Tagliabue pumped about game in Mexico
Expansion to Mexico still is a generation away despite the success of the NFL’s first regular-season game staged outside the United States.
Commissioner Paul Tagliabue said the Arizona Cardinals’ 31-14 victory over the 49ers in Mexico’s capital lent credibility to the league south of the border. A record 103,467 fans packed cavernous Azteca Stadium on Sunday night, the largest regular-season crowd in NFL history.
But Tagliabue said the size of the crowd wasn’t the key factor.
“I think this game lets the fans here in Mexico, the athletes here in Mexico and businesses and everybody else know that we’re for real,” he said during a question and answer period Monday before the American chamber of commerce in Mexico City. “It was an element of legitimacy.”
He said the key to the future will be scheduling additional regular-season games in Mexico, and developing players in this country who can make it to the NFL and cultivate a strong fan base back home.
“We will get there — here and in other parts of the world — more quickly than most people appreciate because the athletes are out there,” Tagliabue said, adding that Rolando Cantu, a Mexico-born guard on Arizona’s practice squad, will likely make an NFL roster in the future.
Tagliabue said before kickoff Sunday that things already had gone so well in Mexico City that he believed the game would be the first in an annual tradition on foreign soil. Toronto and London are top candidates for next season.
Source: msnbc.msn.com
Mexico to stage 1st regular season game outside US
Organizers are hoping to attract a record 105,000 crowd to Mexico's Azteca stadium when the San Francisco 49ers play the Arizona Cardinals in October, the first regular season NFL game outside the United States.
San Francisco safety Tony Parrish said his team were pumped up about the contest on Sunday October 2.
"This game right here is going to be all business," Parrish told a news conference on Friday. "I've never played in front of that many people and I'm excited about that."
The Azteca stadium, which normally hosts soccer matches and rock concerts, holds
In Mexico, NFL has untapped market
Tony Parrish, the 49ers defensive back, spent three days in Mexico during the summer promoting his team's game Sunday against the Arizona Cardinals in Mexico City. He found he didn't have to do much promoting.
The NFL estimates there are 20 million football fans in Mexico, making it the largest fan base outside the United States. Reporters from more than 150 news outlets attended Parrish's news conferences. At youth camps, he met some of the 250,000 players involved with organized football.
At some point, it dawned on him that he wasn't there as a novelty.
``They don't just
Cooperation is key for Mexico, U.S. game wardens
Game wardens from Mexico will join U.S. game wardens on Thursday to observe how enforcement is done here at the annual dove opener in Imperial Valley.
Lt. Joe Brana, a 26-year veteran of the Department of Fish and Game based here, said one or possibly two Mexican game wardens will ride along with his opening-day enforcement team of state and federal game wardens. Dove season opens Thursday, with shooting time set for 5:47 a.m.
"I'm looking forward to it because it's something we've never tried before," Brana said.
It's all part of
Football: Mexico City to stage NFL game
merican 'tackle' football is coming to Mexico. The National Football League (NFL) announced the Arizona Cardinals and San Francisco 49ers would play the first regular-season contest outside the United States on October 2nd.
If the game is well received, it could mean more NFL games played outside the United States.
The league will evaluate all of the markets that have indicated an interest in hosting games around the world, including several in Europe, Canada, Asia, according to Roger Goodell, the league's executive vice president.
Goodell spoke at a news conference to talk about the
NFL's Mexican foray more peddling than expansion
So what does Mexico City have that Toronto does not?
Well, it has a population of 18.1 million, for one thing. At last count, it was home to 161 museums and 344 hospitals. There are World Cups and Olympics in its sporting resume.
Plus, tonight it has the first regular season NFL game played outside the United States. Eat your heart out T.O. (and, no we're not talking Terrell Owens here).
Paul Godfrey, the former Metro chairman and current president of the Blue Jays is heading up a "fact finding" delegation at tonight's game, expected to attract
COLUMBUS, Ohio - What better way to qualify for the World Cup than by beating Mexico? Or, what better way than by beating the United States?
The archrivals get that opportunity to clinch a spot in Germany 2006 by winning Saturday night. Even a tie might be enough for both sides, but neither country is thinking about draws in what has become one of soccer’s most heated series.
“The reason I know how special this game is, is on Sunday night, a full week before the game, I was already thinking about the game laying in bed,” U.S. star Landon Donovan said.
NFL - 49ers, Cardinals set for historic Mexico trip
Sunday 2nd October 2005 will be a momentous date in the 86-year history of the NFL, as it will be the date of the first ever regular season game to be played outside the United States.
The San Francisco 49ers will take on the Arizona Cardinals at the Azteca Stadium in Mexico City, with a crowd of 85,000 expected.
The event is part of Hispanic Heritage Month, and could pave the way for further games to be held outside the USA, including a proposed game in London.
The game will be broadcast by 18 broadcasters
History to be made in Mexico City
For the first time in the 86-year history of the National Football League, a regular-season game will be played outside the United States when the Arizona Cardinals face the San Francisco 49ers this Sunday night in Mexico City's Estadio Azteca.
The game, which coincides with the nation's annual celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month, will be televised nationally in the United States by ESPN and ESPN Deportes, and by Televisa in Mexico. Westwood One Radio will broadcast the game in English and Spanish. Kickoff is at 8:30 p.m. ET and a sold-out crowd of 85,000
Don't expect a huge crowd in Mexico
Go for it. You know something's phony when the NFL doesn't blow its own horn. Take Sunday night when league history will be made by playing the first regular-season game outside of the United States.
The game is in Mexico City at Estadio Azteca. But there's been hardly a promotional peep.
The catch is that the teams are the Arizona Cardinals and the San Francisco 49ers. That's like promising diamonds and sending zirconia. In the case of the Cardinals, cheap zirconia.
No wonder the NFL has abandoned its original prediction of 105,000 fans. Oh, check that
US Soccer Team Beats Mexico, 2-0, Earns Berth in 2006 World Cup
The U.S. Men's Soccer team has defeated Mexico, two-nothing, to earn a berth in next year's World Cup in Germany. The U.S. men are the first team from the North, Central American and Caribbean region to book a place in the World Cup.
The match was even through the first 53 minutes, but then Oguchi Onyewu deflected teammate Eddie Lewis's free kick in front of Mexico's goal.
Mexican goalkeeper Oswaldo Sanchez sprawled across the goalmouth to try to stop Onyewu and when the shot ricocheted off the goalpost, Steve Ralston
