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Super Bowl VIPs complaining about their game experience

Discussion in 'Football: NFL, College, High School' started by GRENDEL, Feb 18, 2011.

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  1. GRENDEL

    GRENDEL Contributing Member

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    Super Bowl VIPs complaining about their game experience
    By Chris Chase
    Fri Feb 18 01:18pm EST


    By mistreating Super Bowl fans who were left without seats at Cowboys Stadium and then subsequently lowballing them with compensation, the NFL gave off the impression that it doesn't care about the little guy. According to a few VIP fans who were at Super Bowl XLV, the league didn't show much concern for the big guys either.

    In an article in the Philadelphia Daily News, Paul Domowitch entertainingly details a myriad of Super Bowl-sized complaints from VIPs and sponsors.

    "In the past, you couldn't miss where you were supposed to go," [said a source close to the situation.] "You'd get off a bus or out of your limo and there would be someone there to tell you, 'Tailgate party right this way.' This one, no one had any idea where to go. VIPs and sponsors were being funneled in [to the stadium] with regular fans."​


    With the regular fans? Ugh. Hobknobbing with the proletariat and common folk. I hope the "regular fans" at least had the decency not to look the VIPs directly in the eyes. And I pray -- pray -- that these very important people/refugees didn't suffer the indignity of arriving at the tailgate party only to find that they ran out of caviar and Chateau Lafitte.

    When New Orleans Saints owner/executive vice president Rita Benson LeBlanc, who is the granddaughter of majority owner Tom Benson, and the heir to the team, called from the airport for her free limo, she was informed that the perks were only for each team's principal owner. In other words, only grandpa. According to a source, Tom Benson was furious with Jones.​


    When you see "granddaughter of majority owner Tom Benson" you get the image of a 5-year-old girl in pigtails holding one of those huge lollipops, sadly waiting at the airport for a ride that never came. Except that Rita Benson LeBlanc is 33 and quite capable of calling her own limo or Town Car or, gasp, taxi. Should the Cowboys have accommodated the owner-in-waiting? Sure. Could she have arranged her own ride? Absolutely.

    Many league executives also were upset when they and their families were told at the last minute that they had to give up their Super Bowl seats and watch the game on television in a tent outside the stadium as the league gave their seats to many of the displaced 1,200.​


    The old saying "the customer is always right" apparently has no place in the NFL. When you host a dinner party and there isn't enough steak to go around, you give up your piece. It was completely logical for the league execs to give up their seats. That's what they should have done. I'm sure nobody was happy about it, but sometimes you have to take one for the team. Anonymously bashing the decision a week later isn't part of that process.

    Then there was the awful sound quality during the Black Eyed Peas' halftime performance. Once upon a time, the league spared no expense when it came to staging its biggest game. Since the departure of the league's longtime special events coordinator, Jim Steeg, 7 years ago, though, it has dramatically cut costs.​


    When you select the Black Eyed Peas as halftime entertainment, you're pretty much guaranteeting awful sound quality.

    Domowitch believes the problems at Super Bowl XLV may cause some sponsors to back out of next year's game. He writes that the league has done damage control with FedEx and Castrol Motor Oil in an attempt to calm down the big-money sponsors. If the NFL is as successful with them as it was with the aggrieved fans, expect to see UPS and Valvoline at next year's game.

    http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/blog/sh...mplaining-about-their-game-exp?urn=nfl-323354
     
    #1 GRENDEL, Feb 18, 2011
  2. DonnyMost

    DonnyMost not wrong
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    I thought it would've been funny if the guys from the "never miss a superbowl club" had ended up being one of the 800 displaced folks who didn't get their seats.

    And then one of them died.

    :(
     
    #2 DonnyMost, Feb 18, 2011
  3. Qball

    Qball Contributing Member

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    OMG the atrocities these VIPs faced!!

    :rolleyes:
     
    #3 Qball, Feb 18, 2011
  4. Joshfast

    Joshfast "We're all gonna die" - Billy Sole
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    I mean, I get it, some of those complaints were trite.

    But still doesn't change the fact the Super Bowl in Dallas this year sucked something fierce.
     
    #4 Joshfast, Feb 18, 2011
  5. Nick

    Nick Contributing Member

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    Them blowing this Super Bowl is equivalent to an NBA superstar missing a game winning DUNK at the buzzer.

    With a stellar performance, this Super Bowl could have been the best thing ever to happen to the metroplex.... virtually cementing the area with "big league" status, and guaranteeing them many more Super Bowl's to come.

    Instead... they fell completely ass backwards and re-inforced the "dumb redneck" stereotype that most of the USA has for Texas.
     
    #5 Nick, Feb 19, 2011
  6. jdh008

    jdh008 Member

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    At this point, I think it's safe to say that the Super Bowl in Dallas was a huge failure.
     
    #6 jdh008, Feb 19, 2011
  7. ROXRAN

    ROXRAN Contributing Member

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    Bring it back to Houston, everything went smooth. . .
     
    #7 ROXRAN, Feb 20, 2011
  8. Nick

    Nick Contributing Member

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    It would be great for the city... but I would hate to see the national media crap all over the city (again) if things didn't go as smoothly.

    Honestly, at this point, the NFL should just have it in warm weather, guaranteed to put on a good show places. Miami, New Orleans, Tampa, San Diego, and LA (if they ever get a stadium). Then every 10 years or so they can go to Houston, Dallas, and Glendale.
     
    #8 Nick, Feb 20, 2011
  9. jdh008

    jdh008 Member

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    I actually agree with Bill Simmons' proposal for Super Bowl host cities. He wants the host city to rotate between Miami, San Diego, New Orleans, and one other city that slips my mind.

    At first I was against it, but in light of what happened in Dallas, (even allowing for the snow and ice) it might work. This way, those cities would have hosting down pat. There would be no surprises.
     
    #9 jdh008, Feb 20, 2011
  10. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Contributing Member
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    Keep in mind the weather has been crappy this year in SD and at the moment LA doesn't have a state of the art stadium with the type of amenities that the NFL likes. Neither place has a dome same with Tampa and Miami where it might not freeze but lots of rain is a possibility. I think to minimize chances of weather problems a dome is more important than a warm climate.

    While Dallas suffered from some unusual weather most of the in stadium problems were due to poor planning and execution.
     
    #10 rocketsjudoka, Feb 20, 2011
  11. Major

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    Who manages the Superbowl? For example, the seating problems in Dallas - is that something that Jerry Jones and the Cowboys are responsible for? Or does the NFL take control of preparations?

    If I'm the NFL and this is my signature event, wherever it is, I would have my people in charge rather than leaving it up to the local owner and management.
     
    #11 Major, Feb 20, 2011
  12. DonnyMost

    DonnyMost not wrong
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    After this colossal failboat, that may be what ends up happening.
     
    #12 DonnyMost, Feb 20, 2011
  13. countryfan75

    countryfan75 Member

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    LMAOOO!!!!!!!!! That's funny!

    My sentiments exactly.
     
    #13 countryfan75, Feb 20, 2011
  14. BetterThanEver

    BetterThanEver Contributing Member

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    The biggest problem with Dallas wasn't even the weather. There have been many superbowls with snow and ice on the roads.

    Dallas's problem was pure incompetence, poor planning, and lack of execution. They were flying by the seat of their pants. The Dallas Cowboys were told on September 5th, 2010, to get a permit. By December 30th, the Cowboys still hadn't submitted a permit application.

    The permit application was finally requested on January 5th, 2011. Even after they got approved, there were many mistakes on the designs for the extra seating. If the application was submitted earlier, the mistakes would have been corrected earlier.

    Even if it never snowed in Dallas, it would have been a disaster with seating and crowd control. The same type of incompetence could affect a Superbowl in California or Florida. Things were smoother in Houston than Dallas.

    http://athleticbusiness.com/articles/lexisnexis.aspx?lnarticleid=1359171099&lntopicid=136030023
     
    #14 BetterThanEver, Feb 21, 2011
    Last edited: Feb 21, 2011
  15. rrj_gamz

    rrj_gamz Contributing Member

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    Wah....its fair to say Arlington won't be getting a superbowl again...for a very long time if at all..you'd didn't hear this happen to Houston...

    weather or not, things just went wrong all over...
     
    #15 rrj_gamz, Feb 21, 2011
  16. GRENDEL

    GRENDEL Contributing Member

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    The NFL takes over the preparations, they had control of the stadium since the Cotton Bowl ended I believe.
     
    #16 GRENDEL, Feb 21, 2011
  17. msn

    msn Member

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    meh. Houston did a great job, and folks who actually pay attention will remember that.

    Besides, everybody knows Dallas isn't Texas. We evicted them years ago.
     
    #17 msn, Feb 21, 2011
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