Sunday’s NFC Championship between the Atlanta Falcons and Green Bay Packers was scheduled to be the final NFL event in the Georgia Dome. Falcons fans want one more.
With the team soon to be in route to Houston for Super Bowl 51, its fans want a viewing party inside their home stadium to watch the big game together, 70,000 strong. Only problem? Roger Goodall and the NFL won’t allow it.
According to league rules, a team cannot host such an event, likely due to the ratings hit it would take with tens of thousands of people watching a single television instead of tens of thousands of individual screens. With Super Bowl ratings bring in the most money of any game in American sports, you bet the NFL isn’t going to let any cash slip through the cracks.
One Falcons fan, Andrew Wagner even started a Change.org petition to open up the Georgia Dome one last time:
According to a report by Brandon Leak of ESPN Radio, Atlanta’s Democratic Mayor Kasim Reed is working on a plan to get the Georgia Dome popping for the big game:
Atl Mayor Kasim Reed said he’s working on a plan to open the Ga Dome Super Bowl Sunday for Falcon fans #RiseUp #AtlantaFalcons @KasimReed pic.twitter.com/qNS718ZQGB
— HometeamBrandonLeak (@Hometeam_BLeak) January 24, 2017
While it wouldn’t be allowed anyway, another roadblock would be the fact that team owner Arthur Blank is flying every team employee to the Super Bowl, leaving nobody left to work the road rally which so many professional sports teams have put on during championship games.
