Cowboys Stadium Adding Limited View Super Bowl Seats

Added on Jan 28, 2011 by Jack Thurman in

Super Bowl

It looks like Jerry Jones is going to get the record for the all time largest Super Bowl attendance no matter what it takes. Were there a sports betting proposition available on the Super Bowl attendance, this would be a ‘lock’. They’ve already convinced the NFL to count the standing room tickets they’re selling outside of Cowboys Stadium, and now the Dallas news media is reporting that workers are installing an undisclosed number of ‘limited view’ seats to jack up the attendance even more.

According to this report, workers are in the process of adding as many as 15,000 temporary ‘limited view’ seats which will push the seating capacity of Cowboys Stadium to over 100,000. Combined with a yet to be determined number of people outside the venue, it looks like the best Super Bowl betting opportunity could be on this year’s game breaking the attendance record of just under 104, 000 set in 1980 at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena.

Bill McConnell, NFL director of event operations, confirmed the increased capacity but was otherwise vague on specifics:

“Capacity will be over 100,000. Exactly how many will be here, we won’t know until game day.”

The ‘limited view’ seats are definitely not for the claustrophobic. Most offer a reasonably clear view of the field, but are located under an overhanging section of seats which will block the sight line to Cowboys Stadium’s (in)famously large video screen. According to McConnell, there will be a ‘vetting process’ on these seats before game time:

“Our ticketing people are going to go through with the people that are building the seats to make sure which ones are obstructed and which ones aren’t. There is a process in place to determine which seats will be included on game day. … Some seats that are here now won’t be there on game day, and some may be added.”

Very likely the ‘process in place’ has to do with how many seats will be necessary to get Jerry Jones the Super Bowl attendance record. According to Dallas area ticket broker Steve Parry, a more common complaint is the comfort of the temporary seats and not the view:

“With what people are spending for this kind of event, they [occasionally] get in temporary seats — which are sometimes temporary benches — when they think they’re in real seats in the Super Bowl.”

In addition to the temporary seats and the outside standing room tickets, the Cowboys are increasing the number of standing room tickets they’ll sell inside the stadium. Team spokesman Brett Daniels did a nice job of spinning it to suggest they’re just trying to do it for the fans and not for the attendance record:

“Our goal is just to let as many people as possible be part of the Super Bowl experience as we can, whether that be attendance in the building, out in the fan plazas or down at the NFL Experience.”

If the Cowboys keep at it long enough, they may find a way to include Dallas area sports bars and gentleman’s clubs in the official Super Bowl attendance figures.