CLEVELAND — The 2023 NFL Draft in Kansas City is now in the books with Detroit, the host city for next year’s Draft now on the clock. The 2025 site is expected to be announced soon with all eyes on the ’24 runner-up Green Bay.
The Draft has grown into one of the biggest gets in all of sports behind the Super Bowl and Men’s NCAA Final Four. David McClenton of Euclid recalls the thrill two years ago when Cleveland played host.
"People who have never really experienced what Cleveland has to offer they really got a taste of it firsthand just because of the fact the city went all out to make sure everything was great,” McClenton said.
The problem was because of the pandemic tickets were limited to allow for social distancing and the up-close seats where people were able to pack in were limited only to those fully vaccinated at the time. The end result was an economic impact of $42 million for the region, welcome money coming out of the pandemic for sure but less than half of what Kansas City saw this weekend. That's why the head of the Greater Cleveland Sports Commission David Gilbert tells News 5, “we absolutely have our hat in the ring for another future draft."
The commission has taken the first step in that process by filing a "formal expression of interest" with the NFL and they believe the league is open to a re-do in the near future.
“Right now what they're bidding on, my understanding is, is really cities over the next two or three years,” Gilbert said. “It's not likely to happen for us over the next two or three years but certainly over the next five, six, seven years we would love to see it back and would hope to see it back.”
One issue with that timeline would be the long-talked-about renovations to Browns Stadium and the development of the area around it that made up the massive footprint of the '21 Draft.
“It would not rule us out, the lakefront was an amazing site,” Gilbert said. “What we do know is it's a big footprint and I think we all saw what a big footprint it is when it was here. Not just the stage but everything around it so we would still need a space that is wonderful, unique to Cleveland and also has the footprint size to make it work. Lakefront I would think would be ideal to do it again somewhere on the general Downtown lakefront but it would not preclude it at all from being somewhere else in and around Downtown.”
A possible alternative site could be Burke Lakefront Airport which for 25 years shut down each year for the Cleveland Grand Prix.
"I don't think there's anything presupposed of what sites could or couldn't be there. Burke Lakefront was a site that was looked at last time and they chose - down where they held it last time where the port warehouse was."
If not the lakefront Theo Cady of Cleveland has this suggestion:
"I don't know maybe even like Blossom if they would be able to host that, it's a huge outdoor venue, they could do a lot of setup there with the big hill,” said Cady.
The hill being something Kansas City offered this weekend. Ultimately Gilbert said when the time comes, it will be the NFL's call.
"I think our job would be when they're ready to look at Cleveland again that we show them a palate of great options, probably still the lakefront being first among them."
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