There's been no shortage of rumors about where the Kansas City Royals will play after their lease at Kauffman Stadium expires in 2031. The latest rumor is that the team will relocate to 119th Street and Nall Avenue in Overland Park.

Rob has written extensively about Kansas City ballpark plans and rumors and shared his opinion. For more, check out these related stories: Is This Ballpark Better Than Kauffman Stadium?, Where Will The Royals Future Home Be? They Still Don't Know?, Royals Owner Sherman Saying A Lot But Revealing Very Little

Rumor Origin

Yesterday morning, Bob Fescoe, one of the morning personalities on Kansas City's 96.5 The Fan, in a conversation with Dusty Likins, asserted that it seems like the Royals playing at 119th Street and Nall on the old Sprint Campus is pretty much not an "if" or a "maybe" but more of a "when" kind of thing.

Fescoe asserts that he's picked up that impression in his conversations with folks in Arizona, I'd assume during Royals spring training, and people in Kansas City. Additionally, he said that he had heard the Royals were talking to the Jewish Community Center adjacent to the Sprint campus about purchasing that land. You can check out a segment of Fescoe and Linkins' conversation on X, here.

Digging Into The Rumors

Looking at Google Maps aerial images of the Sprint Campus, it seems there is room for a stadium, parking, and whatever entertainment, hospitality, residential, and nightlife businesses Sherman and the Royals would like to include in their stadium plans. Add the parkland at the corner of 119 and Nall from Overland Park into the development, and the Royals have a ball game.

I would be surprised if the Jewish community center Fescoe talks about would be easily swayed to move. Its campus includes a school, indoor and outdoor fitness facilities, a pool, tennis courts, sports fields, a theater, the Midwest Center For Holocaust Education, and the Jewish Community Foundation of Greater Kansas City. That's a big facility to re-build somewhere else.

Of course, Fescoe pointed out the Royals don't need that campus, they'd like it.

If you look at the Sprint Campus, however, while most of it is permanently closed and much of it is parking garages, Aspiria still has a significant presence on the campus with a few other businesses. For the record, Aspiria told KSHB they're not in any negotiations with the team to build a stadium at the site. While a spokesperson for the Jewish Community Center told KMBC that their CEO is unaware of any discussions or proposals.

The Rumor: Rediculous, Plausable, or Done Deal?

Let's be blunt: this is a rumor, but John Sherman said back in February that the Royals know what they want to do and where they want to go, and the team should be able to talk more about it over the summer when negotiations and deals are pretty much done. While I wouldn't say Sherman's comments pointed to a done deal, they indicate the team was pretty confident in their pursuit.

Fescoe's conversations and observations on how people couched their discussions and talked to him about the site might also have merit, especially if they share Sherman's confidence that everything will work out.

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The area, from the retail and restaurants already there, seems to suggest that it could be the perfect spot for more housing, retail, and entertainment-type places team owners like to put in their ballpark neighborhoods. I don't think getting Aspiria and whatever else is still open on the Sprint campus to move would be hard.

The one sticking point in my mind is how many residential neighborhoods and developments surround that area. Sure, there's retail that buffers the Sprint campus from many neighborhoods, which isn't bad. Yet, if I lived in one of those neighborhoods, I'm not sure I'd want to deal with the influx of traffic and people. That's perhaps the only significant downside. In my mind, it's plausible.