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Playoffs?! CIB predicts Colts won't host postseason game

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Add the Capital Improvement Board of Marion County as one more prognosticator giving the Indianapolis Colts low odds of making—let alone hosting—playoff games.

The city entity that owns Lucas Oil Stadium, where the Colts play their home games, budgeted $1 million less in admission-tax revenue for 2013 for one reason: The board does not expect the Colts to host a playoff games like the team frequently did over the past decade with quarterback Peyton Manning under center.

“I think we got spoiled,” Chief Financial Officer Dan Huge said of the Manning days, when the Colts regularly hosted at least one home playoff game annually and often hosted two.

Manning spent the entire 2011 season on the bench with a neck injury, and the Colts tumbled to a woeful 2-14 season. The Colts cut Manning loose this spring and then drafted Stanford quarterback Andrew Luck to replace him.

Luck impressed everyone in his first preseason game Sunday, even seeing his first pass—a short screen to running back Donald Brown—turn into a 63-yard touchdown play.

But when CIB officials gathered Monday afternoon to consider the 2013 budget, Huge stuck with his prediction.

“Any adjustment after yesterday?” Leonard Hoops, the CEO of the Indianapolis Convention & Visitors Association, jokingly asked Huge.

“No, not yet,” Huge said, sparking a chuckle from Hoops. He added later, "I'd rather be conservative."

He’s not alone. For example, Bleacher Report gives the Colts a 24 percent chance of making the playoffs—but only as a wild card team, which usually play its playoff games on the road.

The CIB charges a 6-percent tax on all sporting event tickets at Lucas Oil Stadium, as well as the other facilities it owns: Bankers Life Fieldhouse, Victory Field and the Indiana Convention Center.

Huge expects those venues to sell enough tickets next year to generate $5.7 million—$1 million less than he budgeted a year ago, before Manning got hurt.

 

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  1. As a St. Vincent employee of over 20 years, I am saddened and disheartened by this announcement. Unfortunately, as the healthcare "industry" continues on this political and corporate path, all that St. Vincent Hospital has stood for spiritually for its employees and this community is being sucked dry. I know it truly has no choice. It is not just Obamacare or just competition or just any single thing. This trend started long before I was even born when the government became involved in healthcare and it became an "industry." I grieve for those who will lose their jobs, one of whom may be me, but I also grieve for this hospital which I have served for over 20 years. May God give us and it the grace to withstand the future of healthcare.

  2. Why do people constantly harp on this issue and act ignorant about what a city population measures? A city's population is the city's population. There is no argument or debate about it. If you want to measure the density of a city--measure it. If you want to measure the size of a metropolitan area, then measure the metropolitan population. City boundaries cover different sized areas--and they always have (though the disparity has probably increased since about 1900 or so when more cities began annexing their surrounding communities). For example, San Francisco only covers 49 square miles while Houston cover nearly 600 square miles. No one argues about the population rankings of either city even though they clearly cover extremely different sized areas. Indianapolis is the 13 largest city by population in the U.S. That is a fact. While the population of a metropolitan area may give you a better sense of how large a community is, as noted, even metro areas can vary widely in the size of geographic area they cover--so that is not a perfect comparison either.

  3. If Whole Foods went in, I doubt the Nora one would stay open, and with all those customers coming to Broad Ripple traffic would be horrible, and forget about a run to the grocery on weekend nights. I think concern over the number of apartments is misplaced, but the 400 space parking garage has me concerned - someone needs to ask the developer just how much traffic they think this development is going to generate. I am not against more neighborhood residents, but heavy commercial traffic going in and out at that location sounds like a mess.

  4. I thought everyone was innocent until guilt was proven. Seems people have already convicted Reggie in the press. My nephew was a good kid and is a good man, more to this story im sure

  5. Going by the Marion County population only is of little use. 13th largest? No Way! To judge the real size of a metro area, the easy way is to look at the Arbitron rating list. Indianapolis hovers around 40th largest in the nation--sometimes more, sometimes less. Advertisers want to know exactly how large the population is before they buy radio advertising. Arbitron figured it out long ago. Indianapolis is estimated at 1,427,500. The real #13 is Seattle-Tacoma with a metro population of 3,470,400. So, the population of just Marion County is completely irrelevant to anything useful as far as metro area planning.

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