Results tagged “soldierfield”

Bummed you missed U2 for their recent stint at Soldier Field? Don't worry, Bono + The Boys have scheduled a return trip for July 6, 2010 as they extend their massive tour. With several open days on either side of that date, additional shows are also possible. Tickets will go on sale in November, though specifics haven't been announced. [Tribune]

Earlier this week, we mentioned the current U.S. bid to host the 2018 or 2022 World Cup. Yesterday, the bid committee announced a new push for cities to show their support for their role in the bid, including Soldier Field. As of this afternoon, Chicago had around 4,500; Seattle is the overall leader with over 13,000 supporters signed up and surprise Atlanta (~11,000) coming in second.

Now that we're past the Chicago 2016 failure, attention can now turn to the next major sporting event bid: the World Cup. While the U.S. men's national team has secured its spot in South Africa for next summer's World Cup (woo! CONCACAF Hexagonal Champs!) and Rio prepares to host the 2014 World Cup as a tune-up for the 2016 Olympics, bidding is underway for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup tournaments. And, of course, the U.S. has thrown its hat in the ring for both. The U.S. joins a bevy of countries competing for 2018 and 2022 including England, Russia, and Australia.

The family of Walter Payton wants to put up a statue honoring the Bears legend, but they've been met with resistance from the Chicago Park District. It seems the Park District is a-okay with a statue of Payton going up - it is, after all, being donated by the Payton family - but has adopted a hard line of not allowing the statue to go up in the one place it makes sense: Soldier Field.

It seems having one of the biggest rock bands on the planet and thousands of its fan is pretty hard on a stadium's turf. The Bears are busy replacing the sod at Soldier Field ahead of this weekend's home opener against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Resodding the field after the preseason is actually routine, but the team decided to wait until after the U2 concerts this past weekend before going ahead with the sod replacement; the sod being used is a bit deeper so it'll hold better. Meanwhile, Desmond Clark lashed out at the field conditions before U2 ever took the field, concluding a rant about field conditions with, "we have one of the worst fields in the NFL and there are no excuses why the Chicago Bears, of all teams, should have to play on such a bad surface." [Tribune]

Teenagers do stupid stuff. We all know it. Most of us did stupid things ourselves. And so did these teens: a trio of teens was arrested for tagging the police memorial by Soldier Field. Police say the graffiti was non-gang-related and not anti-police. Which is nice, but still. Really kids? If you're gonna tag something, you couldn't find a blank brick wall in an alley? You had to tag a memorial serving fallen police officers? Send 'em to boot camp, we say.

180 National Guard troops got a warm welcome home today from friends, family, and Governor Pat Quinn. The ceremony was held today at Soldier Field; it's the first trip home in almost a year for the soldiers from the 178th Infantry. The troops were among those that Gov. Quinn visited during his surprise trip to the Middle East a few weeks ago.

       

After a less than stellar performance against Costa Rica earlier this week, the U.S. Men's Soccer team rolled in to Soldier Field last night for a match against Honduras in front of over 55,000 fans. In spite of falling behind early, the U.S came back and won 2-1 to advance to 3-1-1 overall in the Hexagonal standings, good enough for second place at the halfway point of qualifying. Carlos Costly got Honduras on the board first with a goal in the fifth minute. It wouldn't be until the 43rd minute that Landon Donovan got the equalizer courtesy of a penalty kick after a Honduras player was called for knocking the ball down with his hand inside the box. The game-winner came in the 68th minute when Donovan's corner kick sailed to Clint Dempsey, who headed the ball down, and Carlos Bocanegra headed the ball in for the go-ahead goal. Next up for the Americans is a break from qualifying so they can head to South Africa to participate in the FIFA Confederations Cup against Egypt and soccer heavyweights Italy and Brazil.

Did you enjoy our pics from this weekend's Frank Lloyd Wright tour? Well, now there may be a LEGO set just for you. Our pals at Gapers Block point out that LEGO plans on soon releasing a new line of sets featuring famous architectural wonders, such as the Sears Tower (right). GB also directs us to PrairieMod, who has a preview of a pair of Frank Lloyd Wright sets soon to be released. According to a press release posted on PrairieMod:

If you've noticed an abundance of men and women in uniform around town, it's because it is the first ever Marine Week here in Chicago. It kicked off Monday morning and continues through Sunday night. The Marines will be showcasing their talents around town all week. You can see the full list of events here, but here is a list of events that are free and open to the public.

A few odds and ends from the world of Chicago sports.

If you've been waiting to see professional lacrosse at Soldier Field, you can exhale because your time is finally here. The Chicago Machine, of Major League Lacrosse, have reached an agreement for the professional lacrosse team to play a pair of games this season at Soldier Field. Appropriately enough, it'll be the season opener and closer that'll happen at the spaceship on the lake. The Machine will open their 2009 season on May 30 against the Boston Cannons and close it out August 8 against the Long Island Lizards. Other home games will take place at Toyota Park and one match-up (against D.C.) happens in Milwaukee.

In a lawsuit that should come as a surprise to nobody, the Chicago Park District is being sued for switching Soldier Field's cleaning contract to a company that is owned by one of Mayor Daley's biggest fundraisers.

Could Chicago have become a routine host of the Super Bowl and the Final Four? Crain's Ed Sherman seems to think so, saying the city should have built a new stadium with a retractable roof rather than renovating Soldier Field.

Instead of building the Space Ship by the Lake, the city should have constructed a domed (preferably retractable) stadium. A Super Bowl and a few Final Fours would have helped pay for the extra expense.

Continue reading "Dept. Of Bad Ideas: A Domed Stadium For Bears?"

We know the Bears pulled off a pretty fantastic victory last night, but one fan who was in attendance at Soldier Field learned how dangerous Chicago's cold winter can be the hard way. Chicago Police officer Femi Odugbesan found Jozef Kowalkowski in a delirious state wandering around in front of the Shedd Aquarium after Kowalkowski called police just after 1 a.m., saying "I am very cold." Officer Odugbesan is credited with saving Kowalkowski's life.

“He kept calling back and I found him right in front of the Shedd Aquarium. He was walking towards me," Odugbesan said, adding that Kowalkowski was wearing all black clothing and a coat with a hood, but had no gloves and no hat.

Continue reading "Bears Fan Delirious For The Wrong Reason"

Sometimes, naming-rights deals for parts of stadiums make a fair amount of sense by pairing a sponsoring brand that corresponds to the use of the area and the demographics of the fans. The Bud Light bleachers at Wrigley Field is a good example.

We've never been huge fans of the phrase “Chicago has two seasons: winter and construction." We prefer to think of it as winter and awesome or winter and street-festivals, but we also can’t help but agree.

Who wants to go ice skating a Soldier Field? We do! We do!

After the Trib ran a story about Wheeling's Amante Enad roasting pigs in his back yard in traditional Filipino fashion, the village issued him a citation barring the practice and asking him to fork over (hay-oh!) his roasting equipment. [Trib]

In a day packed with college football bowl games, the coolest televised sporting event on New Year's Day had to be watching the Buffalo Sabres and Pittsburgh Penguins play an NHL game outside in Buffalo, in front of over 71,000 fans. It brought the game back to its roots, played outside on frozen ponds and lakes throughout the Midwest and Canada. Now imagine that same game outside, only featuring two of the NHL's "Original Six." With the Black Hawks roaring back from the brink of irrelevance in the months after Bill Wirtz's passing, playing hockey in a sold-out Soldier Field, for example, would be the capper on an impressive resurrection.

Uck. Grey crappy icy Sunday afternoon. No Bears game - just the memories of Thursday's injury plagued horror. If only it were 1940 - it was during this weekend of that year that the most lopsided NFL games ever played took place - and the Bears whooped the Redskins' ass 73-0. The below video from that game is titled The Greatest Block in NFL History - it might not be the absolute greatest of all...

Where Can I Go Sledding?

Chicagoist almost turned off the TV when the Denver Broncos scored to go up 34-20 on the Bears on Sunday, and we're willing to bet a fair share of the Bears fans at Soldier Field fled the cold rain about then as well. Fortunately, we decided to stick it out and saw a most improbable win, as the Bears scored two late touchdowns to tie the game and Robbie Gould kicked a field goal in...

U.S. Soccer announced the selections for the 2007 Best of U.S. Soccer Awards and Chicago has several representatives in the competition. For Best Fan Atmosphere Chicago's Soldier Field gets two nods: one for this sSummer's Gold Cup Final in which the United States defeated Mexico and the other for the U.S. game versus Brazil in September. Chicagoist is voting for the Gold Cup game--it wasn't the most pro-U.S. crowd, but the fans filling Soldier field...

We're not very good at this rah-rah patriotism stuff sometimes. Especially when it seems like there's so very little to be patriotic about. Day in and day out, we're bombarded with information about our dysfunctional County Board, our crumbling mass-transit system, a stumbling economy, a dismal federal government and a long-term embroilment in a far-away sandbox, so on and so forth, fill in your own blank here: _________________

Chicagoist felt like Liz Crokin when we shared a room at Fogo de Chao with some of the best footballers (soccer players, whatever your preference) in the world. Chicagoist started off the day enjoying the thoroughly entertaining Clash of Champions between the United States and Brazil at Soldier Field with 45,000 other rabid soccer fans. After attending the Brazilian practice session on Saturday we wrote that the U.S. needed to be careful not to give...

Brazil's national soccer team arrived in Chicago on Friday for their Clash of Champions match-up with the United States National Team at Soldier Field on Sunday. Brazil did not wait long to entertain fans. On Saturday they held their one and only training session prior to the match with the United States and they did it in front of a crowd of a few hundred die-hard fans at Toyota Park. Chicagoist has always enjoyed watching...

Northern Illinois traveled to Soldier Field this weekend for the "Geico Soldier Field Showdown" where a sell-out crowd saw them fall to the Iowa Hawkeyes 16-3. Former Huskie standout running back Garret Wolfe signed with the Bears for the 2007 season, but unfortunately for Northern Illinois he was not in pads on Saturday for the Huskies. The Northern Illinois offense only netted 21 rushing yards compared to the Hawkeyes, who had two 100-yard rushers and...

The Bears played their third preseason game Saturday night, hosting the San Francisco 49ers. With the Bears taking the field at home for the first time since last year's playoffs, all eyes in Soldier Field were squarely on Rex Grossman. Even before the game, camera crews and Chicagoist ourselves focused in on Rex's practice snaps. We wanted to see any signs of progress after Grossman's three fumbles against the Indianapolis Colts last Monday, of which...

Chicagoans are in for another soccer treat this year when the United States National Team hosts Brazil at Soldier Field on September 9. Originally the 'Nats were slated to play Mexico in Mexico in what would have been a rematch of the 2007 Gold Cup final that took place earlier this summer in Chicago. Due to financial problems that game has been called off, though Chicagoist thinks it might have something to do with the...