The 2024 NFL Draft made history for the sport of pro football. The event set a new attendance record with nearly one million attendees, per the league. The draft is ongoing at the time of writing Saturday.
Those numbers include the amount of people at the event over the three day period when it was conducted.
The 2024 Draft
The 2024 draft was filled with big names, and big-time prospects. The first 14 picks in the first round were offensive players, with three quarterbacks going in the first three selections. The Bears took USC gunslinger Caleb Williams with the first overall selection.
The ceremony was held in the city of Detroit, home to the Lions. The Lions had one of the best seasons in franchise history, making it to the NFC Championship game for the first time in more than 30 years. That energy seemed to seep into the draft experience, as fans flocked to the ceremony in droves.
“The city, it’s got an energy to it,” Bedrock CEO Dan Gilbert said, per the Associated Press. The company helped organize the event. “I think that’s one of the reasons we’re able to convince the NFL to do the draft out here. They could feel the energy as we took them on tours here.”
The previous attendance record was in Nashville in 2019. During the COVID pandemic, the draft was scaled down, and fan presence was limited. The new attendance record clearly indicates the country still has a strong appetite for pro football.
NFL popularity growing
It's not just the United States that has an appetite for American football. The NFL is taking steps to increase its footprint not only in the United States, but around the world. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell says that he wants more pro football games in other countries. The league is scheduled to play games in England, Germany and Brazil in the coming years.
“I honestly think we’ll be playing 16 games internationally if you go 10 years out,” Goodell said to ESPN, per the Associated Press. “I think we’ll try to get to eight or nine in the next couple years.”
The NFL Draft will be held in Green Bay next season. The fans of the Packers will surely hope to break the attendance record, as it was set in Detroit, their heated rival. Goodell believes the draft will continue to move from year to year, so it will be interesting to see which cities bring out the most people.
“We have a lot of communities that want to have the draft, and I think we’ll continue to try to move this around and share it with other communities and bring the fans, but we always try to innovate something new every year,” Goodell added.
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