Wednesday, June 2, 2010
BY STEVE JANOSKI
I’ve heard it on the radio waves, on TV, and seen the excited announcements on Facebook for the past week— our very own Giants Stadium is finally going to get the Super Bowl in 2014.
This is a good thing for both the area and the NFL. It’ll bring business to the state, and it will also be nice to see football being played once again as the real men used to play it—outside in the brutal elements, come snow, sleet, or rain.
With the right weather conditions (or the wrong ones, if you’re playing), we might even have a repeat of the legendary Ice Bowl—the 1967 NFL title game played at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where the temperature was a balmy negative 13 degrees at game time and the referees couldn’t use their whistles because they froze to their lips on contact.
That’s some manly stuff right there.
Of course, even with all of the excitement over the game, there’s one thing that bothers me—people, it seems, need a geography lesson on where exactly Giants Stadium is.
Say it with me boys, all you announcers and pundits and sportswriters across this great land—it’s in "New Jersey."
I know you want to forget about us except when making your poor jokes about the shore or big hair or any of the other…stuff…that has floated around about us over the years, but now, you’ve got to acknowledge us.
Too long have we taken the back seat to that shining city across the Hudson, and this latest affront on the part of the national media in referring to it as a "New York Super Bowl" is recklessly belligerent toward our state.
This won’t be a "New York Super Bowl" any more than the Knicks are a New Jersey disgrace—we will be dealing with the traffic, we’ll be putting up with the tourists, and most importantly, we’ll be bringing in the cash from it.
And rightfully so.
New York has long claimed the Giants as their own, even though the team played in three different states at various times before finally settling in the Meadowlands in 1976; while East Rutherford is only 7 miles from Times Square, you’ve still got to cross one big state line to get there.
Although I can only talk as a Giants fan, even the New York Jets, by far a more "New York" team, have played at the Meadowlands for 26 years after hustling out of Shea Stadium.
What’s that say about the city and football?
What says even more is that in all of the Giants games I’ve ever been to, I have yet to hear any kind of New York accent or talk to any fancy folks from Manhattan or Queens who made the trek out to the swamps to come see "their" team play.
It’s folks from Wayne or West Caldwell, Bayonne or Belleville, that go the games, pay the exorbitant parking fees, and trade their less-used appendages for the $10 beers.
I’ve accepted that the team that plays in New Jersey in the stadium built for no other purpose than to house them still has that damned "NY" on their helmets—some things just aren’t going to change.
But at least for the next four years, I want it tattooed on these announcers’ foreheads that East Rutherford isn’t New York, and that this game will be among New Jersey’s shining moments whether they like it or not.
So no more "New York Super Bowl."
No more "NY/NJ Super Bowl."
No more "New York Area Super Bowl."
With the right weather conditions (or the wrong ones, if you’re playing), we might even have a repeat of the legendary Ice Bowl—the 1967 NFL title game played at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where the temperature was a balmy negative 13 degrees at game time and the referees couldn’t use their whistles because they froze to their lips on contact.
That’s some manly stuff right there.
Of course, even with all of the excitement over the game, there’s one thing that bothers me—people, it seems, need a geography lesson on where exactly Giants Stadium is.
Say it with me boys, all you announcers and pundits and sportswriters across this great land—it’s in "New Jersey."
I know you want to forget about us except when making your poor jokes about the shore or big hair or any of the other…stuff…that has floated around about us over the years, but now, you’ve got to acknowledge us.
Too long have we taken the back seat to that shining city across the Hudson, and this latest affront on the part of the national media in referring to it as a "New York Super Bowl" is recklessly belligerent toward our state.
This won’t be a "New York Super Bowl" any more than the Knicks are a New Jersey disgrace—we will be dealing with the traffic, we’ll be putting up with the tourists, and most importantly, we’ll be bringing in the cash from it.
And rightfully so.
New York has long claimed the Giants as their own, even though the team played in three different states at various times before finally settling in the Meadowlands in 1976; while East Rutherford is only 7 miles from Times Square, you’ve still got to cross one big state line to get there.
Although I can only talk as a Giants fan, even the New York Jets, by far a more "New York" team, have played at the Meadowlands for 26 years after hustling out of Shea Stadium.
What’s that say about the city and football?
What says even more is that in all of the Giants games I’ve ever been to, I have yet to hear any kind of New York accent or talk to any fancy folks from Manhattan or Queens who made the trek out to the swamps to come see "their" team play.
It’s folks from Wayne or West Caldwell, Bayonne or Belleville, that go the games, pay the exorbitant parking fees, and trade their less-used appendages for the $10 beers.
I’ve accepted that the team that plays in New Jersey in the stadium built for no other purpose than to house them still has that damned "NY" on their helmets—some things just aren’t going to change.
But at least for the next four years, I want it tattooed on these announcers’ foreheads that East Rutherford isn’t New York, and that this game will be among New Jersey’s shining moments whether they like it or not.
So no more "New York Super Bowl."
No more "NY/NJ Super Bowl."
No more "New York Area Super Bowl."
It’s New Jersey. Get it right, especially you New Yorkers.
Otherwise, I might just have to start confusing Manhattan and Long Island…and we all know how much you’ll like that.
"Manhattan? Mastic? It’s all the same to me."
http://www.northjersey.com/sports/pro_sports/95480194_New_York_crashes_Jersey_s_Giant_party.html
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