Is there room for the NFL in Oklahoma?

[semisimple]

That may already be happening, this was the first year in a while that more people moved to OK from TX, than to TX from OK.

Edit: found it. ACS state-to-state migration estimates for 2010: http://www.census.gov/hhes/migration...-to-state.html

Hard to say definitively given the margin of error, but still looks like that claim is probably true. Interesting...

[redrunner]

http://www.texastribune.org/texas-co...atterns-texas/

[metro]

The Oklahoman had an article a few days ago on the reverse migration.

[Oil Capital]

any chance you could provide us with a link?

[Laramie]

What I posted was totally taken out of content by some. All I was saying has to do with the fact that Texans do a great job of promoting their own state. I'll talked to people who have driven to Texas to buy things that were right here in Oklahoma. Again, we don't really know what we have here.

Don't get me wrong; some 15 years ago when I use to post on the Oklahomans' old forum; people were not civil; if you didn't agree with them, you were smoking crack or crazy. I do recognized that we have come a long way.

[ljbab728]

Here's OKC's chance.

http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?slu...owl-goodell-la

Sorry, won't happen.

[Laramie]

Are we ready for the NFL? NO! Should we put ourselves in a position to be able to secure an NFL franchise around 2020? It remains to be seen...

[OKCNDN]

OKC would need at least a few more companies the size of Devon and Chesapeake that actually invest in OKC like they do before any serious discussion of sports teams is made. I do not believe there is enough disposable income for OKC residents. More population is only good if the increase is accompanied by an increase in disposable income.

[Bellaboo]

Nope, It'll never happen....at least not in our lifetimes..........as far as paid for football, it'll stay in the college ranks in this state.

[OKCisOK4me]

Are we ready for the NFL? NO! Should we put ourselves in a position to be able to secure an NFL franchise around 2020? It remains to be seen...

...that 2020 should be more like 2050, fyi.

[Laramie]

...that 2020 should be more like 2050, fyi.

Everyone is entitled to their opinions. I'll say this again, I'm an optimistic person about where we are headed. I heard these same phrases back in 1989 when I
really got into message boards.

People kept saying that Oklahoma City would never get this or that and we can't support this or that and it would be 2020-2050 before we got a major league team. I've heard all this before.

The NHL expansion derby sidestepped us in 1997. Mayor Norrick had a vision and we built an arena and instead of settling for the NHL we go the Grand Prize--NBA!

When 2020 arrives, let's hope we're in a position to take advantage of an option to have another MAPS for HOOPS vote by having some type of structure in place in case the referendum is MAPS for PIGSKIN.

[OKCisOK4me]

Fact (greater than) opinion.

We built a bare bones arena that sat less than 20,000 for concerts and the eventual dream of either professional hockey or basketball. Had Katrina not happened and we filed to be host city to a relocated New Orleans Hornets, there's no telling where we would be right now.

Stadiums in the NFL have fan capacity anywhere from 61,500 (Chicago Bears) to 82,566 (New York Jets/Giants). I agree with the above poster that corporate sponsorship plays a heavier roll in the NFL than in the NBA/AHL. Devon, Sandridge, Boeing, Continental, Midfirst, Loves, Chesapeake, USFleetTracking, Said Indian Casinos, American Fidelity, Sonic, Cox, could double their work forces and we'd still have a shortage for corporate sponsorship regarding the NFL.

We need more companies based here in downtown, and it'd help if there were Some more Fortune 500 or Forbes Top 100 companies in the metro.

I, like you, would really like to see it be a possibility, but you need massive roots before you can grow a large tree and I don't see the OKC population exploding by 2020.

[Laramie]

Fact (greater than) opinion.

We built a bare bones arena that sat less than 20,000 for concerts and the eventual dream of either professional hockey or basketball. Had Katrina not happened and we filed to be host city to a relocated New Orleans Hornets, there's no telling where we would be right now.

Stadiums in the NFL have fan capacity anywhere from 61,500 (Chicago Bears) to 82,566 (New York Jets/Giants). I agree with the above poster that corporate sponsorship plays a heavier roll in the NFL than in the NBA/AHL. Devon, Sandridge, Boeing, Continental, Midfirst, Loves, Chesapeake, USFleetTracking, Said Indian Casinos, American Fidelity, Sonic, Cox, could double their work forces and we'd still have a shortage for corporate sponsorship regarding the NFL.

We need more companies based here in downtown, and it'd help if there were Some more Fortune 500 or Forbes Top 100 companies in the metro.

I, like you, would really like to see it be a possibility, but you need massive roots before you can grow a large tree and I don't see the OKC population exploding by 2020.

An NFL team in Oklahoma City would need the corporate support from the whole state of Oklahoma; not just OKC.

Fortune 500 companies: http://www.buyandhold.com/bh/en/rese...tes/index.html

Louisiana has three (3) Fortune 500 companies and Oklahoma has four (4).

New Orleans has one Fortune 500 company; Oklahoma City has two.

I realize that it's going to take a strong corporate presence in a community to support the NFL; however, who knows what will happen in 2020. What we didn't see in the 80s came to fruitation in the first decade of 2000.

If Fortune 500 companies were the gauge by which a city would get an NFL franchise, Richmond, VA and Fort Worth, TX would be prime target markets. Fort Worth is there; Richmond is not.

There are many avenues of which Oklahoma City could benefit from having a stadium (even one with minimum temporary amenities)--I'm just not sure what we should build?

I see that Oklahomans have taken such a backseat to Texas that we have become so shadow-burned from the Lone Star State that is going to take time realizing that Texas isn't all that. Texas is coming after our companies and our water. OKC lost Fleming and Kerr McGee to Texas, Tulsa lost even more; we need to do more to keep homegrown companies and improve the quality of life here than just old hometown cooking...

Texans don't tell you about the down-sides of their state because they accentuate the positives and dwell less on the negatives. Oklahomans on the otherhand don't realize our potential.

I don't want to became another Texas because I see where Texas is headed.

[OKCisOK4me]

MSA of Ft. Worth is more than the whole state of Oklahoma. Don't get me wrong, with good influx of future residents (like the positive note of us having more newer residents than Texas recently), it may be possible. I just don't see it happening before or during the next U.S. Census. I can honestly see it being more like 2030-2040.

I was looking at the Google Maps after I wrote that reply to see where a prime spot for a stadium would be. I'm honestly thinking #1 would be between Shields/OKCRocks Climbing & New I-40/Future Boulevard. Once the Cottonseed Mill has moved, then that will be a great spot with easy access to the three sporting venues in OKC (Chesapeake, Bricktown Ballpark & Future Stadium). I'm not including Cox Convention Center cause that may be torn down in the future and be turned into 4 regular sized blocks instead of 1 super block. Option #2 would have to be where Wheeler Park is (sorry history buffs) but it's the only land area near downtown that is feasible beside option #1 for a big enough stadium.

[Laramie]

MSA of Ft. Worth is more than the whole state of Oklahoma. Don't get me wrong, with good influx of future residents (like the positive note of us having more newer residents than Texas recently), it may be possible. I just don't see it happening before or during the next U.S. Census. I can honestly see it being more like 2030-2040.

I was looking at the Google Maps after I wrote that reply to see where a prime spot for a stadium would be. I'm honestly thinking #1 would be between Shields/OKCRocks Climbing & New I-40/Future Boulevard. Once the Cottonseed Mill has moved, then that will be a great spot with easy access to the three sporting venues in OKC (Chesapeake, Bricktown Ballpark & Future Stadium). I'm not including Cox Convention Center cause that may be torn down in the future and be turned into 4 regular sized blocks instead of 1 super block. Option #2 would have to be where Wheeler Park is (sorry history buffs) but it's the only land area near downtown that is feasible beside option #1 for a big enough stadium.

In the MAPS III proposal item #10 which didn't make the shortlist the stadium was on the riverfront, I couldn't tell the exact location.

I have the utmost respect for your vision and comments; maybe I'm looking to far ahead; however, I can say this for the state of Texas, they do plan more aggressively than Oklahoma.

[Oil Capital]

, I can say this for the state of Texas, they do plan more aggressively than Oklahoma.

How so?

[Spencerific]

There are 1,322,459 people in the metro area according to the 2010 census.

Here are some population estimates at the national average population growth rate.

2020 - 1,441,133
2030 - 1,604,561
2040 - 1,786,523
2050 - 1,989,120
2060 - 2,214,692
2070 - 2,465,844
2080 - 2,745,478
2090 - 3,056,823
2100 - 3,403,476

Here are some population estimates for NFL cities (in millions).
:NYJ :NYG New York 19.0
:CHI Chicago 9.6
: DAL Dallas 6.3
:PHI Philadelphia 5.8
:HOU Houston 5.7
:MIA Miami 5.4
:ATL Atlanta 5.4
:WAS Washington D.C. 5.4
:NE Boston 4.5
: DET Detroit 4.4
:ARI Phoenix 4.3
:SF :OAK San Francisco/Oakland 4.3
:SEA Seattle 3.3
:MIN Minneapolis 3.2
:SD San Diego 3.0
:STL St. Louis 2.8
:TB Tampa Bay 2.7
:BAL Baltimore 2.7
: DEN Denver 2.5
:PIT Pittsburgh 2.4
:CIN Cincinnati 2.2
:CLE Cleveland 2.1
:KC Kansas City 2.0
:IND Indianapolis 1.7
:CAR Charlotte 1.7
:TEN Nashville 1.6
:JAC Jacksonville 1.3
:NO New Orleans 1.1
:BUF Buffalo 1.1
:GB Green Bay 0.3 (112 miles north of Milwaukee 1.5 M)

Just info for the conversation.

[Laramie]

Good figures and projections. Projections for the growth rate? These are good for 10 years; projections past 10 years are definitely a gamble for any market. Again, the NFL looks at your market area which is a 100-mile radius and your media market which includes the number of TV households in your metroTV market. Where did they come up with that radius? They looked at Los Angeles which takes the average worker 90-minutes to travel to work. Sounds insignificant doesn't it? Why the NFL used that figure--your guess is as good as mine.

Green Bay, WI has a franchise because it was the National Football League's first; it's an exception.

Jacksonville 1.1 came in the same time as did Charlotte 1.3 (1995). They (JAX) certainly wasn't ready for the NFL. Charlotte had a very strong corporate base.

Buffalo has two major markets within its 100-mile radius (Rochester, Syracuse).

New Orleans had about 1 million at the time they entered the NFL in 1967.

The NFL is so commercial that it definitely would take someone with deep pockets and strong corporate support to maintain a franchise entering 2000 and beyond.

Again, who knows what might be in store for 2020.

[Jersey Boss]

FWIW, Buffalo has three major markets within 100 miles as you are forgetting Toronto. I think those that make an argument for OKC based on population are missing the picture of how does OKC compare to the other markets in disposable income/per capita earnings of the population? A comparison of OKC to Houston, Dallas in which both of these cities have NBA teams would be more telling if a comparison was made of the average incomes of these locales or % of the population with an income of greater than 80k.

[CaptDave]

I doubt the NFL will be expanding any time soon so this may never be a possibility. However, in the World Class Tennis Stadium thread, there is an excellent multisport stadium concept. It could be home to our AHL team and a possible MLS franchise. I think OKC could support MLS and NBA with our current or near future population. The stadium in the thread would fit very nicely at the cotton mill site and we would still have arenas in close proximity for events such as the Big 12 basketball tournament. We would be able to redevelop the Cox Convention Center site and still have a smaller arena for the AHL too.

[ljbab728]

I doubt the NFL will be expanding any time soon so this may never be a possibility.

You could be right, but see the link in my post number 108. It's not totally out of the question for an expansion. It's just not going to happen here any time soon.

[BoulderSooner]

would be great for OKC to build an alamo dome type facility

[Laramie]

I doubt the NFL will be expanding any time soon so this may never be a possibility. However, in the World Class Tennis Stadium thread, there is an excellent multisport stadium concept. It could be home to our AHL team and a possible MLS franchise. I think OKC could support MLS and NBA with our current or near future population. The stadium in the thread would fit very nicely at the cotton mill site and we would still have arenas in close proximity for events such as the Big 12 basketball tournament. We would be able to redevelop the Cox Convention Center site and still have a smaller arena for the AHL too.

Good point!

Salt Lake City would be the market which mirrors that of OKC. They have NBA and MLS:

NBA: Utah Jazz - Energy Solutions Arena - capacity 19,911, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Solutions_Arena
MLS: Real Salt Lake - Rio Tinto Stadium - capacity 20,501, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Stadium*

Market Size 2010 figures:
Salt Lake City MSA . . . . . . . population: 1,125,000 Media TV households: 928,000 (includes most of the state)
Oklahoma City MSA . . . . . . population: 1,252,000 Media TV households: 712,000 (does not include Tulsa)

MSA population: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_o...tistical_Areas
Media TV households: http://www.sportstvjobs.com/resource...sizes-dma.html

*Rio Tinto stadium was built in suburban Sandy, Utah at a cost of $117 million.

[CurtisJ]

Dont know if this has been adressed or not, but they do not sell alcohol in the suites at Galleger Iba (and i don't know from experience, but i would assume it is the same in the Boone Pickens Stadium suites). They allow the companies and individuals that have purchased the suites to stock their own fridges with beer and wine. Most of these companies pay a college student who is a family member of an employee or something to make sure the suite is stocked when the company execs/guests get there for the game.

[dcsooner]

Good point!

Salt Lake City would be the market which mirrors that of OKC. They have NBA and MLS:

NBA: Utah Jazz - Energy Solutions Arena - capacity 19,911, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Solutions_Arena
MLS: Real Salt Lake - Rio Tinto Stadium - capacity 20,501, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Stadium*

Market Size 2010 figures:
Salt Lake City MSA . . . . . . . population: 1,125,000 Media TV households: 928,000 (includes most of the state)
Oklahoma City MSA . . . . . . population: 1,252,000 Media TV households: 712,000 (does not include Tulsa)

MSA population: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_o...tistical_Areas
Media TV households: http://www.sportstvjobs.com/resource...sizes-dma.html

*Rio Tinto stadium was built in suburban Sandy, Utah at a cost of $117 million.

Salt Lake City Combined Area includes Ogden UT about 38 miles away which bumps its pop up to about 1.7 M