Field of Schemes

Sonics co-owner: We wanted OKC all along - wait, are you writing this down?
August 14, 2007

"Throw another move threat on the fire: Yesterday, Seattle Sonics minority owner (and billionaire natural gas mogul) Aubrey McClendon told the Oklahoma City Journal Record that he was 'under a self-imposed gag order' regarding operations of the team - then yammered at length about it, including the statement: 'We didn't buy the team to keep it in Seattle; we hoped to come here. We know it's a little more difficult financially here in Oklahoma City, but we think it's great for the community and if we could break even we'd be thrilled.'" . . . | more

As reported by Neil deMause of Field of schemes, "The British bank Barclays has tied the New York Mets' record $20 million a year naming rights deal [with Citigroup] with a reported 20-year, $400 million contract to dub the new Brooklyn Nets arena the Barclays Center."

Writing for The Brooklyn Paper, Gersh Kuntzman and Dana Rubinstein outline Barklays' rap sheet, which includes being founded on the slave trade, collaborating with the Nazis, doing business with South Africa's apartheid government, and fueling the civil war in the Congo.

As the NBA season gets underway, League of Fans would like to draw attention to the efforts of Stephon Marbury of the New York Knicks for the introduction of his new $15 sneaker, the Starbury One, which he will wear on the court during games.

As Business Week reports:
"'Two hundred to buy a pair of sneakers,' Marbury says, 'that's groceries for the week.' He wants Starbury One's low price to show kids how little it costs to make a high-quality sneaker. 'History is going to say Stephon Marbury changed the game,' he says."

More teams scalping their own tickets. In a column titled "Yankees Show Contempt for Their Most-Loyal Fans," Scott Soshnick of Bloomberg News explains how the Yankees are policing ticket resale websites and revoking season tickets from fans who have sold their unused seats online.

At the same time, the Yankees are planning an operation called Pinstripe Marketplace, which the Yankees describe as "a new and exciting feature which will create a forum through which full season ticket licensees will be permitted to resell their tickets."

George M. Steinbrenner III
Owner, New York Yankees

Dear Mr. Steinbrenner:

So you want to be the man who tears down "the House That Ruth Built." And for what? More profit.

Neither you, nor the city government you pressured, nor anyone else should ever do this to a place so rich in history and tradition as Yankee Stadium. Would the city ever tear down Carnegie Hall? Adding wasteful insult to senseless injury, you command hundreds of millions of dollars in public subsidies and primary neighborhood parkland to support a new impostor stadium.