Detroit wins bid to host 2024 NFL Draft

After years of trying, Detroit finally won the bid to become the ninth city to host the NFL Draft since it moved from New York.

On Monday at the NFL owners meetings in Florida, the league announced they have awarded the bid to make Detroit the host city of the 2024 NFL Draft.

The draft will be specifically held in the Campus Martius Park and Hart Plaza area. Lions team president Rod Wood provided a few more details down at the owners meetings in Florida on Monday.

“Weather permitting, the draft will be outside at Campus Martius. That will be the draft stage,” Wood said. “We’ll be using a lot of the venues in downtown, including the Fox Theater will be part of it, Hart Plaza will be part of it. Hopefully will have some music events at Ford Field and maybe even Little Caesars. So it will be throughout the whole city.”

“Needless to say this is a great day for us,” Lions owner Sheila Ford Hamp added.

Earlier this month, Packers president Mark Murphy announced that Detroit was a finalist for the draft, along with Green Bay and Washington D.C. It appears Detroit outbid those two cities and will become the ninth city to host the draft since the NFL moved it from its long-term residency at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. Here’s a look at the other host cities:

2015-16: Chicago
2017: Philadelphia
2018: Dallas
2019: Nashville
2020: Virtual
2021: Cleveland
2022: Las Vegas
2023: Kansas City

“As we learn that Detroit has been selected to host the 2024 NFL Draft, today is momentous for our city and the Detroit Sports Commission,” said Dave Beachnau, Detroit Sports Commission Executive Director in a press release. “Hosting the NFL Draft in Detroit promises to be a celebration of our community’s spirit. It will deliver high value for our residents, businesses, and the great fans who make Detroit the best sports city in America.”

Wood has been pushing for Detroit to be a host city for the NFL Draft or the Super Bowl since he was hired as team president back in 2015. This will be the first time Detroit hosts a major NFL event since Super Bowl XL in 2006.

“We’re hoping to be a serious contender for the 2024 Draft,” team president Rod Wood said back in 2021. “We’re still in the mix for that, and hopefully we can bring that to Detroit, and by then everything is fully reopened and we can have hundreds of thousands of people downtown enjoying the Draft in Detroit.”

Wood mentioned that the Lions were finalists for the 2022 NFL Draft.

Earlier on Monday, the NFL announced that the Lions would be the feature team for HBO’s Hard Knocks. Quite a week for the franchise.