Paul Daugherty

pdaugherty@enquirer.com

So our professional club de futbol has picked three sites as potential locations for a brand-spankin’-new stadium. So the league to which the club aspires strongly suggests applicants come bearing solid, soccer-only stadium plans. So it will come to pass sooner or later that wealthy owners of said club de futbol will arrive at the public trough with hats in hand. (Nice hats, the kind you can get at Batsake’s. Wool in the winter, cool Egyptian cotton when it’s hot. Very stylish.)

In its year-plus of existence, FC Cincinnati has been a wild success, at least from an attendance standpoint. It has proven, to now, to have been a credible rival to the Reds for weekend entertainment coin. The times have been a-changin’ for awhile now. Kids, young adults, burgeoning families like futbol. FCC is well-run, well-heeled and on a roll.

Howevuh. . .

There is no way in hell we’re buying them a stadium.

That era has passed. And not just here. Stan Kroenke, owner of the LA Rams, has a net worth of $7.4 billion-with-a-B dollars. He’s financing the new Rams playpen himself. In Vegas, they’re saying the Raiders increased room taxes and the bottomless pockets of someone named Sheldon Adelson will cover the stadium costs.

No free lunch anymore, Thickwallets.

You want a soccer stadium? Gather a group of investors and tell them to pony up.

On that note: Stadium tax foes get ready to rumble

Which is what will happen here if the public says no thanks. Which the public will.

It will be interesting, in any case, to hear what FCC ownership might say to sway us. What rationale could be used that hasn’t been used before?

Tell us again what an economic boon to our community another new stadium will be. Tell us of our need to be “major league.’’

If we don’t build it, another city will. And then what?

Tell us of all those great jobs that will be created. “Get your hot dogs, heah!’’

(Actually, the construction of said stadium would produce good jobs, but only for a couple years.)

Threaten to move your USL team from Cincinnati, if you don’t get a new place to play.

And so on.

One advantage the Reds and Bengals had that FCC does not: They could claim that central riverfront development and the redone Ft. Washington Way depended on new stadia attracting critical mass. And they were right. Without the draw of sports, the central riverfront would be a lesser spot.

What area is FCC going to improve with its presence? The Oakley area is already booming. The Newport suggestion is OK, but Newport already has the Levee and the aquarium. Taft HS football stadium? What?

These days, these pitches come across as the traveling vacuum salesman throwing dirt on my rug. You want me to do what? They’re insulting our intelligence.

There is a very fine regional expression, popular in the New York metro area, that should apply to any request for tax hikes to build a soccer stadium. No, it’s not fuhgebbaboutit.

It’s something a bit saltier and popular with the wiseguys who populated The Sopranos. It begins with an F and ends with outtahere.

Now, then. . .

NOW YOU SEE HIM. . . In the time it takes you to read this sentence, Billy Hamilton ran from 1st base to home plate on a sharp single to LF last night. Unless you’re a really fast reader, in which case slow down.

A reason I keep doing what I do is the small chance I will see something I’ve never seen before. I did see Deion Sanders, as a Red, score from 1st on a single to CF, so maybe Billy’s burst doesn’t qualify. That makes it no less impressive.

Nice W for The Club. They beat around the great Tribe bullpen, again, in splitting the four-game series. How does that work with the Cup? Do the Reds keep the top, the Indians the base?

What we’ve learned about them after 46 games is this: They hit.

They hit so much that if one or two hitters is slumping, it doesn’t matter. They hit for average and power and in the clutch. They’re fast. If they had any starting pitching, they’d be in the wild card mix, which is a ridiculous thing to say, given all the talent they’ve traded away in the last two years.

Temper that wild enthusiasm with this: Pitching matters more than hitting. Baseball is not a nightly 9-8 walk through the buffet line. Last year, it was the bullpen’s atrocities. This year, it’s the rotation’s turn.

The hitting-pitching comparison could barely be more stark. Offensively, the Reds are No. 1 in the National League in SBs and 2nd in SB %; 4th in OPS, 5th in runs and 7th in HRs.

Their starting pitchers are last in homers allowed (by 10 dingers!), last in opponents’ OPS, last in ERA by nearly a full run and 13th in walks.

Yikes.

And despite the excitement this team conjures on a nightly basis, it has still lost 9 of 12. But the club is giving you your money’s worth. No doubt about that.

Fangraphs says the Reds have had the 5th-easiest schedule so far.

THE TRUE STORY ABOUT THE BASEBALL ATOP THE BANKS. A guy emailed me two days ago, wondering about it. His girlfriend said it was part of the Perez statue outside GABP. He said no way. She was right.

Thanks to multiple Mobsters who provided the explanation. The ball is meant to represent the launch angle of a Doggie dinger hit in the ’75 Series. Ingenious. The things we learn together in This Space, Mobsters. . .

FUNNY STORY ABOUT HECKLING. . . I wrote a column yesterday telling Joey Votto how to handle hecklers. Before I did, I asked a former prominent Red for his favorite heckler story. He offered this, paraphrasing:

“In Philadelphia one time, a guy is yelling at a Phillies pitcher. The guy has two kids with him, one a baby, another looked to be about 8. Both boys.

“This guy is screaming, “F--- you! You suck!’’ I’m shocked. I mean he has two little kids with him. Then the 8-year-old screams, “Yeah, you suck!’’

Ah, Philly. Good people there. Salt of the earth.

AND NOW, BEERMANDAVE HAS A GRIPE HE’D LIKE TO SHARE. . .

It's Your Beer



Please forgive the following rant. This weekend is Taste of Cincinnati. As I perused through the 100-plus dishes being offered for our culinary enjoyment, something stood out. Why is there still so much macro and non-Cincy beer offered at this event?

It's advertised as a taste of our city. Of course I'm excited that Braxton, Christian Moerlein, MadTree, Rhinegeist, and Rivertown will all be featured. I'm sure it's way too optimistic to think that the macro guys would be absent at a big draw like this one. I guess it is some of the others that bother me.

Bells is a fantastic brewery. Great Lakes and West Sixth both make some solid brews. But why do we need them to prop up a beer scene that is without doubt one of the best in the country?

Maybe it is a distribution issue for some, but with the number of cool collaborations out there, it seems like the largest Cincy breweries could support the newer and smaller teams to get a few pulls at The Taste. How will we ever convert those non-micro drinkers if we keep making it so easy to grab a St Louis rice wine?

It would be cool to see 100% Cincinnati brewed beer at this Taste, relabeled if necessary with helpful monikers like Better Bud Light and KY Yuengling. If you made it this far, thanks for allowing me to vent. I'm looking forward to someday drinking along with way too much Cincy food.

Cheers! cincybeerguydave@gmail.com

Fun-espondent Patrick is on vacation. I docked him a week’s pay.

PETE’S SELLING BALL 4192. . . It’s been well documented in This Space my support of and fondness for P.E. Rose. What makes me mad is his willingness to sell every memorable piece of his past, even to the extent that he embraces his own downfall if it helps him make a buck.

Now the 4192 ball is up for auction. Doubtless, Pete had already peddled it to a collector and it’s just being recycled. I think he still has a World Series ring or two. What else?

Maybe he has given some great memorabilia to his kids, who hopefully will pass it down to their kids, and so on. Rose might not be big on trophies, awards etc. Beats me. I keep weird stuff: A rock from a beach on the west coast of Ireland, a cone from a loblolly pine right of the 13th fairway at Augusta National, an ashtray given to the media from the ’92 Barcelona Olympic Committee. I mean, an ashtray at a sporting event, in an era that was already discouraging smoking. LOL.

I have a bunch of awards. I display only two: The two national 1st places I won in 2014, for column and feature writing.

Anyway, I wish Pete possessed even a pinch of sentimentality. Some things mean more than money.

TUNE O’ THE DAY. . .Elton John provided the soundtrack for my high school years. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road was at the center of everything we did. It came out my senior year. One of the few double albums worth the second album. So much great stuff here. This one’s the greatest.

Harmony-n-me were pretty good company. . .