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MLB stadiums willing to host college football games
Jul 30, 2009
MLB teams willing to play host to college football games
By Jack Carey, USA TODAY
With Yankee Stadium preparing to host four college football games over five seasons starting in 2010, three other iconic baseball stadiums might follow suit.
Officials at Fenway Park in Boston and Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles say they are open to hosting college football, maybe even bowl games. This comes on the heels of discussions among Illinois, Northwestern and Wrigley Field about a game between the Big Ten rivals at the Chicago Cubs' home park.
Army recently announced it will play four games — against Notre Dame, Rutgers, Air Force and Boston College — at the New York Yankees' new home between 2010 and 2014, renewing a tradition started in 1925 of Black Knights' games at old Yankee Stadium.
The Chicago Bears played at Wrigley for 50 years.
The Red Sox are enthusiastic about the idea of football.
"Absolutely," said Sam Kennedy, chief marketing officer for the team. "We are open-minded to football. It's a great idea, and we'd be open to any number of ideas for blue-chip events. A college bowl would be one of those events."
Fenway, in its distant past, hosted games involving Boston College and the then-Boston Patriots. It is hosting an NHL game New Year's Day. Wrigley hosted a hockey game last season.
Josh Rawitch, the Dodgers' vice president of communications, said that although the team hasn't been approached about hosting college football, "we'd be all ears."
While Yankees chief operating officer Lonn Trost declined to comment on the possibility of a bowl game at Yankee Stadium, NCAA spokesman Bob Williams said an informational conference call, in which the bowl application process was discussed, has been held, although there have been no negotiations about a specific bowl at the ballpark.
"(Moving the games) is a little gimmicky, but it's probably a good idea as a way to build some offseason time for those facilities," said Darin David, account director at Millsport, a Dallas sports marketing firm. "It's another way of utilizing the facility.
"It's a little bit of a money grab, but it seems to be something that appeals to people. They are finding alternative ways to use the facilities, which makes good business sense."
The San Francisco Giants' stadium hosts the Emerald Bowl, and the Arizona Diamondbacks' stadium once hosted the Insight Bowl.
Not everyone thinks moving regular-season game is beneficial.
"It depends upon the circumstances and the schools," said Andy Geiger, former athletics director at Ohio State, Stanford and Maryland. "It's been my philosophy that whenever you can play a game on campus, it's a positive. When I was at Ohio State, we always got pressure to play a game in Cleveland, and I always resisted because we had a gorgeous stadium in Columbus, and that's where our students were.
"One of the great values of having a major college program is to bring alumni to the campus. That's more meaningful than bringing a game to the people."
