New York is getting a Super Bowl? About time!

By now, most NFL fans know that the site of Super Bowl XLVIII will be the new Meadowlands Stadium in New Jersey. It’s a historic win for not only the Giants and the Jets, but all NFL teams in cold cities.

To put it in perspective – the coldest Super Bowl ever played was in New Orleans. Yeah, that New Orleans. The one in Louisiana. True, it was 39 degrees that day. But generous estimates put the temperature of Super Bowl XLVIII in the low twenties with a good chance for rain or snow.

Talking to NFL Network, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said, “People talk about the weather, but, you know, this is football, not beach volleyball.”

Now that the NFL has created this precedent, will they stand by it?

Cities like Philadelphia, Boston and even Green Bay must be rubbing their hands together, Monty Burns style, over this. Around 100 million people watch the game each year, and tens of thousands of fans are willing to shell out exorbitant amounts of money for tickets to the Big Dance.

But the NFL is tricky. Philly has already been denied a Super Bowl, and other owners in colder climates have expressed uncertainty about throwing their names in the ring.

So from a fan of a cold weather team to the participants of that fateful Super Bowl in 2014 – don’t screw this up for the rest of us.

A game of epic proportions will create an “I told you so” feeling amongst owners who had been snubbed, and hopefully soften up the rest of the owners.

Sure, the game could be played in Florida. And there is logic to that. Eliminating the elements from the biggest game of the year is the best way to determine which team is truly the best.

“In the back of everybody’s mind, people want to be in South Florida that time of year,” Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross said, probably whilst wearing a Tommy Bahama shirt.

But to NFL fans, I pose this question – how many games really come down to the teams duking it out fairly? Injuries take a toll on even the best players. Guys have off games. And yes, sometimes the weather in Buffalo kind of sucks in January.

All of these things are part of what makes the NFL brand so unique. It’s not baseball, where rain stops everything. Football players are gladiators. A little snow isn’t likely to discourage them from playing in what is probably the biggest game of their lives.

On top of that, come of the best cities in the world are cold in the winter. New York is the greatest city on Earth. Philadelphia and Boston not only have rabid sports fanbases, but also some of the most amazing cultural sites in the country. Green Bay is the most storied franchise in the sport.

Preventing these teams and their fans from going to these stadiums for the Super Bowl is doing a disservice to everyone, including the NFL brand. So yes, we’d all love to sit on the beach before the Super Bowl and drink a mai tai, but part of that just sounds… wrong.