Detroit a Finalist to Host 2024 NFL Draft, Packers President Says

One of the most-anticipated NFL events each year could be coming to the Motor City.

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Green Bay Packers president Mark Murphy told NBC 26 on Monday that the finalists to host the 2024 NFL Draft are Green Bay, Washington, and Detroit.

If it happens, this will be the first time the City of Detroit has hosted the NFL Draft, which has been jokingly referred to as "The Lions Super Bowl" - so honestly, I feel like Detroit would do it up!

The NFL Draft was always held in New York prior to 2015, when the league started moving it to different cities. This year's draft will be held in Las Vegas April 28th through the 30th. The 2023 NFL Draft is slated to take place in Kansas City.

For the past several years, the Lions, along with the city, have been pushing to bring the draft to Detroit, the Detroit Free Press reports.

In March 2021, Lions president Rod Wood told the Detroit Free Press,

We’re hoping to be a serious contender for the 2024 draft and we’re still in the mix for that. Hopefully we can bring that to Detroit and by then everything’s fully re-opened and we can have hundreds of thousands of people downtown.

In 2017, Wood made his pitch to the Free Press on why Detroit is a prime location for the NFL draft, citing the renaissance of the downtown and walkability to restaurants and bars, in addition to the city's location:

And then the other two things I think that are really in our favor is the location of Detroit, relative to other NFL cities, because we want to get as many teams here and their fans rooting for the draft, and we’re centrally located, we’re close to obviously all of the Midwest cities, East Coast cities, and then the importance and proximity to college football. Because the draft kind of is an intersection of pro and college football and a lot of colleges want to come and watch the kids that they watched in college go through the draft, coaches want to be here, etc. So I think having kind of the intersection of college football and pro football, and so many players from Michigan and Michigan State and Ohio State, and other nearby colleges. Even the MAC. A lot of guys from the MAC have been drafted, that could be a nice selling point that differentiates us from almost any city.

According to NBC 26, the final decision regarding 2024 NFL Draft is expected to be revealed at the Annual League Meeting at the end of March in Palm Beach, Florida.