If you believe that the NFL's Chargers and Raiders are coming to town in order to share a $1.7 billion stadium in Carson, you might also be interested in our all-you-can-eat diet.

In other words, it's a scam. The NFL has long kept the L.A. market vacant as a way for teams to extract costly stadiums from taxpayers in their hometowns. Moving to Los Angeles is a perpetual threat. Both teams have been angling for new venues in San Diego and Oakland. Plus, they hate each other. 

If you don't think this is about getting stadiums built elsewhere, read this part of the teams' joint statement last night:

We have both been working in our home markets to find a stadium solution for many years, so far unsuccessfully.

We remain committed to continuing to work in our home markets throughout 2015 to try to find publicly acceptable solutions to the long-term stadium issue.

We also both understand and respect the NFL’s relocation process, and we intend to adhere strictly to the relocation procedures that the League has set forth for Los Angeles.

In particular, we respect the right of the NFL’s owners to decide on all Los Angeles–related relocation issues and understand that any relocation application that is filed for Los Angeles must obtain the approval of three-fourths of the NFL’s owners.

… We are pursuing this stadium option in Carson for one straightforward reason: If we cannot find a permanent solution in our home markets, we have no alternative but to preserve other options to guarantee the future economic viability of our franchises.


The teams fully admit they'll be pursuing the Carson stadium plan as well as stadiums at home at the same time “to preserve our options.” Suckers.

Still don't believe us? What happened to the planned AEG stadium downtown? What happened to the planned Majestic Realty stadium in Industry? What happened to the Rams' stadium in Inglewood? Where's L.A.'s team? 

The story of the fake (or at least highly insincere) stadium plan was dropped in the lap of the Los Angeles Times last night. The plot of land targeted is across the 405 freeway from the one place in Carson all of y'all will recognize — Ikea.


San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer sounded pissed. He stated this last night:

It's now abundantly clear that while we have been working here in San Diego to create a plan for a new stadium, the Chargers have for some time been making their own plans for moving to Los Angeles. This would amount to abandoning generations of loyal Chargers fans. Despite this news, we are going to continue our efforts to develop a viable stadium solution.

A news conference unveiling the full renderings of the proposed stadium was scheduled for 10 a.m. in Carson. 

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