
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, May 23, 1993                   TAG: 9305230146
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: D-9   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: From Baltimore Sun and Associated Press reports
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

NFL OWNERS TO ESTABLISH INITIATION FEE

Members get no special golf privileges and they pay for most of their meals, but they are guaranteed premium seats at pro football games. And at Super Bowl time you won't see them standing in line for a ticket or beer.

Best of all, the club - one of America's most exclusive fraternities - has a few openings.

On Tuesday, the world will find out just how costly the initiation fee will be to join the NFL. The owners of the existing 28 teams will meet in Atlanta and set the fee for the two franchises they will award this fall.

Officials in the five cities - St. Louis, Baltimore, Charlotte, Jacksonville and Memphis - hoping to gain one of the teams will be watching anxiously. A franchise fee too high could prompt some to drop out; a price too low could help competitors with weaker applications.

"They will go for the highest price they can get their hands on while showing some fiscal responsibility," said Michael Megna, an expert on franchise values with American Appraisal Associates in Milwaukee.

Committees of owners have established a number of potential price and term packages, ranging from $125 million to $175 million with payments stretched over three to seven years, NFL sources have said. Most observers expect the price to be on the high end of the range.

That would make it the most expensive expansion in history. Hockey charged $50 million last year, baseball $95 million in 1991 and basketball $32.5 million in 1989.

The last time the NFL expanded, in 1974, it did so at relatively bargain-basement prices. The Seattle Seahawks paid $17.2 million over 10 years, and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers paid $16 million over seven years. The league also barred the new teams from the shared television revenues for the first few years.

by CNB