Time for the BCS to Follow Suit

The NFL announced yesterday that the 2014 Super Bowl will be played in a cold-weather climate ... outdoors:

IRVING, Texas -- If you build it, they will come -- wearing winter coats.

The New Meadowlands Stadium, the $1.6 billion jewel co-owned by the New York Giants and Jets, will host the 2014 Super Bowl, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell announced Tuesday afternoon at the league's spring meeting.

"It's a historic moment for the league," Goodell said.

Saying that New York is a unique market, Goodell added: "It will be a great experience for our fans. It will be a great experience for the NFL."

The league's 32 owners, undaunted by the prospect of a wintry championship game, awarded Super Bowl XLVIII to the New York/New Jersey region after also considering bids from Tampa and South Florida, both traditional sites. South Florida and Tampa have hosted the Super Bowl 10 and four times, respectively.

One commentator notes that the namesake of the trophy awarded to the Super Bowl winner would be thrilled:

"Lombardi would love this Super Bowl"

I agree, as does my friend the Cranky Con, that this is a good move:

... I have always thought they should play the Super Bowl in a cold weather city. It is ridiculous to see the championship game of a winter sport played in balmy 80-degree weather in southern California or Florida. Not that it is always inappropriate to play the Super Bowl in warm weather cities, after all there are franchises in these cities, but this is a welcome development ...

And now it's time for the powers-that-be at the BCS to follow suit and hold a “National Championship” game in a northern city. Under the current practice, which has been in effect for the past 3 years, the title game is no longer tied to any particular bowl, so there’s absolutely no reason why this couldn’t be done.

Football is a fall/winter sport meant to be played outdoors. In the elements. On REAL GRASS. Northern teams who are built to play in cold/wet-weather conditions on soggy fields are put at a disadvantage when they must travel to warm-weather climates every December and January to play bowl games against teams built to play in more moderate and dryer weather.

Let’s see how the SEC powerhouses or Southern Cal perform in a “National Championship” game in Big 10-type weather and field conditions.


UPDATE
My preference for scheduling an occasional cold-weather BCS "Championship" Game is applicable only so long as Division 1-A college football insists on this farce of definitively crowning a "National Championship". It becomes moot as soon as they do the right thing and return to the traditional bowl alignments*.


*Surely you didn't think I was going to call for a playoff, did you?


UPDATE #2
Ignore the cries and complaints regarding the NFL's decision (and my argument that the BCS should do the same thing) by those who believe playing football in 70+ degree weather or, Heaven forbid, in-frickin-doors, is some sort of birthright.

(Especially ignore the pissing and moaning if said complainer apparently happens to believe that his NFL team's having sniffed Super Bowl success for the first time in said franchise's entire history suddenly makes him some sort of expert and/or decider on where Super Bowls ought and ought not to be played. And especially, especially ignore the pissing and moaning if said complainer is still smarting from his college team's loss in the Capital One Bowl, despite said team's much-vaunted "overall team speed", to a "slow" Big 10 team because - waaaaaaah! - they had to play outside in the cold rain and muck.)

Besides, NFL football was being played and NFL Championships being decided in cold-weather climes for decades before the first Super Bowl was even played. Ironically, the coldest Super Bowl ever played - at 39° F - took place in the home city (at Tulane Stadium) of the team just now sniffing Super Bowl success for the first time in its history.