Three years ago, Washington D.C. was seen as a football town, with the Washington Redskins being far-and-away the most popular team in the city (and its surrounding suburbs).
Washington D.C. has taken huge steps forward in being seen as a more well-rounded sports town with the success of the Washington Capitals (playoff appearances, this year’s President’s Cup as hockey’s most victorious team of the season), resurgence (and then this season’s relapse) by the Washington Wizards (a perennial playoff team) and the (likely) impending arrival of college basketball phenom John Wall, the growth of soccer as the D.C. United built a strong fanbase with their championships and now not only the return of major league baseball to the city with the Washington Nationals, but also two of the league’s most promising prospects in Stephen Strasburg and Bryce Harper.
Now that it seems Washington D.C. might be supporting their sports teams all year round, a huge announcement has been made which shows another huge step forward as a sports town.
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It has been announced that the 2015 All Star game for Major League Baseball will be hosted at Nationals Park here in the Nation’s Capital.
That’s HUGE.
Not only will the stars from other baseball teams get to see first hand what kind of facilities the Nationals could offer them were they to sign here as a free agent (or come here in a trade), but (more importantly) it also goes a long way to showing the media and officials from other sports what Washington D.C. is capable of doing in hosting a major sporting event.
Dare I say it: this could be the second step towards getting a Super Bowl in Washington D.C. (and maybe even the Olympics, which D.C. has attempted to get on more than one occasion).
The first step in getting a D.C.-based Super Bowl was taken recently as New York (New Jersey, actually) was awarded an upcoming Super Bowl, the first Super Bowl in the recent era to be held in a cold-weather city.
Though Washington D.C. will never get to the point where the entire city is engrossed by the major league sports teams which reside here, the large portion of sports-loving residents who live here and have adopted D.C. as their new hometown (forsaking other cities and countries from which they came) will have something to be proud of, and the Nations Capital will continue to grow in stature as a sports-loving city.
Don’t forget the NHL’s promise that Washington will host at least one Winter Classic between 2012 and 2020!!!