Inside the Ram-Chargers marriage as the NFL fights for Los AngelesSeth Wickersham--Don Van Natta Jr.
THE SKELETON OF a stadium sits at the center of a construction site three times the size of Disneyland. It is a futuristic mass of steel and concrete that appears to have both risen from the earth and descended from space. SoFi Stadium -- the name sounds from the ether -- will house a football field 100 feet below ground level and is surrounded by mammoth mounds of excavated Inglewood, California, soil piled like peaks in a range around the development. When it opens next summer, its backers hope SoFi will mark the end of one NFL era in Los Angeles -- defined by rotting venues and teams that have drifted in and out over 73 years -- and the beginning of another. The $5 billion-plus project will feature a translucent roof that appears to hover above the stadium, as if allowing it to breathe, and will be home to 298 acres of retail space, including a theater, a concert venue and a new NFL Media headquarters. Now, though, seven days a week, it is surrounded by cranes and trucks and an army of hustling workers in white construction helmets bearing the logos of two home teams: the Los Angeles Rams and the Los Angeles Chargers, an arranged marriage of clubs whose high-level executives barely speak with one another.
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