If I'm reading the financial report correctly, I think UofL basketball revenue went up about $4.7M their first year in YUM! from the previous year (Freedom Hall) About $2.7M of that was directly from having 3000 more seats to sell. They also had about 40 more suites to lease at YUM!. If all of those suites were leased at $75K each that would have generated another $2.6M or so. I know that is a $600K difference or so. ???What again is UL's profit from the Yum and boxes? I did not see that.
The first (and absolutely largest) impediment to bringing an NBA franchise to Louisville is finding a team that REALLY wants to move into the Louisville market. IF there was a team REALLY serious about moving to Louisville then there would talk of renegotiating UofL's lease to accommodate them. Naturally, UofL would be resistant to that action. But, if push came to shove, the Arena Authority could simply renege on the lease and say "see ya in court". And if such a suit was "won" by the Arena Authority the "victory" would likely come with HUGE damages payable to UofL. At such hypothetical point, UofL could consider the ugly option to move back into Freedom Hall. Could the Arena make it on just the NBA alone? And remember, most of these pro franchise that moves are looking for HUGE concessions from the city, not just a nice play to play.For WC...If you think this isn't true about Otis's "ownership" of the Yum, then why can't an nba franchise be brought to Louisville...because Otis "owns" the Yum and has "complete" control over it and will sometime if the future probably be given the chance to buy it for pennies on the dollar...
And, yes, there is a contingency provision that UofL could purchase the arena IF the Arena Authority decided to declare bankruptcy and liquidate the facility. I believe UofL has the first right of refusal to purchase should that extremely unlikely situation come to pass.
Peace
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