So $7 million awarded to Marshall for proposed baseball facility
- Thread starter bbneutralfan
- Start date
8.000001 million with the savings from repurposing dollar tree shopping bags..
According to what I read this morning, we now have $10 million total available... The cost for the stadium that was "proposed" with the fancy architectural drawing and whatnot was estimated at $25 million.
Unless MU magically comes up with another $15 million, I'm not sure getting around $8 million from the city is going to move the needle.
Being a logical person, my question would be, "What kind of stadium can we build for $10-11 million?"
The answer to that is the same as it has been for decades.
One that is more than sufficient for Marshall’s needs, but not for the half-dozen groups around town that want MU to rent it to them for $1 all summer so they can own a faux-minor league team.
How long have these new baseball stadium threads been around on this forum? Has to be closing in on 20 years, doesn't it?
I joined with my original account in 2004... So at least that long... I remember back then the question was, what would it take to restore/resurrect the old stadium in West Huntington?
The only thing that has changed is, as football’s needs have dictated MU’s entire sports program to move from conference to conference, baseball, like everything else, has moved up and down in level of competition. The sad truth is that SBC, especially with Southern Mississippi added in, is going to be WAY better than CUSA, and we really had to over-achieve to even be mid-pack competitive in CUSA. We risk real joke status in SBC baseball if we don’t pick it up, and there is no way to recruit better than we have without a facility.
The longer they wait, the more expensive it gets. That initial rendering was probably a little nicer than what is actually needed. You can always make improvements later, but I'd think $15M or so would build you a facility that is an upper level SBC one (ex JMU). Not many SBC facilities blow me away, I know everyone wants a Taj Mahal, but we dont have a budget for that.
While I agree with the sentiment, the last thing any of us want to see is the athletic dept start something, not have all the funds needed, then it gets halfway and comes to a halt.
Maybe Im old fashioned, but why not call some schools that have built stadiums in the last 5-10 years, see how much theirs cost and find a company to do it for the amount of money we have?
There is no reason we can't get something built that's as nice as Francis Marion... A DII school halfway between Darlington and Conway, SC... They built a phenomenal stadium 10 years ago for about $7 million. The whole project was $11 million and included a field house and a softball stadium.
Francis Marion Patriots baseball stadium
Because some in BoG were opposing Hamrick from building it, and frankly I'm tired of re-explaining that, and now the location is considered to change on the old ACF lot.
It doesn't have to be minor league worthy. I want a place to skip out of work early on occasion to catch a game. A SBC level playing surface, a place to sit, somewhere to buy a hotdog and somewhere to take a leak. It doesn't have to be that extravagant.
Mike Hamrick was supposed to raise money for it. But we’ve heard crickets since.
Now some will say COVID stalled the fundraising efforts. I kept in touch with my clients via email, calls and Zoom sessions. Not sure why we couldn’t do that and continue to raise money. And then do personal visits - if needed, later.
Tell me how that shut down contacting donors? Calls, emails, texts, zoom sessions still went on in the business world. I think construction still went on all over the country.
Don’t believe everything that comes out of the Schewey.
I'm sure he only needed to make a few calls and our fans would empty their wallets. Not.
A number of schools have built, remodeled, expanded, etc baseball facilities in the past two-plus years (LSU, Florida, UConn, etc) ... Blaming the pandemic at this point for not getting things accomplished is what you do when your plan failed, never got off the ground, or you had/have no plan.
Yep. The whole bid process was flawed. Hence the 8 mil quote over the budget. COVID is a convenient excuse and easy out.
Money was already raised when the groundbreaking ceremony happened.
The pandemic delayed everything which also returned the initial estimated cost to be much more than initally believed (not sure why that is. If proven to be on our end, Hamrick is 100% to blame for it, but for it to have been as off as it was, I suspect the BoG wanted it moved to a different location, resulting in the price hike). Also, supply costs and just smoothness of transport of goods was becoming an issue, for a school that barely can break even, in a poor state run by a soggy human sponge, and a fanbase just waiting for Hamrick to sneeze so they can have reason to cry "fire Hamrick" its no shocker that things didn't happen like the rest of the civilized world.
He has had constant resistance from some of the BoG, simply because they don't want him to look successful.
A few in the MU BoG don't like Hamrick and if you think pettiness in disallowing the success of someone you don't like is somehow filtered out in such settings, think again.
Hell, why retain a loser HC for an additional year where there doesn't seem to be any shred of hope of success, but choose not to retain a guy who got you back to a title game? Oh wait, maybe because one was a hire of Hamrick directly while the other was sort of shoe horned in.
As for Hamrick himself? Don't know. May have had enough of the BoG's BS, said, "let the next guy do it" and give all of you what you wanted...a self fulfilling prophecy that he is a failure and the worst AD in our history while the next guy is already being questioned for thinking outside the box and not focusing on...toilets.
The bid was opened in early Dec. 2019. it was a flawed process from the start. Maybe it was an ego issue between parties. Mike should have known better. How some things were overlooked is mind boggling for a project of this magnitude.
Mike did a great job on many fronts but he sure as hell wasn’t perfect.
I agree he certainly wasn't.
We may never know how all this actually went down and what was said/done behind the scenes. I do stand on what I have said that some in the MU BoG did disrupt the process because of (insert reason) dislike for Hamrick.
I dunno, maybe get a tape recorder, get a handle of his favorite liquor, sit down with him and ask,
"So, tell me what REALLY happened in your last 2 years of being MU's AD."
I will say, why there are still some who aren't on board with a baseball stadium, but seem supportive of MU moving into a conference that demands effort and has shown high expectations, is beyond me. It's somewhat oxymoronic.
Just build it. As the soccer stadium showed, it could be a worthy investment.
The softball field cost $2.5mil in 2008. Even with inflation and high construction costs, you would think for about $10 mil you could build something twice as big spending 4x as much money. While I personally wouldn't care if we dropped baseball all together, if we going to play they need to build a moderate facility. We don't need an extravagant field when in reality only a couple hundred people, at most, will attend the majority of the games.
From what I have heard, the baseball stadium is now going behind the softball field, but the land hasn't been procured, so it has to go back through the legislature to allow Marshall to purchase it. That being said, it was two months ago that I heard this.
They’ll have to demolish the two buildings on the property. Hopefully no soil or utility issues this time.
I’ve heard Krogers might move to the 5th ave location to build a super store…
baseball to be built 3rd Ave next to softball
potential shopping complex and hotel to go across 3rd from new baseball stadium
baseball to be built 3rd Ave next to softball
potential shopping complex and hotel to go across 3rd from new baseball stadium
According to the Cabell County Assessor's Office, the land behind the softball field toward the river is owned by the Huntington Municipal Development Authority and McGinnis Investment Corp. MIC purchased the property decades ago and just sold a sliver of the property to HMDA in 2020 so I would expect they would be open to discussions of selling the property.
It would be a good play to try to parlay a trade for the 5th ave lot that was originally for the stadium with the lot behind the softball field. I would expect HMDA would view the 3rd ave lot as more valuable, especially if there is a new baseball facility in the immediate area. The city and university could sweeten the pot by taking $500k of the federal money and using it as an incentive for a company to invest in the 3rd ave property. Marshall get is land for the field, HMDA gets a new development on previously empty land, and the new company gets $500k of infrastructure... everybody wins.
It would be a good play to try to parlay a trade for the 5th ave lot that was originally for the stadium with the lot behind the softball field. I would expect HMDA would view the 3rd ave lot as more valuable, especially if there is a new baseball facility in the immediate area. The city and university could sweeten the pot by taking $500k of the federal money and using it as an incentive for a company to invest in the 3rd ave property. Marshall get is land for the field, HMDA gets a new development on previously empty land, and the new company gets $500k of infrastructure... everybody wins.
Oh boy! Here we go again. Another shopping complex, etc., along 3rd Avenue. Anyone remember former MU President Dale Nitzschke (sp.) from back in the 80s or so? He proposed a similar development along 3rd Avenue dubbed "Marshall Commons". Mixed retail, commercial, some housing, including for MU students, etc. That was 30 to 40 years ago! This sounds like another version or so of that, or maybe "Super Block, part Deux"!! Same-O, Same-O Huntington, it appears!!
It would be surprising if Kroger were to move from 5th ave considering they recently spent millions remodeling the store. On the other hand, for an entity like Kroger that's just a drop in the bucket.
Louisiana’s baseball stadium was built in the late 70s but underwent a $17M renovation in 2017-18.
The SBC has some very impressive baseball facilities.
