I thought this was a really cool showcase for Kansas City, and the icing on the cake to a championship season and parade.
Would I travel to see the draft anywhere else? No. Not a chance. While I love the NFL and even follow the draft process way in advance, I still think it's something that translates just fine to TV. But when it's in your proverbial backyard??! You have to go and check it out!
Real quick, I watched the first night on TV: it looked unreal. Great shots of the city and the sea of people.
The hype around this thing was real, so I was worried about traffic and whatnot. My buddy and I opted for the "Main Max" KC bus (free) and it couldn't have been smoother. To board, it was near my house, and the bus took us right to the entry.
We were up by the stage and it was kinda boring, TBH. Loud, packed, and people just standing their sipping beers. It got more fun when we started walking around and finding all the marketing activations and whatnot.
I thought it was overall run very well, with people on site to take photos at all the photo ops (Chiefs themed stuff, Lombardi trophies, rings, and more).
Up on the south lawn was the more capitalistic, data-capturing brands that we've all come to know too well. Little Caesars had a football throwing contest, Bud Light had a slide to go down, there was a 40 yard dash, etc, etc. The problem? The lines to do literally any of these was several dozen people deep, so we skipped it all.
All in all though, for the novelty of it, for what it meant to bringing so many people to our city, and for the hometown atmosphere, I really enjoyed this one-off event. read more