Ironically, the Jets are set to travel there in the 2018 season. Giant fans should note that former head coach Tom Coughlin, the Jags' 1st coach who got them to within a game of the Super Bowl twice, is now back with them, in their front office.
Before You Go. Jacksonville is in Florida. It's frequently hot, even during the winter season. At least it's not as rainy as Miami. Ironically, this week, they got hit with snow for the 1st time in 30 years. But Jacksonville.com, the website of North Florida's largest newspaper, the Jacksonville-based Florida Times-Union, is predicting low 60s for next Sunday afternoon, and low 50s for evening.
Florida is a former Confederate State, and the parts of Florida north of the Tampa Bay region sure seem like a foreign country. But you won't need to bring your passport or change your money. And it's in the Eastern Time Zone, so you won't have to fool with your timepieces.
Tickets. The Jaguars have had attendance problems for years. Even this season, their 1st trip to the Playoffs in 10 years, they averaged only 61,405 fans per home game, about 91 percent of capacity. Of course, this being the Playoffs, tickets will be difficult to get, and more expensive than usual.
Regular season prices were as follows: In the 100 sections, seats are $226 on the sidelines and $82 in the end zones; in the 200 sections, $77 and $52; in the 400 sections, $72 and $42.
Getting There. It's 941 miles from Times Square in New York to downtown Jacksonville, and 940 miles from MetLife Stadium to EverBank Field. Knowing this distance, your first reaction is going to be to fly down there.
This is not a great idea, because, unlike Miami and Atlanta, Jacksonville isn't considered an important enough city to have regular nonstop flights from the New York Tri-State Area. Not only will it cost you over $1,200, but your change of planes might not be anywhere near Florida. United Airlines might send you all the way to O'Hare in Chicago before sending you on to Jacksonville International Airport. The airport is 14 miles north of downtown, almost halfway from downtown to the Georgia State Line. Bus 1 will get you downtown in less than an hour.
The train is not a very good idea, because you'll have to leave Penn Station on Amtrak's Silver Star at 11:02 AM and arrive in Jacksonville at 6:39 the next morning, a 19 1/2-hour ride. The return trip on the Silver Star will leave at 11:03 PM and return to New York at 6:50 PM. Round-trip, it'll cost $331. And the station isn't all that close, at 3570 Clifford Lane, 5 miles northwest of downtown. Bus 3 will get you downtown in a little over half an hour.
How about Greyhound? There are 3 buses leaving Port Authority every day that go to Jacksonville. The ride, including the changeovers, takes about 25 hours. Round-trip fare is $500, but it can be cut by nearly in half to $291 with advanced purchase. The station is at 10 N. Pearl Street, downtown.
If you want to drive, it'll help to get someone to go down with you, and take turns driving. You'll be going down Interstate 95 (or its New Jersey equivalent, the Turnpike) almost the whole way. It'll be about 2 hours from the Lincoln Tunnel to the Delaware Memorial Bridge, 20 minutes in Delaware, and an hour and a half in Maryland, before crossing the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, at the southern tip of the District of Columbia, into Virginia. Then it will be 3 hours or so in Virginia, another 3 hours in North Carolina, about 3 hours and 15 minutes in South Carolina, a little under 2 hours in Georgia, and about half an hour in Florida before you reach downtown Jacksonville.
Given rest stops, preferably in one in each State from Maryland to Georgia, you're talking about a 24-hour trip.
Once In the City. A lot of people don't realize it, because Miami is Florida's most famous city, but the most populous city in the State is Jacksonville. However, while Miami has about 425,000 people within the city limits, there are 6.5 million living in the metro area, making it far and away the largest in the South, not counting Texas. In contrast, Jacksonville has about 913,000 people, but only 1.6 million in its metro area. It ranks 30th in NFL markets. It would rank dead last in both MLB (31st) and MLS (26th), and close to it in the NBA (28th) and the NHL (27th).
The French first settled the area in 1561, but the Spanish took it away from them in 1565. It was given to Britain in a 1763 treaty, back to Spain in another treaty in 1783, and Spain ceded it to the U.S. in 1821. Formerly known as Fort Caroline, for the wife of King George III, it was renamed for the U.S. Army General who conquered Florida, Andrew Jackson.
The sales tax in Florida is 6 percent. ZIP Codes in Jacksonville and the surrounding area begin with the digits 320, 322 and 344. The Area Code is 904. The St. John's River bisects the city, but it is Bay Street, 2 blocks north of the River, that divides addresses into North and South, and Main Street into East and West.
The Jacksonville Skyway is a monorail system around downtown, similar to Detroit's PeopleMover and Miami's Metromover, with the difference being that it's free. The Jacksonville Transportation Authority runs it, and also runs the buses, which have a single-ride fare of $1.50. A 1-day StarCard is $4.00.
And the annual game between the universities of Florida and Georgia, a.k.a. "The World's Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party," has been played there since 1996. Being in Florida makes it hardly a neutral site, but the tickets are split right down the middle, as with such other neutral-site games like Texas vs. Oklahoma at the Cotton Bowl.
The Gator Bowl game was played there from 1946 to 1993. The old North American Soccer League's New England Tea Men moved there from Foxboro in 1981, but after 2 seasons, the people of North Florida and South Georgia decided they didn't want to see a professional soccer team called the Jacksonville Tea Men.
The Gator Bowl, during the 1964 Florida-Georgia game.
The old Coliseum and Wolfson Park can be seen in the background.
The Beatles were scheduled to play the Gator Bowl on September 11, 1964. When they found out that the stands were going to be racially segregated -- and this was 2 months after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 became law -- they refused to play. John Lennon actually said, "We never play to segregated audiences, and we aren't going to start now. I'd sooner lose our appearance money." Whether this was Lennon's 1st "revolutionary" act is unclear, but the group, and manager Brian Epstein, were unanimous. The City of Jacksonville, owners of the stadium, relented, and the concert went on.
The stadium came close to getting the Houston Oilers in 1987, and in 1993 the city was awarded the Jaguars on the condition that a new stadium be built. The only part of the previous stadium that remains is the west upper deck (which only dates to 1982) and the ramping system. During the reconstruction process, the University of Florida hosted the 1994 Gator Bowl, the Gators and Bulldogs traded home-field advantage for their game, and resumed playing at the site in 1996.
The U.S. national soccer team has played at the new Jacksonville stadium 5 times, all wins, most recently a World Cup Qualifier over Trinidad & Tobago on September 6, 2016. It played at the old stadium once, an exhibition game (or a "friendly") that was a warmup for the 1994 World Cup, a 1-1 draw with the former Soviet "republic" of Moldova.
Food. Miami is South Florida. Jacksonville is The South. Big difference. Florida is the opposite of the rest of the country: The further north you go, the redneckier it gets. Pretty much anything north of the Orlando Science Center, north of downtown Orlando, might as well be Hazzard County, which was apparently in rural Georgia.
Indeed, go 31 miles north or 38 miles west, and you'll be in Georgia. So don't expect a lot of bagels, pasta or Cuban sandwiches. More like barbecue and, as one of George Carlin's routines went, "How ya cook them grits?"
Okay, all joking aside: The concessions at EverBank Field are rather ordinary. As with the west stand at Rutgers Stadium, there's stands at Sections 405 and 431 in the upper deck where you can get a turkey leg. There, and downstairs at 119, you can get a pork sandwich. At 142, a prime rib sandwich. There are a few stands selling Italian and Polish sausages. Other than that, no big deal, which is odd for a Southern stadium.
Team History Displays. There's not much history to display. This season marked only the Jags' 3rd division title, winning the AFC South after winning the AFC Central in 1998 and 1999. They also reached the AFC Championship Game in 1996 as a Wild Card and 1999 as Division Champions. In other words, once they got their 1st season, 1995, out of the way, they were tough in their 2nd, 3rd and 4th seasons. But they have pretty much struggled since. And there's no display for these minor titles at EverBank Field.
Nor do the Jags have any officially retired numbers. Since offensive tackle Tony Boselli retired in 2002, his Number 71 has not been given back out. There is a team hall of fame, the Pride of the Jaguars. Boselli, quarterback Mark Brunell (Number 8), running back Fred Taylor (28), receiver Jimmy Smith (82), and original team owners Wayne and Delores Weaver have been elected to it. Taylor arrived in 1998, the rest were all "original Jaguars" in 1995 and were there for the run to the 1996 AFC Championship Game. Including Taylor, they were all there for the 1998 and 1999 Playoff runs.
Stuff. The Jags Pro Shop is located on the west main concourse, behind Sections 109 and 110.
As 1 of the NFL's 4 newest teams (not counting the Rams' and Chargers' moves back to Los Angeles), the Jaguars don't have many books written about them. And there are no DVD collections about the team.
What we have is this: After their remarkable 2nd season, John Oehser and Pete Prisco wrote Jags to Riches: The Cinderella Season of the Jacksonville Jaguars. Ken M. Bown -- and new Jags owners Shahid "Shad" Khan has his name on it as well, but how much he contributed is questionable -- published Big League City!: 100 Years of Football in Jacksonville in 2014. Presumably, this also discusses high school ball, the Florida-Georgia game, the Gator Bowl, the WFL's Sharks and the USFL's Bulls.
During the Game. From September 1 to 7, 2017, during the NFL National Anthem protest controversy, FiveThirtyEight.com polled fans of the 32 NFL teams, to see where they leaned politically. Jaguar fans, in the northern, therefore "Southern," part of Florida, hard by (as they would say in country music) the Florida-Georgia Line, were rated 2.4 percent more conservative than liberal. They were 1 of 6 teams whose fans were more conservative than liberal.
However, this team is only in its 23rd season. It is possible to drum up a good rivalry in that time. The Carolina Panthers, the same age, already have a good one with the Atlanta Falcons. The Baltimore Ravens, a year newer, already have nasty ones with (as you might guess, since they used to be the original version of this team) the Cleveland Browns, and also (probably due to proximity more than anything else) the Pittsburgh Steelers.
The Jaguars are in the AFC South, but their struggles have meant that they haven't had too many big games lately. They have a little bit of a rivalry with what is, technically, and even newer team, the Tennessee Titans. But there are other AFC South rivals, the Indianapolis Colts and the Houston Texans, don't inspire much anger.
Certainly, North Florida people don't have much reason to dislike either the Giants or the Jets, even if they might not exactly be fond of New York City. If you visit EverBank Field, your safety will probably not be in danger, as long as you don't provoke anybody.
The Jaguars hold auditions for National Anthem singers, instead of having a regular. Their fight song is "Stand Up and Fight for the Jaguars." Their cheerleaders are known as the Jacksonville Roar. Delores Weaver, the wife of the original owner, designed their uniforms, approved their dance routines, and even served as a judge during tryouts.
Their mascot is a jaguar named Jaxson de Ville, and he wears a Number 00 jersey. The original performer, from 1996 to 2014, was Curtis Dvorak. His wife, Melanie McAlister, was a cheerleader with the Roar from 2001 to 2004. They were married - not in their respective costumes - at the stadium in 2005. They have since divorced.
His entrances have been notable. Like the Phillie Phanatic, he has a motorized all-terrain vehicle. He's also used a golf cart, a Jeep, and risky removes, such as sliding down a rope from the scoreboard and using a zip wire to bungee jump off the light towers. In 2009, a zipline stunt went wrong, and he was stuck hanging by his feet like Harry Houdini for 3 minutes until he was helped down - remarkably, unhurt.
But he's probably best known for - not once, but twice - taking a Pittsburgh Steelers Terrible Towel and desecrating it, stomping on it one time, rubbing his armpits with it another. Both times, the Jags went on losing streaks. I hope his successor is smarter.
After the Game. EverBank Field is one of those venues which is not only not in a bad neighborhood, it's not in any neighborhood. I don't know how rough the surrounding area is, but the highways in the parking lot act as buffers anyway, so you have no reason to worry about the safety of yourself or your car.
As for where to go after the game, I can't be sure. I checked for area bars where New Yorkers gather, and the closest I came was finding a 2008 reference for Jet fans at a Beef O'Brady's. But it's now a Woody's Bar-BQ, and if you're a Jet fan, you probably don't like owner Woody Johnson, so do you really want to go to a place called Woody's?
If you visit Miami during the European soccer season (we're now right in the middle of it), the leading "football pub" in town is Culhane's, at 967 Atlantic Blvd. in Atlantic Beach, 15 miles east of downtown and a mile in from the Atlantic Ocea. Bus 10.
Sidelights. On February 3, 2017, Thrillist made a list ranking the 30 NFL cities (New York and Los Angeles each having 2 teams), and Jacksonville came in 29th, next-to-last, calling it "the least sexy Florida destination in the NFL." I presume that covers all aspects of the city, not just sports.
Jacksonville's minor-league ballpark and sports arena are about halfway between downtown and EverBank Field. The Jacksonville Suns played in the Triple-A International League from 1962 to 1968, and then in the Double-A Southern League from 1970 onward. They were renamed the Jacksonville Expos in 1985, became the Suns again in 1991, and were rebranded as -- I swear, I'm not making this up -- the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp for 2017.
They've won 7 Pennants: In 1968, 1996, 2001, 2005, 2009, 2010 and 2014. They were a Mets farm team from 1966 to 1968, and have been a Miami Marlins farm team since 2009. Since 2003, they've played at the Baseball Grounds of Jacksonville. At 11,000 seats, it has the highest capacity in Double-A ball.
The Baseball Grounds and the Veterans Memorial Arena
The 15,000-seat Jacksonville Veterans Memorial Arena also opened in 2003, with an Elton John concert. It's been home to minor-league hockey's Jacksonville Barracudas, and the Jacksonville Icemen just began play there. The arena is at 300, and the ballpark at 301, A. Philip Randolph Blvd., about a mile east of downtown. Bus 11.
The 8,200-seat Jacksonville Baseball Park opened in 1955, and in 1964 it was renamed for the team's owner, Samuel W. Wolfson Baseball Park. The Suns won 3 Pennants there, before leaving for the new park in 2002, with the old park being demolished.
Early in his career, and in the ballpark's, Elvis Presley sang there, on May 12 and 13, and July 28 and 29, 1955, and February 23 and 24, 1956. 1201 E. Duval Street, just to the northwest of the Gator Bowl site/current location of EverBank Field.
Before Wolfson Park, local baseball's home was opened in 1912 as Barrs Field, became Joseph E. Durkee Athletic Field in 1926, was rebuilt after a fire in 1936, and has been J.P. Small Memorial Stadium since 1985. It was known for its 285-foot right-field distance, and for being the ballpark where Hank Aaron showed the Milwaukee Braves that he was major league ready in 1953.
The teams that played there were called the Jacksonville Scouts starting in 1921, the Jacksonville Tars ("tar" is an old term for a sailor) in 1926, and the Braves in 1954. The Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers both used the 1912 version for Spring Training in 1919 and 1920. It was also home to a Negro League team called the Jacksonville Red Caps.
Unlike Wolfson Park, which replaced it, it still stands. 1701 Myrtle Avenue N., about a mile and a half northwest of downtown. Bus 12.
Orlando is 136 miles from Jacksonville, downtown Tampa 202, the Tampa Bay Rays' Tropicana Field 222, and Atlanta 346. So you would think that the Rays and the Atlanta Braves would be the most popular baseball teams in North Florida. Well, yes and no. It's actually nearly a 3-way tie: The Yankees, according to a recent survey, had 17 percent of Jacksonville's baseball fandom; the Braves, 16 percent; and the Boston Red Sox, 14 percent. Neither the Rays nor the Marlins, despite being the local nine's parent club, got into the top 3.
Proximity doesn't seem to affect basketball, either: The Miami Heat are the most popular NBA team, but that could be a residual effect of LeBron James and winning 2 out of 4 Finals. The Los Angeles Lakers are next. The Orlando Magic are way behind, and the Atlanta Hawks are almost completely ignored.
In addition to the preceding, Elvis sang in Jacksonville at the Florida Theater on August 10 and 11, 1956. 128 E. Forsyth Street, downtown. He also sang in North Florida at the City Auditorium in Pensacola on February 26, 1956. It opened in 1955 and was demolished in 2005. 900 S. Palafox Street.
The University of North Florida is the 2nd-biggest college in the immediate area. Jacksonville University was long an NCAA Division II school, and is still in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS, formerly Division I-AA), but in 1970, its basketball team got all the way to the NCAA Final before losing to John Wooden's UCLA. Its big star was future Hall-of-Famer Artis Gilmore.
2800 University Blvd. N., 8 miles northeast of downtown, across the River. Bus 15.
The most prominent museum in the city is the Museum of Contemporary Art, at 333 N. Laura Street, downtown. Fort Caroline, founded by the French in 1564 but taken over by the Spanish the following year, is one of the oldest historic sites in America. 12713 Fort Caroline Road, 13 miles northeast of downtown, across the River. No public transit. No President has ever come from Florida, and none has a notable connection to Jacksonville, other than it being named after Old Hickory.
At 617 feet, the tallest building in Jacksonville since 1990 has been the Bank of America Tower, at 50 N. Laura Street, downtown. In the photo at the top, it's the tall building on the left. It replaced the one on the right, still the most familiar building in Jacksonville, the Wells Fargo Center -- not to be confused with the Philadelphia arena of the same name. Formerly known as the Independent Life Building and the Modis Building, at 535 feet, it was the tallest building in all of Florida from 1974 until 1990. 1 Independent Drive.
Just to the south of both of these buildings is perhaps the most famous structure of any kind in Jacksonville, the Main Street Bridge, which carries U.S. Routes 1 and 90 over the St. John's River. It opened in 1941, and in 1957 was renamed for the city's longest-serving Mayor, the John T. Alsop Bridge. But everybody still calls it the Main Street Bridge.
The Main Street Bridge, with the Wells Fargo Center at the right
Jacksonville is not sexy like Miami, or Disney-and-kid-friendly like Orlando. It isn't a big location in which to set TV shows and movies. A few military-themed movies, such as G.I. Jane, used Naval Air Station Jacksonville as a shooting location.
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Jacksonville is the largest city in Florida, but it defies New Yorkers' image of Florida. It's a reminder that Florida is a Southern State. But that means they love their football. And you might like their football, too -- but less so, now that the Jaguars have gotten good again.
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