Neutral Sites for Conference title games?

[I-Want-Troy's-Hair]

WTF - What a bunch of crap is this.....God-ell is a freaking idiot....don't like the weather in Jan/Feb....bite me -

Neutral Sites For Conference Title Games?
Posted by Mike Florio on March 30, 2009, 10:24 a.m.

With the NFL possibly expanding the regular season and with the NFL not inclined to start the regular season earlier than it already does, the conference championship games could be moved deeper into each new year.

As Liz Mullen of SportsBusiness Journal reports, there’s a chance that the AFC and NFC title games could land in February, during one of the all-important ratings “sweeps” periods.

(As we’ve previously pointed out, the Super Bowl also could end up being played on President’s Day weekend, giving many football fans the ability to stay up late and/or get snookered without having to worry about getting up for work the next day. Reports surfaced last week that such a move likely would prompt NASCAR to move the Daytona 500, which historically occurs that same day.)

Given that the weather only gets worse in cities like Green Bay and Chicago and New York and Foxborough and Pittsburgh and Buffalo as January gives way to early February, Mullen points out that the championship games could be moved to a neutral site.

We don’t like this possibility. Not one bit. Especially since the teams that regularly play in the potential neutral sites would potential have an unfair advantage, if they qualify for one of the games.

The only way to avoid such an outcome would be to send the AFC game to stadiums in which an NFC team normally plays its home games, and to send the NFC game to an AFC stadium.

Even then, it might be a challenge to sell the games out in a neutral location — and it would be grossly unfair to the fans of the team that secures the right to host the championship game.

Besides, winter is football weather. And if anyone thinks that freezing conditions create an unfair advantage for the home team, ask Packers fans what they got in exchange for free-drying their cajones for three-plus hours in January 2008.

PFT Planet, feel free to chime in on this one. (As if you ever need an invitation to do so.)

profootballtalk.com

[KeiselPower99]

That is complete crap. I dont want a longer regular season I dont want neutral sites for conference title games. This is football. You hit each other you play in cold weather. This commish has got to go.

[PisnNapalm]

OH HELL NO!!!

[tony hipchest]

pretty c0cky for the NFL to shit all ove NASCARs "superbowl" like that. i mean who the hell do they think they are? just start the regular season 2 weeks earlier.

and the neutral site idea is bogus too. if it actually comes down to it i guess they could give LA 2 games a year and finally forget moving (wasting) a franchise out there.

[Steeler in Carolina]

Who cares about President Day weekend as the Super Bowl. Most of America still works that day. Heck, even school was in session in my town.

[RoethlisBURGHer]

OH HELL NO.

The top seed remaining earns the right to play the conference championship game in their home stadium.

If a team doesn't like playing in the cold and snow, they should have played better to get a top seed.

How fair would it be for the Steelers to have to play a team that's very finesse as the home team in say, Houston...where playing it Pittsburgh weather would be an advantage to the Steelers.

I wouldn't be very happy with that at all.

[nojobny]

He's just lost his mind. Those owners better knock some sense into him - FAST!

[lilyoder6]

that would completely be stupid if that happened... then there would be no sense for seeding in the playoffs...

[BrandonCarr39]

I read somewhere that only about 1/2 of the teams that hosted the CC games won.

I mean really-HFA didn't really matter THAT much in the CC games, so why would neutral sites make any more of a difference?

[pittsburghp8baller]

yea im pretty sure this gets laughed at when brought up.