Louisville, St. Louis, Oklahoma City and his native Memphis were all markets Wooldridge considered. But from the start, New Orleans ranked near the top of his list for personal and business reasons. His daughter had been born there, and he identified with the joie de vivre of the city. He also knew how badly New Orleans, which had been burned by the Jazz leaving town in 1979, wanted the NBA back. So badly, in fact, that a bill had gotten pushed through the legislature in 1993 to reallocate money from the hotel-motel tax for a host of projects that included building a downtown arena on spec in the hopes that it would one day house an NBA team. One of the first people Wooldridge contacted was Doug Thornton, an executive with SMG, the global stadium management company that oversaw operations at the Superdome for the state of Louisiana. Thornton represented the state in lease negotiations and essentially served as the de facto czar of professional sports for the Louisiana Stadium and Exposition District (LSED). Wooldridge and Thornton met in 1998 and had stayed in touch during the interim.