WHILE vacationing last week in Quebec, I read an editorial in The Montreal Gazette that crystallized for me the fatal flaw in New York City's attempt to win the 2012 Summer Olympic Games. The bid was essentially bungled by an inability to appreciate the mass-appeal value of a good burger.
The editorial was about the renaissance of the Canadian Football League and especially the reborn Montreal Alouettes, who disappeared for nine years from a league that was often predicted to be facing a similar fate.
To the contrary, football - at least the Canadian-rules version - is a hot sport throughout the province these days, particularly among French-Canadians who previously shunned it. Three French-speaking universities are fielding teams, while thousands of fans are embracing an all-American pastime of the parking lot.
As The Gazette reported: "Le tailgate (a parking-lot party that begins several hours before game time) is every bit as big an event at Quebec football games as the tailgate parties in Buffalo or Atlanta."
There you have it. So-called francophones, who once thought of football as a vulgar simulation of war, have grasped its essential significance as live entertainment next door to the great North American cookout. They have recognized what New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg; Daniel L. Doctoroff, the deputy mayor; and the Jets' owner, Woody Johnson, apparently did not.
How could the key New York players in the costly 2012 Olympics pursuit construct their original plan around a parking-challenged football stadium that, among other insurmountable opponents, was not even appetizing for famished fans? Was it because Bloomberg, Doctoroff and Johnson are too rich and refined to enjoy their filet mignon on paper plates?
We'll never know how the voting would have gone in Singapore on Wednesday had Johnson not insisted on returning the Jets to New York on the West Side of Manhattan and agreed to build a luxury-suite palace in Queens. One thing is clear: NYC2012 would not have made the end-game impression of a desperate delegation in disarray that no doubt precluded any chance of the upset London ultimately pulled.
At the very least, Johnson, Bloomberg and Doctoroff would have created - in addition to an easier commute for the Jets' large Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island fan base - a legacy of national sporting events, real revenue producers, that they were promising in return for the public subsidies in Manhattan.
Remember the Super Bowl? While the war of the Far West Side was still being waged, the N.F.L. munificently weighed in by awarding its 2010 showcase to New York - provided there was an agreement in place to open a stadium in Manhattan with a roof over it by 2009.
When the Manhattan deal died, I didn't hear anyone say the Super Bowl had officially expired, so I called the N.F.L. yesterday to find out if 2010 was still a possibility, provided a roof was built somewhere in the region that would eliminate the possibility of a halftime breast exposure to frostbite.
A league spokesman, Brian McCarthy, said the deal offered to the Jets and the city for the Manhattan stadium was in place until the end of the year. I asked: What if the Jets and Giants agreed to put a retractable roof on the new stadium planned for the Meadowlands?
After checking with the brass, McCarthy called back to say, "They would have to submit a new bid."
This sounded neither promising nor hopeless, so I called Jay Cross, the Jets' president, to ask if the Jets, now positioning themselves to partner up in the Meadowlands with the Giants, would be interested in constructing a retractable roof.
While the teams would have no interest in playing indoors, Cross said, "From the league's perspective, there would be a lot of interest in having a roof in the region." Provided, of course, it was paid for by New Jersey.
"The lion's share of benefits of having a roof are accrued to the municipality," Cross said. Could be, or it could also be a case of another negotiating tactic to determine just how much public largesse might be available.
It's hard to believe the Giants and Jets couldn't produce substantial nongame revenue from a climate-controlled stadium they jointly controlled. And whatever happened to all that civic and regional pride we were hearing about? How about the Giants and Jets, cashing in on New York's name all these years while nestled in New Jersey, digging a little deeper so the city they claim to represent could reap the certain tourist windfall the Super Bowl and Final Four across the river would bring?
Who knows? Maybe New York and New Jersey could figure out a way to work together to bid for a regional 2016 Summer Games to defray burgeoning costs.
Last week, The Montreal Gazette also reported that construction costs for the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver were running 40 percent ahead of original projections. Meanwhile, yesterday's horrific news out of London was a reminder to its Olympic people what a staggering and costly challenge it faces to secure the prize it won.
In the end, it could be argued that Bloomberg and friends did New York a favor by sabotaging their own bid, thereby preserving for Jets fans the all-American right of le tailgate. (Attention, Woody: that's a parking-lot party that begins several hours before game time.)