Miami Making Bid For Future Super Bowl
MIAMI (CBSMiami) – The road to the Super Bowl is no easy task for players and coaches of the NFL, but hosting the ultimate game is no easy task either. With the bid for who will host Super Bowl 50 just a few months away, South Florida hopes to bring the biggest game to Sun Life Stadium.
Next year the game will shift north to Met Life Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. From there, Super Bowl Sunday heads to the desert and University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona.
In 1968, South Florida hosted Super Bowl II with a crowd of about 75,546 football fans. Decades later, Floridians have their fingers crossed, to mark the 50th anniversary of the game by bringing it back.
"It's a 50-50 chance. It's us against Santa Clara. I think we have a deep history," Rodney Barreto from South Florida's Super Bowl Committee told CBS4's David Sutta. "We've had 10 Super Bowls in our backyard. I think the NFL loves being here."
The NFL's love affair with Super Bowls in South Florida's sunshine will be up against a brand new $1.2 billion dollar stadium in California; the future home of the San Francisco 49ers.
Why is the brawl such a big deal?
Hosting the Super Bowl lands big money and more and more cities are realizing it. Estimates show that the 2010 game held in Miami brought in $333 million to the local economy.
Although South Florida's Super Bowl Committee has formed an all-star cast of Miami Dolphin greats to make its pitch to the NFL, the stadium will need an overhaul to complete their proposal.
Back in 2007, fans were left soaked at Dolphin Stadium holding the most expensive ticket in sports and just three years later, rain threatened the big game again.
This year, the Dolphins have proposed an idea to help cover fans.
"The field is open. The players will be playing in the elements," said Barreto. "They want to see improvement at the stadium. The Dolphins are dealing with that. That's not our issue."
The committee is in New Orleans focused on learning.
"We want to make sure that we are on the cutting edge of anything new out there. We want to make sure that we are not being outdone by our number one competitor," said Barreto "New Orleans is our number one competitor. They have now tied us with 10 Super Bowls and we want to outdo them and do 11."
The final decision of Super Bowl 50 will be made in May when the NFL owners meet and decide the Super Bowl for 2016 and 2017.
