Super Bowl LVII: Palm Beach scores with strong ties to Philadelphia and the Eagles

Like so many Americans, plenty of Palm Beach residents will be watching Super Bowl LVII on Sunday when the Kansas City Chiefs take on the Philadelphia Eagles.

But a few Palm Beach homeowners will be more keen on the outcome than others — and that includes Jeffrey Lurie, majority owner of the Eagles.

We've rounded up some details about Lurie’s lavish Palm Beach digs, plus a look at a couple of other Palm Beachers who have strong feelings about Philadelphia — Hollywood icon Sylvester Stallone, whose film character Rocky Balboa made those stairs outside the Philadelphia Museum of Art famous; and John S. Middleton, principal owner of the Philadelphia Phillies major-league baseball franchise.

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Lurie’s vacation mansion faces the Intracoastal Waterway in Palm Beach on the stretch of coastal road known to locals as Billionaires Row. It’s an apt spot for Lurie, whose net worth is estimated by Forbes at $4.4 billion.

Lurie’s ownership company bought the house for a recorded $28.75 million in 2013, six months after he married Tina Lai. The previous year, he and his then-wife, Lori Christina Weiss, divorced and she retained a minority ownership stake in the Eagles as part of their settlement.

Completed in 2008, the Palm Beach estate fronts 185 feet of waterfront and comprises nearly 2 acres. The mansion encompasses 17,113 square feet of living space, inside and out, Palm Beach County property records show.

The home offers wide views of the Intracoastal Waterway from every major room, and was designed for entertaining with extensive open-air loggias, one of which features a fireplace, according to a previous sales listing.

With a dock, the property faces an island in the Intracoastal Waterway that is a designated Audubon bird sanctuary— which seems especially appropriate for the owner of Eagles.

No word if the estate has a home theater among its amenities. Lurie’ maternal grandfather, Philip Smith, founded the General Cinema theater chain, which eventually became Harcourt General. Lurie, a former college professor who holds a doctorate in social policy from Boston University, bought the Eagles in 1994 from Norman Braman for a reported $195 million, using a $190 million loan with his mother to do it.

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Stallone, who owns a lakefront estate on the North End of Palm Beach, in 2018 posted on Instagram that he was rooting for the Eagles in their third Super Bowl appearance, which capped the 2017 season. The Eagles ended up winning that game, 41-33, against the New England Patriots, a team owned by Robert Kraft, another Palm Beach billionaire resident.

And it’s no wonder Stallone has a soft spot for Philadelphia. The first “Rocky” movie in 1976 kickstarted his film career. There’s even a statue of Stallone as Rocky at the base of those steps at the city’s art museum, where the character trained for boxing by running up and down, just as thousands of tourists do each year.

Stallone bought his Palm Beach compound in 2020 for $35.375 million, using the Southpaw Trust, a name that nods at his famous left-handedness.

Stallone and his wife, Jennifer Flavin Stallone, have made improvements to the Bermuda-style property, which was completed in 2014 on 1½ acres with 253 feet of lakefront featuring a dock and a sandy beach beyond the seawall.

The estate includes a main house, a separate pool cabana and a guesthouse.

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Phillies' Middleton completed seaside custom mansion in 2015

Philadelphia native, tobacco heir and billionaire Middleton — the majority owner of the Phillies with a 48% stake — completed his custom Palm Beach estate on 1.8 oceanfront acres in 2015.

Middleton used a limited lability company in 2010 to buy the vacant property at 947 N. Ocean Blvd. for $19.32 million from Kraft, who had once considered building his own estate there.

Known as Turtle Bluff, Middleton’s British Colonial-style house faces about 215 feet of shoreline and has extensively landscaped gardens — so extensive that in 2019, the Preservation Foundation of Palm Beach recognized the property with its major landscape award.

The grounds include two swimming pools, fountains and a lily pond. The house itself has five bedrooms and 25,390 square feet of living space, inside and out.

Forbes estimates Middleton’s net worth at $3.4 billion. Married to Leigh Middleton, he sold his family’s tobacco business in 2007 to Philip Morris’ parent company, Altria, for $2.9 billion.

Read more about the Middleton estate:Palm Beach Preservation Foundation honors Middleton's landscape with Smith Award

From the 2021 archives:Owners of Super Bowl-bound Bucs have strong ties to Palm Beach

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Darrell Hofheinz is a USA TODAY Network of Florida journalist who writes about Palm Beach real estate in his weekly “Beyond the Hedges” column. He welcomes tips about real estate news on the island. Email dhofheinz@pbdailynews.com, call 561-820-3831 or tweet @PBDN_Hofheinz.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Super Bowl LVII: Palm Beach, Philadelphia and Eagles have strong ties