Angels’ ‘for sale’ sign raises stadium questions for Anaheim

As baseball fans wonder who might become the Angels’ fourth owner in the team’s 61-year history, Anaheim officials and residents are reacting to the news that Arte Moreno may sell the franchise with questions of their own.

When might Angel Stadium get some improvements? Can the city make a new deal to develop the acres of parking lots around it? And what about the team name?

Angels Baseball announced Tuesday that owner Arte Moreno has hired a firm to explore selling the team, nearly three months after Anaheim officials pulled the plug on a deal to sell the stadium and surrounding property to his business partnership.

The sale had overcome several obstacles, including a residents’ group’s lawsuit and a dispute with the state over affordable housing, but it couldn’t withstand news that its chief champion, Anaheim Mayor Harry Sidhu, was under federal investigation.

Allegations in court documents say he may have tried to pass confidential information to Angels Baseball officials while the city was negotiating the stadium deal with them, and in return he allegedly hoped to seek $1 million in support for his reelection.

Sidhu has not been charged with a crime. His attorney has maintained that a thorough investigation would prove Sidhu did not disclose any secret information, and that his campaign contributions are in compliance with the law. Investigators noted in the court documents, the FBI agent had no evidence the team’s representative was aware of his intention or if Sidhu actually solicited any campaign funding.

Sidhu announced his resignation in May, the day before the council voted to void the sale of Angel Stadium.

For some, Tuesday’s news that the team could change hands was unexpected.

Councilman Steve Faessel said he didn’t want to speculate about what may have triggered it, but noted that Moreno has “had the team for 20 years, he’s no longer a youngster – this may or may not have resulted from the voiding of the stadium deal, he could have always had this at the back of his mind.”

Good news?

Surprising or not, Moreno’s announcement was seen by many as good news for everyone involved.

The team owner no longer has a lucrative development deal with Anaheim, but his prospects to turn a profit for the Angels are good, Ballpark Digest publisher Kevin Reichard said.

“Franchise values are very high right now,” Reichard said – and with Major League Baseball’s decision last year to allow private equity investment in its teams, “all of a sudden there’s a lot of money lying around.”

A new owner also would give the city a chance to reset expectations for the future lease or sale of the stadium.

While baseball has been part of Anaheim culture for a half-century and that tradition is expected to continue with a new owner, Councilman Trevor O’Neil said, “it is an opportunity for a fresh start that I think is welcome among all of us now.”

The prospect also has rekindled the flames of hope that the team could again be called the Anaheim Angels.

In 2005, Moreno changed the name by putting “Los Angeles” in front and “Anaheim” at the back, saying he wanted to make the team more marketable. The city spent more than $4 million on an unsuccessful legal challenge that concluded in 2009; now some see a potential ownership change as a new path to their desired result.

It’s a reasonable issue for the city to bring up, said former Mayor Tom Tait, who left office in 2018.

“My hope is that any buyer would honor the intent of the lease and name the team Anaheim Angels rather than naming the team after our rival city, Los Angeles,” Tait said.

State Sen. Tom Umberg (whose district includes the stadium and who was critical of the sale) put it this way: “I’m hopeful the new owner won’t be afraid to be associated with the city of Anaheim.”

That’s not Umberg’s only wish. “I’m a huge Angels fan and I look forward to them putting together a team that goes to the playoffs regularly.”

Questions remain

As prospective buyers begin considering the major investment of owning a baseball team, they’ll likely weigh the fact that the Angels come with a stadium lease that runs through 2029 and could be extended through 2038. The City Council does not need to approve the transfer of the lease to new owners.

That lease charges the city as landlord with some maintenance costs, but it gives the tenant the responsibility of keeping the stadium up to the standard of “first class professional baseball stadiums” – something the city hasn’t so far tried to interpret.

A city study from nearly 10 years ago estimated the venue would need at least $150 million in improvements, and with inflation “we would estimate that figure is easily double,” city spokesman Mike Lyster said.

Moreno never publicly said whether he planned to renovate the stadium or build a new one had the property sale gone through; the deal left room for both options.

The city would welcome working with new ownership and addressing “critical questions” that remain, Lyster said, including what to do with a stadium that’s more than 50 years old (and hasn’t had a major overhaul since 1998), and what to do with parking lot space “that is really underutilized and could be put to better use.”

Councilman Jose Moreno (no relation to Arte Moreno) was an early critic of the stadium sale, but he said he’s never had any animosity toward the Angels owner, who as a businessman was trying to get the best deal he could.

“I think regardless of who buys the team, it’s still incumbent upon the city to have honest, transparent and tough negotiators who will negotiate on behalf of the city of Anaheim” and its residents, he said.

“We must ask ourselves in choosing a council and mayor,” he said of the upcoming elections for three seats and the mayor, “will they negotiate in the best interests of the people of Anaheim, and who has the track record to be able to do that?”

Source: Orange County Register