The Chicago Bears are entering the 2013 season with a number of new primary players in head coach Marc Trestman and tight end Martellus Bennett and while the team has Super Bowl aspirations, so does the city and mayor Rahm Emanuel, who came out for hosting the big game as well as the NFL Draft.
The Bears made an interesting move over the weekend and moved on from the previous regime of general manager Jerry Angelo, as they traded away 2011 first round pick Gabe Carimi to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers for a sixth round pick, according to sources that spoke with ESPN. The offensive lineman was picked at 29th in the first round and he lost his job last season and there was speculation this offseason that the team could make a move with him. The Bears took Kyle Long out of Oregon and Jordan Mills from Louisiana Tech in the draft and the team was disappointed with his play last season and his injury history.
According to ESPNChicago.com and Pro Football Talk, Emanuel's spokesperson told reporters that the mayor spoke with commissioner Roger Goodell recently and he continued working on his push for his city to host a Super Bowl sometime in the future. The report says that Emanuel's spokesman, Tom Alexander, said to ESPNChicago.com that the mayor and Goodell spoke about having the Super Bowl at Soldier Field and he also needled the commissioner into considering Chicago for the 2014 NFL draft, as the NFL is planning on pushing it into May due to scheduling conflicts at Radio City Music Hall.
NFL spokesperson Greg Aiello told ESPNChicago.com that the league appreciate's Emanuel's interest in the NFL and later in the report Goodell spoke about having the 2014 Super Bowl in a cold air, open air stadium in New York, which could end up with some snow or harsh weather that time of the year. Goodell added that if it works out well in New York, it could mean that other cities like Chicago (Philadelphia expressed interest too), could be in line for future games. Emanuel spoke up Soldier Field's special designation as the first stadium in the league to certified by LEED, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, but one knock on the city could be the size and capacity of the stadium.
Soldier Field holds just over 63,000 at the stadium, while MetLife in New Jersey holds over 80,000, which is one of the reasons the league selected it to host the first open air, cold weather Super Bowl. The championship has been held in a number of cold cities before, like Detroit and Indianapolis, but those cities have domed stadiums. The next chance for a Super Bowl in Chicago would be in 2018, as the NFL awarded San Francisco and Houston the next two that were up for grabs.