Will the NFL come to Oregon? Your comments

Earlier this afternoon, John Canzano wrote about the possibility of the NFL coming to Portland. Many shared their opinion on the topic.

Some of your comments are selected below.

ironicisntit wrote:

Forget it. the people with the kind of money you need (the corporate suite crowd) would rather frolic in San Francisco or Seattle for the weekend. A franchise can't make it wthout the skyboxes and corporate sponsorship. An NFL stadium would be a white elephant. the market is too small. and we like our sports...participatory.
I_am_the_walrus wrote:
... I think Portland would support an N.F.L. team more then a Baseball or Hockey team. Why? The N.F.L. only plays 8 home games and with Oregon and Oregon State selling out every weekend (and most of those coming from the metro area) it proves that this area would support football. Think about it...only 8 games instead of 81? It's easy to look at a schedule and make plans around 8 games. ...

Swenson wrote:
It's embarrassing that otherwise rational people are actually typing statements with "NFL" and "Portland" in the same sentence. An NFL team in Portland, or anywhere in Oregon, will not happen in the next 25 years. It will not even be something anyone at the NFL seriously considers, and it will remain solely the topic of desperate sports blogs on slow news days like this.

Los Angeles couldn't get their new Farmers Field stadium built even though they have the land, a Billionaire, the NFL's blessing, the citizenry's blessings, the second largest TV market in the nation without football, the political will to expand freeways and condemn property, AND a fat corporate sponsor. Los Angeles has ALL of those things right now, and Farmers Field still sits in mothballs.

Meanwhile, in Portland, we have NONE of those things that LA has. But what we do have is a political environment that can't get a Trader Joes built on a vacant lot and an elitist citizenry that will quickly look down their noses at anything so low-brow as American football. Even the wild card of a sudden Nike sponsorship and about a Billion dollars of Nike money can't overcome that, as if Nike would ever consider that.

So why on earth would the NFL ever consider Portland?!? It won't.

BeaverFan97301 wrote:
You will never see a Pro Team move in along the I-5 corridor anywhere from the Aurora Cutoff (Hwy 551) north to Vancouver. Just won't happen. The infrastructure can't support it, and pitiful planning in the anti-highway Portlandia has ensured that expansion won't happen.

And yet, I-5 is the ONLY route which makes any sense in the entire state to locate a Pro Team franchise on. It is the connector to the entire rest of the state.

So unless they plan on Salem, or maybe Eugene (I'm sure Duck Country would love some competition for entertainment venue / money) then you can pretty much write off ever seeing this happen.

It was too late 25 years ago when we still had room to expand the freeways. It's far beyond too late now. Pat yourself on the back Portlandia, your anti-freeway embracement has ensured that Portland will never be anything more than a little brother of Seattle.

Be sure to check out the entire conversation. What do you think? Can you see the NFL in Oregon?