IRVING, Texas -- The Dallas Cowboys are poised to move into their new headquarters, the Ford Center at The Star, later this year. The organization hopes the NFL draft will come to their Frisco, Texas, home in 2018.
The Cowboys will move into their new offices this summer. They then will begin practicing there after returning from their training camp home in Oxnard, California.
The Cowboys are among a number of teams -- including Philadelphia, Denver, Green Bay, Jacksonville, Pittsburgh and Los Angeles -- that have expressed interest in hosting the draft in the future, according to a league spokesman. Canton, Ohio, was also mentioned as a possible host.
The NFL expects to announce a decision on the 2017 location later this summer but does not have a time frame in which they would name future sites.
Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones and executive vice president Stephen Jones have said the team would like to host the draft. Chad Estis, the Cowboys executive vice president of business operations, told the Frisco Chamber of Commerce last week The Star could host the draft, according to Community Impact Newspaper.
"I don't know if there's a bigger event we could have at The Star," Estis told the chamber, according to the report. "From a pure media standpoint, that could be one of the biggest things that we could potentially have."
The Star will include a 12,000-seat stadium that will be shared between the Cowboys and Frisco Independent School District. In addition, the multi-use development area will include shopping, restaurants and an Omni Hotel. When the 91-acre site is fully developed, the estimated cost of the project will be $1.5 billion.
The Star will host a number of high school football games Aug. 27.
The Cowboys have called Valley Ranch home since 1983. The 80,000-square-foot facility includes three practices fields, although only two are used now, a running track and most of the Cowboys' office space. Some employees also work out of AT&T Stadium.
Chicago has held the past two NFL drafts at the Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University, which seats about 3,000. More than 225,000 attended the Draft Town celebration in Grant Park over three days.
"The potential for having the draft in Frisco at The Star is immeasurable, especially with an organization like the Cowboys behind it," Frisco Mayor Maher Maso told the Dallas Morning News. "We feel it would be a huge benefit to our community and, frankly, to the region. If you think about it, something on the caliber of the NFL draft is really regional in nature and will benefit all the communities in North Texas."