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.
The problems aren’t happening for everyone, we have already sold a LOT of tickets. Really impressive start even with the shopping cart system being messed up. If you are one of the people having issues you can try a few different things. The first is try a different browser. It works for me on Chrome but not Safari for example. Try on your phone, or try on a desktop. Just whatever options you can think of, try that first. If you still can’t get it to work, just keep adding random stuff to your cart and if anything adds try deleting it. When that happens for some reason everything will just suddenly show up in your cart and you can adjust it from there. Honestly the whole thing is so weird and I have sent a bunch of support requests trying to figure it out but haven’t had any luck yet.
If you still can’t get it to work, just wait a couple days because we are going to get it figured out. We aren’t gonna sell out of tickets in the middle of the summer so don’t panic. And if you are still having issues in a week, just email us at dolfansnyc at gmail and we will get you sorted out another way.
Okay, now that we have talked about troubleshooting, let’s talk about the event.
As you probably know by now we are throwing another massive group takeover when the Dolphins play the Jets in New Jersey on October 9th. We do a free party the night before at our bar Slattery’s, an all you can eat and drink tailgate before the game and of course we buy multiple sections of upper deck tickets so you can be surrounded by Dolphins fan at an away game. There’s no experience like it. We even do bus transportation to the game from our bar Slattery’s.
If you haven’t been before, check out our video page to get the full experience and then head on over to our FAQ if you have any questions. If you have been before you know what to expect so let me just give you the updates. The big update is the price unfortunately. EVERYTHING has gone up in price since last year. The Jets are charging us way more for tickets, food prices have gone way up and my god the busses got expensive. This means two things 1) You are gonna pay a little more this year and 2) We are gonna make less money for charity. Ultimately this event is about bringing us all together and while the charity aspect is a huge part of what we do, hopefully we can make up those margins by doing some raffles and merch sales. We need to make this event affordable.
Ticket prices if you order before the season starts are $65. That’s exactly what they were if you bought during the season last year so it’s not bad. We have had more expensive years ticket wise in the past so I don’t think that’s a big deal. Food prices are up more than 20% but our tailgate partner Urban Tailgate is also willing to take a cut on his margins and we are offering the full food and drink package for $85 which is exactly where it was last year too. We had a $10 off deal for a little bit last year which we don’t have this year but the tailgate is $100 after the season starts so it’s still a pretty good deal. You can also just hangout out with us at the tailgate and BYO if you like. Everyone is welcome.
The biggest increase is the bus and it’s dramatic. In the past we charged $40 for round trip tickets and we made a decent bit of money for charity on those and this year we have to charge $50 and we might end up actually losing money on the bus. There are cheaper public transportation options so if you are on a budget look into those, obviously not as fun as a rowdy bus of Dolphins fans, but we just want to make sure you know about it. We are pretty upset about the bus situation honestly.
Oh and one more thing, we introduced “The Total Package” last year where we offered transportation, tailgate ticket and game ticket at a discount. Unfortunately we can’t offer a discount anymore, so we are giving everyone who buys the total package a free DolfansNYC drink koozie. It’s obviously not as good as saving $10 but we wanted to do something fun for you guys. We will also have extra koozies for sale at the tailgate for $5 if anyone wants to pick one up who didn’t get the Total Package.
I realize this post has been a little bit of a bummer, but this event is so amazing and we do so much good that I had to end it off with some good news. We did a raffle to win two Total Packages to the Takeover and in the process raised almost $900 for the National Compassion Fund who makes direct donations to victims of mass casualty events like the recent events in Buffalo and Uvalde. The winner of the raffle was actually 2020 Dolphins Fan Of The Year Big E who then immediately donated the tickets back to us and bought his own, so we will find a deserving recipient for them and let your you guys know about that when we figure it out. Really great from Ian.
Thank you guys so much for everything and we can’t wait to see you on October 9th, or evens sooner at Slattery’s!
Thanks you all for coming out to the 2021 #MetLifeTakeover. What an absolute blast! From the party at Slattery’s to the tailgate to the Dolphins play on the field everything went off without a hitch. Despite a slightly less than normal turnout (the team’s record, the pandemic and the Jets only selling us 700 tickets didn’t help) we still had one of our most successful years. Thanks to you guys we raised over $6000 for charity between raffle, auction and merch sales. And that doesn’t even include the money we made off the tickets sold. That money is going back into our war chest to make new merch, raffle prizes and other expenses for next season, but it will all eventually be turned into even more money that we can use to do more good. The merch/raffle/auction money will be going to the Miami Dolphins Foundation, The Dolphins Cancer Challenge and the Jason Taylor Foundation.
So here’s a quick breakdown on the weekend. On Saturday night we had a great crowd at our bar Slattery’s Midtown Pub. We had DJ Syckturtle spin both that night and the tailgate the next day. We had a live auction that raised over $1000 on just three items and we had a big raffle as well for a bunch of great signed stuff. One of our members even brought a team signed ball from the Philbin era that had some great signatures on it despite how we may feel about those years. Another one of our members donated a Marino jersey that raised $275 in the live auction. Special shout out to Robert who bought it AND the Christian Wilkins signed jersey for $500!
One of the coolest parts of Saturday night, and the tailgate, was that the Miami Dolphins entire podcast network came out. We had Dolphins legend OJ McDuffie and his The Fish Tank co-host Seth Levit (and DJ DJ Prēc), Drive Time’s Travis Wingfield and Dolphins Today host Johanna Torres all come out and party with us both days. Nat Moore and Jason Jenkins also came out during the tailgate… those guys never miss one. Want to give a special shoutout to OJ who signed autograph after autograph and posed for picture after picture the entire time he was there. And another shout out to Seth who also runs the Jason Taylor Foundation who donated the Jason Taylor jersey to our game day raffle. He told us to give all the money to the Miami Dolphins Foundation in the DCC but we raised so much that we had to surprise him with donation to the JT Foundation as well.
The tailgate itself was an absolute party. We took over the entire parking lot between L4 and L7. It was massive. Our partners at Urban Tailgate killed it again. They were a little understaffed at the last minute and that led to some long lines, but the food was incredible. We will get that worked out for next year and make sure the lines aren’t nearly as bad. Huge shout out to our friends at Sailor Jerry for providing not only Sailor but also some bottles from their sister brands Reyka Vodka and Fistfull of Bourbon.
The game couldn’t have gone much better. The Jets hung around for a bit, but in the second half the Dolphins put them to bed and you could hear our “Let’s Go Dolphins!” chants on TV. Several of the Dolphins players Tweeted about us after the game and the #MetLifeTakeover hashtag absolutely exploded on Twitter. I couldn’t even keep up with it. We even got a little write up in the Miami New Times. Very cool.
So thanks again everyone for making this year one of the best years ever. I can’t wait to do it all again next year. I got a pretty good gallery of photos for you too. I have a back injury so I didn’t do a great job documenting it, but there are still some fun shots here. Also we have the 2021 #MetlifeTakeover video coming soon. That should be amazing. Now go check out the photos below! (Click here to view the gallery directly on Flickr where it looks less wonky than the embedded gallery viewer.)
The 2019 #MetLifeTakeover video is finally here! It took way longer than we wanted it’s been a crazy winter for all of us here at Dolfans NYC and I am just glad we finally got it done and I think you guys will see that it came out great. 2019 was not exactly a great year for the Dolphins, and this game didn’t go super great on the field, but despite our lower than normal numbers, we had one hell of a tailgate and having two full sections of Dolphins fans is still pretty damn impactful. You could easily hear us on TV yelling from the upper decks.
The video includes interviews with Dolphins alumni Nat Moore, Dolfans NYC regular Shawn Wooden, and Joe Rose plus the Dolphins Jason Jenkin’s who presented us with a framed custom Dolphins jersey celebrating our 10th anniversary of our Jets game takeovers. The video also includes interviews with South Florida South Sentinel Dolphins writers Safid Deen and Omar Kelly and of course a ton of Dolphins fans.
Huge thanks to everyone who helped out, Oscar Collazos for hosting, Curtis from RizeOptix for directing and editing the video, Urban Tailgate for the great food and drink, Solo D for the live performance, Tropic 2.0 & DJ Syck Turtle for the tailgate music and Sailor Jerry for sponsoring the event. Also, a big shout out to Hotels.com for coming out and filming a video about us. And of course big thanks to the Miami Dolphins for all the support including setting up a live taping of The Joe Rose show in the middle of our tailgate.
We also want to thank all of you guys for helping us raise over $10,00 for charity this season. And we need to ask your help again. We are trying to raise money for the 14 members of the Slattery’s staff who have been laid off because of the Coronavirus. So far we have raised enough to give them each $200, but we would like to do more, so if you want to help out, please PayPal us whatever you can to DolfansNYC@gmail.com. We are going to randomly select one of the people who donate to win a prize once the world gets back to normal, but we don’t know what that is yet because we need to be able to get back into Slattery’s to see what we have to give away.
Okay! That’s it. Please take the time to watch the video, we put a lot of work into it. Plus, I have a feeling you guys don’t have anything else to be doing while you are stuck in quarantine! NYC and Florida are two of the hardest hit places so please, please stay safe out there! Phins up!
Every year we try to up the #MetLifeTakeover and so every year we try and raise the level of our annual #MetLifeTakeover video. It was pretty hard to outdo the last video, which was hosted by Dolphins legend Sam Madison, but I think we may have done it!
This year the #MetLifeTakoever was really on another level. Thanks to an early season game we had one of our biggest crowds with over 1100 people and thanks to our partnership with Urban Tailgate the party in the parking lot was out of control.
Both of the video teams from the last few years were unavailable and we sort of scrambled at the last minute to find a crew. Fortunately Curtis over at RizeOptix was recommended to us by one of our Twitter followers. He absolutely killed it with the video with a lot of help from our host Oscar Collazos. Oscar is a die hard Dolphins fan who happens to be a professional comedian. With no Dolphin royalty available to host Oscar was the perfect choice for the video and he did a fantastic job.
This video features interviews with former Dolphins Nat Moore & Joe Rose as well as Dolphins CEO Tom Garfinkel and Dolphins SVP of Communications & Community Affairs Jason Jenkins. Jason has actually been to every single #MetLifeTakeover and seems to really support what we are doing. There’s also an interview with Brian Miller who runs PhinPhanatic.com and did a series of storiesabout the #MetLifeTakeover. He also has been uploading virtual reality video to his new YouTube channel Phinatics360.
Also in the video is footage from our pre-party at Slattery’s Midtown Pub the night before and a performance from SoLo D. Every time I watch our video I get his song “Hit Squad” stuck in my head. I also need to give a shout out to DJ Tropic for DJing both parties and Sailor Jerry for sponsoring the tailgate.
Lastly, and probably most importantly I just wanted to thank everyone who came to the takeover, came to the tailgate, bought a raffle ticket, bought a t-shirt or just threw a couple dollar bills into a bucket at one of our weekly meet ups at Slattery’s. Because of you guys we have been able to donate $13,750 to charity this year and don’t think we are done giving. Just today we donated to Koa Misi’s CA wildfire fundraiser and we plan on doing more with Dolfans who live in Northern California.
We will have a full breakdown of everything we have donated at the end of the season but here’s an overview: We have donated $7000 to the Miami Dolphins Foundation, $2000 to the Dolphins Cycling Challenge, $1000 to RISE, $900 to cancer research charities, $2300 for various disaster relief efforts and several hundred dollars to our own members in need.
Okay, enough rambling. Let’s watch the 2017 #MetLifeTakeover video!
Last weekend we headed down for Miami for a convergence of two events. First we had the annual Web Weekend which is a conference of people who run Miami Dolphins web sites that has been hosted by the Dolphins for the last 12 years. Michelle and I became friends there so the birth of Dolfans NYC came out of that event. The second event is the Dolphins Fan Club Weekend which is a gathering of fan clubs from around the country for a home game. Unfortunately since we are part of both weekends we can’t go to all the events but we had a great time anyway. Oh and the game was pretty good too…
Let’s see if I can give you guys a quick rundown of the event.
FRIDAY:
On Friday we went to the team training facility and got to listen to a bunch of people talk and we did a little Q&A with everyone. The highlight was of course Coach Campbell but we also got to talk to Matt Darr, Rishard Matthews and Mike Tannenbaum which was pretty awesome. Darr might have been the most interesting speaker actually because he talked a lot about what it’s like being an undrafted free agent with almost no hope of making the team, but it was all pretty great. Fortunately our resident journalist, Alex Kramers, wrote up the Campbell talk and he got a few moments to himself with Rishard Matthews!
SATURDAY:
Web Weekend on Saturday always starts with a community service event with the Dolphins “Special Teams”. This particular Saturday we helped Feeding South Florida pack up expired but still good food to give to families in need. And by “we” I mean everyone else because I slept 90 minutes the night before and was dead to the world. Luckily we made a $250 donation Feeding SF so I feel a bit less guilty.
Saturday afternoon was our chance to tour the practice faculties, check out the Nick Saban Memorial Bubble, and eat in the team cafeteria. After that we had the Miami Dolphins Webbie Awards that are given out by the team and voted on by other Miami Dolphins sites. For the third or fourth year in a row we won the Eddie Jones award for community service which is what we strive for. So I want to thank everyone who has helped us raise money for charity ever year. Speaking of which we donated $5000 to the Miami Dolphins Foundation which was a great thing to be able to do. Thanks again! (Oh we also won the Webbie for best use of social networking which I got to keep cause I run all that stuff! Woo!)
Between Webbies we got to talk to some more people including CEO Tom Garfinkel (who is always incredibly interesting to talk to) and Dolphins legend Tony Nathan who has a movie in theaters now about his life! I cannot wait to see Woodlawn now that I know it’s about him. Tony was wearing an Alabama hat so we had to give him a Dolphins NYC hat and he actually wore it to the Dolphins game the next day when has an honorary captain! Amazing! The webbies ended with a media roundtable where we got to ask of Dolphins journalists a bunch of questions. The roundtable featured Adam Beasley, Andrew Abramson, Andy Cohen, Alain Poupart and Dolphins great Kim Bokamper. Afterwards we gave Kim a Dolfans NYC shirt which makes up for the time that he let me take home a menu from his restaurant… speaking of…
After the webbies we went over to Bokamper’s to meet up with the Fan Club Weekend crew. We had about 25 people in Miami for the game so it was good to see Crazy Uncle Billy and the crew. We just missed Solo D’s performance but I think he is gonna play both the #MetLifeTakeover AND the Takeover preparty so I wasn’t too upset about it.
SUNDAY:
What can I even say about Sunday? It was the best first half I have ever seen in my life. There was even an insane storm during part of it but I just stayed in my seat and got wet. What a blast that was. The second half wasn’t quite as exciting but it was still a great time and honestly I thought I was going to pass out if I had to sing our fight song again!
So yeah, amazing weekend and it was awesome to see everyone and be in Miami. Big extra thanks to Scott Stone and Sergio Xiques for throwing the Web Weekend and Fan Club Weekend for us.
Oh and see you guys tonight at Slattery’s for Thursday night football!!!
This past weekend was amazing. Not only did we help organize a group trip for fan clubs around the country but it was also the Dolphins annual Web Weekend a conference of Miami Dolphins web masters that I have attended 11 years in a row. Also the Dolphins played one of their most dominant games in the history of the franchise so that was nice too.
Dolfans NYC was founded because of Web Weekend. Michelle and I both ran Dolphins fan sites and realized we both lived in NYC and started watching games together. A few years later we abandoned our former sites and started Dolfans NYC. This is the 6th time we have attended as Dolfans NYC and the weekends keep getting better.
This year we donated $5000 to the Miami Dolphins Foundation beating our $3000 donation last year after giving $1000 in both 2011 and 2012. That’s $10,000 to the Foundation thanks to you guys. To celebrate we are holding a FREE raffle this week at Slattery’s Midtown Pub for the Lions game. All you have to do is show up and you get a ticket! We should have some cool prizes including a Dolfans NYC shirt signed by AJ Duhe.
Speaking of AJ Duhe, he and Chris Chambers came and spoke to us during Web Weekend. We also had GM Dennis Hickey and CEO Tom Garfinkel in attendance as well. It was pretty great. Plus Jordan Tripp, Michael Thomas and the Finsiders joined us at a party on Friday. Coach Philbin was supposed to speak with us but unfortunately he was out of town because of the death of his father. As always Michelle stepped up and bought a condolence card that we all signed.
The last event of the weekend (aside from the game!) was the Dolphins Webby Awards which are given out to Dolphins Websites. It means a huge amount to me that we have now won the Eddie Jones Community award all three years of its existence. This club has become as much about giving back as it is about football and so that award means a ton to me. We also won the social networking award which I take a bit of pride in considering I do 90% of the social networking for Dolfans NYC. Our third award was the “Most Informative Site” award which is kinda silly considering I haven’t updated this site in a month. That being said our Twitter account and Facebook page serve as great newswires and it still means a great deal because the awards are voted on by our fellow web masters.
Anyway, check out the pictures in this Flickr gallery below. I took all the pictures with our logo watermarked on the images. The other shots are courtesy of the Miami Dolphins. See you guys Sunday!
The first game of the year is tomorrow and I know everyone could not be more excited. I will probably get about two hours of sleep tonight. It’s like Christmas morning for adults! Slattery’s is going to be rocking tomorrow so make sure you get there early! The bar will be open at 11! It’s going to be amazing and in celebration of opening day we are launching the Dolfans NYC E-Shop!
As long as there has been a Dolfans NYC logo people have wanted t-shirts with that logo on it so of course we made t-shirts. Of course when that happened people who didn’t live in NYC wanted the shirts. For years we have said that the shirts were only available at Dolfans NYC events because we wanted people to have a reason to come to our watch parties. That was partly true, but the real reason is that I hate going to the post office and didn’t want to deal with any of the shipping. Michelle has a full time job and a baby and I run my own business. We just simply don’t have time to ship stuff.
Fortunately we found a solution! A friend of mine for nearly 20 years runs a small record label and record distribution company called Handstand Records and I pitched him the idea of selling some Dolfans NYC stuff for us. He is sending out shipments every day already and was open to the idea of selling our gear. Not only that but he built the web store for us!
So now you can get Dolfans NYC T-shirts anywhere in the world! (Looking at you Belgium!) Plus we have some new stuff this year like tote bags! Ooh! When it gets a little colder we plan on making some sweat shirts and reprinting the very popular Dolfans NYC beanies, plus we have some surprises in store! So keep checking back!
And remember all the money we make (after Handstand’s cut) goes back to the Dolfans NYC war chest which is used to buy more merchandise, throw bigger and better events and most importantly donate money to charity! We have donated nearly $10,000 to the Miami Dolphins Foundation alone! So spend some money, get some cool stuff and do some good!
Thanks to everyone who has signed up for the #MetLifeTakeover! If you haven’t yet make sure you sign up ASAP! But this post isn’t about the takeover, we have another exciting event planned and we have a very unique opportunity to be a part of something HUGE!
Through events like our #MetLifeTakeover, the Miami Dolphins have seen just how strong the fan base is around the country and they want us all to participate in a #SunLifeTakeover: the first ever Out-of-Town fan club meet-up! On November 2nd the Dolphins play the San Diego Chargers in Miami and we are all gonna go together! Fan clubs from DC, Atlanta and California are already on board and get to party with all of them!
This is going to be an amazing event IN MIAMI and we want the Dolfans NYC crew to roll deep! Let’s show these other fan clubs who represents the hardest! To entice you even more we are offering you some cool rewards on top of what the Dolphins are offering!
Here’s what you can get:
– Discounted tickets together, in the same section as other fan clubs
– Complimentary busses to and from the stadium if we bring more than 50 people
– A post-game photo on the field with all the other fan clubs
– Tour of Sun Life Stadium on Monday, November 3rd
– Opportunity to meet hundreds of other Dolfans all over the country
– Autographed items auctioned off for ticket buyers
– Cheerleaders and TD the mascot to stop by select tailgates pre-game
IN ADDITION TO ALL THE GREAT STUFF THE DOLPHINS ARE OFFERING, HERE IS AN EXCLUSIVE OFFER THAT WE ARE MAKING TO DOLFANSNYC MEMBERS!!!
-Everyone who buys a ticket through our group will get a free DolfansNYC tote bag with some fun prizes, as well as a coupon for $5 off DolfansNYC merchandise.
– All fans who buy tickets through our link will be entered into a drawing to win various prizes, including: a $100 AmEx gift card, a cleat autographed by Mark “Super” Duper and a DolfansNYC goodie bag!
-First 10 people who buy a ticket will get a free DolfansNYC hat or shirt!
Plus discounted hotel partners from the Dolphins:
Renaissance Plantation: $125 per night (800-316-7708) (We recommend everyone book the Renaissance so that we’re all together).
Shula’s Miami Lakes: $129 per night (305-821-1150) – includes breakfast for two
The Clevelander: $239 per night (877-532-4006) – includes welcome drink at check-in AND four drink tickets per room
The Essex Standard: $209 per night (877-532-4006)
So let’s do this! Sign up with DolfansNYC and let’s party in Miami.
On Thursday Dolfans NYC threw a big Halloween party and the Dolphins won in miraculous fashion as Cam Wake sealed the game with only the third overtime safety in NFL history. Another great half was wasted with another poor third quarter but Ryan Tannehill made the plays he had to make to lead the team to a game tying field goal with seconds left in regulation. When the safety happened Slattery’s Midtown Pub erupted and we had free shots all around. The Dolphins broke the Bengals winning streak and ended their own losing streak and we partied.
We had DJ Tropic DJ again and he killed it all night. We had a costume contest as the three finalists battled it out via Instagram to see who would get the most likes. Mr. McGibblets out beat Ricky Williams by one vote and Joe Philbin came in a distant third. I loved the Philbin costume but after four straight losses he didn’t get a lot of love. My pajama wearing “Tired Of Losing” costume got the most votes but of course I was not eligible and Mr. McGibblets walked away with a hat signed by OJ McDuffie and Sam Madison. Mr. McGibblets also promised he would be coming to our #MetLifeTakeover on Dec 1st in full costume!
The next Dolphins game is a Monday night game against the Bucs and we will be having DJ Tropic in the house again as well as a huge raffle. We also will have our new DolfansNYC hats for sale again. I hope you guys get a chance to pick one up. Hope to see you guys then.
Now check out the Halloween party photos from Slattery’s Midtown Pub below. Double click to open em in a new window so you can save them to your computer!
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.
