Musketeer Madness

This guy's an idiot in terms of what a college basketball team needs. The McCormick Place was never a good location for DePaul, and he blows off a key issue (available playing dates) for DePaul at the UC, plus the UC would have kept all the parking, concessions, etc., money.

Well can't DePaul always change its mind and accept the UC's offer? The UC offer will always be there, right? It doesn't sound like there is anybody else competing with DePaul to use the UC when the Bulls and Blackhawks aren't using it.

39, see my above post, and previous post(s) re the lack of available playing dates, in addition to the monetary issues.

Between the Hawks, the Bulls, concerts, etc., the UC was only offering DePaul 4 open dates in February, for example, which is a big month for college b-ball.
And do you think that DePaul is going to bump the Bulls and Hawks for prime nights? Hardly. Think if X could only play on 4 days at the Cintas in February, and the days were all Mondays. That would suck.

The UC offer sounds good if you give it no thought, but it actually is NOT a good idea at all.

Not being a Chigagoan, I have no feel for this. I will say that when X was at the Gardens, they did not get to practice there often because of the ice. And X was competing with only one other tenant, the minor league hockey team. They had to practice a Schmidt. Not being able to practice where you play is very detrimental to the home court advantage. I'm sure the Demons would be best served having their own facility for all the reasons Neutral mentioned as well as being able to practice there. From the standpoint of competing with X, I'm fine if they go to the UC.

Mr. Neutral wrote:39, see my above post, and previous post(s) re the lack of available playing dates, in addition to the monetary issues.

Between the Hawks, the Bulls, concerts, etc., the UC was only offering DePaul 4 open dates in February, for example, which is a big month for college b-ball.
And do you think that DePaul is going to bump the Bulls and Hawks for prime nights? Hardly. Think if X could only play on 4 days at the Cintas in February, and the days were all Mondays. That would suck.

The UC offer sounds good if you give it no thought, but it actually is NOT a good idea at all.

I agree that there are problems with the UC for DePaul, but the UC offer will apparently always be there.

I thought the article was misleading in that respect, the article made it sound like this offer from the UC was the UC's final offer.

When does the Finkl site go on the market/get listed for sale?

The UC offer may or may not always be there, but trust me, Jerry Reinsdorf (primary owner of the White Sox and Bulls) is not making it in any way to help DePaul. He's just trying to fill more dates for his own place while keeping most of the money, and DePaul would be left with the ***** dates and playing in an arena that's MUCH too big for it. They don't need to be playing in a 20,000-seat arena; they need something Cintas-sized, give or take a few seats.

And maybe it's hard for you out-of-town guys to understand, but the aggravating thing is that DePaul's handling this exactly like they handled their entrance into the Big East. Did DePaul step up recruiting, bring in an energizing coach, get a marketing program in gear? Nope, they did not. They've been living off the BE ever since they joined it, while offering their fans very little reason to come out and see them.

If they really want to get a suitable arena situation, they have to do what X did, go to the alums, tell them it's going to cost X dollars, raise the money, and build it. Instead, they're basically looking for handouts and table scraps, and giving themselves only the best of bad options to choose from. Trust me, this is not being handled well at all, which is another reason that their AD, Jean Ponsetto, has to go.

Neutral I believe I understand the situations you talk about and it is difficult for DePaul versus what X did for a few reasons. First, the Cintas is able to use the arena for other dates without near the competition that Chicago would provide. Second, the conference center at the Cintas is a money maker (so I have heard). Third, the Cintas was made possible really by two major events: 1) a VERY generous gift from Bob Kohlhep and his father in law. (My understanding is that the Cintas name was in effect "given" to Cintas by Bob and his father in law so that no Cintas money went in to the arena. There were rumbles of some atheists and anti-Catholics putting up a fuss if Cintas put any money in.) I believe their combined contribution was in the area of $9 million. There were other specific gifts also (see the names on the wall on the entrance by the parking lot at the head of the steps down to the arena level) but not in that magnitude; 2) the concept, which was still new at that time, of premium seat licenses which in effect allowed X to borrow a significant amount of the cost and effectively pay it off with the seat licenses. And once the debt is paid off (not too long from now I believe) the seat license money flows to the AD or the school.

Add to that the fact that the cost of constructing a similar arena now (instead of 15 years ago) is substantially greater than before. I believe the Cintas was in the area of $43 million.

This is all coming from my memory so if I have any of my facts wrong, please weigh in and correct me.

But they do have some good news.
http://seasonpass.suntimes.com/news_art ... _id=599124