By Evan Weiner

March 22, 2008

(New York, NY) -- Former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer may be the butt of comic's jokes but his resignation from the state's top job is no laughing matter to the Dolan Family, the owners of Madison Square Garden in Manhattan, New Jersey Nets owner Bruce Ratner, who wants to take his NBA to Brooklyn and perhaps New York Islanders owner Charles Wang, who wants to renovate the Nassau Coliseum as part of the Lighthouse Project. Spitzer threw his support behind the transformation of the Farley Post Office, which is located across the street from Madison Square Garden, from just a grand post office into a grand transportation center with a new Madison Square Garden behind the post office property on Ninth Avenue.

Spitzer apparently had no problem with claiming land through eminent domain and that was important for Ratner's arena project to proceed. New York's new Governor, David Patterson who has also become the punch line of jokes because he has admitted to having several affairs during his marriage, said in 2005 that there should be a statewide moratorium on the use of eminent domain. Patterson is just days into his new job and needs to work on getting a new state budget approved by both houses of the legislature and pumping up a new Madison Square Garden or a Brooklyn arena should be a back burner issue at the moment.

Patterson will apparently not suffer any fallout from admitting his dalliances and will serve out Spitzer's term.

On February 23, about two weeks before it was revealed that Spitzer was caught with a call girl, the New York Times reported that the $14 billion proposal to transform Pennsylvania Station and the district around it was in danger of collapse because of the softening economy, shortfalls in government financing, political inertia and daunting logistical problems. The Dolans new Garden would have been incorporated into what is being called the Moynihan Station to honor the former New York United States Senator who suggested that the Farley Post Office be turned into a "new" Pennsylvania Station.

The plans called for the arena to be moved about one block west of its present location and that the Garden would be razed and replaced with skyscrapers.

By early March, Spitzer was pushing ahead hoping to save the project by introducing the Port Authority into the mix with that agency putting money into the transformation of the post office to a transportation station and arena.

The Dolan Family has dusted off old plans to renovate 40-year-old Madison Square Garden in the event that the Moynihan Station project never gets off the ground. Ironically, the present Garden was built on the site of the old Pennsylvania Station Beaux-Arts building which was knocked down in 1964.

The Dolans lost a key ally in Spitzer who felt that the development of the Moynihan Station was important for Manhattan's midtown.

Meanwhile, the ever shrinking Atlantic Yards development in Brooklyn may have a suffered a big blow when Spitzer was caught in a Washington, DC hotel room with "Kristen." The Brooklyn arena may be a bit bigger than the plot of land that Ratner wants to build on. If that is the case, Ratner may need the remaining space to be seized by eminent domain and if Patterson hasn't changed his stance, he won't get the necessary support he needs from the Governor.

Ratner's project is undergoing a downsizing because of the uncertain New York City and American economy and has put certain aspects of the Atlantic Yards project on hold.

Spitzer was a supporter of Wang's Lighthouse Project in Uniondale that would have the renovation of the Nassau Coliseum as the central component of an arena-village plan that would include office space, residential and commercial development. Nassau County and Wang were to share the costs

Ratner, who allegedly wanted to move his Nets into Madison Square Garden, still thinks his Nets will be in Brooklyn in about two years. In 2004, Ratner started talking about building an arena over railroad tracks not far from where Walter O'Malley could have relocated his Dodgers from nearby Ebbets Field more than a half century ago. The Atlantic Yards project grew to eight million square feet of apartments, office space, stores in 16 towers, an arena and eight acres of open space.

Ratner may have some options. He could stay at the 27-year-old New Jersey Meadowlands Arena, tried to work out a deal with Dolan and play at the Garden, move his team to the New Jersey Devils new building in Newark but he would be a secondary tenant there and not get the lion's share of the arena generated revenues or look at Long Island and either sell the Nets to Wang or move to the Nassau Coliseum, if Wang moves ahead with his project.

If Ratner wanted to sell his team to non New York interests who wanted to move the franchise, Las Vegas and Kansas City would be among the first in line for an opportunity to snap up the team.

A change in the top elected office in New York State may unexpected results in the sports world with Madison Square Garden, the New Jersey Meadowlands, New Jersey Devils, Brooklyn and Nassau County officials wondering just what the fallout is for them from Eliot Spitzer’s very public fall after being caught with a call girl. For the Dolans, it may be a renovated Madison Square Garden, for Brooklyn, no new arena, for New Jersey a chance at keeping the Nets, for Long Island, no Nassau Coliseum renovation.

Spitzer had supported the Manhattan, Brooklyn and Nassau County projects; will David Patterson lend his support? That is what the Dolans, Ratner and Wang would like to know.

(evanjweiner@yahoo.com or eweiner@mcn.tv)