Depending on who you ask, a generation can mean twenty years or thirty years or twenty-five years or, well you get the idea. I am not sure either but I always thought it meant different things to different people but the value of time is somewhere in that window. I think.
For those of us who grew up in middle Tennessee, the idea that a NFL team would come to Nashville was simply preposterous. No way could Nashville ever get that big or important that the NFL would put a team in Music City. We may have a moniker of a bunch of hillbillies but a doubting Thomas would have been more apropos.
Fast forward all those years and on September 13th, the Tennessee Titans will begin their 30th season in Nashville. 28 years as the Titans and two as the Tennessee Oilers. 1997, a team from Houston moved to Nashville and played in Memphis for the home games. But, they were based here and the preseason games were also here so we count that.
Thirty years or a generation to some that Nashville has had an NFL team. Now we are about to knock down the first NFL stadium and will open a new one in 2027. The Super Bowl, the dang Super Bowl, will be played here in February of 2030.
Nashville has become a global city and not only because of country music. So many corporations have moved their headquarters here and there is no doubt that it was because Nashville had an NFL team and became that sports destination.
I often think about my grandpa when things such as this pop up. He passed away in 1987 and was a native and a huge football fan and a bigger fan of Nashville. His city with a NFL team, an NHL team, and a MLS team would have made him so happy in every way possible. Now his beloved city will begin their 30th year as a home to an NFL team with a massive new stadium literally across from the river where he worked.
One generation and counting.
