NFL Playoffs: Cold With Chance of a TV Blackout
The first winter storm of 2014 has largely come and gone, but it has left snow, frigid temperatures and untold delays in its wake. Caught in the mess are the thousands of N.F.L. players, fans and members of the news media trying to get to Cincinnati, Green Bay, Indianapolis and Philadelphia, where wild-card games will be played this weekend.
Though many of the players will play in freezing temperatures this weekend, they have not faced many major hurdles yet. After all, the San Diego Chargers, the Kansas City Chiefs, the San Francisco 49ers and the New Orleans Saints fly on their own jets and are expected to reach their destinations roughly on time.
Reporters and television crews are another story. Jeff Duncan, a columnist for The Times-Picayune, left his home in New Orleans at 4:30 a.m. on Friday morning. He and the Saints beat reporters Larry Holder and Katherine Terrell caught a flight to Atlanta. A connecting flight was supposed to get them to Philadelphia by 12:19 p.m., but it was canceled.
So, they flew to Baltimore, where they rented a car and planned to drive the last 110 miles to Philadelphia. Along the way, they met the son of a longtime Saints administrator. 'His flight also was canceled and by happenstance found us here and is hitching a ride with us,' Duncan said. 'Fun stuff.'
Some members of the news media, unable to make their flights, have canceled their trips entirely. Fans, too, have been forced to scramble to get to games, or have decided to stay home.
By Thursday, the Cincinnati Bengals, the Indianapolis Colts and the Green Bay Packers still had not sold out their stadiums, raising the prospect of an N.F.L. playoff game being blacked out in a local market for the first time since 2002, when the Miami Dolphins-Baltimore Ravens playoff game was not shown in and around Miami.
This season, only two games were blacked out, an all-time low. To avoid a blackout, a game must be sold out 72 hours before kickoff. But the league gave the Bengals, the Colts and the Packers extensions until late Friday afternoon. That seemed to do the trick as team sponsors bought big blocks of seats, helping the Colts and the Packers sell out their stadiums.
In Indianapolis, Meijer, a larger retailer, bought 1,200 tickets for Saturday's playoff game against the Chiefs and will donate them to military families. Larry Hall, the director of ticket sales for the Colts, said many fans fly to Indiana for games, but it was unclear how many would be able to reach Indianapolis.
Kroger, a grocery chain, bought an undisclosed amount of tickets for the Bengals-Chargers game to get the team closer to a sellout. The Bengals had until 4 p.m. Eastern time Friday to fill their stadium. Part of the problem has been that even before the snowstorm hit the Midwest and the East Coast, fans did not know until after the regular season ended when their team would be playing this weekend, according to Jack Brennan, a spokesman for the Bengals.
'You've got a tough product to sell in a short time because until Sunday night, we couldn't tell people what time and day the game is,' Brennan said.
The league also requires that tickets be sold at face value during the playoffs, which prevents teams from discounting or giving them away. 'While I don't think our tickets are as high priced as in some markets, there are less levers you can pull for a playoff game than during regular season,' Brennan said.
Playoff tickets were also being sold during a holiday week, when many families have been traveling. In Green Bay, the Packers also added 7,000 seats in the off-season, giving them more tickets to sell. The team was also left for dead after quarterback Aaron Rodgers was injured and the team stumbled. Their late-season comeback to qualify for the playoffs may have surprised many fans.
The last time the Packers failed to sell out a playoff game was on Jan. 8, 1983, when they drew 54,282 for a victory against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Those fans who are planning to attend the game Sunday night at Lambeau Field are bracing for frigid conditions. Alex Sosnowski, a senior meteorologist at Accuweather.com, expects temperatures at kickoff to be below zero, dropping to about 10 below zero by the end of the game. With winds up to 20 miles per hour, the wind chill could fall to about 20 below.
'The folks going to that game will have to layer up out the wazoo,' Sosnowski said. 'I hope they don't run out of coffee, tea and cocoa, because they can be lifesavers.'
The weather will be so cold that longtime fans like Tony Hoes and Chuck Olsen will forgo their traditional tailgating party, and instead enjoy the pregame festivities at a concession tent outside the stadium.
'We usually like our beer during the game, but when it gets this cold, we might just have one or two,' Hoes said. 'It's such a dramatic difference when it gets into the single digits, you have to be a little smarter about being outside. You don't want to lose a finger in return for your fun.'
The silver lining for fans of teams that make it to the next round is that the weather may be noticeably warmer. The game in Seattle on Jan. 11 is expected to include rain and temperatures in the 40s, while the game in Foxboro, Mass., will be cold, but with no snow or rain, Sosnowski said. The games in Charlotte, N.C., and Denver should also be played in the 40s.
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