Last Beam Laid Down on New Stadium - Still No Sponsor

According to Newsday the new stadium at the Meadowlands is 4 months ahead of schedule as the last steel beam was laid down on March 9th. "The state-of-the-art, $1.6-billion facility is targeted for completion by November, and the Giants and Jets will play there starting in 2010." The owners of both teams were on hand to witness the milestone. Apparently it is a big deal to get the final piece of steel up on the stadium - it's good to hear that it is ahead of schedule. I hope that the Jets go out with a bang this season, their last in their embarrassingly named home field, Giants Stadium.

So far to my knowledge nobody has stepped up to sponsor the new field. I wonder if it will open without a full stadium naming rights deal due to the economy. If they do it better be called The Meadowlands or something generic like that rather then keeping the name Giants Stadium. Maybe they could do a different name for every event - like an event by even basis naming convention where when the Giants play it is Giants Stadium and when the Jets play it's Jets Stadium??? Concerts - call it the Meadowlands... Until the economy eases up there is no way a company is going to be able to afford the fee to slap their name on the stadium - interesting times because if the stadium was completed 2 years prior they probably would have had to turn down companies for the rights to lock themselves into a 30 year deal.

Not certain how not getting a naming rights deal will effect the economics of both the teams involved as well as the entire area surrounding including all of the infrastructure being developed to get into and out of the area. I'm sure the powers that be counted on a steady stream of revenue coming from a lucrative naming rights deal - I hope that the timeline stays on track even without the anticipated money that was supposed to be coming in by now...

As a fan I don't really care whether or not the stadium has a company name on it or not - I just don't want to be playing in Giants stadium any longer....

Original Story from Newsday