Today’s Miami Herald is reporting that Miami-Dade County has won the bid to host World Wrestling Entertainment’s next “Showcase of the Immortals,” WrestleMania XXVIII. (That’s the number 28 for us laymans.) The event will be held at Sun Life Stadium, a venue that hosts the Orange Bowl annually and has held five Super Bowls in the past.
The bid process took three years, but with the announcement, the state of Florida gets its second WrestleMania event in the span of four years. Miami-Dade County won the bid over the likes of Los Angeles (which hosted WrestleMania 21), New Orleans (has never hosted a WM), New York (WrestleMania, WM X, and WM XX), and Toronto (WrestleMania VI and X8).
WrestleMania XXVIII will also be the third WM to be held outdoors. WrestleMania IX emanated live from Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, and 2004’s WrestleMania XXIV was held in the Citrus Bowl in Orlando.
Whenever the Miami Dolphins play at Sun Life, the stadium can seat a little more than 75,000.
Since WrestleMania XXIII, World Wrestling Entertainment has averaged more than 72,000 per event. And last year’s event at Glenndale, AZ in University of Phoenix Stadium grossed $5.8 million and became the highest grossing entertainment event ever at the stadium.
