Arlington ready for the spotlight as these three huge sporting events come to town

Arlington will bask in the glow of national and international spotlights all through the final three months of this year.

That enviable reality is a direct result of the quintessential can-do spirit of the city’s forward-looking people, who have charted the course that now spans three generations.

Three world class events are about to take place in the city’s extraordinary entertainment district, and among the primary beneficiaries are ordinary folks who call Arlington home.

First up are the Major League Baseball playoff games, culminating with the World Series, offering the potential of 19 nationally televised games at Globe Life Field.

The new ballpark will be host to one National League Division Series that takes the field starting Tuesday. The winner moves on to the National League Championship Series, in which the pennant champion will be decided, beginning Oct. 12.

Then, for the first time since 1944, an entire World Series will be played in a neutral ballpark. That’s baseball history being made in Arlington. That excitement begins on Oct. 20.

A couple of weeks after the Fall Classic has concluded, we move across the street into AT&T Stadium to witness the Professional Bull Riders World Finals Championship.

For 26 straight years, the most prestigious event in bull riding has been held in Las Vegas.

“This larger-than-life, premier bull riding competition captivates an international audience,” Arlington Mayor Jeff Williams said, “and it’s the perfect fit for our world-class entertainment district.”

The four-day event begins Nov. 12 to what the city described as “a lightning-fast, Herculean collaboration” among the city, the state, the Dallas Cowboys, CBS Sports and the bull riding association.

Then, on Dec. 3, the already sold-out 2020 Wrangler National Finals Rodeo moves into Globe Life Field for its 10-day extravaganza. It features the top 15 in each event on the Cowboys and the Women’s Professional Rodeo Association circuits.

You may wonder about how a rodeo would be staged on a baseball field. First, it is a reminder of how Globe Life Field was always designed as a multi-event venue.

Then, rodeo chief executive George Taylor said: “We spent a lot of long nights talking about the structure of the arena and what we would do. It was really exciting as it started to come together on how we could really optimize a baseball field.”

All of this could not have come at a better time for Arlington’s visitor and tourism economy. The losses occasioned by the pandemic will now be at least partially recovered as fans for these events arrive, occupy hotels, eat at restaurants, spend their money on tickets and other things they want and need while they are in town.

That will drive sales tax revenue that the city can use to pay for services that benefit all of the community’s residents and businesses. Just how much that will be is hard to know at the moment.

The bull riding and rodeo events have worked out seating capacities so far, and baseball commissioner Rob Manfred said he was pressing ahead with plans to have fans in the stands for the league championship and World Series games socially distanced in four-person “pods.”

All of this good news had its origins long ago. Voters showed up in record numbers on four different occasions and overwhelmingly approved partial funding to build three baseball parks and a football stadium.

Arlington’s legacy of making the city a national destination continues to thrive.