Commentary from Comptroller Darlene Green

Red October means Green for St. Louis

October 10, 2014 | 2 min reading time

This article is 10 years old. It was published on October 10, 2014.

St-Louis-Cardinals
Red and blue may be divided when it comes to politics, but when it comes to St. Louis sports—red and blue are coming together nicely in downtown St. Louis. We love Red October in St. Louis. Our employees at City Hall are all abuzz with World Series wishes and proudly wearing red, and blue. We love a red and blue October in St. Louis. After all, this is a huge sports town.

Besides the Cardinals, our St. Louis Blues opened their season at home and the St. Louis Cardinals showed their support for the St. Louis Blues' season home opener, via Twitter. Thousands of fans proudly showing off their Blue Note jerseys Thursday evening made the trek over to Scottrade Center. And on Monday, the St. Louis Rams will be in prime time when they host the San Francisco 49ers at the Edward Jones Dome. 

The Cardinals play Games 1 and 2 of the NLCS against the San Francisco Giants at home this weekend. Those games played here translate into additional tax dollars for our city. So, the longer the Cardinals play in the postseason, the better. The two NLDS games that were played in St. Louis brought in an estimated $500 thousand in tax revenue. 

Now that we've reached the NLCS, ticket prices are higher than the NLDS games. When the Cardinals go all the way to the World Series it means even more, in terms of tax revenue for our city. Here's how it all adds up: two NLDS home games, four NLCS home games and three World Series home games could bring in nearly $4 million in taxes for our city. 

In March, Forbes valued the Cardinals' worth at $820 million. They also called St. Louis "the best baseball city in the major leagues." Reasons including attendance, television viewership and the teams' performance are what earned St. Louis that distinction. This season's NLDS games reached record numbers in attendance. 

We love Red October in St. Louis. With World Series wishes we proudly wear red, and blue. Our last trip to the World Series was in 2013, but we lost to the Boston Red Sox. The last time we won the World Series championship was in 2011, three years ago—so I think we've waited long enough. Go Cards! Go Blues! Go Rams!

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