CHICAGO — A pigskin wonderland was being raised in Grant Park early Tuesday ahead of the 80th N.F.L. draft. By Thursday evening, when Tampa Bay is expected to make the first selection, it will include flag football fields for children, a Selection Square where all 32 teams will set up shop and make their picks, and provisional studios for both ESPN and the NFL Network. Draft Town, as it has been named, will also come equipped with a bar and all manner of league merchandise for sale.
This year’s draft — the first in Chicago, and the first outside New York since 1964 — is a spectacle, even by the N.