Giants Stadium

Giants Stadium

The Meadowlands
File:Giantsstadiumlogo.gif
Location	50 Route 120 East Rutherford, New Jersey 07073
Owner	New Jersey Sports & Exposition Authority
Operator	New Jersey Sports & Exposition Authority
Capacity	80,242
Surface	FieldTurf
Construction
Broke ground	1972
Opened	1976
Construction cost	$78 million
Architect	HNTB
Tenants
New York Giants (NFL) (1976-2009) New York Jets (NFL) (1984-2009) New Orleans Saints (NFL) (2005)(One Game) MetroStars / Red Bull New York (MLS) (1996-2007) New York Cosmos (NASL) (1977-1984) New Jersey Generals (USFL) (1983-1985) NY/NJ Knights (WLAF) (1991-1992) NY/NJ Hitmen (XFL) (2001)

Giants Stadium, frequently referred to as The Meadowlands, is the home stadium for the New York Giants and New York Jets football teams of the NFL, and the Red Bull New York soccer team of MLS. It is located in East Rutherford, New Jersey in the Meadowlands Sports Complex, which also hosts the Meadowlands Racetrack and the Continental Airlines Arena. As of 2004, official seating capacity is 80,242, making it the second-largest stadium in the NFL behind FedExField. It is also the ninth-oldest stadium in the NFL. The stadium also was one of the sites of Live Earth 2007.

History

Giants Stadium was the first major league sporting venue in New Jersey (though the Brooklyn Dodgers had played some home games in Jersey City in 1957), and its success, along with that of the Giants in the 1980s was a major impetus behind increased pride and enthusiasm among New Jersey residents.

Because the Jets play in a stadium named for another NFL team, the Jets officially refer to the site as simply The Meadowlands, as do all official NFL and team game notes regarding Jets home games.

Giants Stadium opened on October 10, 1976, as 76,042 fans witnessed a loss by the Giants to the Dallas Cowboys. College football made its debut at Giants Stadium on October 23, 1976, with Rutgers defeating Columbia 47-0.

The New York Cosmos of the North American Soccer League moved to Giants Stadium for the 1977 season and remained until the league folded in 1985.

In 1984, the New York Jets became co-tenants with the Giants.

Other professional football teams that have called Giants Stadium home over the years include the New Jersey Generals of the USFL; the New York/New Jersey Knights of the World League of American Football; and the New York/New Jersey Hitmen of the XFL.

The stadium has also hosted numerous college football games, including the Garden State Bowl from 1978-1981; the Kickoff Classic from 1983 to 2002; the New York Urban League Classic since 1981; a number of Rutgers homes games; several Notre Dame-Navy and Notre Dame-Army games; and the Army-Navy Game on three occasions, most recently in 2002. Syracuse University also played two home games at Giants Stadium during the 1979 season, against West Virginia and Penn State, while the Carrier Dome was under construction. Columbia also played some home games at Giants Stadium in 1983, due to construction at its home stadium. Temple University, needing a home field due to a schedule conflict with Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia, used Giants Stadium as their home field versus Penn State in September 1996. Princeton University also played one home game at Giants Stadium (against Yale University) during the construction of Princeton's new stadium in 1997.

Nine games of the 1994 FIFA World Cup soccer tournament were held at Giants Stadium (including one semifinal), along with several games of the 1999 Women's World Cup. In 2003, the SuperCoppa Italiana, an annual match pitting the winners of Serie A (Italy's top division) and the Coppa Italia (Italian Cup), was held in Giants Stadium instead of in Italy because both clubs involved (Juventus and AC Milan) were touring the United States late in the summer, when the event is normally scheduled. In 2005, it played host to many matches to the CONCACAF Gold Cup, including the final which saw the USA victorious over Panama in a 3-1 penalty shootout after both sides failed to score goals during regulation and extra time. It has seen many European soccer tours in recent years paying venue to such big clubs as Manchester United,Celtic F.C, Chelsea, Liverpool, and many others. In 2006, the Red Bulls set a franchise attendance record in an exhibition game against FC Barcelona, with the stadium fully sold-out for the first time.

New York Jets playing at Giants Stadium, November 2001

The largest crowd to ever attend an event at Giants Stadium was 82,948, as Pope John Paul II celebrated Mass during a rainstorm on October 5, 1995.

Concerts have also been a part of the Giants Stadium experience, with notable acts such as as Bruce Springsteen, Grateful Dead, The Rolling Stones, Depeche Mode, Green Day, and Bon Jovi taking the stage before appreciative audiences. Bruce Springsteen played 10 nights in support of his The Rising tour during the summer of 2003. The majority of the Paradise City music video by Guns N' Roses was filmed at the stadium in 1988. There is also a major ski apparel equipment sale each year at the stadium.

For some years, a popular urban legend purported that the remains of Jimmy Hoffa had been buried under one of the end zones at Giants Stadium. This led a wag in Sports Illustrated to suggest that "This lends new meaning to the term coffin corner!"

Thanks largely to the dual occupancy of Giants Stadium by two NFL teams since 1984, it has surpassed Wrigley Field (home of the Chicago Bears for fifty seasons) as the venue to have hosted more NFL games than any other in league history.

Changes and co-tenants

New York Giants playing at Giants Stadium, December 2005

To accommodate these varied events, Giants Stadium has sported various playing surfaces in its history. AstroTurf was the original surface for the playing field. This surface was covered by Bermuda grass sod for the World Cup in 1994, identical to that at the Rose Bowl where the other semifinal and the finals were held (so that both teams in the finals would have played on identical surfaces). The grass was removed after the World Cup, as it would have died in the New Jersey winter. The MetroStars, however, installed a grass field each spring, but was removed prior to the football season, forcing the team to play its final home games each year on AstroTurf. The AstroTurf was replaced in 2000 by and a system of interchangeable grass trays was implemented from 2000 to 2002, but was considered a failure, since the quality of the field worsened as the NFL season progressed. (Part of the problem may have stemmed from the fact that the original AstroTurf field was kept in place under the grass, to help in drainage.) It was replaced by a new artificial surface, FieldTurf, in 2003.

When the New York Jets left Shea Stadium and moved to Giants Stadium in 1984, many predicted the stadium would be renamed. Understandably, the Jets organization preferred not to reside in a facility named after another team. However, under the terms of the stadium lease, changing the name of the stadium requires the Giants' approval, and the Giants refused to change the name. The proposed new stadium is expected to bear a sponsor's name as bids for the naming rights are currently being accepted - it is not yet known if such an agreement will include renaming the current stadium if and when it is finalized.

While the stadium has a decidedly blue atmosphere, matching the Giants' team colors, when the Jets play there, the walls are covered with green banners, matching their colors. In addition, the gates outside the stadium are covered with green Jets logos to hide the standard blue and red. The endzones also used to be repainted green when the Giants played with blue endzones, but ever since the Giants changed their endzone art to a white GIANTS with a green background, the painting of the entire endzone is not needed. However, Jets logos are still painted on over the Giant logo. In mid-December, traditionally the stadium hosts a Saturday-Sunday NFL doubleheader, with the Giants playing a home game one day and the Jets playing the other. The night between the games is a challenge for the stadium grounds crew, as they have only hours to convert the stadium from one team's colors to the other. As per the NFL schedule, the Giants and the Jets play each other once every four years. In that case, there is a predetermined home team, and a predetermined away team. In those games, the "away" team gets a rare away game in their own home stadium. The Giants and Jets typically play each other every year in the NFL Preseason, and the teams rotate annually home/away.

Notable moments

• October 10, 1976: 76,042 fans witness the Giants losing to the Cowboys in the first game ever played at Giants Stadium.
• October 1, 1977: Soccer legend Pelé played his last game, an exhibition match between the Cosmos and Santos. He played the first half for the Cosmos and the second half for his old Brazilian team.
• November 19, 1978: Joe Pisarcik fumbles the handoff to Larry Csonka with just seconds remaining in the game, allowing Herman Edwards (later a Jets head coach) to scoop it up and run it back for a touchdown, giving the Philadelphia Eagles an improbable 19-17 win. This play would be known as "The Miracle at the Meadowlands," and helped lead to the hiring of Ray Perkins as head coach, and later George Young as general manager.
• September 1984: The New York Jets move into Giants Stadium.
• July 14, 1985: The Baltimore Stars defeat the Oakland Invaders, 28-24, in the 1985 USFL Championship Game, the final game in league history.
• August - September 1985: Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band perform six sold out shows on the final leg of their Born in the U.S.A. Tour.
• January 11, 1987: The New York Giants shut out the Washington Redskins 17-0 in the NFC Championship game. Two weeks later, the Giants would win their first Super Bowl.
• June-July 1994: Giants Stadium serves as a venue for the 1994 FIFA World Cup, opening with Ireland's 1-0 win over Italy, and concluding with Italy's 2-1 win over Bulgaria in the semifinals.
• December 13,1998: The New York Giants defeated the then-13-0 Denver Broncos.
• October 23, 2000: In what has been called the greatest game on Monday Night Football, the New York Jets come back from a 30-7 deficit by scoring 30 points in the fourth quarter and another 3 in overtime to beat the Miami Dolphins 40-37.The game is known as the Monday Night Miracle.
• January 7, 2001: The Giants set an all time team record for attendance (78,765)with a 20-10 playoff win over Philadelphia.
• January 14, 2001: On a field of painted mud, the New York Giants shut out and wallop the Minnesota Vikings 41-0 in the NFC Championship Game to send the Giants to their third Super Bowl.
• July-August 2003: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band break their own record with 10 sold-out shows on the Rising tour.
• September 1, 2005: The punk rock band Green Day sold out Giants Stadium with Against Me! and Jimmy Eat World. It was their biggest concert of all time (80,000 people)
• September 19, 2005: The New Orleans Saints played as the home team at Giants Stadium versus the Giants (in name only, of course; no more than a few thousand Saints fans had been evacuated to the area or otherwise traveled to New York). The game was relocated from the Louisiana Superdome due to damage caused by Hurricane Katrina, and the inability to prepare one of the team's eventual temporary homes in time.
• July 7th, 2007: The New York portion of Live Earth, a worldwide series of concerts of pop and rock music featuring various bands and musical artists planned to inspire global warming activism, was held at Giants Stadium. Kenna, KT Tunstall, Taking Back Sunday, Keith Urban, Ludacris, AFI, Fall Out Boy, Akon, John Mayer, Melissa Etheridge, Alicia Keys, The Dave Matthews Band, Kelly Clarkson, Kanye West, Bon Jovi, The Smashing Pumpkins, Roger Waters, and The Police all performed.

New stadium

On September 29, 2005, it was announced that Giants Stadium would be replaced with an $800 million stadium that is scheduled to be opened in 2010. The New Meadowlands Stadium will be nearby the current stadium. The New York Jets were planning a move to a new domed stadium on Manhattan's West Side sometime near the year 2010. However, with the political defeat in June 2005 of the West Side Stadium plan, the Jets ended up agreeing to share the new Meadowlands stadium with the Giants. The Giants and Jets hope the stadium will be built by 2010.

On January 25, 2007, Swedish construction company Skanska AB had announced that it received a $998 million order to design and build a new football stadium for the New York Giants and the New York Jets. The open-air stadium will seat 82,000 spectators and include 217 luxury suite boxes. The luxury suites will include several additional amenities, such as more ample space between rows which will help people arrive to their seat much easier and watch the game more comfortably. The overall atmosphere will be enhanced with comfortable couches, armchairs and several flat panel televisions. In addition, there will be several food stations that will differ considerably in comparison to other stadia around the league. Fresh carving stations, sushi, and several bars are just a few options. Entering and leaving the stadium will be accessible through a private lobby, where club patrons will have access to reserved parking.

Once the New Meadowlands Stadium is completed, Giants Stadium will be demolished to make way for parking and possible expansion of the Meadowlands Xanadu complex. The next step for the Giants and Jets is to collaborate on getting their new stadium built while still playing games in Giants Stadium alongside the construction site. Statements from the Washington Post say that Mara said the two clubs will have to address some problems arising from the loss of parking spaces. "Now we've got to get it built, yeah, and try to figure out how to get people in and out of the complex while it's being built," Mara said. The Giants' other co-owner, Steve Tisch, said: "It is a relief. But it sort of takes this off the table and the bigger issue is building the stadium."

One issue with the new Giants Stadium is the rising costs. Ticket prices will continue to rise in order to offset this tremendous cost. In addition, season ticket holders may have to pay a fee just in order to reclaim their seats, through the sale of Personal Seat Licenses. One of the biggest questions towards offsetting the cost is acquiring a corporate sponsor to help pay for the Stadium via naming rights.

External links

• Meadowlands Sports Complex
• New York Giants
• New York Jets
• Red Bull New York

40°48′43.90″N 74°04′37.14″W