Tampa Bay Super Bowl Epilogue

Today, the NFL selects Super Bowl sites, and host cities plan the event, years in advance. When the first game took place, Los Angeles did not even submit a bid until two months before the game. Also under consideration for that first game were Dallas, Houston, Miami and New Orleans. While the league eventually decided to play the game in the afternoon, it is interesting to note that some of the stadiums were eliminated because they did not have sufficient lighting to facilitate a nighttime color telecast. Miami got more lead time to host the second Super Bowl. In May, they were selected over Houston, Los Angeles and New Orleans. Miami also hosted Super Bowl III, which remains the only time a city has hosted consecutive games.

The Super Bowl rotation used to be fairly simple: Miami, New Orleans, Pasadena. Tampa Bay sort of broke the old rotation by hosting Super Bowl XVIII and the bidding has escalated ever since. At one owners meeting in the 1980s, it took over two days for fourteen cities to make presentations. The traditional sites will continue to get games and the Super Bowl is now a reward to communities that build new stadiums. Cities are willing to go to great lengths to stage the event. Tempe, Arizona had the game taken away because the state did not recognize the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. At the next election, the voters approved the holiday and Tempe got the game. Even though Pasadena has the Rose Bowl, which size alone makes it an extremely attractive venue, the city does not put together a favorable enough package to lure the game. Pasadena was part of the regular rotation, hosting every three or four years, but got overconfident and fell from favor. All the traditional venues seem to have fallen from favor from time to time. Miami, due to the political climate and aging Orange Bowl, went a decade without holding the game. Reports of price gouging in New Orleans caused that city to be passed over.

Tampa Bay is already thinking about hosting another Super Bowl. Miami, Arlington (Texas) and Indianapolis are the sites for the next three games, making 2013 the next available date. However, using history as a guide, the game is likely to return to Tampa around 2016.

Tampa Bay is home to a far different sports landscape than when it was awarded its first Super Bowl. There are the baseball Rays, hockey Lightning and indoor football provided by the Storm. College gridiron action comes from the USF Bulls, the Outback Bowl and the new St. Petersburg Bowl. The NHL All-Star Game and NCAA Basketball Final Four have made stops in Tampa Bay. The fact that the Buccaneers have won a Super Bowl and the Lightning a Stanley Cup only enhances the imagine of the area. Not that long ago, all this might have been difficult to imagine.

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