Just doing a quick post to let everyone know that we messed up and the bus to MetLife Stadium does not start running until 2pm so we are going to now be taking the 160 bus from Port Authority at 12:20pm. We are still meeting up at Slattery’s to walk over but it’s a long walk so we will be leaving at 11:40 now. Feel free to meet us at Port Authority as well. You can also take NJ Transit to the game starting at 1pm. Click here for more info.
Also, just as a reminder we have a party tonight (Friday) at Slattery’s Midtown Pub. The party starts at 6pm and we will be doing a raffle and have a merch for sale. We will have our DJ there as well and we have some discounted Dolphins memorabilia as well. Trying to empty our storage bins for the off season.
Can’t wait to see everyone this weekend! Phins up!
This has been a very strange year for the #MetlifeTakeover as we didn’t even know what day it was going to be until late last night. We had to make plans well in advance and it’s caused plenty of complications. But now that we know the game will be 4:25pm on Sunday, we have some details for you guys!
We scheduled our yearly pre-party for Friday night months ago and we can’t change that even though the game is Sunday. We will be at our bar Slattery’s Midtown Pub from 6-8pm. We will have a DJ, a raffle and merch for sale. We should have some good deals as we try and clear out inventory for the off season.
With a 4:25pm start time, tailgating begins at 11:25am. It takes us about an hour to get everything fully up and running so the official start time is going to be 12:30pm. As always we will be in Charter Bus Lot L4.
If you need game tickets, purchase on the secondary market in one of our sections, either 322 or 323.
Because we couldn’t give the bus company a specific time, we couldn’t charter busses this year, but anyone who wants to go together as a group Slattery’s Midtown Pub will be open at 11am and we will be walking over to Port Authority as a group at 11:40. It’s about a 15-20 minute walk from the bar. You can also try and meet us at Port Authority at noon. The bus leaves at 12:20.
Keep in mind you won’t be able to leave anything on the public busses so plan accordingly.
This year is going to be smaller than normal, and colder than normal, but at least the game has actual postseason implications and we know we are all going to have a great time. We can’t wait to see everyone. Phins up!
It’s finally here! The 2024 #MetLifeTakeover is ready to go. Okay, technically it’s in 2025 given that the game is week 18 of the NFL season, but it still counts as the 2024 Takeover. Things are going to be a bit different this year so make sure you read below before heading over to metlifetakeover.com to grab your tickets!
Much of the Takeover will be the same this year. As per usual we have over 900 tickets available over a few sections in the upper deck. We are still going to be doing an amazing tailgate with our partners at Urbain Tailgate and the #MetLifeTakeover pre-party at our bar Slattery’s is back after a year hiatus. Even in the cold, this should be another amazing year even if we are all hoping that the Dolphins are resting half the team to get ready for the playoffs.
The changes this year have (almost) everything to do with the NFL’s frustrating flex schedule. We know the game is going to be week 18, but we don’t know if it’s going to be a day game or a night game or on Saturday or Sunday. Because of this we have a number of changes:
We cannot provide bus transportation from our bar Slattery’s this year. The bus companies aren’t going to hold the whole weekend open for us. We do plan on meeting as a group to walk over to Penn Station together before the game so we can still go together to some degree.
The pre-party is going to happen on Friday night at Slattery’s even if the game is on Sunday. We don’t want to make Slattery’s hold open both Friday and Saturday for us. No matter what this event is always a blast. So much fun to catch up with everyone and meet new people who traveled in for the game. It’s in the heart of the city so you can plan some fun tourist stuff around it too.
Because we aren’t doing a tailgate/bus/game tickets package we are going to be selling the game tickets and Urban Tailgate will be selling the tailgate tickets. I realize this is a bit of a pain for you guys, but it will make our lives so much easier. To make up for it use code DOLFANSNYC on the Urban Tailgate site to get $20 off a tailgate ticket before the start of the season.
The game tickets have gone up in price. That has nothing to with the flex scheduling, and everything to do with Jets fans hope that an aging checked out Aaron Rodgers is going to save their franchise. The tickets are still cheaper than you will get from Ticketmaster and we are cutting our margins quite a bit on pre-season ticket sales, so don’t wait until the regular season to buy because prices go up $25.
We have all the full details including the exhaustive FAQ on the Takeover website so I hope you read all of that, especially if this is your first time coming. It goes over transportation options, tailgate details, location of the bar, the seat selection process and everything.
So that’s it. I can’t wait to see everyone this year. Phins up!
Get excited because this is the first time in years the #MetLifeTakeover recap video came out before the season was over. Luckily our director and editor, Curtis Edward Paul, has some free time right after the Takeover and was able to finish the whole things in a couple of weeks. That being said, this video was released on social media before the Cowboys game and I am just now getting around to putting the video thanks to visiting family for the holidays and then not wanting to think about football for a few days after the butt kicking the Ravens put on us. Pain.
But yeah, the video is up and it’s amazing. It features interviews with a lot of the regulars like Nat Moore, Joe Rose, Solo D, 2023 Fan of the Year Chris Barker, plus interviews with Frank The Tank, Mary Martinez, the viral elementary school teacher and more. Another viral Dolfan, Kickball Dad, made the video as well. This year wasn’t officially our biggest event ever, but only because the Jets would only sell us around 950 seats. It was the first time we have ever sold out before the season even started, the most busses we have ever had and I know our section had thousands of Dolphins fans because people bought up every ticket in section. The secondary prices in our section was like $80 more than anywhere else in the upper decks. The video very much reflects how amazing our party was.
Shout out again to Urban Tailgate for helping us throw this party, DJ D Rell and crew for the music, Oscar Collazos for hosting the video, all our volunteers and of course all of you guys who came out to party with us.
Now hopefully the Raven’s game has been pushed down into the deepest parts of your brain and you can actually enjoy this video. We worked really hard on it. Phins up!
The #MetLifeTakeover was a huge success this year and I just want to thank all of you for making it amazing. We weren’t able to get as many tickets this year because the Jets thought they were gonna be good this year (lol), but we sold out before the season even started and gave out our section number to the hundreds and hundreds of people who emailed us requesting tickets too late. I wouldn’t be surprised if we had 2500 Dolphins fans sitting together because our sections were packed. With the great tailgate and the Dolphins dominating on the field it was just an amazing day.
Speaking of the tailgate, we had a huge crowd all day and a video I took from the top of our U-Haul went viral, being reposted by tons of national media outlets, and even a local TV station reached out about using it, although I have no idea if they actually did. Speaking of TV, the film crew from HBO’s Hard Knocks came out to the tailgate, interviewed Michelle and I as well as some other fans and did a short segment during episode two of the show. If you didn’t watch the episode you can watch the short segment here.
We had some cool guests at the tailgate this year. Dolphins legends Joe Rose and Nat Moore never miss a tailgate but we also had a couple of social media stars, with Kickball Dad returning to the Takeover to film some videos, and elementary teacher extraordinaire Mary Martinez celebrated her 30th birthday with us. We had two Miami Dolphins Fans of the Year in attendance, Dolphreaky and the newest Fan of the Year Chris Barker. Solo D performed as he always does and my cousin came out because her husband is a huge Dolphins fan and that was really cool for me.
On the charity front, we raised over $6000 just from raffle and merch sales and that doesn’t include the money we made from ticket sales. We are unfortunately dealing with some possible unexpected expenses because of an unfortunately incident that we won’t get into, but we should be able to donate over $10,000 to charity this year. We will be announcing donations as they happen on Twitter but hopefully at the end of the year I can do a run down of the good that money is doing. By the way, all donations to us are tax deductible so if anyone is interested in donating please reach out.
Shout out to DJ Drell, our new regular Slattery’s DJ for killing it at his first #MetLifeTakeover and Solo D for his yearly performance. Solo came to the second or third one of these we ever did and hasn’t missed one since. He’s become such a huge part of our tailgate experience. Thanks as always to our tailgate partners Urban Tailgate. Those guys take everything off our plate and handle all the food, drinks, games and simple stuff like getting there hours before the gates open to make sure we get our regular spot. And lastly, huge thanks to all our volunteers who we couldn’t do any of this without. From our bus captains, to the people selling merch and raffle tickets, to just random people who grab a bin from the bus and bring it over to the tailgate for us, we appreciate you guys a ton.
Anyway, I did a terrible job of documenting the event, but I did technically take some photos, so I got a gallery of stuff for you guys to look through. Don’t worry though, we will have one hell of a recap video for you guys coming a lot sooner than last year’s video. I can’t wait for you to see it.
Last year we filmed an incredible video capturing the biggest #MetLifeTakeover yet, but unfortunately our editor just got swamped and wasn’t able to finish it until this morning. Fortunately he made it just in time for week one so you can watch the video as you get hyped for the first game of regular season!
This video is so much fun and features interviews with Dolphins alumni Nat Moore and Joe Rose as well as interviews with Dolphins Fans of the Year Big E and Dolphreaky, plus as always SoLo D and a ton of Dolphins fans. We did a tribute to Jason Jenkins in the last #MetLifeTakeover recap video, but we wanted to do another one with the interviews with Nat and Joe. Jason just meant that much to us we had to honor him twice.
Hope this makes you guys want to join us at this #MetLifeTakeover! Game tickets are sold out but you can still join us for the all you can drink and eat tailgate! Get your tickets at metlifetakeover.com!
Now let’s go beat the hell out of the Chargers! Phins up!
Posted by Dolfans NYC in Misc Posts | Comments Off on 2022 #MetLifeTakeover Recap Video
We are so excited to bring you an all new #MetLifeTakeover purchase process that should go much smoother than things have in the past. If you were wondering why we are late getting tickets up this year it’s because we designed a brand new MetLifeTakeover website and moved our PayPal checkout system to a Shopify store. On top of that we now have a whole new seat selection process which should make our life easier and give you the flexibility to choose where you sit and with whom. I don’t need to get into this all here because we have a brand new website and a full frequently asked question page for you to learn all about the new process, but I will let you know a few things.
First of all, sorry for the delay. We were looking for a web designer and finally found one that was willing to work for free and of course you get what you pay for. We supper appreciate her, but she ended up getting swamped at work and unfortunately the page just wasn’t ready in time. I gave up on my dreams of a fully custom website, and we signed up for Wix and I spent countless hours learning how to build us a site. It’s not perfect but I think it will work.
The Shopify store is great and should make your lives much easier. Easier checkout, more options and unlike PayPal you will actually get an email confirmation. Plus we are set up as a non-profit with them and we can accept tax deductible donations with ease. The new seat selection should make this process much easier (and faster). Plus you will be getting the seats directly from the Jets instead of from us via the Jets and you will now be able to get support directly from them if you have any ticket issues. Basically once a week we will be sending codes out to people who purchased tickets and you can use your code to pick your seats and download your tickets.
Now the bad news. Prices have gone way up. Fortunately we put down a deposit last year and so we have over 900 tickets to the game and the prices are significantly cheaper than the secondary market but they are still $110 per ticket which is up $100 from last year. After the regular season starts the prices go up to $120 so it’s a good idea to order soon. Tailgate tickets have gone up quite a bit too, but we aren’t marking up those at all, so we are actually losing money on tailgate tickets because of credit card fees. Also for the first time kids under 10 eat free with an adult tailgate ticket purchase! Bus tickets are the one thing that haven’t gone up in price but we are raising them $5 once the season starts as well to encourage early sales. All that being said, we still have a great deal on a total package which saves you $10 if you buy game ticket, tailgate and bus.
Okay, now with all the changes and new system please read the site and the FAQ carefully, and please read it again before sending us an email. We get crushed with emails during these few months and even if it’s something simple they add up so please make sure you can’t answer it yourself before reaching out. We really appreciate it.
I went to the NFL Draft for the first time back when it was in NYC every year and Jake Long was our first pick and for some reason I just kept going back. I’ve missed a few years here and there but I think I have been to nearly a dozen of them over the years. Last year we didn’t have a first day pick so I almost didn’t go but I was already going to be out in LA and it’s a nice drive to Vegas from there so I decided it was worth extending my trip by a couple of days. This year we once again didn’t have a first round pick, and it was in Kansas City, but for some reason I signed up again and at least I got to eat a bunch of BBQ.
As many of you know, I am a photographer for a living and I love the access I get as a member of the “Inner Circle” the area in front of the stage where 24 fans from each team get ot sit. The Dolphins offer these spaces to the people who run fan clubs so I have been lucky to get seats there several times now. A lot of the same fans go every year so it’s been great to have a little reunion every year and take a ton of photos.
I guess I should say something about how I feel about our actual draft picks in a blog about the draft. With only four of them it was going to be hard to make a huge impact but I was really hoping to get offensive line help early. I am less concerned about tight end because we have so many other weapons but when Washington was still on the board at 84 I was a little disappointed we took a running back. I was kinda hoping we would trade for Cook so that sort of took him off the table (or did it?) After the disappointment wore off I came around to the first two picks a lot more. We have had such issues with secondary depth in the past and if Cam Smith is as good as he looks, that problem is solved. Plus with our aging corners, he’s obviously the future at an incredibly important position. Achane was easier to get excited about. Total BPA pick who is electric and makes so much sense in a McDaniel offense. Is he big enough? Will those ankle breaking moves work against NFL talent? I have no idea but there is huge upside for a player taken that late in the draft. In the sixth and seventh we addressed TE and the oline and I don’t know if either of those guys will pan out, but I am glad they addressed some needs… and Higgins seems he could have a huge upside as well (big, fast, smart, breaks tackles).
Anyway the Draft was a blast even without a first round pick and thanks a ton to the Dolphins for continuing to invite me to these things. I a bunch of photos so I hope you get a chance to look through them. I got photos of a bunch of the draft picks, all the superfans and even a couple of famous YouTubers if you (or your kids) are into that kinda thing. Check out the gallery via Flickr below…
Despite the loss the Dolphins took on the field, the #MetLifeTakeover weekend was absolutely incredible. I cannot believe how much we have grown and it’s been so great to hear from so many people about how much fun they had despite the game. It means so much to us that you guys keep coming back and we can’t wait to do it again next year, hopefully even bigger. So let’s get to some numbers.
We had over 1400 people sitting together across four sections. We had over 500 people pay for our tailgate with a lot more people just coming to hang out around us in lot L4. We had five busses and gave out 800 rally towels for free. Between two raffles we raised over $5000 for charity and our friends at Ticketboard raised another $1000 with their raffle. We were able to donate $2500 to the Miami Dolphins Foundation, $2000 to the Jason Taylor Foundation, $500 to the Concern Foundation for breast cancer awareness month and we will be matching Ticketboard’s $1000 donation to the Dolphins Cancer Challenge at the end of the season (The DCC is in February 2023).
Next up we have some thanks to give out. First of all thanks to everyone who volunteered to help out, donated raffle prizes and just showed up. Only two of us run this whole thing, but we couldn’t do it without you all. We need to thank our bar Slattery’s Midtown Pub, our catering company Urban Tailgate, The Dolphins, The Jason Taylor Foundation, DJ Syckturtle, Solo D & Miami Sports Music for providing music (and a live podcast). We need to thank Liquid Death, Sailor Jerry, Reyka Vodka & Fistful of Bourbon for providing beverages for our tailgate. Thanks to Oscar and RizeOptix for our recap video (hopefully coming soon – check out last year’s here). Thanks to Antwan Staley for writing about the event for the NY Daily News (if anyone has a copy of Saturday’s paper let us know) and big thanks for Nat Moore & Joe Rose for making it out to the tailgate to sign some autographs and take some pictures.
Between the party at Slattery’s Saturday night and the tailgate on Sunday we had so much fun this weekend. If only the Dolphins could done their part and won. But this isn’t just about football, it’s about friends and doing some good for the community, and on those levels we came out with a huge win. Thanks again for coming out and check out some of the photos I took on Sunday below.
This recap video is very late, but honestly after three huge wins and the next takeover less than two weeks away, maybe it’s the perfect time to release it. Last year was such a blast. We had a really fun pre party at Slattery’s where we raised a ton of money for charity, then we had one of our smoothest tailgates ever, good weather and a huge win. We also had a bunch of the Dolphins media crew show up including Dolphins legend OJ McDuffie, his The Fish Tank podcast co-host and our old friend Seth Levitt, Travis Wingfield from Drive Time and Johanna Torres from Dolphins Today. Check out the video below to see interviews with all of them and a bunch of Dolfans, a mini Solo D music video, and tons of shots of Dolfans taking over MetLife Stadium.
This is also a great time to let you guys know that we are only about 50 tickets away from the most tickets ever sold to a #MetLifeTakeover EVER. We want to break our record of 1250, so if you have been thinking about going, now is the time! This is going to be our best event ever. Phins up!
Despite the loss the Dolphins took on the field, the #MetLifeTakeover weekend was absolutely incredible. I cannot believe how much we have grown and it’s been so great to hear from so many people about how much fun they had despite the game. It means so much to us that you guys keep coming back and we can’t wait to do it again next year, hopefully even bigger. So let’s get to some numbers.
