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NBA lockout costs Philly
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December 8, 1998: 6:50 p.m. ET
City, stood up for All-Star Game on Valentine's Day, is stuck with the tab
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - The five-month-long NBA lockout has put the squeeze on yet another player - the City of Philadelphia.
The city, which was to host the National Basketball Association's 1999 All-Star Game and the weekend of events surrounding it, was informed Tuesday that the game, scheduled for Feb. 14, had been canceled. That decision could cost Philadelphia $35 million, according to estimates from a sports marketing firm.
But the mayor of Philadelphia, Edward G. Rendell, told CNNfn that even if the game had not been canceled, it might not have brought in as much as expected.
"You can imagine the surliness of a game that would be played if we started the season the second week of January ... It would be a sham of a game, and we wouldn't get the significant economic impact from it. We'd probably get less than half of the economic impact of a regular game," said Mayor Rendell.
Still, a number of businesses that had geared up to accommodate the All-Star event must now come up with other sources of revenue on short notice.
Hotels, for instance, are "scrambling to replace the losses," said J. Mickey Rowley, executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Hotel Association.
Roughly 5,000 rooms were reserved for the weekend, which at an average rate of $150 per night for four nights, bringing to at least $3 million the total potential loss, Rowley said. That figure does not include the $2 to $3 million in associated revenues from food and beverages.
But, Rowley said, in all likelihood the final loss absorbed by hotels will be "south of $1 million" by the time Feb. 14 arrives and other arrangements have been made.
The NBA apologized to Philadelphia for standing it up on Valentine's Day and promised to bring the All-Star Game back as soon as possible, but it did say the next two games are already promised to other cities.
With the basketball season ebbing away and fans' disgruntlement growing, the NBA may be making a number of other apologies before the lockout is settled. And the economic losses tallied as a result of the stalled season are likely to grow even higher.
Timothy Schneider, publisher of SportsTravel, a trade magazine for sports events managers and team travel planners, estimates that nationwide the NBA lockout will end up costing "hundreds of millions of dollars" in revenues ordinarily earned in connection with basketball's pre-season, season and post-season periods. 
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