A little over a decade ago, former Minnesota Wild owner Bob Naegele Jr., spent $45 million of his own money to help build the Xcel Energy Center.

Naegele and then-St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman are widely credited with bringing NHL hockey back to downtown and helping to transform the state capital from a sleepy city by the Mississippi River to a Midwestern showpiece now hosting the Republican National Convention.

As the nation focuses its attention on the Xcel and St. Paul, this week could be viewed as yet another one of Naegele's crowning achievements. (Naegele, 68, sold the Wild for a reported $260 million earlier this year.) But as Minnpost's Roxane Battle discovered, Naegele will be among several notable Republicans who have opted to skip the convention — but not for reasons you might think.