Area’s big businesses can save the Crew
Anthony Precourt has been the obvious and most convenient piñata hanging in the middle of Crew supporters who think it is madness to steal away with Columbus’ team. I have used this space to take my own swings at Precourt and, while my arms are not tired, it’s time to take a breath.
On Tuesday night, the Crew plays what could be the last home game of
2017 — the first leg of a two-leg Eastern Conference final series against mighty Toronto FC, which might be the best Major League Soccer team ever assembled. I have made a public plea for Precourt to do the right thing and avoid Mapfre Stadium. It’s like that old Henny Youngman joke: Does your face hurt? No? It’s killing
If Precourt does not have the good judgment to allow Columbus fans to have the moment for themselves, I hope Columbus fans ignore him and focus on the team they’ve supported, passionately and with class, since 1996. Be bigger than Precourt. It’s not difficult.
When Precourt dropped his “I’m taking my talents to ATX” bomb on Oct. 17, the first column I wrote on the subject contained the line, “Precourt has a
Columbus will not collapse without an MLS team, but it will have a black eye if the Crew takes off for Austin, Texas. Companies like Amazon take note of such things because companies like Amazon need young people and, increasingly, young people like soccer.
It is heartening to see a report like the one in
Tuesday’s editions of The Dispatch: Columbus Foundation president and CEO Doug Kridler has proposed a stadium solution that seems workable, with some more work. Good on Abbott Labs for making available land it owns on the rim of Downtown.
There are a lot of other brothers that could spare a dime for a community trust.
Columbus has five Fortune 500 companies based in its metro area — Cardinal Health, Nationwide, American Electric Power, L Brands and Big Lots. These companies combined for $220 billion in revenue last year. Two of Columbus’ largest employers, JPMorgan Chase and Kroger, are also Fortune 500 companies. Together, they accounted for another $220 billion in revenue last year.
That’s seven companies with a combined $440 billion in revenue last year — including one, Nationwide, which owns
a piece of land to the west of the Arena District. What is more, there are nine other Columbusbased companies in the Fortune 1,000, and they combined for another $27 billion in revenue last year. Among them is at least one of the various businesses run by the Schottenstein family, a branch of which owns a piece of land to the west of the Arena District, right next to Nationwide’s piece.
Little if any of that concentrated power has plugged into the #SaveTheCrew movement, which instead has relied on thousands of millennial volunteers, a fleet of microbreweries and other small businesses and a group of organizers whose budget is funded by donations and bumper-sticker sales.
These engaged citizens give me hope for the future. They want to preserve the Columbus MLS franchise — not just for themselves, but for
their city. They understand urban repopulation is a hallmark of 21st century demographics. They want their children and grandchildren to be Massive.
They are proud that Columbus has established itself as the spiritual home of U.S. Soccer. They watch English Premier League games on weekends — Columbus is one of the top four American markets for EPL viewership, right behind Austin. These are our kids.
Austin can brag on a lot of things — it is right up there on lists that measure “startup density,” small-business climate, fastest-growing population, and so forth — but, with just two companies (Dell computers and Whole Foods) in the Fortune 500, it is not in the same big-business class as San Antonio, let alone Columbus.
I’m no George F. Babbitt and I can’t begin to understand the way businesses operate in the Midwest. I know this: City leaders, including the former owner of this newspaper, as well as Nationwide, used their muscle to put Nationwide Arena on firm financial footing.
I can guess this: The subject of the Crew has been broached in Columbus boardrooms. I wonder this: Is it not in the interest, and within the power, of Columbus’ big-business community to save the Crew?
What we have here is a hostage situation, with all the ugly trappings that a modern sports-team owner-captor brings with it. I get it. But if Precourt has one fiber of reason in him, there should be a solution.
Once the Crew leaves, MLS isn’t coming back, and the minor leagues are not the same thing. The kids in our city understand that now, just as they’ll understand it 50 years from now.