With the process reaching Ross-Rachel will-they-won’t-they proportions, the Chicago Cubs’ Spring Training future has taken another turn. The Arizona Legislature has yet to pass legislation addressing the funding needed to construct the facilities necessary to keep the Cubs in Mesa, Arizona. And now they’ve adjourned.
An agreement between the team and Mesa officials allows the Cubs to negotiate with other cities if Arizona lawmakers don’t pass legislation by July 12. Lawmakers ended their session Thursday, and a special session is unlikely.
The move could reopen the door for Florida to lure away baseball’s highest-drawing spring training team.
Lawmakers considered adding surcharges to car rentals and spring-training baseball tickets, but the plan faltered after Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig came out against it.
Cubs chairman Tom Ricketts said he wasn’t aware of Friday’s events.
“I don’t know anything about it,” he said after his team beat the Arizona Diamondbacks 11-5 at Wrigley Field. “I’d have to wait until next week to be able to know about any of that stuff. I haven’t been on top of it.
“It’s a long process,” he said. CHICAGO SUN-TIMES.
The inability to use a surtax on all Cactus League games (the so-called “Cubs Tax”) is no doubt partially to blame for the legislature’s struggles to pass funding legislation. Thank you monsieurs Selig and Reinsdorf.
This, of course, does not necessarily mean that anything with respect to Florida will happen. It simply means that if nothing is done by July 12, the Cubs can start talking to the Collier County folks again – and any other takers.