Quit whining! Super Bowl belongs everywhere
DALLAS – A couple inches of snow did not cause the earth to split open here in North Texas and swallow Cowboys Stadium, the Maxim Party and three scheduled promotional appearances by The Situation.
You may have heard otherwise.
It’s been cold and snowy (a whopping 1.8 inches at DFW Airport on Friday) here and to a cadre of complainers that’s enough to declare life as we know it over and demand that the NFL never again dares to put the Super Bowl somewhere that doesn’t have palm trees.
Never mind that Sunday’s game between the Green Bay Packers and Pittsburgh Steelers will be played inside a dome, meaning the weather will not be a competitive factor – except for the fact that when it comes to football the absence of weather is weather.
The whining has nothing to do with the actual game and instead concerns a lot of manicured hands getting chapped by the wind while waiting for the valet outside Nick and Sam’s, the Uptown steakhouse. You know, it’s quite an inconvenience when you’re trying to digest your $28-an-ounce New Zealand Kobe beef.
“It’s part of the wussification of America,” Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell declared when a Philadelphia Eagles game was postponed due to snow back in December. It might be the line of the season for the NFL. It ought to ring through the streets here.
They're trying to wussify the Super Bowl, where the weekend weather forecasts call for 42 and partly cloudy.
[Related: Falling ice injures six at Cowboys Stadium]
If you’re going to stage Super Bowls in locales that are immune to inclement weather then your list of host cities is Miami, Tampa and San Diego, with Phoenix, where it gets cold, but not icy, as a borderline option. That’s it.
Nice weather is ideal, no question. No one needs travel delays. Everyone likes warm weather. The safer it is for workers, the better.
The value of bringing the big game around the country to regular people and taxpayers, who have been asked (forced) to pay for NFL stadiums, should continue to overwhelm those desires though.
As the weather improves, the local families will hit up the NFL Experience in Dallas or star gaze in Fort Worth or get caught up in the excitement of the weekend, and that's what should matter most. The busy waitresses and booked catering companies and cops on extra detail work count more than A-lister comfort.
The NFL is America’s game and in America it sometimes gets cold. The rich and beautiful can buy a hat. Or just stay in Hollywood.
The only problem North Texas has is its insistence on spreading sand – not rock salt – on ice. It doesn’t work and never will. Why they don’t know this is a mystery. It won’t be a problem next year in Indianapolis – “We get a lot of practice dealing with the weather,” joked Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels.
It’ll all be moot (or melted) by Saturday anyway.
The Super Bowl is a television show for the majority of fans. There’s a reasonable debate about playing the game outdoors in cold weather (such as New Jersey in 2014). I’m in favor of it.
Arguing that the game shouldn’t be played indoors in a city which might get cold though is ridiculous. It doesn’t affect the actual game, just the sideshow that garners too much attention – stars and parties and corporate executive comfort.
For the regular person, it’s a different deal. Know anyone in your neighborhood who wouldn’t gladly slip on some boots and button up their coat for a chance to hit up a Super Bowl weekend?
The most important part of staging a Super Bowl is the economic impact – which will churn on, mostly unabated. This region was hit up to fund part of Cowboys Stadium. This is payback.
Then there’s the general excitement that sucks locals in. The league does a tremendous job trying to stage scores of free events, concerts and promotions since few people can handle the game's exorbitant price.
That’s why the game should be played all over. It gives a chance to fans from different regions to take it all in.
This Super Bowl brought the game to a part of the country where football is king, the pinnacle of the sport paying homage to its roots. Next year’s game will be centrally located in Indianapolis, an easy drive from so many fly-over country cities and towns. It’s where rabid NFL fans, who are unlikely to ever travel to South Beach, reside. In 2013 it’ll help the still recovering economy of New Orleans, where an ice storm is predicted to hit Friday. In greater New York in 2014, it’ll visit the nation’s most populated region.
“We intend to have the People’s Super Bowl,” Daniels, the Indiana governor, said. “Our city is very well configured for this.
“Everything will be happening within a few blocks of each other. So whether people are going to the game or not, they can come down for rolling street parties that will last several days and mesh right in with the NFL Experience.
“It will be a great party and, as I say, maybe the one most accessible to the average person,” Daniels continued. “They can come and enjoy everything that the big shots can.”
Not surprisingly, the big shots aren’t too concerned. It got cold and snowed a bit in Texas and you’d think someone punched them in the face.
Whine, whine and order more wine.
