AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Read our AI Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n By their reckoning, the friendship between Royals owner John Sherman and Hallmark chairman of the board Don Hall Jr. goes back decades.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n From the start, it was steeped in a common vision.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Even as Sherman was consumed with entrepreneurship and growing his business in its early years, he was enjoying enough success that Hall sought to engage him further in community and philanthropic endeavors.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Sherman had long admired how the Halls and the families of Ewing Kauffman and Henry Block and others had invested in Kansas City. It didn\u2019t take much convincing to reel him in.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Because it was \u201cvery clear that (Sherman\u2019s) interests in the community were bigger than his interest in just his business<\/a>. \u2026\u201d said Hall, who along with Sherman spoke with The Star at length Friday morning. \u201cHe had just a real passion to do things that were good for the community.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Similarly motivated, Hall and Sherman dedicated themselves to numerous causes together \u2014 particularly through the Civic Council of Greater Kansas City, for which Sherman succeeded Hall as chair.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n From that grew a mutual appreciation and trust.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n So much so that Sherman confided in Hall when he was considering buying the Royals in 2019.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n All of which helps explain the advent of the extraordinary announcement Wednesday in what each described as a partnership: an ambitious and audacious plan to enable the Royals to build a stadium and ancillary development in the footprint of Hallmark headquarters in Crown Center and Washington Square Park.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The plan calls for an 85-acre area to accommodate more than $1 billion in private development around or near the proposed $1.9 billion stadium. The stadium itself is expected to be funded by up to $600 million from the city, an as-yet-undisclosed amount from the state and, Sherman said, approximately $800 million from the Royals.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As we roamed Benton\u2019s event space atop the Westin at Crown Center and gazed out at the 360-degree panorama of what Hall called the cultural center of the community, each spoke about how this union of two of Kansas City\u2019s most beloved institutions came to be, and how they view what will unfold from here.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Much of it remains a work in progress.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Through the years since Sherman began speaking publicly about moving the team from Kauffman Stadium to a modern home most preferably in the city, Hall was a frequent advisor \u2014 or at least an ear.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n His standing offer from Hall, Sherman said, was \u201chow could he be helpful, just in general, on this journey.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n It was a long and winding road to this point, Sherman self-deprecatingly reminded again on Friday: Sure, he said with a laugh, it all went just like \u201c65 Toss Power Trap\u201d \u2014 the touchdown play immortalized by Chiefs coach Hank Stram being mic\u2019d up in Super Bowl IV.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n After the voter-rejected Crossroads plan of 2024, the Royals negotiated with a number of entities \u2014 including the city, North Kansas City and the state of Kansas.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Amid all that, Sherman became both struck by and stuck on some aspects of Washington Square.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Among the issues with the five-acre site were the minimal flexibility to develop around it, negotiations with the railroad to build over the existing tracks and even how the stadium itself would fit.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cYou said, \u2018It won\u2019t be symmetrical,\u2019\u201d Hall reminded Sherman.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Sensing Sherman was struggling with those options, Hall suddenly was moved to broach something he said he hadn\u2019t thought about much before that moment.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He\u2019d had no previous notion of moving Hallmark headquarters, he said, and certainly had never seen it as a potential site for baseball. It wasn\u2019t really a consideration, he added, \u201cuntil I said it out loud.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Thinking out loud, really, with someone he could trust to kick around such ideas.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201c\u2018What if we thought about this differently?\u2019\u201d Hall recalled saying to Sherman.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Sherman remembered Hall putting it something like this: \u201c\u2018I\u2019d like to think about reimagining Crown Center. And what if we could think about bringing baseball here?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Either way, it was an ah-ha moment. Or an epiphany.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n On the other end of the phone on his screened porch at home that day, Sherman immediately stood up \u201cto make sure the blood was flowing right, to make sure I heard him right.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n He was struck at the thought of all that could be done with this type of property in the heart of an American city. And he was something approaching astounded by Hall\u2019s willingness to consider the profound change from the company\u2019s beloved home of more than 50 years.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cI had to bring my heart rate back down,\u201d Sherman added, \u201conce I understood he was serious.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The relationship set the tone for what was to come over the impending months \u2014 from that spark to culminating the deal in the last few weeks.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Shortly thereafter, they convened at Benton\u2019s and gazed over the landscape and tried to open their minds to what was possible.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Imagine a blank sheet of paper<\/i>, Hall would tell Sherman, and they set about exploring numerous scenarios with the help of stadium and land experts who offered models about everywhere on the 85 acres.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Looking down upon it Friday, Hall said \u201cit looks pretty obvious right now, but it wasn\u2019t obvious at the time.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n But they kept exchanging \u201cwhat ifs?\u201d and kept meeting.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Even when it meant defying convention.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cYou can\u2019t do it through brokers,\u201d Hall said.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Meaning?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cWe had to clear the lawyers out of the room a few times,\u201d said Sherman, noting this deal had to be made \u201cprinciple to principle.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n In essence, he added, they entered into the process with the philosophy that \u201cwe\u2019re going to pretend like we\u2019re already partners.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n By the end, Hall said, the message to attorneys advocating or documenting it all was, \u201c\u2018You\u2019re working for both of us. \u2026 We\u2019re trying to find the best solution here. We\u2019re not trying to go one-up.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Even in that spirit, the deal came together late in mid-April. A proposed city ordinance originally phrased to focus entirely on Washington Square Park was amended to be titled \u201cWashington Square Park\/Crown Center area\u201d<\/a> just a day before it was introduced to City Council on April 9.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Asked about that timetable, Sherman and Hall each pointed to his own reasons for the late shift.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve done a lot of deals, and I never say they\u2019re (even) 50% until we\u2019re on the way to closing \u2026\u201d Sherman said, later adding, \u201cWe couldn\u2019t tell (city officials) about this until we finalized our deal. And the moment we finalized our deal, we told the mayor and city manager.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n For his part, Hall said they kept it \u201chighly confidential\u201d until it was done-done, so employees and tenants of Crown Center could promptly be notified when their agreement was certain.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Each also spoke to different aspects of the nature of the partnership.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll have a development company that we\u2019re partners in, but the stadium will be separate from them,\u201d Sherman said. \u201cThat will be its own entity. It will be sold to the Royals, that (approximately) 15-acre plot. \u2026<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cAnd then the Royals will, I\u2019m going to use the word, \u2018contribute.\u2019 I don\u2019t know if that\u2019s the right legal term, but in essence, the city or some agency of the city will ultimately own the ground and the stadium and then lease it back to us.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As Hall put it: \u201cThere\u2019s a group John heads that owns the team. We\u2019re not involved in that at all. There\u2019s a group that will own the stadium. \u2026 Hallmark\u2019s not involved in that, either. The land that we currently occupy will go to that group; we will not be responsible for that.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n But Hallmark will partner in what Hall called the \u201cthird entity\u201d of development around the stadium.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As it stands now, anyway, Crown Center itself is to be preserved, even as Hallmark will get a new home in the immediate area of what Sherman called the operation\u2019s \u201cphase one.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cI hope so,\u201d Hall said with a laugh as he considered Sherman\u2019s term for possible expanded development later.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Hallmark has some 2 million square feet of space and some 1,200 people to be moved, Hall said, as it looks to modernize in a new environment he believes \u201cwill make us even better as a company.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As he pondered that future, Hall said \u201cwe\u2019ll shed a tear of nostalgia\u201d when the building comes down but celebrate carrying on the vision of his grandfather, Joyce Hall: After he disembarked from a train at Union Station in 1910, he furthered \u201cthe Kansas City Spirit<\/a>\u201d of grit and generosity that brought him here from Norfolk, Nebraska.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Similarly, Sherman reiterated how much he loves Kauffman Stadium, where he went on his first date with his future wife, Marny, and like Crown Center opened in 1973. He thought, too, about how they cried when they moved out of their first home on the way to their futures.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m going to be sad,\u201d Sherman said. \u201cBut I\u2019m also kind of responsible for making sure that we kind of write the blueprint, (and) we\u2019ll take those memories with us and bring them here and build new ones.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n When it comes to potential elements and names for the new stadium the Royals will seek to be in by 2030, Sherman said, \u201cI think that\u2019s a process.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
An epiphany<\/h2>\n
![\"Royals](\"https:\/\/www.kansascity.com\/public\/latest-news\/njre63\/picture315525796\/alternates\/FREE_1140\/IMG_3116.jpeg\" "\\"IMG_3116.jpeg\\"")
Pretend we\u2019re already partners<\/h2>\n
\u2018We should put a little shrine there\u2019<\/h2>\n