The Pontiac Silverdome has certainly seen better days. The 35 year old domed stadium hosted a Super Bowl and 1994 World Cup games, was home to the Detroit Lions and the Detroit Pistons and was really a premier concert venue hosting shows for rock legends like Aerosmith and The Rolling Stones. Right now the dome is virtually empty with not even a monster truck show or wrestling event booking the once very active venue. The however can all change according to Mlive.com’s Josh Hakala.
Many people in the Metro Detroit Area might not be aware that the Silverdome was actually auctioned off and purchased for $583,000 by Greek-born Andreas Apostolopoulos with the intention of bringing professional soccer back to the state of Michigan. Now the first step in doing this is having the dome host “Match of the Titans”, an exhibition game between Italian mega-club AC Milan and Greek powerhouse Panathinaikos.
“We would like to create something big here in Pontiac,” said Steve Apostolopoulos, the director of sports at the Silverdome and son of Andreas. “We have the land and we have a great opportunity, and we want to do something that’s beneficial to the area.”
Trying to lure an MLS franchise to the area isn’t however the most intriguing thing about all of this, it is what they are going to do to the Silverdome that really makes you say WOW! What the Apostolopoulos family intends to do with the Silverdome is tear the roof off and divide the building into three sections. At the ground level of the Stadium their would be a concert hall and multi-purpose arena capable of hosting hockey games, basketball games and other indoor sporting events. On top of the concert hall and arena would be a 30,000 (which falls right in line with the average stadium size in MLS) seat soccer stadium with natural grass. If you think about the current layout of the Silverdome, the upper would serve as the lower bowl for the proposed outdoor soccer stadium. Sound crazy? Yes, but it definitely deserves some looking into since it has the potential to drive in a lot of revenue to the the city of Pontiac, the Metro Detroit Area and the State of Michigan.
So what is MLS looking for when considering a city for expansion? According to Hakala MLS is looking for…
- Committed long-term ownership with deep pockets.
- Approved plan to build a soccer-specific stadium where the team would control revenue streams such as parking and concessions.
- A healthy media market
- A strong soccer fanbase
I think the Metro Detroit Area and the city of Pontiac can fill all those needs and ultimately get a MLS franchise here. Now I also know that there are a lot of soccer haters and doubters out there that are going to bring up the failures of the Detroit Neon and the Detroit Rockers, two former indoor soccer teams that played in the area during the 1990’s. Well this wouldn’t be indoor soccer it would be outdoor soccer in a league that has really established itself in a country that has really put soccer on the back burner in the past. The MLS has been around since 1996 and seems to be continually expanding opening up new franchises in Vancouver, Montreal and Philadelphia. Could it soon be coming to Pontiac and Detroit? With the owner in place it certainly seems like a good possibility.
