Wednesday, June 28, 2006

expatriate Pittsburgher cavalry to the rescue

So it is now common knowledge that Mark Cuban, Dan Marino and others are looking to buy the Penguins. Without getting into it too much, the interesting thing is that at least Cuban is explicit that his participation is contingent on the team staying in Pittsburgh. Now, I am not a big poker player... but it seems to me that if you have a billionaire and a couple of uber-millionaires all intent on keeping the Penguins in town at all costs, there is a lot less incentive to have casino revenues go toward building a new arena. If nothing else it says something about where this new group sees itself in the whole casino debate. They have essentially shown their hands, which would typically not be a good thing to do. but I ususally presume that successful people, as these obviously are, have reasons for each of the things they do.

and who is going to buy the Pirates now if these rumors of the team being put up for sale soon wind up to be true?

2 comments:

Tim Murray said...

How magnanimous of these successful people who fled Pittsburgh at the first opportunity that they deem it crucial for the Pens stay here for the benefit of us poor stiffs stuck here. It is, of course, fitting that these men are being lauded by the news media, given that Pittsburghers generally embrace people only after they've become successful and left town. If you want a museum, a bridge or a street named after you here, your chances skyrocket if you leave town.

John Morris said...

This seems to be a very sad but true fact. It's funny how Pittsburgh's huge diaspora is rarely mentioned as a force for economic developement. Does anyone remewmber poor little Ireland?

The fact remains that these people are a tremendous force that could be harnessed. Unfortunately, this is a crowd that is hard to sell. A lot of people from out of town see the cities potential but the people who are from here are pretty jaded.