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I was scanning the twitter feed today as saw one hyping a professional rugby game at Quincy's Veteran Memorial Stadium.
It precipitated a lot of memories for me, this beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon. The Vet was built as a depression era WPA project in 1938. My first memory of seeing it was in 1961. Since my HS was in the suburban league we played both N.Quincy HS and Quincy HS, so at least once a season we played there. Then After college, the HS team I coached usually played at least one of the Quincy teams. And finally my home games and all our practices were played at the Vet when I played professionally (sort of) in the Atlantic Coast league. So LOTS of memories in that stadium.
Now that you have the background, my point is that THAT stadium is almost 90 years old and STILL operating and hosting games and thousands of fans over those years. Fans that were basically satisfied to have a place to sit and watch a game, be it football rugby or soccer, or any of the other myriads of sports that have been played there.
Do your remember those times? The days when the object of the stadium was to provide a place to WATCH the damned game. It didn't have to have many amenities. Just a place to take a piss and have a drink and something to munch on and a seat or bench to put one's ass, while you rooted for your team, Most of the game usually you were on your feet if it was an exciting contest.
I guess my point is, does it REALLY have to cost multiple BILLIONS of dollars to entice a fandom to go to your stadium and watch your team. (SoFi cost FIVE Billion
) Forget about the question of giving hundreds of millions of dollars to Billionaires to fund these projects with public money. Isn't the GAME itself reason enough to spend time and money to see, for example a Pats team??
Think about it. This year 65K plus fans will go to the Foxboro and see a game where they will spend HUNDREDS of dollars to attend between tickets , food, and parking, and a SIGNIFICANT percentage will spend most of their time essentially watching the game on TV. (between the massive replay screens and red seat fans, who watch most of the game munching canapes and remaining indoors watching it on TV....OOH, they piss me off so much!)
OK, I'm all ranted out. I just wanted to start a discussion about, do you REALLY need to sit in luxury in order to watch a game and have fun. When is much too much? Do we really need to burden the public coffers to provide venues that are SO expensive. I read where the Stadium that the Titans finished in 1999 is now "past it's effective life span" A stadium that cost $300MM to build is going to get torn down after about 25 years and replaced with one that will cost between 2-$3Billion. Think about it, Quincy's Veteran Memorial Stadium is 90 freakin' years old and its STILL drawing crowds and entertaining sports fans.
Disclaimer. Last year a friend of mine took me too a playoff game, with his sons, to watch the Celtics in his "luxury box". Was it great to have a waitress take my order for my 3 course dinner (steak tips for me) You bet. Was it convenient when they came back every now and then to offer another beer or snacks (all included btw) And the coolest part of the package was the cool Celtics T-shirt which I STILL wear at the gym. But it was THE GAME that kept me on my feet and what we talked about. Btw, we went to game and came back by Limo, which didn't suck either. Was it an AWESOME experience? Sure it was, especially after they won.
But as cool as it was, it was STILL the game that stood out and when I think about it, I would have been just as entertained if I was up in the nosebleed seats (just hungrier)
What I want to know if Pats fans would be OK with having a more Spartan Stadium that was clean and safe AND more reasonably priced to see the Pats. I know that it would still cost hundreds of millions. But does it HAVE to cost the 2-3 Billion and have so many amenities that the Titans are planning to spend along with close to $800MM from the state?
It precipitated a lot of memories for me, this beautiful sunny Sunday afternoon. The Vet was built as a depression era WPA project in 1938. My first memory of seeing it was in 1961. Since my HS was in the suburban league we played both N.Quincy HS and Quincy HS, so at least once a season we played there. Then After college, the HS team I coached usually played at least one of the Quincy teams. And finally my home games and all our practices were played at the Vet when I played professionally (sort of) in the Atlantic Coast league. So LOTS of memories in that stadium.
Now that you have the background, my point is that THAT stadium is almost 90 years old and STILL operating and hosting games and thousands of fans over those years. Fans that were basically satisfied to have a place to sit and watch a game, be it football rugby or soccer, or any of the other myriads of sports that have been played there.
Do your remember those times? The days when the object of the stadium was to provide a place to WATCH the damned game. It didn't have to have many amenities. Just a place to take a piss and have a drink and something to munch on and a seat or bench to put one's ass, while you rooted for your team, Most of the game usually you were on your feet if it was an exciting contest.
I guess my point is, does it REALLY have to cost multiple BILLIONS of dollars to entice a fandom to go to your stadium and watch your team. (SoFi cost FIVE Billion
) Forget about the question of giving hundreds of millions of dollars to Billionaires to fund these projects with public money. Isn't the GAME itself reason enough to spend time and money to see, for example a Pats team??Think about it. This year 65K plus fans will go to the Foxboro and see a game where they will spend HUNDREDS of dollars to attend between tickets , food, and parking, and a SIGNIFICANT percentage will spend most of their time essentially watching the game on TV. (between the massive replay screens and red seat fans, who watch most of the game munching canapes and remaining indoors watching it on TV....OOH, they piss me off so much!)
OK, I'm all ranted out. I just wanted to start a discussion about, do you REALLY need to sit in luxury in order to watch a game and have fun. When is much too much? Do we really need to burden the public coffers to provide venues that are SO expensive. I read where the Stadium that the Titans finished in 1999 is now "past it's effective life span" A stadium that cost $300MM to build is going to get torn down after about 25 years and replaced with one that will cost between 2-$3Billion. Think about it, Quincy's Veteran Memorial Stadium is 90 freakin' years old and its STILL drawing crowds and entertaining sports fans.
Disclaimer. Last year a friend of mine took me too a playoff game, with his sons, to watch the Celtics in his "luxury box". Was it great to have a waitress take my order for my 3 course dinner (steak tips for me) You bet. Was it convenient when they came back every now and then to offer another beer or snacks (all included btw) And the coolest part of the package was the cool Celtics T-shirt which I STILL wear at the gym. But it was THE GAME that kept me on my feet and what we talked about. Btw, we went to game and came back by Limo, which didn't suck either.
Was it an AWESOME experience? Sure it was, especially after they won.But as cool as it was, it was STILL the game that stood out and when I think about it, I would have been just as entertained if I was up in the nosebleed seats (just hungrier)
What I want to know if Pats fans would be OK with having a more Spartan Stadium that was clean and safe AND more reasonably priced to see the Pats. I know that it would still cost hundreds of millions. But does it HAVE to cost the 2-3 Billion and have so many amenities that the Titans are planning to spend along with close to $800MM from the state?
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