AEG Abandons Plan for Downtown LA NFL Stadium: Latest Details and Comments

After pumping roughly $50 million into a proposed football stadium in Los Angeles, AEG admitted defeat and waved the white flag.

The group will no longer continue its pursuit of the planned venue, per Sam Farmer, Nathan Fenno and Tim Logan of the Los Angeles Times:

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The sports and entertainment conglomerate is no longer in discussions with the NFL or any teams about the Farmers Field project, company officials told The Times on Monday. AEG was the onetime front-runner in the competition to bring professional football back to the nation’s second-largest market.

"I think it's fair to say we have turned our attention to proceeding with an alternative development," AEG Vice Chairman Ted Fikre said.

Fikre said that AEG has informed city officials that it will not seek an extension of an April 17 deadline to secure a team. The deadline was previously extended six months.

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AEG's goal was to have the stadium built in downtown Los Angeles, next to Staples Center. However, the group found itself crowded out after proposals for stadiums in Carson, California, and Inglewood, California, emerged.

ProFootballTalk's Mike Florio wrote that what tanked AEG's bid was a desire for an ownership stake in whatever team moved into Farmers Field.

Instead, the St. Louis Rams got the Inglewood City Council to give the green light for a potential $2 billion stadium, while the San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders are partnering up for a proposed ground-share in Carson.

AEG attempted to thwart the Inglewood venue by commissioning a report from former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge that stated a stadium in Hollywood Park posed a terrorist threat.

The Hollywood Park planners had already gotten approval by that point from aviation experts and the Federal Aviation Administration.

ESPN's Arash Markazi noted that AEG had strong motivations to see at least one of the LA stadiums knocked out of the competition:

Fenno said that the report wasn't taken very seriously by local experts:

In the end, it had no impact on the Los Angeles stadium race.

The NFL may one day return to the "City of Angels"—it just won't be at Farmers Field.