Miami Dolphins Want $400 Million to Renovate Stadium but Swear They're Totally Not the Marlins

Remember when the Florida Marlins were all, if y'all don't give us millions and millions, we're just gonna go ahead and take our ballclub somewhere else, and the City of Miami was all, nooooo here ya go! and then threw millions and millions at the Marlins and now taxpayers are stuck paying for a $515 million stadium and the shittiest baseball team in the world?

Remember that?

Yeah. Good times.

Oh, hey, guess what?

The Miami Dolphins now want our money and are "threatening" to leave if they don't get it.

/frantically looks for checkbook
//gets distracted watching The View
///falls asleep
////farts

Apparently, Stephen Ross, the do-nothing-say-nothing owner of the never-healing ass fissure known as the Miami Dolphins, is going to ask taxpayers today to pick up some of the tab for $400 million worth of renovations to Sun Life Stadium.

According to Armando Salguero, Ross will sell the idea that the Dolphins are a "different kind of fish." Salguero also says. "The Dolphins, unlike practically all other NFL teams, currently have no lease holding them to their home stadium and thus their hometown. So basically, nothing is tying the Dolphins to South Florida other than tradition and ownership."

So to recap, Stephen Ross' pitch for more money is:

1. Hey! At least we're not the Marlins! *shrug*
2. GIVE US MONEY OR WE WILL LEAVE MAYBE BECAUSE THE LEASE IS UP OOGA-BOOGA!

Salguero also reports:

Ross is prepared to pay for "substantially all" of the freight of this modernization as long as his government partners begin helping him with the cost of running the facility. This according to a source familiar with the Dolphins' thinking.

That's a big deal.

O IS IT?

Where do we sign up so you can get our money even faster, Missah Ross???

There's also the promise that the tax dollars won't be coming out of the pockets of local taxpayers but through a hotel bed tax.

WHERE HAVE WE HEARD THIS BEFORE?

Oh. Yeah.

If keeping a general manager who has been in charge of a team that has finished with no more than seven wins four years in a row and then calling that general manager "smart" is not enough to convince the world that Stephen Ross is a fucking dolt of the highest order, then mayhap these new developments will.

Ross, who somehow by some magical wizard pixie dust, became a gazillionare, is running the Dolphins with the ineptness of Homer Simpson falling asleep at his station at the power plant during a nuclear meltdown.

First, he masks the fact that his team is awful by trying to razzle-dazzle fans with the promise of a snazzy new logo. Because he thinks you're stupid. 

Then, he holds a state-of-the-franchise address where he throws out middle-school-gym-coach-talking-points like "Our plan is to win" as a promise to fix the perpetually 7-9 Dolphins and says nothing more while keeping the one guy around who is solely responsible for the mess on the field. Because he thinks you're stupid.

And now, he plans to ask for millions of dollars in tax money to renovate the stadium while SoFla is still healing from the wounds inflicted by the lies perpetuated by the Marlins. And his sole defense will be "BUT WE'RE NOT THE MARLINS DERRRRRRP." Because he thinks you're stupid.

Oh, but the veiled threat of taking the team away will be the sure-fire way to get what he wants.

Because he's right. We are stupid.

Not this time. We say let's call Ross' bluff.

OOHHH YOU WANT TO TAKE AWAY OUR LAUGHINGSTOCK OF A FOOTBALL TEAM AND MOVE THEM TO GREAT BRITAIN?? WHAT EVER SHALL WE DOOOOO?????

Or, we can write him a check for $7.09 and then tell him that our plan to get him more money is to get more money.

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