As Coors Field enters its fourth decade, the naming rights for the stadium remain an all-time bargain.
At the Rockies’ inception, Coors Brewing Company became a limited partner in the club. The company’s investment was $30 million, according to what board chairman Bill Coors told The Denver Post in 1995.
With that limited partnership, the club “granted the naming rights in perpetuity to Coors Brewing Company or its successors,” according to the between the Rockies and the Denver Metropolitan Major League Baseball Stadium District. The stadium district, a political subdivision of the state, owns Coors Field.
So through the first 30 seasons of the team playing at 20th and Blake, Coors Brewing Company (which became Molson Coors Beverage Company after a has paid a measly $1 million per season to have its name on the stadium. The company is no longer headquartered in Colorado but still brews beer in Golden.
“I’d do it again for twice the money, but don’t tell Dick Monfort that,” quipped Pete Coors, the former head of the company and the great-grandson of its founder Adolph Coors.
Pete Coors, 78, threw out one of three ceremonial first pitches on Friday ahead of the snowy home opener against the Athletics. He recalled the conversation with Jerry McMorris ahead of his company investing in the club.
McMorris and Greeley brothers Dick and Charlie Monfort bought the Rockies from their original owner, Mickey Monus, who had to sell the team after he became implicated in with his company. Thus, Coors Brewing Company’s limited partnership was an important piece of keeping the team in Denver. The company sold its 14.5% stake in the team in 2013.
“Jerry said, ‘We really need Coors to be part of it,’ and I said, ‘Okay,'” said Coors, whose family has been season ticket holders since the Rockies’ inaugural season in 1993. “I said we would be a limited partner, and what we really wanted was our name on the ballpark. Having it as Coors Field all these years has been pretty special.”
The company’s $30 million price tag for indefinite naming rights to the stadium is a steal compared to Denver’s other two modern stadium rights deals. In 2019, the Broncos’ stadium name was sold to Empower for and in 2020 the Nuggets/Avs arena struck a deal with Ball Corporation for
