Third take. Third withdrawal. Take off your helmet, put away your poles, turn off the lights. The game is over.
There won’t be a new ballpark or major league club in Montreal anytime soon. The project’s promoter, Stephen Bronfman, was aghast Thursday, hours after Major League Baseball turned down its concept of a joint-custody team with the city of Tampa.
“We believed so much in this sister city plan with Tampa. We don’t have a plan B, ”he admitted frankly. “Disappointed”, “exhausted”, “upset”, Mr. Bronfman added that he had not “spent five minutes thinking about something else”.
Two observations.
• No plan B? It’s stunning. For years, everyone in North America has called the sister cities project “ridiculous” and “insane”. And that’s the release version. Even Stephen Bronfman’s most die-hard defenders were convinced that joint custody was plan B! But no. The consortium had no intention – or means – of acquiring an expansion team for US$2.2 billion.
• Opposition was expected to come from here. Community groups. From opposing promoters. From the City of Montreal, which had a right of veto over the allocation of the land. From the Government of Quebec, courted to finance the construction of the stadium. Not even. The fatal shot came from a valuable ally, the Major League Baseball board, on which sits Stephen Bronfman’s partner in this adventure, owner of the Tampa Bay Rays, Stuart Sternberg.
Surrealist.
“Stuart is due to sit on this committee in three weeks. I don’t know how he’s going to do that,” said Bronfman, who received no explanation for Major League Baseball’s refusal. I asked him if, at least, he had had the opportunity to defend his project with the decision-makers.
” Me ? Never, no. We always went through Stuart. It was he who presented it with its president. Stuart is on the executive committee. He was the one having the discussions. In the end, it was pretty hard for him too. There wasn’t a lot of engagement. It’s difficult when we [nous dit] : go go go, not go. When you only have beliefs. Maybe one day we will know more. »
***
For years we have been asking the Montreal Baseball Group for more transparency in its procedures. Not just us journalists. Politicians too. I quote Mayor Valérie Plante last month: “There is enthusiasm, interest. But there are also fears. We need to have concrete elements so that Montrealers and Quebecers can say whether it is a good idea or not. »
Today, we better understand the prolonged silence of Stephen Bronfman and his partners.
They too were waiting for answers. Clues. A major leaguer’s beacon call. They weren’t holding the helm. They were just passengers on deck, searching for the Promised Land through thick fog.
For the baseball fan that I am, the end of the adventure is disappointing. Baseball, I eat it. It’s the sport I grew up in. The sport in which I started my career as a journalist. The sport around which our family holidays revolve. I spend my summer evenings in the stadiums of Côte-Saint-Luc, Laval and Saint-Lazare. I could see myself in the new stadium, with my family, on a cool September evening, with two hotdogs, a sweater and an orangeade.
As a taxpayer, I was even open to financial assistance, within reason. On this side, I console myself by noting that at least we have not repeated the error of hockey in Quebec.
Our elected officials had the wisdom and the prudence not to invest hundreds of millions in the construction of a new stadium or to give away the most coveted land in the city center, without a written guarantee. Written guarantee that the Montreal Baseball Group, despite all the will of the talented people who worked there, was never able to provide.
Will there be a sequel in 5 years? In 10 years ? In 20 years ?
May be. I wish. After all, as Yogi Berra said, in baseball, it’s not over until it’s over.
You still have to have the chance to go to bat.
