This season, Moore has attended a training camp practice; a preseason upset of his favorite team, the Baltimore Ravens; and three regular season contests. On Oct. 5, as the Commanders played the Chicago Bears on the field, he made his own moves off it. He met with new Commanders managing partner Josh Harris for about 30 minutes in Harris’s suite. Then, outside the Maryland-owned suite where he would watch the game, Moore ran into team president Jason Wright.
In 2021, Wright told Moore, his best efforts to give tickets away still only resulted in a “half-full” stadium. Now, the stands were packed. The Commanders reported a sellout that night against the Bears — and for the other four home games they have hosted this season.
“It’s not just palpable; it’s contagious,” Moore said in October, referencing positive energy around the franchise. “Honestly, it’s been something that’s been so long overdue for Commander fans. … Seeing how excited folks are now about this team, about the new ownership, about a new vision, about a new direction, about the chance of having a winner, that matters. And it changes our psychology for being here.”
Soon after their purchase of the team was ratified in July, Harris and his limited partners started preparing to replace FedEx Field, which has been the team’s home since 1997 and is one of the worst stadiums in the NFL. The Commanders are contractually obligated to play there until 2027 but can stay indefinitely because Harris owns the land and the stadium. Since the sale, Harris’s group has toured other stadiums and sought to rebuild bridges Snyder torched, including with leaders in Maryland, D.C. and Virginia.
When the battle for the stadium picks up, Moore has the most to lose if FedEx Field isn’t replaced by a gleaming, multibillion stadium and a mixed-use development to attract year-round activity in Maryland. Moore called his efforts to persuade the team to stay in Landover thus far “very aggressive.”
At the Sports Business Journal Dealmakers conference Thursday, Harris, who declined a request for an interview for this story, spoke about the need for a modern stadium. He said the team is looking “for a new home,” echoing comments he made in September.
“Obviously, we’re in a fortunate position,” Commanders limited partner Mark Ein said at the conference. “Any sports ownership group would feel good to have as many options as we do with three jurisdictions who would all love to welcome us. And so we’re evaluating it, and they all have pros and cons.”
‘A great position’ — if a deal had to be done now
So far, Maryland is the only jurisdiction with an available site and an apparatus to provide public funding. But even so, the state doesn’t necessarily have “a great strategic advantage” over D.C. and Virginia, said Terry Clower, the director of the Center for Regional Analysis at George Mason University.
“If the deal had to be done today, Prince George’s [County] is in a great position,” Clower said. But he pointed out Harris’s group seems willing to wait for D.C. and Virginia to get the legislative help they need, because it could help increase competition.
The fact that Harris already owns more than 200 acres at the FedEx Field site in Landover is a small advantage for Maryland, according to Irwin Kishner, a partner at New York-based firm Herrick Feinstein LLP who has been the lead counsel in more than a dozen major stadium transactions. “Having the undeveloped or partially developed real estate is critically important in a competition to gain a stadium in your [jurisdiction],” Kishner said. “However, it’s not the determining factor.”
Roger Noll, a professor of economics emeritus at Stanford, said Harris’s land in Maryland is only a small advantage for the state because the cost of land (millions) will be dwarfed by the cost of the overall project (billions).
Of the 30 stadiums in the NFL, 13 were built on the same parcel of land as the previous stadium. Another five were built in the same municipality and less than 10 miles from the previous stadium. Seven — including FedEx — were built in the same metro area, but either in a different municipality or farther than 10 miles from the previous site.
Clower, Kishner and Noll all stressed Harris’s group will probably decide the location of the new stadium based on a broad economic analysis that includes cost, space, development rights and the ability to attract commercial investment. They agreed the biggest factor will be public funding — whether directly, with a grant-like payment, or indirectly, with tax breaks or infrastructure improvements. (DC’s last stadium deal, at Audi Field, was based on infrastructure improvements.)
“By far the most important thing is going to be the willingness to pay,” Noll said. “How much money is the state or local government going to commit to the project?”
The night of the Bears game, the Commanders decorated the Maryland suite with customized jerseys for Moore and Lt. Gov. Aruna Miller (D), as well as photos from their visit to team headquarters in Ashburn. A Maryland flag stood in the corner. Washington legend Doug Williams, the first Black quarterback to win the Super Bowl, welcomed Moore.
Excitedly, Moore looked out into the stands and painted a vision of what a new stadium in Maryland could look like. He insisted it could help drive “economic momentum” for Maryland’s economy, which, when adjusted for inflation, grew by just 0.2 percent between 2018 and 2022. Moore said he’s made several arguments to the Commanders that illustrate why Maryland is the right destination.
According to Carter Elliott IV, a spokesperson for Moore, those arguments include the economic potential of a mixed-use site, “traffic mitigation measures” to improve the game-day experience, the importance of using “influence and investments to advance social justice and equity goals” and how planned public investment had already catalyzed “an almost $2 [billion] private development pipeline.”
This summer, Moore took the most aggressive stance of any local executive so far when he said he was willing to provide public funds for the construction of a new stadium, on top of the $400 million the state has already committed to investing in the surrounding area, known as the Blue Line Corridor, regardless of the future of the Commanders. Moore argued that greater investment could help boost a new stadium, and Prince George’s County Executive Angela D. Alsobrooks (D) has said she wants to turn the area into a hub for sports and entertainment, possibly including a youth sports field house, an amphitheater and a library and cultural center.
But research by economists shows stadiums are not necessarily economic drivers — especially NFL stadiums, which are generally used far less often than ballparks and multipurpose arenas. Many Prince George’s County residents say they’ve seen little benefit since the Commanders arrived in Landover.
“I know economically what they mean to this region,” Moore said of the team. “When people say, ‘Do you want the Commanders in Prince George’s County?’ my answer is, ‘Hell, yeah!’ ”
Clower said Moore’s rhetoric reflects the importance of the stadium to Moore’s reputation and the state’s morale as much as economics.
“He doesn’t want to be the governor that lost the team,” Clower said. “Think about the message of losing the stadium or not even trying: … ‘Maryland couldn’t hold onto the team. Prince George’s couldn’t hold onto the team.’ ”
If D.C. and Virginia get the legislative help each needs, District Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) would be formidable opponents.
Bowser is already fighting. A longtime champion of the team’s return to the RFK Stadium site, she must overcome several daunting hurdles, including skeptical neighborhood residents, adversarial city council members and the uncertain future of a bill advancing through Congress that would give the city control of RFK. The federal government owns the site and leases it to the city; the legislation would extend and amend the lease — and, if it passes, RFK would become a realistic option.
In the meantime, Bowser has worked to lay the groundwork to bring the team back. She’s met with the new ownership group and commissioned a $394,000 sports study in part to evaluate funding structures for an NFL stadium. In October, she attended a community meeting at a church near RFK to speak with hundreds of stadium-skeptical residents.
Youngkin is a wild card. Virginia voters rejected his efforts to win full Republican control of the General Assembly in November, but he might find bipartisan support for a stadium deal. Legislators can’t act on a bill to create a football stadium authority before January, which means Virginia can’t yet offer public funds to the Commanders. But Youngkin could negotiate with the team in the meantime, and if Harris’s group wanted to privately finance the stadium in full, it could build without a stadium authority.
A spokesman for Youngkin did not respond to a request for comment.
Harris has carefully avoided indicating a preference. Youngkin also attended Commanders training camp and spent time with the team’s new owners, and the same night Moore attended the Bears game, Bowser sat in another suite not far away.
In an email to The Post, Susana Castillo, the director of communications for the mayor’s office highlighted seven “key moments” in which Bowser has publicly advocated for the Commanders return to RFK since 2017. Last month, at a community event, Bowser said she’d root on Washington at Dallas on Thanksgiving.
“We’re also cheering for the opportunity to bring them home to RFK,” the mayor added.
A ‘football governor’
When the battle heats up, Moore will be critical to Maryland fending off challengers. His trademark charm is a key component in his arsenal — at least until it’s time for the jurisdictions to give the Commanders specific amounts of public subsidies they’re willing to offer.
Moore’s love for football is a big part of his charm. He played wide receiver at Johns Hopkins, and he dismisses criticism that football is “barbarism” and can deliver lengthy dissertations on its many virtues. He picks games every week on 106.7 the Fan. He would let his 10-year-old son play tackle football if his wife would allow it.
“I’m a football governor,” he said during the game against the Bears, beaming with pride that Maryland, a state of 6 million, is home to two NFL stadiums. “This is like a dream for me.”
“[Football is] the perfect game because it literally is game theory on an athletic field,” he added.
Football helped shape Moore as a person, and it now fits into his political goals for reasons bigger than his fandom. Moore was elected governor in 2022, and his so-far unrealized ambitions for Maryland included reducing crime, boosting economic opportunity and ending child poverty. He joined the 14-year effort by other Maryland officials to win the FBI’s next headquarters. In November, federal officials chose Greenbelt for its new national headquarters.
Retaining the Commanders is also key to Moore’s political ambitions, and he is already on offense, cultivating important relationships. Before running for public office, Moore spent four years as chief executive of the Robin Hood Foundation, an anti-poverty nonprofit in New York. While there, he got to know Harris a bit; Harris and his wife, Marjorie, donated between $250,000 and $500,000 to Robin Hood when Moore was CEO, according to a 2020 Robin Hood report.
Since the sale, the two have appeared to make a more concerted effort to develop a relationship. In early August, the Harrises met Moore and his wife, Dawn, in a suite at FedEx Field during a Beyoncé concert. The meeting symbolized a fresh start. For years, Moore’s predecessor, Larry Hogan (R), tried and failed to secure the Commanders’ next stadium as Snyder tried and failed to stoke a competition among the three jurisdictions. Last fall, Hogan was fed up, telling reporters, “We’ve been trying to work with them for eight years.”
“I’ve always had a deep amount of respect not just for his business acumen but also for his societal intelligence,” Moore said of Harris. “I knew coming in that there was a shared philosophy, that he wants to create a winner on the field, and he is fully committed to making sure that the Commanders are going to be a successful team. But he’s also very, very focused on making sure that the community benefits.”
Of Maryland’s relationship with new Commanders ownership, Moore said: “We’ve just been very aggressive in making sure that they know that it’s not just that I believe that this is the right place for them to be.”
Asked how much public funding he would be willing to offer the Commanders for a new stadium, Moore hedged. “We’re already putting our best foot forward,” he said, referencing the Blue Line Corridor investment.
Moore said the specific amount of subsidies would be the topic of future discussions. Last year, Maryland passed a law authorizing the state’s stadium authority to borrow up to $1.2 billion for improvements to the Orioles’ and Ravens’ stadiums in Baltimore. Asked if he saw the Commanders as deserving a comparable investment, Moore said it’s “still too early to figure out what’s going to be the commitment.”
As has been the case for many years, Maryland’s governor is working to land the Commanders’ new stadium as the Commanders try to stoke real competition for it. But now, with new leadership on both sides, Moore seems willing to be patient, to slowly build a relationship that could pay off when it finally comes time to put numbers on the table.
Nicki Jhabvala contributed to this report.
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