Four weeks from today the NFL Draft Extravaganza gets rolling in Nashville, TN when Roger Goodell walks onto the stage to announce that the NFL Draft 2019 has begun.  He’ll get booed roundly.  He always does.

Someone else who got booed roundly is the reason why Nashville has the draft spotlight on them this year, or for that matter, more importantly, why Nashville has an NFL team.  Kenneth Stanley “Bud” Adams, Jr. was a founding owner of the old American Football League back in 1959.    Bud’s franchise was the Houston Oilers, located in an oil boom town.  And, soon he housed the team in the eighth wonder of the world, The Astrodome which gave even more credibility to the new league.

As the league grew in popularity it eventually merged with the National Football League in 1970.  His franchise’s value grew considerably on that day.  When he hired Bum Phillips to coach and when Bum drafted Earl Campbell collectively they could do no wrong.  Then Bud fired Bum.  And it got worse from there.

In 1987, Adams threatened to move the Oilers to Jacksonville, Florida unless significant improvements were made to the Astrodome. Harris County, which owns the Astrodome, responded with a $67 million renovation that added 10,000 more seats, a new Astroturf carpet and 65 luxury boxes. Adams promised that with the new improvements, he would keep the team in Houston for 10 years.  Ever the man of his word, Bud kept them in Houston for exactly 10 more years.  His flirting with Jacksonville made Houston leery.  His outright romance with Nashville led to a divorce.

After Adams met several times with then-Nashville mayor Phil Bredesen, they announced a deal to bring the Oilers to Nashville for the 1998 season to a new 68,000-seat stadium (originally called Adelphia Coliseum, now known as Nissan Stadium).  To throw mud in Houston’s eye, Adams successfully petitioned the league to permanently retire the nickname Oilers.

And in 1998, after a year playing in Memphis, the Tennessee Titans kicked off in Nashville.  How could someone abandon the now third largest city for then, little ole Nashville?

It turns out that everyone’s a winner, like on Oprah’s show, here.  Houston got an expansion franchise in the early 2000’s to replace the Oilers.  The Texans are already a franchise valued at well over 2 billion.  They play average football to sold out crowds and sold out suites year after year.

Meanwhile, Nashville has added an NHL team to their burgeoning portfolio of reasons why it’s now a very relevant US sports city.   Amazon’s million square foot office, Oracle’s 800k square foot office, and Alliance Bernstein’s announced move to Nashville has all occurred in the last six months.  That and more makes Nashville a very relevant city period.  Tall cranes, always a good sign, are everywhere.

Maybe Bud Adams had more vision that we could see in the early 90’s.  He bought into the AFL in 1959 for a 50k franchise price.  The Titans are now valued at 2.05 billion themselves.  That was some vision.

MLB starts today.  Maybe the Houston Astros can get to another World Series.  The Astrodome was built for them originally.  Bud moved in afterwards.

Nashville doesn’t yet have an MLB team.  But, with the growth going on in the city some visionary probably has a plan in mind.

It’s play ball in Houston today. It’s Kyler Murray’s name called as the first round first pick to the Arizona Cardinals in four weeks in Nashville.  And, it’s always a good day to boo Roger Goodell.