For the past two years, the word around Los Angeles was that with billionaire Phil Anschutz involved, the NFL was sure to return in no time flat.

On Wednesday, the word around L.A. was that with Anschutz, viewed as a roadblock by some, planning to sell Anschutz Entertainment Group, the chances of the NFL returning immediately improved.

Fact is, with the L.A. City Council set to approve an environmental impact report later this month on a downtown stadium that AEG was supposed to build, this bit of news clouds the situation once again.

The NFL badly wanted Anschutz to be part of the deal, whether he just built the downtown stadium or bought the team. The reason is simple: Anschutz is worth an estimated $7 billion, although some people in the NFL think that estimate is drastically low.

How badly did the league want Anschutz? In December, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa met with Anschutz at his home in Denver in an effort to convince Anschutz to improve his terms for a team that might want to move to L.A.

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The rule of thumb in the NFL is that the league doesn't go to anyone. It has people come to the league. That wasn't the case with Anschutz. Thus, removing him from the process is not a positive.

"Anyone who thinks this brings more clarity to that project is not dealing in reality," an NFL team source said. "Dealing with Anschutz was hard, but at least you knew who you were dealing with. Do you think anybody is going to negotiate a deal [to move to Los Angeles] if they don't know who is going to run AEG or if that person is even interested in building that stadium?"

The counter to that, as L.A. Times columnist T.J. Simers noted, is that many people hope that billionaire doctor/biotech entrepreneur Patrick Soon-Shiong will buy AEG. The presumption is that Soon-Shiong (who is believed to be worth $7.3 billion) will then open his wallet, sweeten the deal for some team to move to L.A. or just buy one.

Yeah, just like that.

Here's an important lesson to be taken away from the whole Anschutz affair: Rich people are generally in the business of getting richer. If Anschutz thought he could make money by building a stadium in Los Angeles, he would have done it. He wouldn't be walking away from AEG in the middle of this process.

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