MADRID — There’s one thing occurring right here. What it’s, is strictly clear.
The , no strangers to being pioneers within the NFL’s quest to be a worldwide model, are taking part in the because the league phases its first sport in Spain. It’s a celebration of the game in a legendary venue, the futuristic Bernabeu stadium. And the hosts have been nothing if not welcoming everybody into their dwelling.
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So why don’t they wish to come to ours?
There’s a sure irony at work right here, one which runs deeper than simply the NHL, NBA and Main League Baseball additionally farming out video games to international lands. Discover the development but? How all these video games — video games that truly depend — are all going in a single path?
A course correction was on the docket for subsequent month, “was” being the important thing phrase. that may depend in La Liga standings, marking the primary time a serious European league was sending to america the identical kind of product america has been sending to Europe for years.
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Hope you didn’t purchase tickets. Ain’t occurring.
The explanation it was known as off says every little thing about how we view international enlargement versus how Europeans don’t. Blasphemy solely begins to explain the fallout when the match was introduced, which is maybe half the irony.
Extra from Madrid:
We’ll get to that in a second, however first, comedian reduction. Gamers all through Spain have been so postpone with the considered a Spanish league sport in Miami Gardens that they really ceased to be gamers. For 15 seconds, anyway. They really took a knee — throughout matches — in symbolic protest. It wasn’t even a primary. Years in the past, the famed English Premier League proposed an additional spherical of two matches to be held exterior that nation. Hope you didn’t purchase tickets for that, both.
BARCELONA, SPAIN – OCTOBER 18: Gamers stand nonetheless throughout the first fifteen seconds of the match in protest on the choice to play a La Liga sport in Miami throughout the LaLiga EA Sports activities match between FC Barcelona and Girona FC at Spotify Camp Nou on October 18, 2025 in Barcelona, Spain. (Picture by Alex Caparros/Getty Photos)
Again to the irony. One of many loudest cries in opposition to the Barca-Villarreal idea got here from Actual Madrid, the storied membership welcoming the and into their dwelling this weekend. To grasp why, you will need to take into consideration that Actual Madrid and Barcelona aren’t simply rivals; theirs is the fiercest rivalry in sports activities, interval. Every conflict is billed as an El Clasico for a cause. And so they’re by no means for the faint of coronary heart or brittle-boned.
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Collectively, Actual Madrid and Barcelona account for 64 La Liga titles. One finishes first, likelihood is the opposite is second. So the very last thing Actual Madrid needed to see was Barcelona avoiding what could be a hostile environment at Villarreal. Particularly if it meant shifting the venue to South Florida, now dwelling of Inter Miami’s Lionel Messi, who earned the title of GOAT whereas carrying a Barcelona jersey you see throughout city.
Why, to maneuver this match to Florida would upset the whole stability of the La Liga season, Actual Madrid argued. And might we get a present of knees, please?
That’s totally different from the Dolphins (and their season-ticket holders) giving up a 2015 dwelling sport in opposition to the hated New York Jets how, precisely?
Make of all that what you’ll, however let’s not neglect that Actual Madrid, the Dolphins and had historical past collectively earlier than this weekend. In 2017, Ross and Dolphins Vice Chairman Tom Garfinkel scored a coup by getting Actual Madrid and Barcelona to play at Exhausting Rock. It was solely the second El Clasico ever held exterior Spain, drawing a sellout crowd to see Messi dwell. It was a spectacle. However it additionally was an exhibition.
MIAMI GARDENS, FL – JULY 29: Neymar #11 of Barcelona vies for the ball with Raphael Varane #5 of Actual Madrid throughout their Worldwide Champions Cup 2017 match at Exhausting Rock Stadium on July 29, 2017 in Miami Gardens, Florida. (Picture by Chris Trotman/Getty Photos)
The closest you might come to the remainder of the world reciprocating may be Method 1. For years, all of it however ignored america, however not now. There are three races held within the U.S., together with the Miami Grand Prix round Exhausting Rock Stadium. Would any of which were potential, although, had not the whole F1 circuit been bought by Liberty Media? A mass media firm based mostly in Colorado?
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Dolphins, first to cross the pond to play in Europe
Because it stands, the imbalance is barely going to get extra lopsided. Dolphins-Commanders is the seventh and remaining NFL sport held internationally this 12 months, following regular-season video games in Sao Paulo, Dublin, London and Berlin. It is going to carry the overall variety of NFL video games held exterior america to 62, or 121 should you embrace exhibitions.
And keep in mind, the Dolphins and New York Giants have been first to cross the pond for actual, taking part in at London’s Wembley Stadium in 2007. Garfinkel not too long ago informed ESPN that the Dolphins are bullish on being a worldwide model, presumably stepping up plans for worldwide video games.
With extra continents and international locations for the NFL to beat, it’s all about to blow up. A world sport each week? Maybe. A world Tremendous Bowl? Unthinkable, till it isn’t. Possibly sometime, the time period “frozen tundra” in an NFL sense gained’t mechanically imply Lambeau Area.
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Positive could be good, then, if Europe’s main leagues stop their freeze-out of the U.S.
Or do now we have to get on our knees?