[jwplayer KczAcwIP-ThvAeFxT]
The NFL’s decision to expand its regular season to 17 games has resulted in larger changes for its schedule, and one of those could be hitting Saints fans close to home. NewOrleans.Football’s Nick Underhill reported Thursday that the NFL has been in discussions with the Saints and the city of New Orleans about a scheduling conflict between the 2024 Super Bowl and that year’s Mardi Gras festivities.
That combination of mass events may be too much for the city’s infrastructure to support, so it’s possible that New Orleans could end up hosting the 2025 Super Bowl instead. The Saints won the bid to host the 2024 title game back in 2018, making it the eleventh Super Bowl to be played in New Orleans, more than any other American city.
There are a few upsides to postponing the year in which the Saints will host another Super Bowl. The Mercedes-Benz Superdome began extensive renovation work earlier this offseason as part of a yearslong effort to modernize the facility. Delaying its next Super Bowl appearance would do a lot to take pressure off the construction timeline. But the league and the city have not yet ruled out whether to keep the New Orleans-hosted 2024 Super Bowl in place as scheduled, and it’s unclear which city would host instead.
For the curious, here are the locations of the remaining Super Bowls that have been awarded:
- 2021, Super Bowl LV: Tampa, Fla.
- 2022, Super Bowl LVI: Los Angeles, Cal.
- 2023, Super Bowl LVII: Glendale, Ari.
- 2024, Super Bowl LVIII: New Orleans, La.
Saints vice president of communications Greg Bensel later issued a statement to the media:
Statement from saints VP of communications Greg Bensel: pic.twitter.com/4A6GAIBcBY
— Sean FazendeFOX8 (@SeanFazendeFOX8) April 3, 2020
[vertical-gallery id=29870]