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I have a hard time believing the NFL would want San Antonio in their league. As far as McCombs, he would have had a hard time getting the Vikings to leave Minnesota because of the lease and he knows (although he won't admit it) the Alamodome is out of date and serious need of renovation and improvment. I mean, I am certain he wanted to use San Antonio as a bargaining chip (nothing wrong with that) to work something out with Minnesota, especially if San Antonio was willing to offer the heavens.
San Antonio has not done anything to attract itself to the NFL, politically it's cosmetic at best (remember Howard Peak celebrating the naming of the Houston Texans), a supposively rabid football town, any football team or event that has called San Antonio home has not drawn support. Remember the pre-season games in the 90s, some drew below 30,000, which prompted a reported from USAToday to write, scratch off San Antonio off the expansion list. Recently, the Vikings drew 48,000 but tickets were on sale for a year and was blacked out locally.
We say we want the NFL but really haven't done anything to get their attention in terms of prior football attendance (preseason NFL, CFL, WLAF, USFL) and the city's cosmetic approach to the situation. Supposively, we are trying to get the NFLs attention and we aren't even doing that, it's been all talk.
Sure we have the Alamo Bowl but clearly it isn't enough.
Attendance may not be a problem but we know that it's all about the suites. The Browns had great attendence but Modell took the Browns to Baltimore because of lack of city support for a stadium, a stadium that was way, way outdated and Baltimore was offering a deal he couldn't refuse.
The NFL is now a corporate game and we don't have the suites or the companies to sustain an NFL team. It's not like Green Bay or Minnesota where you have the entire state supporting your team.
Since the dome was built, there has been four NFL teams relocating (Rams, Raiders, Browns, Oilers) and none of them took San Antonio seriously.
As far as Austin, the city belongs to UT Longhorns, no way would they support a San Antonio team.
I have not heard from anyone who can realisticly point out what San Antonio has to offer the NFL and why should the NFL should come here.
