WrigleyField 22

Whatever they were trying to accomplish begind the logo didn't work.

Oh well. Time for endless FA speculation.

And a new NCAA football game and my desire to own a gaming console again.

Most stories truely only have multiple bad guys.

Now, imagine that, but a whole game of all the fun stuff Fields can do. Makes you wonder.

Trust teh process.

Trade for Simmons and make him shoot FTs underhand? Problem solved!

You’re right they don’t but they’ll defend it with their life if someone criticizes it. At least that’s been my experience. But we already have a pizza thread so Real Chicagoans defend tavern style. Deep Dish is for the suburbanites something something

Its not baffling since I'm from the area, but it seems somewhat unique among Chicagoans. In college I met people from all across the Midwest and the norm was just to say what big city they were closest to without a "near" or "just outside" qualifier. Except us Chicagoans. The Shaker Heights, OH people just said "Cleveland" though.

living on the west coast for 12 years, I learned awhile ago that it is FAR easier to tell people I am from "northern Illinois", but when the reply is "Chicago??" I say yes. the reason is it takes too much time and far too irrelevant to anything in my life to go into a long description of where I actually grew up. I never have lived in the Chicago metro area. Seattle area, San Francisco area, LA/San Fernando valley, Minneapolis and Madison I have all called home, but never Chicago. So, how infuriated would you all feel about that? Do you still tell people you're FROM there? Or is that more of a response to where you're born?

I mean sure, but also if you don't, okay. Nothing to be mad about.

Canceling my plans for Fields jersey for this one now...

The official Chicago Metropolitan area as defined by the census bureau We need a stadium location version of this... I like that each "side" of the debate also feels the other is the weird nerd part of the meme.

And that small minority of people are wrong. People should work harder in school. The "Chicago" in that middle pic incorporates some of the most rural places in the state. I'm referring more to the "Central Illinois" part. I can't put Champaign in the same categories as Carbondale, for example. And Champaign isn't northern Illinois either. But it's an abstract graphic, you can nitpick any of the borders Every good Chicagoan knows that South of I-80 is Southern Illinois. And South of 64 is Kentucky.

Illinois/Chicago antecdote. My friend from Effingham area would tell people when she was studying abroad she was from IL, which automatically made them think Chicago (and then either Capone or MJ) . That annoyed her so she just started saying St. Louis. So it's definitely a "know your crowd" scenario if you wanna give a roughly accurate description. Naperville and Aurora are probably big enough and known enough, for instance, to just start there rather than Chicago if that's where you live.

People from the city of Chicago get upset when a person from the suburbs says they are from Chicago whether they're talking to a person from Illinois, New York or England. It's very goofy horsefeathers. The city is the city though and Arlington Heights makes Evanston look like the Loop. That middle pic is pretty crazy. The official Chicago Metropolitan area as defined by the census bureau

I actually like the east side with the glass. The saucer part is ugly, collanades or not. But really, trying to save the collanades just really screwed that reno.

IIRC during the remodel they did everything they could to incorporate the colonnades to maintain the landmark status. End result - a horsefeathers looking structure, so bad that it lost the status they tried so hard to maintain. Also - they ended up with the smallest stadium seat capacity in the NFL. This is the most horsefeathering Bears series of events short of them accidentally imploding the place. Jesus Christ. The Bears would walk away fairly unscathed. The city on the other hand....

Its possible the headache of how to split it like 50 ways post Virginia is just not worth it (plus the NFL maybe wouldn't allow it).

Best guess is the McCaskeys made a deal with the NFL, where the NFL agreed to pony up a significant chunk of the financing for the new stadium which will be paid off either in the long haul or as part of any sale of the team. The State of Illinois is not in any financial position to assist with this move and the best the Bears are likely going to get from Arlington Heights and Cook County is real estate tax relief. It's possible there's a major lender behind the scenes on this since most of the McCaskeys' wealth is tied up in the Bears, but I don't see how the NFL would allow the Bears to be plunged into that kind of debt to a third party unless that person is going to purchase the team. If theres a financer already lined up and ready to buy the Bears, it's very likely Pat Ryan, who reportedly has rights of first refusal anyways on any McCaskey sale. I don't think he's quite wealthy enough to go it all alone, but connected enough to lead a ownership group.

I've never purchased land let alone of this magnitude, but submitting a bid feels like more than posturing to me. Announcing that you have made a bid is absolutely posturing. It could lead to something, but generally speaking organizations do not announce their intentions to pay for transparency reasons. Any bid is likely to come with tons of contingencies. In the Bears case, financing, almost certainly of significant public source, is a huge one. So these bids are more outlines. Followed by tons of due diligence and finalizing financing.

I just saw this. I think that was exactly me.

3 pick in 7 on 7 for a certain QB? It'sHappening.gif

Somewhat related, Ravinia has a train stop right outside the venue and after a show - it is a complete nightmare to jump the train. Parking (travel by bus to the lots) is a rodeo as well. Point is - even if there is mass transit, as Tim pointed out - getting a large number of people to leave at the same time is gonna be a nightmare with or w/o mass transit. I don't think anyone would claim its possible to have a 50k + stadium and not have congestion issues. It's of course its not going to be a trip to the grocery store. But touting SFs transit as a positive is laughable compared to the other stadiums in the city. It's only positive in the sense there are multiple options that all kind of suck.

Somewhat related, Ravinia has a train stop right outside the venue and after a show - it is a complete nightmare to jump the train. Parking (travel by bus to the lots) is a rodeo as well. Point is - even if there is mass transit, as Tim pointed out - getting a large number of people to leave at the same time is gonna be a nightmare with or w/o mass transit. Right, people point out that Arlington Park has its own Metra stop and use it as a reason why a stadium in Arlington Heights would be easy to get to. It's one Metra stop on one Metra line. While there are cross-suburb highways like 355 and 294, by and large Chicago's infrastructure is built to get people to and from the city. Someone in like Tinley Park doesnt care about the Metra, they care about having to switch highways 3-4 times and then drive on surface streets not designed to send 60,000 people into a concentrated area. 53 is 3 lanes without any shoulders in the area near Arlington Park exit, and I don't think taking Rand or Northwest Highway is going to be any better. Of course the local roads would have to be looked at a site like Arlington or wherever. And definitely a move to Arlington would be less convenient for certain south suburbs people. But as far as transit to SF goes, the one 18th street Metra stop is the only one that's all that convenient. Roosevelt is at least 20 minutes, but from my experience with a Gameday crowd its probably closer to double that. McCormick Green is about the same. Not sure how bused are, but I can't imagine theyre a great option. As to the hypothetical Tinley park person. It's currently something like 80 to 57 to 94 to LSD. To Arlington is 80 to 355 to 290 to Euclid. So even though it's further the number of HW thing isn't really an accurate complaint. Although theres obviously certain areas that may end up relevant. But yea, there would be some relative winners and losers. But SF is kind of a centrally loser spot for almost everyone, not an actual good spot.