the yankee and mets stadium stuff is just false as far as FC goes. the game will draw attention becuase its in ny vs a certain team. but to the FC people it won't be any more of a highlight, they either follow uconn football or dont right now. if there wasn't a car on the road i could be at yanks in 50 minutes and mets in 45 minutes from norwalk. on a normal day with traffic, its 1 hour if really no traffic to several hours depending on what highways you take(95 merrit hutch throg neck etc) and what time of travel(rush hour or not/construction etc).
its ballpark a hour to the rent for me and there isn't traffic issues for the most part becuase of the several highway options. some go merrit to 91. some go 95 to 91 and some go 7up to 84. its all close to the same and it makes it easy for FC people to get to the rent. getting to nyc is not as easy and is not in any case easier for FC.
a saturday morning game at yanks would be maybe as easy for FC ppl as going to the rent, maybe. all other times would be high traffic and alot worse of a ride. ppl would take the train somewhat but thats just less of a uconn football tailgating atmosphere in the works. its either play a game at giants or don't play in nyc to me unless its a bowl game...a trip to giants stadium for a game is a neutral game if not a away game for uconn vs a michigan nd usc type. so if we did that i would have to think warde would be smart enough to have 6 home games with a acc coming to the rent for season tix purposes.
I disagree. Shocker.
I understand the commuter issues, traveling, in the area - probably a lot better than you can imagine. The concept that proximity is an issue, when it comes to UConn playing in the New York City - in a different state? that's false.
Simply by scheduling games in Yankee Stadium, we're not going to generate a whole lot of new ticket buyers. I think that's what you're getting at it.
But by scheduling games in Yankee stadium, we most definitely will be generating new INTEREST in UConn football in the area.
There's a pseudo-scientific theory out there called the 100th monkey phenomena. It's not a true scientific thing and the way it's described in primates in popular culture is not what the original research showed. BUT....it's a phenomena that most indeed has legitimate reproducibility in when it comes to observing social phenomena in people, espeically around things like media driven social interaction (i.e. sports / entertainment).
Basically what it says, is that once a critical mass, or number of individuals have acquired a learned behavior in a group, that learned behavior begins to spread instantaneously and becomes a natural behavior for an entire population, such that members of that population that were never directly taught a behavior, begin to exhibit the behavior anyway.
By scheduling games in Yankee Stadium, the 100th monkey effect, however serious you take the concept, would come into play in Fairfield county when it comes to the general population interest in uconn football, and being a subject matter of interest.....in Fairfield County to the general population, is something that UConn Football needs to get. If playing outside CT is such a big deal for folks, there's another option to entice the ND's, Michigan's, and the like to CT - and that's the Yale Bowl - if Yale ever gets off their ass and upgrades that facility.
I understand this is heresy to a lot of UConn football fans. But it's the reality of the Northeast. Rentschler field is our home, but if you understand what we had to go through to get it, and why we played 1-AA football for 22 years rather than 1-A football, it probably shouldn't be a big deal for you to understand that playing games at larger venues in the Northeast is part of the deal that UConn will face in the future when it comes to scheduling.
And all of that, makes the fact that Michigan is coming to Rentschler, THAT much bigger for UConn. Michigan playing at UConn is a major, major thing. I'd hate to see it end at two games, and we have a lot of stuff to work with to work out a way to continue it.
Oh yeah, and BTW - I am completely in favor of Michigan playing at Rentschler in 2013, and do not want to see the game moved.
The future could certainly include NYC, but I'm not convinced it has the same loing-term benefits for us that some others on the board feel it does. In fact there could be a few negatives we need to consider as I mentioned earlier.
