Ken Kendrick’s baseball business has four year left on the lease to play in the Phoenix-owned venue.
Another extraordinarily rich sports owner has stomped his feet complaining that politicians are not moving fast enough with wheelbarrows of money to build him a new stadium or at least renovate his present home. Major League Baseball’s Arizona Diamondbacks’ owner Ken Kendrick is somewhat miffed that Phoenix politicians are not seeing things his way and have not given him a nine-figure check to do something about his baseball business’s home. Kendrick claims he wants to remain in downtown Phoenix and is willing to spend a half billion dollars to renovate the business’s ballpark but he needs Phoenix elected officials to play ball. Kendrick issued his threat, don’t play ball with me, I will take my ball somewhere else.
“There are other opportunities available. There are other cities that would covet having Major League Baseball,” Kendrick said. “We may run out of time in Phoenix but we hope that won’t happen. I don’t think that the world we live in threats are the right way to do business. We’re community people. Our franchise is a part of the fabric of Arizona. We call it Chase Field ‘Reimagined.’ That is our hope at the moment.” Kendrick has four years left on his lease to use the Phoenix ballpark. Kendrick’s vision for a new place is simple and it is following the latest trend in arena and stadium building or renovation. He wants a stadium-village. Kendrick wants the stadium to be a centerpiece of a complex that would include restaurants, office space, probably some residential places as well as retail space. And possibly having Arizona lawmakers create a special tax district where all of the taxable revenues go into the stadium-village instead of the general fund for the municipality. Kendrick is getting very impatient as Phoenix and Arizona politicians are not helping him.
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