Too bad there's nobody to play in them.
Right now, St. Louis holds the dubious claim as America's no-sports city. The city has not hosted a pro sports event since the Cardinals and Cubs wound up a meaningless three-game series July 31. Among the nation's largest cities, St. Louis stands alone in its athletic isolation. What's a sports fan to do?
Nothing.
"We're all in limbo," said Cardinals spokesman Brian Bartow, who has not had to update game notes for almost three months.
Unless you count a couple of NBA exhibitions -- and you can't -- the only game St. Louis is playing now is the waiting game.
The Blues, St. Louis' hockey team, can't open at the new Kiel Center until the NHL straightens out its labor mess. The Blues did not even play an exhibition game at home because the center was still under construction.
While the waiting goes on, the Kiel will serve up an International Hockey League game between the Peoria, Illinois, Rivermen, the Blues' top farm team, and Cincinnati on Sunday. Despite ticket prices ranging from $14 to $26, officials expect a hockey-starved crowd of more than 10,000.
As for the Cardinals, St. Louis' baseball club, there is no telling when they will play next. Which is perhaps why more than 50,000 showed for a "fan appreciation day" last month at Busch Stadium.
"It looked like a World Series game or something, the way they were lined up outside," Bartow said. "I guess they were just looking for an outlet."
After that brief high, it was back to waiting for something -- anything.
Fans can start counting the days until St. Louis University, which ended a 37-year collegiate tournament drought last year, starts playing basketball again. The Billikens open Nov. 27 against Bradley.
There is also another official NFL watch going on. The city, twice spurned in its efforts to land an NFL expansion team last year, expects to hear sometime late next month whether the Los Angeles Rams will move to St. Louis and its opulent stadium-to-be.
"They are keenly interested in St. Louis," said former Missouri Senator Tom Eagleton, head of the non-profit group FANS, Inc. "That doesn't mean they aren't interested in other places, as well."
Right now, it's nothing. And empty seats everywhere.
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