EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — The police officer with the automatic weapon strapped around his shoulder said “You cannot do that.” And if there is one rule in life to abide by at all costs, it is this:
Do not cross the guy holding an automatic weapon.
The order was heeded, and no bets — sports bets or live ammo bets — were placed Friday night.
Sportswriters do not often attend sporting events as fans, because movies and walks in the park and trips to the beach are preferable to yet another night at the ballpark or stadium or arena.
But when a relative wins a raffle and gets four seats in a MetLife Stadium luxury box, you figure you might as well see if the Jets (Friday night’s home team at the shared stadium) can do the luxury box thing as well as the Nets, whose spread in Brooklyn can begin with lobster and end with prime rib … or vice versa.
The horror stories that came out of the 2014 Super Bowl XLVIII at the Meadowlands are legend, and anybody who was there in person will tell you that the media coverage did not quite do justice to the human misery that was endured by those who were in attendance on that freezing day — Feb. 2, 2014.
In that game, Percy Harvin of the Seattle Seahawks returned a kickoff return for a touchdown to open the third quarter, and suddenly it was a 29-0 game.
Given the weather conditions, the lopsided nature of the game against the Denver Broncos and the arduous task of getting out of there (all of the parking lots had been converted to hospitality areas; everyone had been told to take public transit; taxis and limos were banned; and a 2.5-mile chain-link fence was built around the perimeter), about 40,000 people decided to find a better place to go — all at once.
Problem was, NJ Transit was responsible for getting all of these people into and out of the area via train, and the station could not handle the onslaught.
People who tried to exit were met by metal barriers and legions of security personnel who directed all of them in the same direction, and a massive human tragedy was averted when the folks in charge radioed to their underlings: “Let the people go.” Chants of “Jersey sucks” eventually ensued.
Suffice to say that MetLife Stadium at the Meadowlands will never host another Super Bowl. At the very least, it should not.
Despite the game being declared a level one national security event, they did not know how to handle crowds back then, and they clearly have learned nothing since. Not many people remember this, but during the postgame news conference, Super Bowl MVP Malcolm Smith was being asked questions when suddenly a man jumped onto the podium, grabbed the microphone, and said “Investigate 9/11. 9/11 was perpetrated by people within our own government.”
Fighter jets, SWAT teams, snipers, more than 3,000 security guards and 700 police officers could not keep that from happening, which just goes to show how one single person with an agenda can subvert every pregame preparedness notion.
Well, things have not changed.
Exiting the stadium complex after Friday night’s 22-16 victory for the Giants, one sportswriter-turned-luxury box patron witnessed one shoehorning monstrosity after another that make about as much sense as allowing Saquon Barkley to play in week three of the preseason while rehabbing a hamstring injury.
Giants coach Pat Shurmur wisely chose to keep Barkley on the bench with Odell Beckham Jr., let Eli Manning get used to playing with some legit pass protection and put all else on hold until the preseason schedule concludes next Thursday against New England.
Manning sat down for good after the first series of the third quarter, and the stadium was 95 percent empty by the time the final seconds ticked off the clock.
But those fans were not going anywhere fast — sort of like the current Baltimore Orioles, next season’s New York Knicks and the “Re-Nominate Hillary Clinton in 2020” faction of the Democratic Party.
A labyrinth of metal barriers and metal fences obstructed the foundational notion of “agress and egress” — and those lucky enough to get their vehicles out of the parking lot were then confronted by an array of orange traffic cones on the five-lane roads that were clearly designed by a capable civil engineer but have been hijacked by the same crowd control “experts” whose jobs were apparently not taken away after the 2014 Super Bowl debacle or the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
Every single vehicle leaving every single lot on the West side of the stadium was traffic-coned to a single exit lane, which also served as an impromptu crosswalk just past the shuttle bus loading area. Oh, and a bunch of emergency vehicles had to navigate all of this with their sires blaring and their horns sounding.
Nothing moved. It was like the vehicular embodiment of Erick Flowers. All together now: “This makes no sense!”
As for the luxury box dynamic, the ease — or lack thereof — of getting around the stadium and the separation of the super-moneyed from the moneyed, all of it was a reflection of what sports and society have become:
- The luxury box, leased by the law firm Sullivan and Cromwell, was comfy but isolating. Each suite has its own attendant, its own wooden door and its own walls. The folks next door on either side may or may not be having a great time, but there is no way to know. In order to high-five someone in the next suite after Hunter Sharpe’s 55-yard punt return for a TD, you would have to break down a wall or climb over a partition
- At $1.8 billion, MetLife Stadium was the most expensive sports construction project in U.S. history. But escalators are almost impossible to find because they built the place without many of them, and the best way to get to out fifth floor suite was via the stairs. Every single human we encountered gave incorrect directions.
- Tailgating activity was somewhat lively, but forget about bringing any food into the stadium. All bags are banned, and wallets must be placed into clear plastic bags. When my sister asked at the security checkpoint what was supposed to go into the clear plastic bag, the fun-hating security supervisor told her: “Money, so you can go buy me a drink.”
- At 5 p.m., some 2 1/2 hours before kickoff, the place smelled great. Sausages were being cooked, cheesesteak meat was being cooked, chicken was being fried … which is great — unless you got hungry during the third quarter and had to eat food that had been cooked five hours earlier.
- As for going to the sportsbook that opened a couple weeks ago in an adjacent facility, there was no going there after you had gotten inside the stadium. The rule states: Once you enter MetLife Stadium, you cannot leave and then come back inside.
I believe this has something to do with protecting us from terrorism, or something.
It was hard to tell while navigating the sidewalks outside, where the young trees that were planted four years ago are competing for space with the security fences, truck bomb barriers, traffic cones and human obstacles in security guard uniforms and military gear.
Sportswriters who write columns such as this run the risk of getting branded with the dreaded dinosaur label. But facts is facts, as they say, and here is one inalienable fact: Going to a game used to be easier, used to be a shared public experience, and used to be a place where fans could bond with each other.
Those things did not happen at the Super Bowl in East Rutherford four years ago, nor did they happen last night at the Meadowlands during the Giants-Jets game.
Institutionalized security paranoia, the luxury box “experience” and the lack of common sense when it comes to controlling 80,000 people while still allowing them to have a good time is not a good recipe for fun.
It is a formula for frustration. Americans can do better.
