicago stadium, which Reinsdorf has said is essential to keep the team in the city.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":59815,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb"],"yoast_head":"\n