To: Spruce
Metropolitan Stadium was a park that died before its time because Cal Griffith was looking to pinch every last Lincolnhead he could pinch. A lot of people today don't realise how and why Griffith stuck the Twins in the Mentaldome - the world's biggest gasbag got built in the first place because the Minnesota Vikings threatened to leave Minneapolis unless they got a new domed stadium on the taxpayers' dime, and Minnesota's grand high muckety mucks fell for it hook, line and stinker. The place was designed and built primarily for football and made merely "adaptable" for baseball. Griffith was offered what amounted to a free lease - and, as you might imagine, Ol' Cheapskate Cal went for it hook, line, and stinker. And stinker it was - Cal was so bent on saving the bucks he didn't bother to read the fine print, which among other things guaranteed every last dollar generated by every last Metrodome event's concessions, parking, and sundry incidentals going to the Vikings, including luxury boxes, with the Twins getting peanut shells at best. And thus did Metropolitan Stadium, still a young park, go before its time.
4 posted on
09/05/2002 8:51:34 PM PDT by
BluesDuke
To: BluesDuke
I seem to recall the Metrodump was financed by a "Temporary" 1/2% sales tax which still exists today.
5 posted on
09/06/2002 5:51:01 AM PDT by
Spruce
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