The US Open Cup, the country’s largest domestic tournament, was named after Hunt in 1999. When Hunt died, he owned MLS teams in Columbus and Dallas. The club was renamed Sporting Kansas City in 2011 and plays its home games before large crowds at a state-of-the-art 18,000-seat stadium. When Major League Soccer was formed in 1996, Hunt brought a team to Kansas City called the Wizards. Lamar Hunt, the soft-spoken Texas oilman who died in 2006, was passionate about soccer. The bid was a big deal here, joined by hundreds and co-chaired by Sporting Kansas City owner Cliff Illig and Clark Hunt, Lamar’s son and the current Chiefs owner. Kansas City really does love both kinds of football, American and association. As Nelson said with a smile, “When you look at the map, oh, we stand out.”īut there was apparently much more. What Kansas City did have, though, was location, smack-dab in the middle of the continental US, the so-called Heartland, no more than a four-hour flight to any other 2026 World Cup site. The city’s big-league baseball team, the Royals, won the World Series in 19, but the club, which has won only one division title in the last 36 years, appears destined for its seventh straight losing season and yet another August fire sale of its best players. Kansas City has had an NBA team, the Kings, and an NHL team, the Scouts, but neither was good enough to play for a championship before moving elsewhere in the 1970s. The Chiefs won the Super Bowl two years ago, but it was their first NFL title in 50 years.