Roger Goodell: Superbowl In London; Oliver & America: Are You High?

8:57 pm EST October 15th, 2007 | News | 5 Comments

This is one of the crazier things I’ve ever read coming out of the mouth of an NFL commish:

nfl cheerleaders A future NFL champion may someday be crowned overseas in a game witnessed predominantly by a foreign audience, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said.

“There’s a great deal of interest in holding a Super Bowl in London,” Goodell told reporters Monday. “So we’ll be looking at that.”

The commissioner said London’s Wembley Stadium would make a great candidate for American pro football’s biggest matchup, given the opening of the stadium’s lastest incarnation and enthusiasm overseas for the game.

Hey, Goodell, it’s nice and all having exhibition games in London and Japan, and even the regular season game scheduled in the UK is interesting, but the very idea of this is beyond the pale. Superbowl Sunday is a uniquely American institution. It’s loud, bombastic, over the top, commercialized, etc. We love it. It transcends race, culture, religion, etc. To take that away from America is to stab us in the back.

Superbowl Sunday in London? This means war. This is a country that has a brand of football where they’re afraid to touch the damn ball.

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5 Responses to “Roger Goodell: Superbowl In London; Oliver & America: Are You High?”

  1. SaveFarris says:
    October 15, 2007 at 9:47 pm

    Not to mention the fact that the weather for London in February is, shall we say, less than ideal.

    Sorry Northern Cities, but the Super Bowl should be on a strict rotation between Miami, New Orleans, San Diego, Phoenix and (when the new stadium comes on line) Dallas. Is the biggest party of the year still the biggest if it’s in Jacksonville or Detroit?

  2. Oliver Willis says:
    October 15, 2007 at 10:01 pm

    Well I disagree with that. I think it’s wimpy they won’t put the Superbowl in a northern city. I’m not saying they should have games up at Gillette, but Giants Stadium, Fedex Field, The Linc, even the Ravens stadium, should all be considered Superbowl locations.

  3. James E. Powell says:
    October 16, 2007 at 12:40 am

    The warm-weather cities only requirement for Super Bowls should be dropped.

    Back in the day, before OW was born, they did not have the high-tech, super-fast-draining, fields that almost all NFL stadiums now have. You almost never see a muddy field. Watch the old NFL films and you will see it used to be quite common.

    I would love to see a Super Bowl played in snow or bad weather.

  4. Bruce says:
    October 16, 2007 at 1:01 am

    I wouldn’t mind seeing the Pro Bowl moved to Europe, though probably southern Europe that time of year. But with you on this, Oliver. It’s like our Champagne to the French; if you move it out of its tacky, over-the-top natural habitat, you denature it and us.

  5. Jay says:
    October 16, 2007 at 8:39 am

    It won’t happen. Goodell is not stupid so there’s no harm in saying, “So we’ll be looking at that.” He can simply say later, “Yeah, we looked at it and decided it wasn’t in the best interests of the NFL.”

    The biggest obstacle is the time difference. They’d have to start the Super Bowl at 1:00pm here and that would affect the network broadcasting the game because it would affect ratings and it would require them to charge less to advertisers. It won’t happen.

    I also believe it is time to end this fair weather/domed stadium crap. It is absurd that the Super Bowl isn’t played in cities like Chicago, DC and New York. Football is not a fair weather sport for crying out loud.