ChiefsPlanet - KC Star: NFL says Super Bowl in KC possible if Bi-State passes

http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansas...s/10041482.htm

Super thoughts for city

NFL: Big game could go to cold site; bistate foe questions timing

By ADAM TEICHER The Kansas City Star

An NFL spokesman said Thursday that the league would consider playing a Super Bowl in a renovated Arrowhead Stadium. The renovations hinge on next week's Bistate II vote.

The sites for Super Bowls in 2011 and beyond were a topic of discussion at NFL meetings near Detroit this week. Kansas City was mentioned, as were Dallas and Los Angeles, who are pushing for new stadiums.

Super Bowl sites have been awarded through 2008 to, in order, Jacksonville, Fla.; Detroit; Miami; and Glendale, Ariz. Sites for the 2009 and 2010 games will be awarded at the league meetings in May.

“After those games are awarded and assuming the Chiefs are playing in a Super Bowl-quality stadium, then Kansas City would be a candidate for a future Super Bowl beginning with the game to be played in 2011,” said Greg Aiello, the NFL's vice president of public relations.

Area residents go to the polls next week to vote on, among other issues, a bistate tax that would provide for extensive renovations of Arrowhead and Kauffman stadiums.

One bistate opponent, Wayne Flaherty, said the NFL stance was a blatant attempt to win votes for the issue.

“I don't think that will win any votes,” said Flaherty, the treasurer for Kansans Against Bi-State. “It's transparent, tantamount to blackmail.

“It tells me the teams, the big proponents and even the NFL know they're in deep trouble. It makes us all more determined to bring this thing down.”

Carl Peterson, the Chiefs' president and general manager, indicated the NFL initiated the possibility of a Kansas City Super Bowl without prompting from the team.

“But I don't know how serious a candidate we would be,” Peterson said. “You would have to ask the commissioner about that.”

Commissioner Paul Tagliabue deferred questions regarding future Super Bowl sites to Aiello. The league did not specify how many cities are being considered for sites beyond 2010 or when a site would be determined. The site is selected by a vote of team owners.

Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt did not return phone messages Thursday.

The NFL has never played a Super Bowl in an outdoor stadium outside Florida, Louisiana, Texas, Arizona or California, though two Super Bowls were played in domed stadiums in Michigan and Minnesota.

There was a brief movement in 2001 to move the Super Bowl to Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J., to aid in the economic recovery of the region following 9/11.

And while the league was thrilled at the prospect of playing the game so close to New York City, the idea never went far for weather reasons, among other issues.

The game is played in late January or early February.

This year on Feb. 1, the date of the Super Bowl in Houston, Kansas City had a high temperature of 32 degrees with almost a half-inch of freezing rain and ice.

On Jan. 26, 2003, the date of Super Bowl XXXVII in San Diego, Kansas City was dry but with a high temperature of 19 degrees.

No Super Bowl has ever been played in such conditions. But the Big 12 has played its championship game at Arrowhead twice, albeit in the typically milder climate of early December, and will bring its game to Kansas City again this year.

Aiello said the NFL has no formal policy against a cold-weather Super Bowl.

“That's up to the ownership,” he said. “The Super Bowls are awarded by a vote of the clubs. If a majority of the owners vote for a Super Bowl in Kansas City, it would happen.”

Another issue is the availability of hotel rooms. Aiello said the NFL requires about 35,000 hotel rooms within an hour's drive of a Super Bowl stadium.

The Kansas City area has about 30,000 hotel rooms.