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Just a day after Miami Dolphins CEO Mike Dee casually quipped that the team was “open” to moving to Palm Beach, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell stressed that the league wants the team to stay put in the only home it’s ever known, Miami-Dade County. Goodell also stated that the league will do “whatever it takes” to ensure that the team gets a modern home in the area.
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“We do want to see the Dolphins stay in Miami,” Goodell told NFL.com “We want to see them stay in a facility that will allow them to compete, and to bring in other big events, including Super Bowls. That takes work, it takes investment, and Steve Ross was doing the investing and was really the guy who was putting his heart and soul into this and his passion into this. What’s frustrating is that it didn’t get a chance to get to the voters.”
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So it seems that Goodell wouldn’t be particularly keen on moving the team to Palm Beach entirely out of the market to, say, Los Angeles. Which makes total sense, especially when it comes to moving the team out of Florida. Miami-Ft. Lauderdale is the 16th biggest media market in America alone. That doesn’t even include West Palm Beach (the 38th biggest TV market) or other places in Florida where the Dolphins have a following. Remember, if that Facebook data is to be believed, the Dolphins’ fanbase extends far into Florida and dwarfs that of the Bucs and Jags. That’s a whole lot of territory for the NFL to just give up on.
Goodell, who traveled to Tallahassee to help lobby for the team’s plan, seems particularly peeved that voters never got a chance to vote on the resolution.
Goodell however doesn’t seem to be under the impression that the quest for stadium upgrades will be over anytime soon, saying the NFL will do “whatever it takes.”
“Of course we will stay involved. We will do whatever is necessary, because we do think it’s right for all of Florida,” he says. “We think it’s particularly good for the Miami-Dade area. It will help attract bigger events, and that will have a real economic impact on the community.”
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