Chicago Cubs owner Tom Ricketts and developer Sterling Bay are forming a joint-venture to bring a USL franchise into the city and a new stadium in the Lincoln Yards area (two miles north of Wrigley Field) by 2021 according to a report in the Chicago Tribune. Ricketts would be the majority owner of the new club while Sterling Bay would develop and own the stadium and adjacent training facility.
“We couldn’t be more excited to be working with the Ricketts family to bring this project to life,” Andy Gloor, Sterling Bay’s managing principal, said in a news release announcing the joint venture. “With their deep expertise in sports franchising, the … (Rickettses) are an ideal partner for us to collaborate with and energize Chicago sports fans with a new local team to rally around.”
“My family is very excited at the prospect of bringing professional USL soccer to Chicago at this terrific new development,” Ricketts said in the news release. “Sterling Bay is a tremendous partner and the USL has a great vision for meeting the demands of passionate fans and growing soccer’s fan base.”
The Tribune reported in October that Sterling Bay’s proposed stadium was part of the effort to bring the likes of Amazon or another large corporation for a mixed-use development. Adding Ricketts adds tremendous credibility to the project.
“It speaks volumes about the growth of the USL when you continue to see interest and investment from proven sports business executives like Tom Ricketts,” USL CEO Alec Papadakis said in the release. “Over the last several years, we have assembled one of the most sophisticated and knowledgeable ownership groups in professional sports, drawn by our focus on building a sustainable, stable and professional organization with significant room for future growth. We welcome Tom and the entire Ricketts family to the USL. They bring a proven record of success to the team, and combined with the excellent group at Sterling Bay, we look forward to their contributions to the future of professional soccer in Chicago.”
Sterling Bay has brought the likes of McDonalds and Google into the city with new headquarters and recently acquired the Prudential Plaza complex as well as the Groupon building at 600 W. Chicago Avenue.
THOUGHTS: I will refer you to a piece done by Guillermo Rivera in the Athletic back in December over how the project would affect the Fire. The Sterling Bay plan is very ambitious and it would be foolhardy to believe that they would settle at USL-level and part of its ever expanding setup. Either a second MLS team or the Fire itself would be a perceived ultimate goal as far as soccer is concerned.
Meanwhile, the Fire are in Bridgeview at Toyota Park struggling to get attention and have looked to acquiring players such as Bastian Schweinsteiger and targeting players like Fernando Torres to get that attention.
When Toyota Park was built in 2006, it was hailed as another new (and much-needed) stadium for MLS and its clubs and was quickly selected as host of the 2006 MLS All-Star Game. Now, as the only fully publicly-funded soccer-specific stadium in MLS, it has lost a lot of its luster and is notorious for plunging the Village of Bridgeview into debt (it was Bridgeview’s decision to pay for the stadium).
There is a portion of the Chicago fan base that prefer a new stadium in the city after seeing the likes of Seattle, Portland, Vancouver, Toronto, and Atlanta thrive in urban and downtown settings. There is also a portion of fans who would like to see the Fire sold and/or moved to the city.
Sterling Bay has gotten farther along in building a soccer stadium within city limits than any group before them. It is an ambitious project, but I would personally be surprised if they draw in excess of 20,000 fans for a USL squad in 2021. If they do start to outdraw and get more attention than the MLS Fire, then MLS will need to make some choices regarding the Fire.
Chicago Fire
USL
