Sidelines
NFL, Hawaii
partnership
isn’t artificialTHIS is the question: What happens if it doesn't happen?
I asked this question of the NFL's Jim Steeg a couple of weeks ago and his response (he's good at this) was to smile and say that he is an optimist and he's not even considering the possibility that Fieldturf won't be in Aloha Stadium by Aug. 2. But time waits for no man. No artificial surface, either. The clock is ticking and the job gets bigger and slightly more impossible with every second. And so today I ask again. What happens if it doesn't happen?
Well the short answer is nothing, at least not at first. There was no crying need to replace the surface, except that the NFL really, really wanted to, and the NFL had signed a deal to do so with the Hawaii Tourism Authority (which didn't have that authority). It would make June Jones happy, of course, and we know BYU was up in arms (72-45 makes everything hurt even more).
In short, a new surface might be better, but the old stuff was OK. You could play another season on it, easy.
It's the long run we wonder about, though. We've all heard the horror story that the NFL will leave. Steeg dismissed that notion, saying things like, "We hope that the conversation about that will now go away." And, "We really feel that we're part of this community and want to stay a part of it." And, "Everything that took place brought everybody closer."
But there are insiders who whisper and hint (and Jones, in his now-public letter to Michael Green, was neither whispering nor hinting) that at least for a while the threat of the NFL leaving was real indeed.
So we'll see if that turf still fits in this window that's getting smaller every second. It could happen. It might not. Any day now we could find out.
Let's hope when we find out we don't have to ask, "What now?" Let's hope we don't have to see if the NFL is still deflecting the question with a smile.
BUT DON'T PANIC. Of course, we should remember that the NFL is not here out of some sense of benevolent charity. We should remember that this is a mutually beneficial arrangement, a win-win. "We want to make synonymous the names of Hawaii and the Pro Bowl," Steeg said. Of course they do. It helps them, too.
Would it be the same game in Orlando? The game itself would be. But let's not forget that way back in the old days some players weren't too excited about playing in an all-star game, another football game at the end of the season, a boring half-speed exercise in trying not to get hurt.
Actually, a few of them don't seem too excited about it now. But they get a free trip to Hawaii now. That seems to tip the scale.
"There's a special feeling to taking a trip to Hawaii," ESPN announcer Chris Berman booms in the NFL's official Pro Bowl-Hawaii promotional video. "It's not just an all-star team at a nice location. It's an all-star game at the best location!"
The game might move, but it would immediately drop in stature, player "injuries" and no-shows would surely increase. ESPN would send its "B" team. The Aloha Spirit would be nowhere to be found. The NFL's own propaganda film made that possibility clear enough.
In that film, Hawaii was called the league's "33rd franchise." You don't drop a franchise just because it gives you a few headaches.
Lord knows, Al Davis and Jerry Jones have proven that time and time again.
Kalani Simpson can be reached at ksimpson@starbulletin.com