There will be a team in Los Angeles at some point in the not-so-distant future. We've known that for the past few years, and according to an AEG release, Farmers Field has cleared its legal hurdles.
"This began as a legal negotiation but soon evolved into a cooperative dialogue about how we could work together to achieve the common goal of serving the needs of all segments of the community on important issues such as affordable housing,” AEG president and CEO Tim Leiweke said in a release. “We are excited about the opportunity for our foundations, our corporate partners and the rest of the philanthropic community to play an active role in leveraging the goodwill of AEG and Farmers Field to help deliver even greater benefits to those most in need. With this important milestone, for the first time in almost two decades the City of Los Angeles is finally poised to see the return of the NFL. With this settlement in place, the project can move forward to spur job creation and offer an even more robust package of measures benefiting the community."
The only legitimate obstacle blocking stadium construction in L.A. now is the lack of an NFL team. It seems highly unlikely that the NFL would consider expanding to 33 teams. The threat of relocation has been as good as gold for some teams in the past year. The Rams and the Vikings were both able to pressure their communities into getting improved/new stadiums using the threat of moving to L.A.
The popular picks for relocation remain the Chargers and the Raiders. The Chargers are just down the road from L.A. as it is, and the Raiders spent much of their history in Los Angeles. On top of the geographical reasons for relocation, both of those teams play in outdated stadiums, making the idea of a brand new field that much more appealing.
