EverBank Stadium

• 1. Ten Acres, Five Names

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  EverBank Stadium has worn five different names since it opened in 1995. Each one marks a deal, a sale, or a shift in who claimed ownership over what the place meant. The stadium stands on ten acres along the St. Johns River in downtown Jacksonville, Florida. It was not built because the city had a professional football team. It was built to keep a college football game from leaving town. Negotiations that began in the early 1990s drew in NFL investors, city bond votes, and a series of last-minute deals. How a dispute over a college football contract eventually produced a venue that would host a Super Bowl is a question worth sitting with.

• 2. Saving the Rivalry

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  In January 1993, representatives from the University of Florida and the University of Georgia opened negotiations with Jacksonville officials. The subject was the future of their annual football rivalry. The two schools' five-year contract with the Gator Bowl was set to expire after the 1994 season. The Citrus Bowl had offered both universities a larger payment for the right to host the matchup. Jacksonville's mayor, Ed Austin, responded with a $25.5 million renovation proposal for the aging Gator Bowl stadium. Georgia's athletic director, Vince Dooley, was not persuaded. Austin raised the offer to $49 million and traveled in person to Athens, Georgia, to press his case directly with Dooley. The effort was partially successful. On the 23rd of March, 1993, the two universities signed a five-year contract with the Gator Bowl, running from 1997 through 2002. The agreement carried a condition. Austin had to pass a renovation bond through the Jacksonville City Council. The construction also had to be finished before the 1996 game. On the 11th of May, 1993, a Tuesday, the Council approved a $219.5 million bond issue. Forty-nine million of that total was earmarked for the Gator Bowl renovations. The bond passage opened a door that investors hoping to attract a National Football League team to Jacksonville had been waiting for.

• 3. Landing the Jaguars

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  Those NFL investors asked the city to add $30 million to the renovation budget. The additional funds, they argued, would make the facility competitive enough to attract a professional team. That number kept rising through the summer. By the 1st of July, 1993, the city and investors had agreed to a lease committing $112.3 million to improvements at the Gator Bowl. The Jacksonville City Council refused to ratify it, sending the deal back to committee instead. One month later, city officials and investors returned with a new proposal pledging $121 million for renovations. The expanded scope required a significant disruption. The Florida-Georgia game had to leave the Gator Bowl for both the 1994 and 1995 seasons while construction proceeded. On the 30th of November, 1993, Jacksonville was formally awarded the 30th franchise in the National Football League. The franchise became the Jacksonville Jaguars. Almost before the announcement had settled, a controversy emerged. The renovation contractor planned to assign 8% of stadium work to minority-owned businesses. The NAACP and a second group objected, contending that African-American firms should have received twice that share. Construction began on the 3rd of January, 1994. The stadium's official opening came on the 18th of August, 1995, with an exhibition game against the St. Louis Rams. Total construction time came in under 20 months at a cost of $134 million, with $60 million provided by the city. When the regular NFL season began, the Jaguars hosted the Houston Oilers in their home opener and lost 10-3. It was the first time an expansion franchise had played its opening home game in a brand-new venue. Within a decade, the stadium would be chosen as the site of the National Football League's most-watched annual event.

• 4. Super Bowl on the St. Johns

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  In 2003 and 2004, the stadium underwent $47 million in improvements to prepare for the Super Bowl. Workers added a sports bar in the south end zone called the Bud Zone, plus escalators in the north and south end zones. A new video and scoring display from Daktronics replaced the existing board. Above the Bud Zone, a premium terrace space called the Sky Patio was installed in the south end zone. The game arrived on the 6th of February, 2005. The New England Patriots defeated the Philadelphia Eagles 24-21 in Super Bowl XXXIX. An attendance of 78,125 made it the largest Super Bowl crowd since 1994. Paul McCartney performed at halftime, playing "Drive My Car", "Get Back", and "Hey Jude". He closed the set with a firework-filled rendition of "Live and Let Die". Before the 2005 regular season, the Jaguars installed tarps over sections of the upper deck. They covered 9,703 seats, reducing standard game-day capacity to 66,851. Attendance had been falling short of what was required to avoid local broadcast blackouts. Despite the reduction, two of the Jaguars' first three home games in 2007 were blacked out. Nine of the ten home games in 2009 were blacked out as well. The 2008 financial crisis was widely seen as a contributing factor in that collapse. Only the final home game of the 2009 regular season, against the Indianapolis Colts, sold enough tickets to avoid a local blackout. For the Florida-Georgia game, the Super Bowl, and occasionally the Gator Bowl, temporary bleachers in the south end zone pushed capacity above 84,000. That expanded configuration produced the venue's all-time attendance record. On the 29th of September, 2007, a crowd of 85,413 watched Florida State defeat Alabama in what was billed locally as the River City Showdown. Each school received nearly 36,000 tickets, and the Gator Bowl Association added 5,800 seats. The Jaguars avoided blackouts in every game during the 2010, 2011, and 2012 seasons. That reversal in fortune coincided with a new name on the building and the start of a more ambitious reimagining of the structure itself.

• 5. A Building Reinvented

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  The stadium had been operating as Alltel Stadium since 1997. That year, a telecommunications company known primarily as a wireless carrier had purchased the naming rights. Alltel's name came down in January 2007 when the contract expired; by then, most of the company's assets had been purchased by Verizon. On the 26th of July, 2010, the financial services company EverBank purchased the stadium's naming rights. EverBank described itself at the time as one of the nation's largest privately held bank holding companies. The Jacksonville City Council approved the deal on the 10th of August, 2010, by a 14-3 vote. In 2014, the agreement was extended for an additional ten years. In November 2013, the City Council approved $63 million in stadium improvements. Jaguars owner Shahid Khan contributed $20 million of that total personally. The centerpiece of the renovation was a pair of end zone video scoreboards, each 362 feet long. At the time of their unveiling, these were the largest HD LED displays of their kind in the world. The renovation also added a platform in the north end zone featuring two wading pools. An additional 55,000 square feet of HD video screens were installed across the building, a world record for any stadium. About 7,000 seats were removed to accommodate the construction. The scoreboards were publicly unveiled on the 26th of July, 2014. In 2016, the Jaguars and the city announced $90 million in further improvements. The work included club seating upgrades, new walkout patios at the 50-yard-line, and a new south end zone team entrance tunnel. An amphitheater called Daily's Place and a covered flexible field were also built. Both phases of that renovation were completed in May 2017. That same year, the Jaguars returned to the playoffs for the first time since the 2007 season. They also hosted a home playoff game for the first time since 1999. The success prompted the team to remove the remaining upper deck tarps, adding 3,501 seats and raising total capacity to 67,814. In February 2018, the stadium was renamed TIAA Bank Field. EverBank had been acquired by the New York-based Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association of America. On the 19th of July, 2019, the Rolling Stones performed in front of 50,358 fans, generating over $10 million in ticket revenue. The concert had originally been scheduled for the 24th of April of that year but was postponed after Mick Jagger underwent a heart procedure. In 2021, the stadium took on a temporary tenant. The New Orleans Saints were displaced from Caesars Superdome by the aftermath of Hurricane Ida and played their entire 2021 NFL season in Jacksonville. In June 2023, the Jaguars announced the stadium would revert to the EverBank name prior to that season. The building also serves as the headquarters for two professional wrestling promotions, All Elite Wrestling and Ring of Honor. In 2024, the stadium was briefly renamed TrEverBank Stadium before the season opener. The stunt was part of Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence's commercial partnership with EverBank. Jacksonville lost that opener to the Cleveland Browns 18-13. That loss was among the final home games played in the building before a wholesale construction project began.

• 6. Stadium of the Future

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  The plans unveiled in June 2023 gave the renovation project a name: the Stadium of the Future. The design calls for a 360-degree concourse, an energy-efficient facade, and a large shade canopy over the seating bowl. Once complete, the stadium will hold 62,000 seats for most events, expandable to 71,500 for college football. NFL owners voted unanimously in October 2024 to approve the project. Construction began in February 2025 and is projected to be finished before the 2028 NFL season. The Gator Bowl, the Florida-Georgia game, and the Jaguars themselves will all need temporary homes during the work. The Jaguars initially planned to play away from Jacksonville in both 2026 and 2027. The final arrangement requires them to leave only for 2027, when they will play at Camping World Stadium in Orlando. The 2026 season will take place in the partially operational stadium at a reduced capacity of 42,507. That figure is the smallest the venue has offered for NFL regular-season play in its history. When construction finishes in time for the 2028 season, the shade canopy will be something no version of this stadium has ever offered.