With Commanders sale imminent, will a new stadium follow?

The Washington Commanders are likely to get a new owner very soon. Will a new stadium follow?

That’s the multibillion-dollar question circulating around the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area as Daniel Snyder appears poised to relinquish control of the team he has owned since 1999. Snyder also owns FedEx Field, the Landover, Maryland, stadium where the Commanders have played since the 1997 season. The Commanders are contracted to play at FedEx through the 2027 season, but beyond that, the team’s home field prospects are a blank slate.

Only eight stadiums in the league are older than FedEx Field, and few have had as many infrastructure problems, from pipes leaking liquid onto fans to railings collapsing. Starting in 2011, the team began removing seats from the stadium; capacity dropped from a high of 91,000 to its current 67,000. Even so, the team has struggled to fill stands for many years. Change is coming, in other words.

Behind the scenes, key players in what’s likely to be a years-long stadium development saga are quietly jockeying for position. Maryland could convince the Commanders to continue playing there in a new or upgraded site. The District of Columbia could entice the team back to its ancestral home, where the franchise played from 1961 to 1996. Or Virginia planners could go big with a bid in the billions to lure the team across the Potomac River.

Whatever happens next, it’s clear that all new movement hinges on Snyder’s departure. While fan and civic interest in the team remains high, Snyder himself had become toxic; at various times over the past decade, discussions with Virginia, Maryland and the District have all stalled because of concerns about Snyder's many legal woes, scandals and questionable operation of the team.

Early in 2022, the state of Virginia appeared on track to create a stadium authority that would be responsible for creating a new, $3 billion domed stadium to house the Commanders. But by the summer, that proposal — which had bipartisan support, unusual in this era — died a legislative death last summer, due in large part to growing concerns about the many investigations into Snyder and the team. (Multiple Virginia government officials did not respond to requests for comment from Yahoo Sports.)

"Only Dan Snyder is reviled and incompetent enough," Virginia Del. Marcus Simon tweeted last June, "to get a bill personally patroned by two of the most powerful men in the General Assembly, the Senate Majority Leader and the Chair of the House Appropriations Committee, killed."

Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser has long pushed for the team to return to the District, even though doing so would require congressional approval to redevelop the federally owned site of old RFK Stadium, the team’s former home. Multiple outlets, including the Washington Post, reported earlier this year that Bowser and NFL commissioner Roger Goodell have been in contact about keeping the District involved in discussions about a new stadium site.

“The league and Mayor Bowser agree that Washington, D.C. should have a seat at the table when a new site is considered,” the NFL said in a statement. “We will continue to work with the Mayor’s office, the Commanders, and Congress to that end — just like we are in contact with local officials in Maryland and Virginia as they review site and stadium options.”

Over in Maryland, state Del. Jazz Lewis, who represents the Prince George’s County area that includes the stadium, notes that the state’s relationship with the team has greatly improved in recent years with the arrival of team president Jason Wright.

“Jason and the team around him have taken their role as one of our corporate partners seriously,” Lewis says. He notes that under Wright, the Commanders began a range of outreach efforts to connect with the community around the stadium, including opening the facility for early voting in the 2020 election, opening parking lots for vaccination during COVID, and setting up backpack giveaways and other one-on-one events to strengthen the bonds between the Commanders and their local fans.

That said, Lewis understands that the state could well lose the team in the coming years. To make the area more attractive — and to stave off the possibility that it could be left with only an empty skeleton of a stadium — Maryland is preparing to invest heavily in the area around FedEx Field.

“We decided a couple of years ago to make sure the community that lives in the shadow of the stadium would get the investment it deserves,” Lewis says. “We believed we were going to see much of what has happened around the Nationals’ stadium — restaurants, areas to live, work and play. That isn’t what happened — [FedEx Field] is on an island.”

Maryland officials have thus created the “Blue Line Corridor” project, named for a line of the Metro mass-transit system that runs from Virginia, through D.C. and into Maryland. The state plans to invest nearly half a billion dollars in an effort to bring higher-end retail, restaurants and living spaces to the area around the stadium. There isn’t money allocated to build a new stadium, but there is money to tear FedEx Field down if that becomes necessary.

“The last thing we want is a towering structure, vacant, deteriorating in our backyard,” Lewis says. “That’s the reason why we made the investment plan, to help continue to grow that area regardless of if the team stays or goes.”

Prince George’s County officials told Yahoo Sports they continue to believe that the county is the best location for the Commanders. While the county is investing heavily in a “Blue Line Corridor, officials declined to comment on any aspect of the stadium, Snyder or the Commanders beyond that.

There are many hurdles to clear in the Commanders sale before a stadium becomes the primary topic of conversation. As Lewis points out, new owners that have just spent $6 billion on a team might not be so eager to drum up another billion, or more, for a new stadium right away. Still, he believes — and he’s not alone — that an ownership change will be a net positive for the area, regardless of where the Commanders end up.

“We hope the new owners can open a conversation,” Lewis says, “that was shut down with Dan Snyder at the helm.”