Why was the Giants' stadium located in New Jersey rather than New York? The Giants accepted New Jersey's offer to build a new stadium. Giants Stadium first opened its doors in 1976. Previously, the Giants had been the second tenant in a baseball stadium, first at the Polo Grounds and then at Yankee Stadium. The move allowed them to have their own ballpark while giving them more security than if they were by themselves in New York City.
Giants owner Bob Bozelian said of the decision, "We are very happy with our arrangement with New Jersey. We believe it will serve the team well to be located in a peaceful, suburban setting with easy access to major highways."
The stadium cost $27 million to build and has a capacity of 70,000 people. It is about 15 minutes from Manhattan by car.
Giants Stadium was the only MLB stadium for eight years after it opened until Dodger Stadium opened in Los Angeles in 1990. The NFL's New York Jets also moved to New Jersey after the Giants left for San Francisco in 1954. The new stadium they played in was called Shea Stadium.
Shea Stadium closed in 1964 after 32 seasons due to concerns about its safety changes made for football. The New York Mets played their final game there on October 4th of that year.
While New York City explored putting the Giants in the reconstructed Yankee Facility, the Giants chose to build their own football stadium rather than remain secondary tenants in a baseball stadium. The New York metropolitan region, including New Jersey, is served by the Giants and Jets. The two teams are known as the G-Men and J-Men respectively.
The Yankees were granted an expansion team in 1969, but the NFL rejected the proposal because it wanted only eight teams per division. The Yankees went on to become one of the most successful franchises in sports history, winning three World Series titles between 2009 and 2011. However, financial difficulties have led them to consider moving some of their games out of New York City.
In December 1968, just before the NFL rejected its expansion proposal, the Yankees announced that they had signed a contract with George Steinbrenner to be the sole tenant of the new stadium being built for the Giants. The deal was said to be worth $1 million annually over 10 years. In addition, the Yankees will receive up to an additional $250,000 if the Giants win the Super Bowl during that time period.
Although both the Giants and Yankees are products of the New York metropolitan area, they are not the same team nor are they related. The Giants are named after the New York Giants of the National Football League while the Yankees are named after the Bronx Bombers of the American League.
The New York Giants were sharing Yankee Stadium with the New York Yankees baseball club in the early 1970s, and they began seeking for their own home. The Giants agreed to an agreement with the embryonic New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority in 1971, and building on the new stadium began in 1972. The first game was played on September 11, 1972, when the Giants defeated Philadelphia 26-6.
They have been playing at Meadowlands since then, except for two seasons (1977-78) when they played all their games at Stanford University's Stanford Stadium.
In 1978, the Giants returned to New Jersey and moved into MetLife Stadium, now known as "Empire State Plaza" - where they remain today. But they did not become full-time residents again until after the 1996 season, when they moved into their new facility at South Jersey Technology Park in Edison. The old Yankee Stadium is now known as "Faith & Fear in Flushing Meadows-Plaza Suite".
New York has no team in the NFL, but they do have the New York Jets of the National Football League. The team was founded in 1946 as the Brooklyn Dodgers, a reference to the former team that now plays in Los Angeles. The name was changed in 1947 to honor the US military veterans who had died while serving in World War II. The original franchise left Brooklyn for New York City in 1956 and has never left ever since.
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