Crap ... what's going to happen to that surge of NFL interest in Jacksonville?

The problem in Jacksonville is if you walk around the area you'll see a hell of a lot more people wearing UF or FSU clothes than Jaguars stuff.

I remember covering a game there and they announced it as a sellout, despite the fact that there were at least 10,000 open seats.

 

All NFL attendance figures are "tickets distributed" -- tickets sold. Whether people actually come to the games is another matter. Attendance figures for all teams are under the same system so whether you like it or not or care to admit it or not, the Jaguars topped eight teams in attendance last year and came an average of about 50 fans away from beating the Steelers. Don't make the mistake of letting whatever deep-seated dislike you have for Jacksonville get in the way of the facts.

 

Re: Crap ... what's going to happen to that surge of NFL interest in Jacksonvill

The biggest problem Memphis has now is that it doesn't have anything remotely resembling an NFL-caliber stadium, and it would take years to get one in place. Liberty Bowl Stadium is a crumbling shithole in a really bad part of town.

 

So 51 more fans would make Jacksonville's fans better than Piitsburgh's... Got it...

 

Not really. Indy and KC have significantly larger metro areas than Memphis and, socioeconomically, the difference is not even close.

I can't believe we're seriously talking about Memphis as an NFL candidate. They'll be lucky if they can keep the Grizzlies.

 

Oh, there's no way Memphis is a viable NFL city now. I was baffled when it got the Grizzlies. I had figured at the time that Louisville was much more likely to get them.

 

There were several years where the local grocery store would buy up the tickets so the Jags games could be shown on TV.

I don't care about announced attendance. The notion that the Jaguars have better fans than the Bears, Vikings and most of the other teams they "outdrew" last season is a joke.

As far as NFL expansion is concerned, as soon as the Jags are playing in LA, I don't think there's any moving around that needs to be done. I seriously hope they don't go beyond 32 teams either, because that number works pretty well.

 

Remember the Memphis talk was late 1980s/early 1990s when teams weren't demanding Taj Mahal stadiums. The Liberty Bowl was considered quite standard at the time. Today, no way.

 

The Liberty Bowl was a shithole in the 80s too.

If Memphis were to somehow fall bassackwards into getting a team, I don't know where they could build it. Out in Germantown near the soccer complex? North near Millington? Can't go west or south due to state lines.

 

They could go south or west, if they wanted and the people with the money wanted it to happen.

Put an NFL stadium next to that dog track in West Memphis, or maybe down by the casinos in Tunica.

 

The NFL doesn't permit individual teams to fudge on attendance figures. You've been around long enough to know this. As far as judging who has better fans, certainly one of the criteria could be attendance. And since you bring it up, where were all those tremendously loyal Bears and Vikings fans last year anyway?
The main reasons the Jaguars were within an average of 51 fans of Pittsburgh is that the Steelers and the city of Pittsburgh had the good sense to build a stadium with a capacity proportional to the population of the metro area (in the mid-60s, if I'm not mistaken). The city of Jacksonville made one huge mistake: it built a stadium with a base capacity of 73,000 (and the ability to expand to as much as 85,000) for one game, and one game only: Florida-Georgia. They were so paranoid about that game being moved to the campuses that they gave in to the UF and UGA special interests in the city and as a result, the Jaguars are playing in a stadium that's simply too big in terms of capacity. With the covered seats (which Goddell said recently more teams may resort to ... wonder if they will get the same ridicule the Jags have gotten) NFL capacity is 67,000. Still a bit too big.

 

Never said that. Simply quoted the attendance figures for last year. Make what you will of it. Fact is that the Jags came within a whisker of outdrawing two of the final four teams in the NFL playoffs ... barely finishing behind Steelers and beating out the Bears. No, Jags fans aren't Steelers, Bears or Vikings fans. Haven't had a team that long. But they're also far from being the worst NFL fans in the league, which you seem hell-bent on trying to prove.