NFL owners meetings start in the Dallas area today and the awarding of the 2014 Super Bowl is on the agenda. Miami and Tampa, both with plenty of Super Bowl experience, are up for consideration. But believe it or not, the co-sponsored bid between the New York Jets and New York Giants at the new $1.6-billion Meadowlands appears to be the favorite.
That means potential snow storms or bitter cold temperatures could come into play not only for the game itself, but for the entire Super Bowl week.
The NFL has some sort of rule that wants the average temperature in the city hosting the Super Bowl to be in the ball park of 54-degrees or higher. But they’ve waived that rule, which would appear to open the door for New York.
Now, I ask you this. If you’re a corporate NFL sponsor and you can take 20 people to the Super Bowl for a week, where would you rather go? Miami, Tampa or New York in February? Nothing against New York, but I’ll take that city in the spring, summer or fall.
New York Jets owner Woody Johnson said, “I think the weather is the only thing, really. It’s the only thing, but we’ve been very upfront with the weather. In New York/New Jersey, we know snow. We don’t know a lot of things, but we know snow.”
Are you kidding me! If New York/New Jersey gets dumped on with a big blizzard, I’m sure Johnson’s knowing snow won’t mean a hill of beans. And if you’re going to the Super Bowl to attend the game and perhaps a couple of days of activities, do you really want to have to deal with your boots and parka the whole time?
The NFL needs to stop making deals with cold weather teams that decide to build a new stadium, especially those that don’t put a roof on it.
This is such a bad idea, that if it goes through, I’m going to hope for bitterly cold weather or a massive snowstorm, which will hopefully teach the NFL a valuable lesson.