Well, That Didn’t Take Long

Allen September 22nd, 2005

Yesterday Oklahoma City announced (officially) that the Hornets will play 35 games at the Ford Center in Oklahoma City.  Baton Rouge will get 5 games and a whopping 82 games will be on the road. 

But John DeShazier of NOLA.com is not happy — you’ll have to scroll down to get to the story entitled "Hornets aren’t playing enough games in Louisiana".

Saints fans who felt slighted at the prospect of only having a
realistic chance of seeing their team in person for half of its
allotted home games now appear to have landed a windfall, compared to
Hornets fans who will see their team play about 15 percent of its
available home dates in Louisiana.

…

The money concern is understood. Every fan understands that operating a
franchise is a business, employees must be paid, goods and services
aren’t free.

It’s understood that the opportunity to make money and play in an
NBA-type facility best is presented by playing in Oklahoma City, at a
19,675-seat facility that has more than 3,000 club seats and nearly 50
private suites, rather than in a 13,000-seat college arena which has a
lack of premium club seats and box suites.

There aren’t any date conflicts to play at the Ford Center, whereas
LSU’s weeknight home games overwhelmingly are played on Wednesday
nights, which is the same night the Hornets play many of their
weeknight home games.

And Oklahoma City is providing money to help pay for the Hornets’
relocation and providing cash guarantees in case the team’s revenues
dip.

But even with all those pluses tilted in one direction and the
negatives galloping toward the other, and the fact that it’ll be 10
times the hassle to play at the PMAC than at the Ford Center, the
franchise still should have fought like hell to play as often as
possible in Baton Rouge, to show more allegiance, to reward the fans
from the city that have embraced it.

While I can certainly understand the feelings that Mr. DeShazier is expressing, what are the real prospects of the Hornets playing under the conditions that would have been present in Baton Rouge?  Scheduling conflicts in a smaller area?  What are the chances that any major business "should have fought like hell to play as often as
possible in Baton Rouge"?

He don’t know too much about big business do he?

I hope for his sake that the New Orleans Hornets can return to their original home New Orleans.  I hope for our sake that they remain here in OKC.

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