THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, June 23, 1994 TAG: 9406230518
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C10 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JIM DUCIBELLA, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: 940623 LENGTH: Long
``CHARLOTTE GETS NBA TEAM,'' a voice screamed while Richardson worked his way through Charlotte traffic.
{REST} That was April 1987. But while everyone else was celebrating the arrival of pro basketball, Richardson that day ordained himself the man to make Charlotte an NFL town.
It took nearly six years for the wealthy former Baltimore Colts receiver to triumph and NFL owners to vote - unanimously - to place the league's 29th franchise in a city once derisively called ``Atlanta Jr.''
``We have such a diversity of strong-willed people that it is difficult to get a consensus on anything,'' NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue proclaimed after the vote. ``Does it ever happen? On any issue? Rarely.''
But it happened. Some of America's shrewdest businessmen rushed to give the Carolina Panthers to a region known for NASCAR and college basketball.
It happened despite a nationally publicized race-discrimination controversy involving Richardson-owned Denny's restaurants that easily could have swayed the image-conscious NFL to turn its back.
It happened even though Charlotte had no existing stadium and a plan to finance a new coliseum the league's financial experts found frighteningly unacceptable.
Mainly, it happened because Richardson refused to let go. One man. One vision. Unwavering determination.
Yes, money, too. A sea of green. But as Richardson proved, money can be found, somehow, someway. It's commitment that destroys lesser players in the big-league game.
A few weeks after Carolinians paraded to a stadium site Richardson promised will be home to a Super Bowl champion within 10 years, the NFL selected Jacksonville, Fla., for franchise No. 30.
That December night, a helicopter landed at midfield of the Gator Bowl, Jacksonville's cavernous relic of a stadium. More than 25,000 citizens went beserk when J. Wayne Weaver, self-made millionaire and majority owner of the Jaguars, stepped onto the field.
It was a scene eerily reminiscent of August 1979, when about 50,000 football-crazed Jacksonvillians convened inside the Gator Bowl waiting for another helicopter - and an NFL franchise - to touch down.
The passenger that night was Bob Irsay, owner of the then-Baltimore Colts and seeker of a new place for his team to play.
``We want the Colts. We want the Colts,'' the crowd chanted. Irsay smiled, looked around and, a few years later, spirited his team out of Baltimore to Indianapolis.
No matter. Jacksonville was hooked on the pursuit of the NFL, though much of what happened in the 14 years between copter landings seemed as painful as giving birth to a two-ton civic gorilla.
Here are their stories.
JACKSONVILLE
Four other NFL owners would visit Jacksonville after Irsay - Houston's Bud Adams, Atlanta's Rankin Smith, St. Louis' Bill Bidwill, New Orleans' John Mecom. Each proclaimed admiration for the community and Adams and Mecom appeared genuinely interested in northeast Florida.
Ultimately, Adams kept his Oilers in Houston and Mecom sold the Saints to Tom Benson. Bidwill abandoned St. Louis for Phoenix and Smith and the Falcons got the new stadium they wanted.
In 1989, ``Touchdown Jacksonville Ltd.'' was formed to pursue an NFL expansion franchise. Among those involved at the start were Jeb Bush, son of then-president George Bush, and Hamilton Jordan, former chief aide to President Jimmy Carter.
Jacksonville businessman Tom Petway became the managing general partner, though it was clear he wasn't wealthy enough to foot the tab alone.
A young Wharton School of Business graduate, David Selden, eventually was added to Touchdown Jacksonville, or TD Jax, as natives called it. It was Selden who convinced Weaver to join the group in October, 1991.
By March 1993, many of the original partners had dropped out. Expansion fees once estimated at $75 million had doubled.
Then there was the Gator Bowl. Everyone knew renovations were necessary, but most estimates put the price at $60 million. After the NFL inspected the facility in April 1993, TD Jax gradually upped remodeling estimates to $112 million.
Soon after, when the city and TD Jax began negotiating a lease, both parties wanted protection from runaway construction costs. TD Jax also sought protection from construction delays, demanding reimbursement from the city if it couldn't field a team in 1995.
And it wanted the deal done in a month, to correspond with its drive to sell premium seating - 10,000 seats at $1,500 apiece.
In late June, negotiations collapsed. TD Jax representatives stormed out of a meeting and proclaimed the project dead. They blamed Mayor Ed Austin, who insisted the contract include a spending cap for his city.
It took a couple days for council members to convince Austin and TD Jax to resume talks. A week later, a tentative, fragile lease agreement was reached.
But by then, the premium-seat ticket drive was struggling. By July 16, the day sales were first reported to the NFL, Jacksonville had sold barely 2,000 of 10,000 club seats and 18 of 68 luxury suites.
Former mayor Jake Godbolt was summoned by TD Jax to head a 10-day ticket-selling blitz. The city did it, hitting 9,000 sales at the end of the drive, 10,300 total.
Various city leaders participated in the drive, which was crucial because it showed the NFL that there would be enough revenue from club seats to cover the $1.1 million guarantee Weaver agreed to pay each visiting team.
The executive offices of the Florida Times-Union newspaper served as command center. Bank executives, university presidents, accountants, doctors, lawyers, architects - even the paper's publisher - abandoned normal business activities to spur the rest of the community into buying tickets.
In late July, the full city council met to consider the stadium lease. Mayor Austin again proposed a spending cap for the city. TD Jax again rejected the agreement. Again, the project seemed dead.
This time, NFL commissioner Tagliabue and two NFL officials flew to Jacksonville, met with Weaver and urged him to return to the race. Later, Tagliabue called Austin with the same plea.
In mid-August, the lease was completed. The city would pay $121 million for renovations. If costs exceeded that, Jacksonville would lend the money to TD Jax, which would pay it back over 30 years at the tax-exempt bond rate.
Weaver would pay the $140 million expansion fee, along with $75 million in start-up costs, salaries and operations for the first year.
Weaver promised city officials that if they tried to alter the agreement, he was gone for good.
When the deal was presented to City Council in late August, several members raised their hands to propose amendments. Before they could speak, a motion was passed to end discussion.
CHARLOTTE
Richardson began to amass his $100 million fortune when he started Hardee's in the early 1960s. Today, Richardson's Flagstar Companies Inc. owns the Denny's chain and is the nation's largest franchisee of Hardee's restaurants.
Not that Richardson didn't align himself with some powerful financial friends. The 1987 press conference at which he announced he was pursuing an NFL franchise was staged at a hotel across the street from the downtown Charlotte headquarters of NationsBank.
That's where his close friend and NationsBank's chief executive officer, Hugh McColl, makes his office. McColl played an integral role in Charlotte's fate.
He reassembled the core group that had helped George Shinn land the NBA franchise - attorney Dick Thigpen, marketing consultant Max Muhleman and accountant John Lewis.
Richardson also added wealthy investors, including the Belk family of Belk-Leggett department stores.
The Richardson group had two problems - financing the stadium and allegations of racial discrimination at Denny's. Richardson immediately met privately with civil rights leaders around the country to present his version of the story.
Several months later, Richardson and the NAACP agreed to establish targets for minority hiring and promotion within Richardson's business and the Panthers.
Richardson's bid might have come undone over stadium financing. He was against using public funds to build a $160 million stadium, and he planned to borrow from three major Carolina banks. But the NFL said that borrowing the money would kill his bid, because it didn't want its owners carrying that much debt.
In September '92, Richardson unveiled a plan in which fans were required to buy a license - for $600 to $5,400 - for the right to purchase season tickets.
Richardson kept about 10 percent of the stadium's capacity, or 7,230 seats, available for single-game sales. A license was needed for any of the other 65,880 seats.
Richardson stressed the importance of fan support for the plan, and they responded in terrific numbers. They snapped up the luxury suites and club seats the first day. Waiting lists formed for the least and most expensive seats.
When the effort slowed after licenses for 49,000 seats had been sold - raising more than $52.1 million - Richardson persuaded two banks to guarantee $30 million worth of outstanding licenses, if any remained once the Panthers began play.
``It was a terrific gamble, in the sense that we didn't have a backup plan,'' marketing consultant Muhleman told The Charlotte Observer. ``Does the potential of fan participation in stadium construction have a future? I believe it does.''
Near the end of the campaign, Richardson furthered strengthened his position by cutting a request for an exemption from the NFL's revenue-sharing policy. It meant abandoning about $48 million in projected revenue and delaying any return on his investment from about eight years to 12.
But it worked. Downtown Charlotte will be home to a 73,000-seat stadium, built by fans who not long ago thought the closest they'd get to an NFL game was by turning on the television.
{KEYWORDS} MAJOR LEAGUES FRANCHISES
by CNB