Malcolm Glazer

PHOENIX -- On the day Malcolm Glazer finally became a member of the NFL club, St. Louis officially threatened to sue to get in.After the NFL owners unanimously approved the sale of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to the Glazer family yesterday, they started to debate the thorny issue of the Los Angeles Rams' proposed move to St. Louis.Hanging over the discussions was a declaration from the attorney general of Missouri, Jay Nixon, that the state will file an antitrust suit against the league if the move is turned down.

Got the perfect name for a Baltimore NFL team? Get in line.In a place where oyster yields are falling, industrial jobs are growing scarce, and the once-ubiquitous Natty Boh is almost impossible to find at sporting events, there is no shortage of passion when it comes to naming a potential football team."

Although the filing deadline is tomorrow, Baltimore should find out today whether it will have three or four ownership groups vying for an NFL expansion team.Three groups are committed to applying this week, but Phyllis Brotman, spokeswoman for Maryland NFL Expansion Group Ltd., said her group will decide today whether to become the fourth."We've completed the application. It's beautiful," she said.But the group hasn't decided whether to send it in with a $100,000 check -- only $50,000 is refundable -- because Maryland Expansion Group still is talking to a major Maryland investor who hasn't decided whether to back the group, Brotman said.

Malcolm Glazer may not be buying the New England Patriots after all.Fran Murray, the minority owner of the Patriots, said today that majority owner Victor Kiam has not been able to make a deal to sell the team to Mr. Glazer, a Florida businessman who heads one of the three groups that filed an application for an National Football League expansion team for Baltimore.The Patriots will likely be taken over by the NFL."I got an indication from Victor that they would not able to make a deal. I know they both tried and were simply unable at this point to find a common ground," said Mr. Murray, who had not participated in the negotiations.

June 1990: Orioles majority owner Eli Jacobs describes his hands-off approach toward club executives: "There is no decision that they would make, or agree upon, that I could conceivably overrule."February 1993: Joel Glazer describes how his family would operate an NFL expansion franchise: "The way we run all of our organizations, we go out and get the best possible people and let them run with it."Once bitten, twice shy, right?Well, maybe.The Glazers, like Jacobs, are out-of-towners, but Joel -- the son of Florida businessman Malcolm Glazer -- might actually mean what he says about the type of owner his father would be under the new NFL labor agreement.

So strong is their desire to own a National Football League franchise in Baltimore that Malcolm Glazer & Sons made an offer that seemingly couldn't be refused. Yet it was quickly discarded. The dollars were right; the premise wrong.What the Glazers proposed was to give each visiting team coming to Baltimore an astonishing $1.5 million per game, which would qualify as a record in take-home pay for any sport. It'smore than double, almost triple, the going rate for playing an NFL game on the road.

It's posturing with a view toward positioning. Malcolm Glazer attempting to create good will for himself in what he hopes will be a successful bid for a Baltimore football franchise, has hit attention-getting musical notes but at the same time is letting someone else blow his horn. Meaning the Baltimore Colt Band.Glazer wants the public to know he has more than a portfolio of impressive financial holdings to offer the National Football League expansion committee. He's now playing the public relations game with more than subtle effectiveness.

That Malcolm Glazer & Sons are within the stroke of a pen of purchasing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers -- and it was to be done today -- is not exactly an upset. A comeback of sorts? Perhaps. But the Glazers were always there, with quiet presence, as they demonstrated unrelenting resolve to acquire a major-league team.Shortly after 6 a.m. today, a source in Tampa said that it was "all over," and the Glazers had bought their way into the National Football League for a record price of $192 million.

Much of what's unfolding in Baltimore's pursuit of a National Football League expansion franchise is the kind of material that makes for a high-powered mystery novel. Only this is authentic, the real goods and not born of the imaginative mind of some writer working out of his attic to portray fictionalized situations.There are the two committed groups, headed by Leonard "Boogie" Weinglass and Malcolm Glazer, eager to win the right to own the team in the event the NFL grants Baltimore approval.

The Malcolm Glazer family, the newest entrant in the National Football League expansion derby, says it has the financial clout to jump-start Baltimore's stalled franchise bid.Mr. Glazer, the sole owner of a conglomerate, brings an asset that no other potential owner may be able to match: He says he has the liquid capital available to write a check for the full price of the team without selling any assets or borrowing money.In their first interview since they notified the Maryland Stadium Authority last month that they planned to bid for a team for Baltimore, two of Mr. Glazer's sons, Bryan and Joel, said yesterday that the family has the cash available to buy the team even if it costs from $150 million to $200 million.