College Football Playoff director estimates it costs a city as much as $16 million to host national title game

Minneapolis earned rave reviews this past week as the city hosted the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament Final Four at U.S. Bank Stadium but leaders from across the Twin Cities are already aiming their sights on holding another big event in the area: the, um, other final four -- the College Football Playoff National Championship Game.

The area was up for the bidding on the upcoming 2020 title game several years ago but ultimately lost out to New Orleans. Based on a recent Star Tribune interview with CFP Executive Director Bill Hancock, it sounds like Minneapolis has a chance to be in the running whenever the bid process (such as it is) comes back open in a few years.

While that should come as no surprise given that it is one of only a handful of “northern” venues in the country that could host college football’s ultimate prize, perhaps the most interesting note that emerged from the interview was the estimated cost some of the cities need to be prepared to pony up if they want to land the CFP:

Hancock also said it’s probably better if a city doesn’t host any combination of the Super Bowl, Final Four and CFP back-to-back-to-back, as it “does stress the resources of the city in terms of finances and also in terms of volunteer manpower.” He estimated a city’s investment for hosting a CFP as $12 million to $16 million, though cities expect to make that back in tourism dollars. Only a few cities have pulled that off in conjunction with a Final Four and Super Bowl, such as Phoenix from 2015-17 and Atlanta from 2018-20.

All things considered, $12-16 million isn’t too surprising a number when you add up all the things like branding, police escorts, practice facility time and all the other mundane items that are all a part of the build up to the big game itself at a big stadium. We’re guessing some cities that are used to big events like New Orleans could lean toward the lower end of the scale while this past January’s trip to the Bay Area had to come at the more premium end of the spectrum.

The future sites of the game have already been announced through 2024 but CFP officials have been tight-lipped about the future of the bidding process. Who knows, perhaps by then they’ll have a lot more on their plates to consider like handling eight teams in the postseason prior to the big game...