Do NFL teams play better in new stadiums? How Nashville East Bank revamp could help Titans
On Feb. 13, 2022, the Los Angeles Rams won Super Bowl LVI at SoFi Stadium, their 70,240-seat home cathedral opened just a year prior. It was validation of years of effort to bring professional football — and high-level professional football at that — back to Hollywood.
That's the fairy tale version of this story. Build a stadium. Field a competitive team. Win immediately. Rake in all the trophies and accolades and cash and positive press for your city. It's the end-of-a-Disney-movie sort of result the Tennessee Titans are going to be shooting for when the new Nissan Stadium opens in 2027.
Reality tells us the Rams' story is much more of an outlier than a trend.
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Ten NFL teams have moved into brand-new stadiums since 2008. Three, including the Rams, relocated cities to get their new digs. One, the Minnesota Vikings, had to build a new stadium because the roof of their previous stadium collapsed. The other six, like the Titans, built their new stadium for the sake of having modernized amenities and a better fan experience.
Combine the 10 examples, and there's no correlation between moving into a new stadium and more winning. If anything, teams have tended to get a little bit worse in their new homes.
Team | Stadium | 3 years before move | 2 years before move | 1 year before move | 1 year after move | 2 years after move | 3 years after move | Win % before move | Win % after move |
Raiders | Allegiant | 6-10 | 4-12 | 7-9 | 8-8 | 10-7 | 6-11 | 35% | 48% |
Rams | SoFi | 11-5 | 13-3 | 9-7 | 10-6 | 12-5 | 5-12 | 69% | 54% |
Chargers | SoFi | 9-7 | 12-4 | 5-11 | 7-9 | 9-8 | 10-7 | 54% | 52% |
Falcons | Mercedes Benz | 6-10 | 8-8 | 11-5 | 10-6 | 7-9 | 7-9 | 52% | 50% |
Vikings | U.S. Bank | 5-10-1 | 7-9 | 11-5 | 8-8 | 13-3 | 8-7-1 | 49% | 61% |
49ers | Levi's | 13-3 | 11-4-1 | 12-4 | 8-8 | 5-11 | 2-14 | 67% | 31% |
Jets | MetLife | 4-12 | 9-7 | 9-7 | 11-5 | 8-8 | 6-10 | 46% | 52% |
Giants | MetLife | 10-6 | 12-4 | 8-8 | 10-6 | 9-7 | 9-7 | 63% | 58% |
Cowboys | AT&T | 9-7 | 13-3 | 9-7 | 11-5 | 6-10 | 8-8 | 65% | 52% |
Colts | Lucas Oil | 14-2 | 12-4 | 13-3 | 12-4 | 14-2 | 10-6 | 81% | 75% |
Seven of the last 10 teams to move into new stadiums had better winning percentages in the three years before their move than the three following years. Nine of the 10 made the playoffs as many times or more in the earlier three-year window than the later. Overall, these teams won 58.96% of their games in the three seasons before their stadium opened and 53.4% of their games in their first three seasons in the new stadium.
Even the juice that comes from a first year in a new home hasn't really translated to a positive trend. These 10 teams won an average of 9.4 games in the year before moving stadiums and 9.5 games in their debut campaigns.
There is one shred of good news for the Titans, though: Home-field advantage is a real factor. The last 10 teams to move stadiums were a combined 48-32 in their first seasons as new tenants, good for a 60% winning percentage.
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Nick Suss is the Titans beat writer for The Tennessean. Contact Nick at nsuss@gannett.com. Follow Nick on X, the platform formerly called Twitter, @nicksuss.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee Titans may see performance boost after Nashville Nissan work
