The Chargers have left the building.

And the stadium in Mission Valley is now a stadium with no name.

The Qualcomm naming rights expired this week on the venue, which opened in August 1967 with a Chargers exhibition against the Detroit Lions.

“A new name for the stadium has not yet been determined,” city spokesman Scott Robinson told me, and the U-T’s David Garrick reports the Q signs will stay up.


It’ll be up to the city’s Real Estate Assets Department to recommend a new name, Robinson said.

My suggestion: San Diego Stadium.

San Diego Stadium is what it was called after San Diego voters overwhelmingly approved a stadium measure in 1965.

Former San Diego Union sports columnist Jack Murphy advocated for the San Diego Stadium appellation, although his own name was added later in honor of his efforts to bring the Los Angeles Chargers and major league baseball to San Diego.


San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium was the venue’s name when, per Robinson, Qualcomm paid the city $18 million in a lump sum payment for the rights as part of the stadium expansion in 1997.

Qualcomm also provided $55,000 in matching funds for the creation of the Jack Murphy statue.

Former Chargers executive Jim Steeg has said the team should have taken the naming rights to the stadium and resold them, estimating that Team Spanos could have garnered up to $6 million annually on the 20-year deal.

“That was one of the stupidest things the Chargers ever did,” Steeg said two years ago.


Steeg called the pact, for Qualcomm, “one of the best naming rights deals in the history of mankind.”

The negotiator of the deal for Qualcomm was Steve Altman, who is a member of group that created the “SoccerCity” initiative that proposes a dense mixed development and soccer-first stadium for the site.

“That was about my only exposure to politics in San Diego,” Altman told me on Feb. 20, “and I tell people it was the most difficult deal I ever worked on.

“It was a great deal,” he said. “We started out trying to (develop) a consumer brand, but when we got out of the phone business, it was mostly name recognition.”


Altman is no longer with the company but said it’s possible that Qualcomm would consider regaining the naming rights.

Robinson said the city “does not comment on any potential or active negotiations.”

So, what we have, San Diego, is Jack Murphy Field inside the venue formerly known as: San Diego Stadium, San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium and Qualcomm Stadium, and formerly home to the San Diego Padres and San Diego Chargers.

The lone tenant now is the San Diego State football Aztecs, whose lease generates only about $150,000 per year for the city.


So, the old place is a money loser for San Diego, although one savings is the $1 million per year spent on firefighters and police officers on Chargers game days.

San Diego Stadium 2.0 has this going for it: The playing surface is still known as Jack Murphy Field.

Elsewhere: Wrecking Ball wouldn’t destroy Q’s memories.

Tom.Krasovic@SDUnionTribune.com; Twitter: SDUTKrasovic