A decent sports bar for college football, that's all I ask

You’d think that with two stadiums and five professional sports teams downtown that you’d be able to find one good sports bar. But until downtown has a full-time residential population it appears even that’s too much to ask at this point. I can see people poised over their keyboards ready to talk about Majerle’s and Cooper’sTown and the like. But let me explain what I mean.

Girlfriend_of_Downtown_Resident and I organize football-watching events for the college we attended. We get a decent group of up to 35 people for the bigger games, and of course being a downtown booster I wanted to host the events somewhere in downtown Phoenix (and take the gamble that we could convince people to visit). Our school plays many of its games at noon in the eastern time zone, so we needed a place that opened early to accommodate us, and preferably one that served breakfast (who wants to eat burgers at 9 a.m.?). That shouldn’t have been a big deal, as dozens of sports bars across town open at that time to accommodate football fans. But none of them are downtown.

Obviously places like Seamus McCaffrey’s and Portland’s were out because there aren’t enough TVs or seats to handle a group of our size. That left Jackson’s on Third, Cooper’sTown, Coach & Willie’s, Majerle’s, or even Networks in the Hyatt. However, none of them open early or serve breakfast; in fact, Jackson’s doesn’t even open at all unless there’s a game going on at Chase Field or US Airways Center that day. They were even a little rude at Coach & Willie’s when I asked about hosting our group— a lot of thanks for trying to drive some business their way.

So, after a broader search, I had to settle on something in north-central Phoenix. At least it’s still centrally located, although it’s not the same as bringing people downtown.

One of the most fun things about living back east were Saturdays in the fall, when people would be walking all over the city to head to gatherings to cheer on their alma maters in football. That happens here, too, although it’s spread out all over the city and people drive to get to their destinations. Hopefully, when we’ve got enough people living downtown to warrant opening up some of these places early, we can have a little bit of that magic in Phoenix as well.