WPCNR VIEW FROM THE UPPER DECK. From John Vorperian, WPPA-TV's Sports Anchor of Beyond The Game, Manhattanville College Sports Marketing Professor. December 26, 2007: If Major League Baseball and the National Football League expand Las Vegas; Portland, OR; Birmingham, AL; and Los Angeles would have new teams, according to Manhattanville College Sports Management graduate students who analyzed the most likely American cities to be awarded expansion franchises as part of a final exam project conducted by their professor, John Vorperian. Vorperian is longtime sports anchor of White Plains Public Access Television's Beyond the Game talk show.
Cashman Stadium, Las Vegas. Nevada. Current home of the Pacific Coast League Las Vegas 51s. In 2004, Las Vegas had approached Major League Baseball with plans for expanding the Stadium to attract the Montreal Expos. Manhattanville students like Las Vegas potential for Major League Baseball.
Posed as a final exam project, the Purchase NY school’s “Dynamics of the Sports Business World” class was divided into four groups. Each group had to select a city and create a viable marketing plan for its expansion club. Those plans included stadium costs, player personnel, front office expenditures, ticket packages, potential corporate sponsors and business partners, team name, colors, mascots, and community outreach involvement.
The L.A. Quakes return pro football to the City of Angels. Mascot ‘Richter The Rhino’ looms large in the club’s designs to entice Los Angeles children tobecome ‘Young Quakes’ and encourage families to attend games.
The NFL’s other outpost, the Alabama Hammers, hope to be placed in the NFC South with a reunion of sorts, Head Coach Norm Chow, currently Tennessee Titans Assistant Coach and once Titan Quarterback Billy Volek.
The Las Vegas Cougars and Portland Pioneers are slated for MLB action. Cougar sponsors would be business endeavors that cater to family entertainment in this USA’s fastest growing metro area. Gambling enterprises would be bypassed. The team would also seek cooperation from gaming interests not to accept wagering on Cougar matches.
DYNAMICS professor John Vorperian said, “The big challenge for sport management students is to think like business people and not as fans.” He noted the Bama Hammers team tri-colors, gold, maroon, and black could be embraced by Crimson Tide and Auburn Tiger boosters alike and the students addressed some diversity hiring issues by picking Mr. Chow as their top coach choice.
The students had to stay within a league’s salary guidelines and project what players would be available for expansion drafting purposes. Vorperian further stated, “Overall, these master candidates submitted some very realistic sport scenario and economic
schemes.”
But sometimes an errant fan thought did pop up here and there in all the reports. One baseball
group’s player personnel had a bevy of low cost free agents, older veterans, young minor leaguers, yet
mixed in the roster was one “Chamberlain, Joba.”
