By Matthew T. Eng, Offbeat NOVA
Unless you live under a rock, you probably heard about the recent news of the potential move for two major Washington, D.C., sports teams to northern Virginia. Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin reached a tentative deal two days ago with the NBA’s Washington Wizards and the NHL’s Washington Capitals (via Monumental Sports & Entertainment) to move the team’s sports venue from the Capitol One Arena to a “visionary sports and entertainment venue” at Potomac Yard in northern Alexandria. The proposed development would include a new arena for the two sports teams, as well as a practice facility, performing arts center, hotels, convention center housing, and shopping.
Naturally, most people in the area are split on the potential move. On one end, the location of the team at Potomac Yard near the new metro would mean potential job creation and a boom for surrounding real estate property values. With that, however, comes the traffic hassles in an already crowded area. This of course does not account for what D.C. natives feel for losing two major sports teams, leaving just the Washington Mystics, D.C. United, and Washington Capitals as the only pro-level teams vying for a competition in the nation’s capital. Mayor Muriel Bowser offered a very hefty counter offer which raised the eyebrows of locals wondering where the substantial figure came from.
This would be a major deal for Youngkin and his administration. However, this is not the first time a pro sports team tried to play in Potomac Yard. In the early 1990s, then-Redkins owner Jack Kent Cooke attempted to move the franchise from RFK Stadium in Washington to “Kent Cooke Stadium” at Potomac Yard. The huge announcement came on July 9, just several months removed from what would be the last Redskins Super Bowl Win (a game I remember watching fondly as a 7-year-old). On that day, Jack Kent Cooke made the announcement with Virginia Governor K. Douglas Wilder for a plot of land in the approximate area where the shopping area resides today next to Richmond Highway.
Like today, the announcement was highly controversial. The Washington Post reported that many Alexandria-area residents and several City Council members expressed their distaste for the plan, adding that they were “angry that Wilder and Cooke hatched the proposal without consulting the city.” Given that the Metro official was also not notified by Youngkin or the investment firm about the newest iteration of the sportsplex, history repeats itself.
Cooke proposed a 78,600-seat stadium with plans to be ready for the 1994 season. Ultimately, the plan fell through after Cooke “rejected concessions that Wilder said were necessary to keep the proposal alive,” just three months after the initial announcement in October 1992:
“I still believe that Potomac Yard is an ideal site for the new Washington Redskins stadium. I thank the governor for his valiant efforts to bring this plan to fruition, but in light of the dramatic changes which were proposed that I cannot abide, I now have no further interest in the Potomac Yard site.” – Redkins Owner Jack Kent Cooke
Washington Post (Thursday, October 15, 1992; Page A01)
The Redkins later received their long-awaited replacement stadium in Maryland, Fed Ex Field, which is (in my humble opinion) a poor replacement for RFK and considered one of the worst stadiums in pro sports.
Will Youngkin forge a new history and ink a deal for pro sports history? Given what happened outside of Reagan National (just up the street from the proposed site) at Thanksgiving, I am personally finding it hard to fathom what would happen to the stadium when somebody like LeBron James and the Lakes comes to town. Ample parking has never been a strong suit for Alexandria, and I don’t see that happening here.
What do you think about the proposed deal?
Offbeat NOVA 