DALLAS — Making a bid to become a host city for the 2026 FIFA World Cup fosters competition between cities — that would include places where NFL teams reside.
When it comes to the Dallas Cowboys and Kansas City Chiefs, the cities they play in both won bids to host World Cup matches on Thursday.
For the two franchises it wasn’t about competition, it was about coming together.
Dan Hunt, the chairman and president of FC Dallas, is also Dallas’ host city bid lead. Hunt’s brother, Clark, is the owner of the Kansas City Chiefs. The Hunt family in Kansas City led the charge to that winning bid.
Dan Hunt worked with Cowboys owner Jerry Jones and the Dallas Sports Commission to help secure Dallas’ successful bid.
“It is like doing business with family. It’s incredibly special,” Dan Hunt said. “Jerry went to my father (the late Lamar Hunt) as a 25-year-old to figure out how to buy a NFL franchise. We’ve had this long standing relationship.”
The Jones and Hunt families live in close proximity to each other in Highland Park. Over the years, the two families worked together on NFL business, Clark and Stephen Jones served on some league committees, and there are soccer events Dan Hunt formed with Jerry Jones.
“I can’t tell you the respect that I have for the Hunts,” Jerry Jones said. “Clark, Dan, his family. Lamar was just such an inspiration and actually such a help to me when I got involved (in the NFL). He’s a help to me now. Some of the things that he’s about are still the tenets that I would use when I’m thinking about how to handle a problem today. A great family of the NFL and I’m just proud to be a neighbor.”
Of the 16 North American cities selected to host World Cup matches, 11 stadiums with NFL teams as the main tenants were selected. AT&T Stadium in Arlington has hosted a Super Bowl, major college football games, boxing matches, two WrestleManias and an NBA All-Star Game since it opened in 2009. Now here comes the World Cup.
“They put enough out there for me to go out there and try to get it,” Jerry Jones said.
“I know the venue and the interest in sports. I know the visibility and I know we bring a lot of visibility, the Cowboys, nationally and internationally, are the most visible team. We want to bring that. That’s not to diminish anything that soccer does, but we want to use that in every way we can to help build soccer in the U.S.”
