I’m guessing the Arlington Park stadium will have one. That concept of ‘Bears football’ is probably going away one way or another once this is resolved.
Yeah, probably. Super Bowls appearances by the Minnesota Vikings when they played outdoors: 4 (The New England Revolution of Championship games) Super Bowls appearances by the Minnesota Vikings since they have moved indoors: 0 "Football" and "climate control" should never appear in the same sentence (except here). Now get off my lawn!
So Fire fans, Bears move out and in theory you are the biggest tenant at Soldier. Does that improve things for the Fire somewhat or greatly? Should there or could there be any modifications to make Fire soccer or any soccer for that matter better? I saw a game at "old' Soldier and while classic, was somewhat dated, reminded me a lot of the Rose Bowl before they started on renovations
Well, the move to Soldier Field already solved everything, which is why we won MLS Cup easily last year and averaged 50,000 a game. [emoji6] Oh, wait that is a long running internal joke here. Really, the move has yet pay dividends for the Fire, other than the nice shots of the stadium and City during the games. It was a medium long decision for the Fire, so we will see. If the Bears leave, the Fire will have some options. I think they will have to something with the field to improve site lines, maybe reduce capacity a bit (although the City might object, because of concerts and other events) and work to improve the game day experience. However the big thing is to improve the team, and that will bring people back and grow the fan base. We never had huge attendance, the max around 18,000. At Soldier Field that will need to grow substantially. Old Soldier Field was fun, but crumbling. The atmosphere was what made the games special. I doubt (but hope) that come back at some time.
Main thing for me regarding the Bears is to no longer have those field football lines and rough used turf come fall.
Don't count your chickens before they hatch. The Park District will still bring in a bunch of gridiron football games. College "classics", for example. And I would expect even some high school football.
Yup. Toyota Park eventually became a Gridiron hub Dallas fans celebrated Frisco Stadium for being football-specific until they too were invaded by high school grid. There's no escape for some teams.
Not disagreeing, but to put in context 18,000 was a really great attendance number for MLS 1.0 when Miami and KC were pulling 8,000…maybe…with free tickets. Whatever version of MLS we’re in now (4.0?), I think the Fire should be bringing in 25k.
All of this is true, which was rather my point, but your comment about MLS 1.0 is definitely well taken. We had decent attendance in the first few years, compared to the league. My larger point is those attendance numbers have never really changed.* 18,000 in Soldier Field, especially if the Fire are the main tenant, would be embarrassing. I agree 25,000 should be the minimum and the goal should be 2/3 full (so, about 40,000). Oh, wait, this is NOT the Optimism Thread. Scratch that. Let's be happy(ish) with 25,000. *https://www.chicagofirefc.com/records/attendance Attendance year by year Year Games Total Average 1998 16 286,190 17,887 1999 16 256,261 16,016 2000 16 214,189 13,387 2001 14 229,438 16,388 2002 14 180,908 12,922 2003 15 210,080 14,005 2004 15 257,295 17,153 2005 16 275,811 17,238 2006 16 225,775 14,111 2007 15 247,356 16,490 2008 15 255,511 17,034 2009 15 220,331 14,689 2010 15 237,216 15,814 2011 17 242,648 14,273 2012 17 278,947 16,409 2013 17 258,880 15,228 2014 17 273,293 16,076 2015 17 272,043 16,003 2016 17 265,234 15,602 2017 17 295,511 17,383 2018 17 251,708 14,806 2019 17 209,516 12,324 2020 N/A N/A N/A 2021 17 181,949 10,702 Total 368 5,626,090 15,288 I have always found it remarkable how consist (prior to 2019 and 2021) the attendance has been. Never more than 18,000, almost never less than 14,000 (2002 and 2003 had the incredibly constrained attendance in Naperville, 2000 just made no sense).
One reason AEG was happy to give full control of Toyota Park to Bridgeview was that the era of stadium concerts was coming to a close. AEG had much better insight into the market and fleeced the city a bit. Big concerts still exist but nothing like the “heyday” of stadium shows. Soldier Field will always have a concert presence though. The proximity to downtown and the lakefront mean it has an oversized allure and mindshare. The Fire will always have to move a game or two because of this but obviously it’ll be better than concerts and the Bears.
And of course there's the fact that SF will be competing for Taylor Swift's booking with a new, fancy stadium out in Arlington Heights.
How much of those numbers during the hostage-crisis years were pumped up, e.g., dumping free tix and counting as attendance? The last years that I attended even semi-regularly (alas, Schweinsteiger and McCarty, we hardly knew ye), the "eyeball test" made it was clear that they were regularly inflated by at least 25%.
Not to mention the scenic drive along Harlem Avenue itself...ahh, three of the happiest hours of one's life. Each way.
"Asked and answered, your honor." [emoji6] Safe presumption it was tickets distributed, not butts in seats.