Jets | Team to hold open practice; camp schedule set Fri, 14 Jul 2006 15:20:19 -0700 Randy Lange, of the Bergen Record, reports the New York Jets announced they will be holding their first ever open practice at Giants Stadium Saturday, Aug. 5, with free parking and free admission to Jets fans. The scheduling was made for a few reasons - new head coach Eric Mangini wants to get a feel for his new home stadium in advance of the Jets' first preseason game there against the New York Giants Aug. 25, and the Jets' marketing department wants to appeal to New Jersey fans in advance of the team moving its training facilities to New Jersey before the 2008 season. Also, Mangini's first training camp schedule reveals some interesting details: only seven two-a-day practices are scheduled, and none after Aug. 13. And the afternoon practices in those double sessions are scheduled to start at 5:30 pm, about the time when former head coach Herm Edwards' late workouts were ending the past five summers.
Bah...I hate this training camp schedule. I could go straight from work to the afternoon practice, but now there are some hours to kill in between. All Hail the NJ Jets.
Why? It's one practice. Some of us in NJ don't go to the training camp practices because of the long drive to Hofstra, so this will be nice to be able to go to one. The fans in NY can still go to all of the rest.
No question. If complaining is an art form, Jets fans are the equivalent of Michaelangelo and the Meadowlands are the f*cking Sistine Chapel.
The Jets and Giants play in the same stadium. The existing stadium was built for the Giants and opened in 1978. The Jets moved from Shea Stadium (where the Mets still play baseball) in 1984 to play at Giants Stadium (the name given to the stadium in New Jersey built for the Giants in 1978). The Giants do not own the stadium, but people around here like to IGNORE that. The New Jersey Sports and Exhibition Authority own it, and both teams lease it out for their use. It's not 1 team's stadium. Now, the Jets and Giants are undertaking a joint venture to build a new state of the art joint stadium, and yet people here say it's not theirs. It's an argument that's dumb, and you do not want to get into it here.
Well, the one issue I have with the latter half of this arguement is that the NJSEA had actually been charging the Jets a higher rate on their ticket sales than they did for the Giants (15% to 10%). The Jets sued the Authority after they refused to lower the rate, but the Authority finally gave in. The "economic parity" wasn't exactly there. And overall, many people argue about the overall feel of the stadium, even though that is debatable. But that fact I mentioned kind of hints at a bit of unfairness. So even though both teams leased it, it was not on equal footing, at least economically speaking, for a long long time.
Sometimes this happens. Look at an apartment complex. Resident A moves in and gets his lease. Resident B gets in later, and his lease is not as good. This happens all the time. The argument that it's the "Giants Stadium" and they OWN it is false. I agree, the colors are not great, but remember, the place was constructed for the Giants primary use. However, they never did own it. The real problem with the stadium is that when the Jets moved, a lot of people who couldn't get Giants tickets jumped on the extra seats for the Jets. The Jets have a lot of season ticket holders who are not Jets fans. A good number of these sell, which yields a lot of visiting fans in the stands.. hence the poor feel. I think way too much is made of the name of the stadium. If they renamed it "Meadowlands Stadium" it would not be a big deal anymore. I agree, the leasing should be fair, but guess what, 2 tenants in exact same apartments sometimes pay different rent. It happens.
Theoretically, that is true, but it's hard to compare. The NJSEA is an agency established by the STATE to oversee the Meadownlands Complex. Sure, government related people are constantly trying to skrew over everyone they deal with, especially nowadays, but for something of this magnitude, that really shouldn't get looked at the same way. It's true. Not disputing that. The City of New York owns Yankee Stadium, but if another major league franchise moved into Yankee Stadium, would it feel the same way, would it feel like home? Hard to tell. If Meadownlands Stadium was the original name of the venue, perhaps. But changing the name, without changing anything else about the stadium to make it seem like home to the new team (see seat colors) makes it very insincere.
