WE’RE SUPER FOR SUPER BOWLS
Landing our 11th Big Game makes us the host with the most
The drought is over, and the Super Bowl is coming back. NFL owners voted Tuesday to award Super Bowl LIV (54) to South Florida in February 2020, ending a string of rejections. The game at the Miami Dolphins’ newly renovated stadium in Miami Gardens will be a record 11th to be staged in South Florida, breaking a tie with New Orleans. It will be the first here since 2010, matching the longest gap between visits by the league’s championship game, and will come during the NFL’s celebration of its 100th anniversary.
“You can’t think of a better place to celebrate and have a party than Miami,” said Dolphins owner Steve Ross, whose investment of more than $450 million into the stadium overhaul made the difference after recent bids failed. “The only thing that could be better is when we’re playing in the game and winning it.”
The NFL also awarded the 2019 Super Bowl to Atlanta and the 2021 game to Los Angeles in voting of the 32 owners meeting in Charlotte, N.C.
Tampa was also being considered for the three games, and New Orleans was in the running for 2019.
South Florida was the last of the regions to make their pitch to the owners, and utilized a former Super Bowl hero to deliver the message.
Hall-of-Fame fullback Larry Csonka, the Most Valuable Player when the Dolphins won Super Bowl VIII in 1974, was the choice to lay out the reasons for returning the game to the area during the allotted 15-minute presentation.
Csonka said hewas pushing todeliver the2020game to put the NFL’s Centennial celebration in South Florida.
“Miami has the facilities tomake it a festival,” Csonka said on the NFL Network following the vote. “I think that’s going to happen with the Centennial game. I plan on being there.”
The choice of Csonka was suggested by former Dolphins wide receiver Nat Moore, a member of the South Florida Super Bowl Bid Committee.
“We wanted to do something different,” committee chairman Rodney Barreto said. “[Csonka] was just here for the [Dolphins’] 50th anniversary, and he got upand did a roast of [former coach Don] Shula and got everybody laughing. He’s got a big presence and he’s a great speaker.”
Csonka certainly has the presence to command attention of the league’s owners. Like with the back-toback Super Bowl championship teams he played on, he had plenty of support to rely on in making the case for South Florida with what Barreto described as “our most competitive bid ever.”
Most important, Csonka could point to the stadium renovation undertaken by Ross, which is in the final phase with a canopy being installed over most seating areas and high-definition video boards and other amenities being added.
Ross indicated during the celebratory news conference that the cost of the project is going to end up being closer to $500 million than the projected $450 million.
“I think when Mr. Ross put hisnameon the line and sprung for the money and redid the stadium completely, certainly that gets their attention,” Csonka said. “We have all the facilities, and I was really awed by them when I saw them two months ago. I delivered that to the owners. We hit it over the fence. I’m happy about it.”
A state-of-the-art stadiumwas the missing ingredient when South Florida was shunned in vying for the 50th and 51st Super Bowls— whichwent to San Francisco/Santa Clara in 2016 andHouston in 2017— and when the regionwasn’t given a chance to bid for the 2018 game that will be played in Minneapolis.
“Miami has hosted more Super Bowls than any other city, and it’s clear why. This is the place to live, work and play, and hosting the Super Bowl at Dolphins’ stadium once again serves as further evidence that Miami is a major event community,” said Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez.
There was a time when Miami was the preferred venue, as four of the first 10 Super Bowls were played at the Orange Bowl. That included perhaps the most memorable when Joe Namath guaranteed and led the New York Jets to a monumental upset victory over the Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl III in 1969.
The competition to host the NFL’s signature event has intensified in recent years due to the economic windfall that it brings. The league has been rewarding cities with new or significantly renovated stadiums.
That is the case with Atlanta, which will open the $1.4 billion Mercedes-Benz Stadium next year, and Los Angeles, expected to have a $2.6 billion facility in Inglewood, Calif., ready for the Rams by 2019.
The overhaul of the Dolphins’ 29-year-old stadium (known as NewMiami Stadium until a new naming partner is announced), has made it once again appealing in combination with the other virtues of the region as a big event and tourist destination.
Barreto cited the ingredients of the successful bid: “A more than $450 million enhancement to Dolphins’ stadium. A budget of cash and incentives valued at more than $40 million. A warm weather destination that always delivers. Always. We are truly thankful to Mr. Stephen Ross, owner of the Miami Dolphins, for all his support and assistance throughout this process.”
Plans for the next South Florida Super Bowl were laid out in a 526-page bid describing plans for aweeklong celebration with the focal point centered on Super Bowl Park in downtown Miami, extending along Biscayne Boulevard from the Intercontinental Hotel to the Perez ArtMuseum.
All of the premier Super Bowl-related events and venues will be based in Miami-Dade, including the NFL Experience, team hotels and media headquarters, due to stipulations in a 2014 agreement that pays a $4 million bonus to the Dolphins for bringing the big game to the stadium.
But Barreto promised that Broward County won’t be left out of the action.
“In essence, this is Miamibecause the core of it is going to be downtown. But there’s enough events to go around,” Barreto said. “We view Broward as a partner and a very good partner. We’ve got a great history there. We’re going to preserve that and expand on it.”
The Broward County Commission approved a resolution Tuesday to provide in-kind services of county personnel and transportation aid, but not a cash contribution to the effort.
Nicki Grossman, a member of the South Florida Super Bowl Bid Committee and Broward County’s top tourism official, estimated the economic impact on Broward at $175 million.
Finally, the Dolphins and the region have a big-event victory to celebrate. Acheer went up in the South Florida committee’s situation room when NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell announced the winning tally for 2020 over runner-up Tampa Bay on the third ballot.
“The NFL has perfect 2020 vision,” Grossman said. “Welcome home, Super Bowl.”