A few days ago, the Dallas Stars submitted a non-binding letter of intent to the Plano City Council, proposing a new entertainment district and stadium nearly 20 miles north of downtown Dallas. According to a new article from the Sports Business Journal, the Stars faced no adversity in the vote, with the Plano City Council unanimously supporting the proposal while offering up to $700MM in public funding.
Given that the proposal is non-binding, the Stars aren’t necessarily locked into moving to Plano, but today’s vote demonstrates that the interest goes both ways. Dallas’ ownership indicated that the stadium itself would cost around $1B, while the mixed-use district would cost around $3B, all things considered.
The Stars are locked into their lease at American Airlines Center until the 2030-31 season, so a new stadium would still be at least five years away, regardless. The city of Dallas remains in contact with the Stars to extend their lease, or keep the team downtown at the very least, but all signs indicate the Stars may be following their fans to the suburbs.
Additional notes from the Western Conference:
- Despite being one of the three teams that Detroit Red Wings captain Dylan Larkin would accept a trade to, it’s not that simple for the Minnesota Wild. In a new article, Joe Smith of The Athletic opined that the Wild are a logical landing spot for Minnesota, but questioned if the Wild had the necessary assets to pull it off. Smith speculated that Minnesota would make Danila Yurov and Charlie Stramel available, but they have exhausted many of their high-value trade assets from acquiring Quinn Hughes this past season.
- After yesterday’s report indicating that the Edmonton Oilers have zeroed in on Mike Babcock as their next head coach, many questioned how this would affect the team’s leadership, particularly the future of Connor McDavid. According to TSN’s Ryan Rishaug, Babcock has already met with Edmonton’s player leadership, which would obviously include McDavid among others. Per Rishaug, the players gave the Oilers’ front office their full support to hire Babcock if possible.
I kind of doubt that Larkin will only accept a trade to those 3 teams. More like he’d prefer to go to one of those teams. Would he really veto a trade to, say, Carolina or Tampa?
Awfully nice of Plano city councillors to subsidize a private asset for a sports team owner worth $4 billion. I’m sure residents are happy that Tom’s getting a leg up amid a housing crisis and small businesses fleeing for the suburbs.