MIKE BURKE
Allegany Communications Sports
These are heady times for Washington Commanders fans. Since the Josh Harris group took over the franchise in July of 2023, the team has upgraded the fan experience at training camp, secured a new stadium naming rights deal with Northwest worth $7 million annually, spent over $70 million repairing the Landover stadium; and most importantly, rebuilt the front office and coaching staff, drafted quarterback Jayden Daniels and reached the NFC Championship game for the first time since 1991.
Then on Monday, the organization and District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser announced a deal to construct a new stadium in the district at the site of the old RFK Stadium, where the team played for 35 years.
It is a deal that never would have gotten done if you know who was still conducting his reign of terror from the junior men’s owners box, nor if the team name was still Redskins. And you can bet your last nickel on that.
“This has been a vision of ours since we bought the team,” Harris said. “We all experienced the rumbling of RFK. The fact that we grew up here gave us that vision to not look at the crumbling concrete that was there but remember in our minds the vivid nature of what Washington football is all about.”
The new stadium, part of a project totaling $3.7 billion, would open in 2030, with groundbreaking expected next year, pending approval of the Council of the District of Columbia.
The Commanders are contributing $2.7 billion, with the city investing roughly $1.1 billion over the next eight years for the stadium, housing, green space and a sportsplex on 170 acres of land bordering the Anacostia River. The stadium, which is expected to seat 65,000 and have a roof to make it a year-round venue for concerts and other events, will take up 16 of those acres.
Everyone at the announcement on Monday was quite giddy, including NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, who recalled growing up in D.C. and attending Redskins games at RFK Stadium during the time his father served in Congress.
Fans of the team are giddy as well, as they should be, because nobody ever really enjoyed the beltway ambiance of the not so quaint little transit hub once briefly known as Raljon, a short-lived wrinkle by the late owner Jack Kent Cooke, who named the land on which he built his tribute to himself after his sons Ralph and John.
There will, of course, be opponents to this deal as it still needs city council approval, not to mention a “Homes Not Stadiums” movement that has asked the D.C. Board of Elections to put on the ballot an initiative that would create a new “Special Purpose Zone” on the RFK grounds to prohibit the construction and use of a stadium or arena for a professional sports team.
Mayor Bowser released a video last week in which she discusses the importance of the city’s sports teams to the local economy that included images of the dilapidated RFK Stadium that has been empty since 2017.
“Washington sports teams should play in Washington,” Bowser said in the video. “The sports economy sometimes gets minimized to fun and games, but it’s dollars and cents. We have to shift our economy. We have to be committed to tough decisions that change the business environment here.”
On Sunday Bowser posted on X about the development of Nationals Park.
“In 2006, DC made a bold investment of $611M to build a new stadium on a vacant lot. Today, that neighborhood has over 85 restaurants, 6,500 residences, & 5 hotels.
“That’s what we mean when we talk about a sports economy.”
Meanwhile, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, who knows all about a sports economy, said “We made what I think is not just a good faith, but a very strong offer for them. But they were just very clear that they wanted the Washington Commanders in Washington, D.C. And I get it. You had an ownership group that paid a lot of money for that team, and I understand that.”
In December, Moore and Harris signed a memorandum of understanding, which said the Commanders would be responsible for tearing down Northwest Stadium and redeveloping the area if the team opted to relocate, with Moore saying he has “very real confidence that they are going to hold to their word and they’re going to do what they promised to the people of the state of Maryland.”
The Commanders’ lease at Northwest Stadium runs through 2027, meaning they will have been in Maryland for at least 30 years, which, really, doesn’t seem possible at all. It seems like only yesterday when training camp was at Frostburg State University, which, of course, was a Cooke barter for Maryland Speaker Cas Taylor’s blessing for infrastructure funding during the construction of the stadium.
Yes, the Commanders returning home to Washington is another tough economic blow for Maryland. Yet even after what will be at least 30 years in the state, the truth is this team will be going home, pending, of course, the approval of at least seven of the 13 D.C. Council members.
And as the governor of Maryland himself conceded on Monday, there’s no place like home.
Mike Burke writes about sports and other stuff for Allegany Communications. He began covering sports for the Prince George’s Sentinel in 1981 and joined the Cumberland Times-News sports staff in 1984, serving as sports editor for over 30 years. Contact him at [email protected]. Follow him on X @MikeBurkeMDT