We Explore Why the Giants Once Played at the Yale Bowl

There's quite a bit of hype going.

On in the air in the NFL right now about teams building new stadiums and playing in a different state than they did the year before.

We have it happening in Kansas City.

We have it maybe happening in Chicago, but it once happened in the Big Apple.

We have a guest on tonight to tell us all about the time the Giants didn't play in New York City or New Jersey.

It's coming up in just a moment.

You know, it seems odd.

You know, one of the greatest NFL franchises is, is the New York Giants, and there's a time when they didn't have a home.

But we have a guest on today that's going to tell us all about it because he has a podcast on that subject.

His name is Joe Santos.

He's a member of the Sports History Network.

Joe, welcome to the Pig Pen.

Hey, Darren, thank you.

It's great to be here.

Thanks for having me on.

I'm looking forward to discussing this podcast, my first podcast, by the way.

So thank you for having me.

Your fourth podcast.

Okay, well, my first first.

Your first podcast.

Okay, so why don't you give us a title of what this podcast podcast we're talking about tonight is and where people can find it?

Sure.

It's called the New York Giants, A Team without a Home.

And you can find it on the classic Sports History Network where you find all the great podcasts on sports.

So that's where you can find it.

All right.

Now, Joe, I know from talking to you off air and talking to some other meetings at Sports History Network and some our monthly meetings that you were from the New England area.

So.

And you're a New England person writing about the New York Giants.

Once you explain that, you know what the attraction is on that.

Yeah, sure.

So growing up in New England, you know, the Giants were the de facto home team there.

All the games were broadcast in New England.

The home games, the away games.

And back then, the Pats were pretty bad franchise.

So the only games that were shown back in Massachusetts for the away games, and the Giants have been there forever.

And my brother, my older brother was a Giants fan, so he was always watching the game.

So by extension, I became a Giants fan early on.

So my fascination with football started with the Giants in the early 70s.

And I was aware at the time, I was a young kid at the time when this whole thing happened.

I knew that they were moving out of Yankee Stadium and they were playing at the yo bowl.

But I didn't really understand why.

I mean, I knew the Yankee Stadium was undergoing renovations and, and all that, but I thought it'd be fun to kind of go back in time, go back in history and find out, you know, pull, pull apart, you know, the reasons why they moved out of Yankee Stadium and why they ended, how they ended up in the Yobowl.

And you know, once I went back and looked at all the details and the stories and fans reactions, it was quite interesting to find out.

Exactly.

Whole, whole thing came about and you know, why they ended up there and you know, the aftermath as well.

Yeah.

You know, you talk about, you know, this team from the early 60s going to the Yield bowl, but, you know, the New York Giants have probably played for one NFL franchise, played probably in the most iconic stadiums of more than anybody else.

You know, Yankee Stadium, the Polo Grounds, and the Yale Bowl.

Now how did they end up getting to the Yale Bowl?

You know, it's a whole different state away.

It's around the bay.

I know it's like over an hour by training.

I've made that trip from New Haven to New York City.

How in the world did they end up there?

Yeah.

So pretty interesting backdrop to how, how it happened.

Up until, you know, after 63, the team took a nosedive and they were really bad, but the games kept selling out, the fans kept coming.

But, you know, even though they played at Yankee Stadium, they were always second fiddle to the Yankees.

And Yankee Stadium wasn't built for football, it was built for baseball.

The sight lines weren't favorable to football.

And as such, you know, none of the pre.

They have to play the preseason games away and the early, early games.

The NFL season had to be scheduled away because the Yankees always took precedent over that.

So that was sort of the backdrop.

And you know, Wellington Mara, the owner for the Giants, said, you know what, we got to give our fans a better experience to watching the games.

It's not fair to them.

And, and also they found a way to make more money as well.

So that was sort of the, the reason why they started to look at other places to move out of Yankee Stadium.

You can have a lot more seats.

You can own the stadium.

It'll be yours.

You don't have to share it within the team.

You can have the concessions, the parking.

And it was an offer too good to refuse, so.

And it made all the sense in the world.

So Wellington Marist said, yeah, okay, we're going to take that.

The mayor of the city of New York City, John Lindsey, at the time, he was furious because don't forget this time, it wasn't that long ago with New York had just lost the Dodgers from Brooklyn to la and the baseball Giants moved to San Francisco.

So Mayor Lindsay didn't want to be the guy that lost another team moving out of New York.

So he petitioned Pete Roselle, the commissioner, and said, no, I want them out of here now.

I want them evicted.

I want another team here.

I want them to take the NY logo off the helmet.

He was really upset.

Howard Kesel jumped in and said, yeah, you know, the Giants have been playing here since 56.

They've sold out every seat.

It's not fair that they, you know, they abandoned their fans.

So the, the city was really upset.

The media got involved and actually the commissioner of the league, Pete Roselle, chimed in and, you know, kind of talked everyone off the ledge, said, hey, listen, the Giants are going to be playing at Giant Stadium.

Yankee Stadium is 6.6 miles from Times Square.

Giants Stadium will be 6.9 miles from Times Square.

The same fans will have to have tickets.

Yankee Stadium will have tickets to the new to Giant Stadium.

And we'll get to see the same.

The games on the way, their way, games on tv.

So not, you know, nothing's changing.

It's going to be a better fan experience.

Well, that wasn't good enough for the mayor.

He was still upset.

He wanted thrown out.

The thing was, he couldn't throw them out because interestingly enough, in doing this research, I found out that the city didn't actually own the rights to the stadium.

Rice University, of all places, actually owned the rights to the Yankee Stadium.

So they couldn't kick him out at the time.

So that's sort of the backdrop and sort of the reasons why the Giants were, you know, we're looking to leave Yankee Stadium and, you know, ended up in, you know, New Jersey, but obviously New Jersey via Connecticut.

So sort of back to all that.

Yeah.

How did Rice University get the rights to Yankee Stadium?

Yeah, it's absolutely.

Yeah, it has to do with the Rice University and the Knights of Columbus and some legally stuff that's, you know, above my pay grade.

But it wasn't until I think it was 72 that the lease expired and then the city owned the stadium.

I think it's 72.

And at the time it was.

Yankee Stadium was in need of desperate repair because they had.

Sections of the stadium were falling apart and luckily no one got injured.

But desperate need of renovation.

So the city announced, you know, the city, the stadium was going to close in 73.

They want to shut it down for a couple of years and, you know, close it down for renovations.

Well, that kind of caught the Giants by surprise because they had honored.

They had agreed.

You know, they said they were going to move.

They were moving this new stadium.

You know, they were oasis in the, in the, in the.

In New Jersey in 75.

That's when they expected the new stadium to be built.

But they were going to honor their lease to play Yankee Stadium through 74.

Well, now that the city owned the lease, own the.

On the rights to the stadium.

I'm like, no, you're out of here.

We have to shut the place down because we have to renovate it.

So the Giants were scrambling like, well, okay, what are we going to do?

And so much so to the fact when this NFL released a schedule in early 73, when they, they didn't release where the.

They didn't announce where the Giants were playing their home games because Giants didn't know where they were going to play their home games.

They were, they had to scramble like they figured they're going to be at Yankee Stadium.

City was like, no, we're shutting down after, after two games.

After two games, you're going to have to find some place someplace else to play.

So that kind of set the wheels in motion.

And that's kind of why, you know, I came up with the header, you know, the New York Giants, a team not home.

And here they are.

They don't have a place to play their home game.

So they're thinking, okay, they're scrambling.

What are we going to do?

We're going to play our home games.

So that's, you know, and kind of how that came about.

Yeah, that's a great point.

They wanted the big city because they wanted to draw these crowds.

And now you have the biggest market city, Indian National Football League, going to a small town somewhat 60, 70, 80 miles away from.

80 Miles away.

Yeah, yeah.

Right, right.

Yeah.

So you kind of, yeah, that's the part that kind of, you know, I, I, One of the reasons why I wanted to go back in history and, and find out how the heck did they land in New Haven, Connecticut, of all places?

I mean, New York, no disrespect to New Haven, Connecticut, but New Haven, Connecticut, New York City, two vastly different places.

And interestingly enough, New Haven is almost equidistant.

Actually, Hartford is almost equidistant from Foxborough to New York City.

So, yeah, Connecticut, it's kind of a weird state because it's, you know, half Boston, half New York.

But, you know, after exploring several different other sites, I think they looked at a college stadium in New Jersey, a couple other places, and they settled on the Yellow bowl in New haven, which is 80 miles away because the crow flies.

And I think one of the reasons they landed on New Haven is because they had played some of their preseason games in New Haven, the Yellow bowl, particularly notably against the Jets.

Every year they had the annual preseason game against the jets in New Haven.

So they had a fan base there.

Connecticut.

Yeah, they kind of figured, okay, there's, there's some New York fans in New Haven.

So that's, that's pretty much why they landed in New Haven.

And plus, you know, they kind of backed against the wall.

They didn't have a lot of time to do a lot of research on this because they kind of came at the last minute because they were freaking, figuring they're going to play, you know, they're going on their lease and state Yankee Stadium through 74 and then move over the Giants game in 75.

And when the mayor came in and said, nope, you're out of here, and they were kind of, you know, you know, having to have to come up with something quick.

So Yale bowl kind of made the most sense for that reason.

So that's how I ended up in New Haven.

And to your point, to get to New Haven, you can get there by train, but, you know, a lot of the Giants fans lived in New Jersey, so it's a long ride.

You have to, you know, especially if you're taking the train, you gotta take your ride to.

You take the bus from New Jersey, the bus to, I guess it's what is It, Madison Square Garden, Penn Station, and then from Penn Station all the way to New Haven.

That's a long ride.

That's about.

Probably about two hours or so.

Two and a half hours to watch a team that wasn't very good.

So that.

That's the other part of it, too, you know, the fan.

The fan experience and all this.

And the interesting, interesting part too, is that, you know, they made the decision.

Yeah, we're going to play our home games at the Yield Bowl, New Haven, but they're going to keep their administrative offices in Manhattan.

And, oh, by the way, they're going to practice during the week at this high school stadium in Jersey City, New Jersey.

So what could go wrong with that flam?

Right?

Yeah.

And when you're talking about miles in a great metropolis like New York City, it's not like, you know, you can go 20 miles in 20 minutes.

It's.

Everything takes a lot longer to get than where I live, at least.

Yeah, right.

So we're gonna play.

We're gonna practice New Jersey City at a high school and keep our administrative offices in New York City.

And then for the home games, we're gonna take a bus from New York City and an hour and a half away and go to New Haven.

So not really a recipe for success.

And it's.

You look at it through that lens, it's no wonder why, you know, in the two years that they play at the Yobo, they won a grand total of one game.

But, you know, it's.

It's odd.

I.

About 15 years ago, I had my first experience.

I got.

I have.

My wife has family that lives in New Haven, and we traveled up there to visit.

And I said, you know, I'm gonna take a little field trip.

They were visiting.

I said, I'm Just take a couple hours.

I want to go see.

You know, I. I look at it as being almost ground zero for American football.

You know, Walter Camp was at Yale.

You know, a lot of the rules of football and the changes from rugby and soccer happened because of Yale.

Yale, folks.

So I said, I'm gonna go see the Yale Bowl.

I'm gonna go check it out.

So I went there and I'm looking around for.

I'm looking for this giant stadium.

You know, like, we think about stadiums, and I finally find signs for it.

And I get there, and this thing's only about maybe 20ft high.

It's sort of an earthen works.

You know, it's not.

It's buried in the ground.

It's a bowl in the ground.

That I, I never really experienced on any other, you know, major college sporting venue before.

So I can imagine the folks that were used to going to Yankee Stadium, you know, traveling to New Haven and getting on the campus of Yale and looking for the Jail bowl, and it's only 20ft high.

It's, you know, not very spectacular from the outside.

I've never been to the Yellow bowl, but I've, you know, obviously seen games there and just reading about, doing the research for this podcast, hearing about the fans experience about that, you know, for one thing, I don't know if this.

It's changed since then, but at the time, the Elbow didn't have stadium lights, so all the games had to be played at 1 o'.

Clock.

Not even no 4 o' clock games.

And forget about night games.

So all the games that we played at one o', clock, I think even in the, in the locker rooms there was a sign that said, go Beat Vassar or something like that.

You know, the team had to take a bus once they got, once they got to the stadium, then they had to take another bus to get from the gates to the, to the locker room.

The showers were really antiquated.

You know, really no security at all.

I know Bob Tucker was one of the, one of the better players on the team at the time.

He tells a story about.

He's on the sideline during the game and he said, there's no security.

Maybe one guy saying, no, you can't come down here.

And he's getting hounded by fans coming standing right next to him during the game, say, hey, can I get your chin strap?

Tucker says, you know, I'm going to need that during the game.

So maybe afterwards he's, you know, asking for chin straps and autographs.

Dirt while the game's going on.

So obviously different time back then, but that was sort of how things ran back then, you know, at the Yield Bowl.

It's, you know, built for Ivy League football.

Not, not regular season, professional football, preseason, you can get away with it, but regular season game kind of, you know, difficult to, to.

To, you know, to, to win under those conditions.

Yeah, I had, I.

About five years after my first time going there.

One of my wife's relatives became an assistant coach at Yale, and I had the chance on my next visit, we got to go there.

I got a tour of the facility.

And actually Yale doesn't even really dress at that stadium.

They have like a building on campus where they walk a couple hundred yards to go.

So the locker rooms there, you're Right.

I mean, Even, you know, 10 years ago when I was in there, they're just old cement walls with cracks in them.

And, you know, this tunnels are very antiquated.

You know, up till 10 years ago, I heard that they did do some renovations.

But I know in your podcast, you were quoting some people and they're talking about, you know, just being wooden planks as benches with numbers on them.

And that's the way it was when.

When I was there.

And, you know, it was a grass field when I was there, too.

I think now they put some newer turf in.

They put some new seating and.

And lights, like you said, in there.

But just in recent times, this was antiquated, and I can't even imagine the early 70s.

It had to be real bad for an NFL team to go there.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Just benches.

You know, someone said that one of the comments was, you know, they asked him, what do you remember is the yellow bowl?

And he said, pulling splinters out of my.

My, you know, backside.

The men's room.

The urinals weren't, like, they weren't attached to the stadium.

I guess they were separate.

And it was, you know, not even a urinals.

You had to go in a trough.

There was one guy that said the game he went to, and I remember watching this game was the last game of the 73 season.

They were playing the Vikings, and it just a miserable day was, you know, they had a nor' easter going there, and it's snow, rain, just a brutal day.

Giants were terrible that year.

The last game of the season.

And yeah, he says he's going to the urinal and the whole thing, the trough, just like, frozen.

It was like a frozen.

You know, you could go skating on it.

Oh, God.

And just imagine people slipping and falling, and you don't want to be touching the stuff you're falling on there, I'm sure.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Another guy said, you know, on the bus ride up there to get to the game, he said it took forever to get there, and people are talking about the.

The screwdrivers and the alcoholic drinks that they're making.

Another guy had passed out, and it was vomit coming out of his mouth.

So that's sort of the backdrop to, you know, I can't imagine, like, you're paying.

I don't know what the ticket prices were back then, but just the experience, you know, to go all that way just to watch a team that won a grand total.

Like I said, one game and then the two years to play it there.

And I read A comment and I think I put in my podcast, you know, Harvard would have been more welcome at Yale Stadium than the Giants were.

The one game they won was against the St. Louis Cardinals who were playing with their third string quarterback.

Jim Hart was injured, he was their first string quarterback.

So they're down to third string quarterback.

And I think there were without five other starters on the team.

So Jim Hart probably learned that he had to be the starter there.

He probably hurt himself at home or something.

Probably.

So that was the only home game they won in.

73.

They beat the Cardinals.

74.

The Giants tried to get a little bit better.

They traded for Craig Morton, gave up King's Ransom to get them.

They gave up their number one draft pick, which then turned out to be Danny.

Randy White play for the Cowboys, pretty good player.

So.

So they got Craig Martin the team and.

And they.

Alex Webster was the coach in 73.

He.

Well, I think he resigned, but he was going to get fired anyway.

So they got a new coach, Bill Orangebarger who came over from the Dolphins.

He was the defensive coordinator for the Dolphins.

He comes over the Giants and they play a little bit better.

Defensively they're much better, but offensively, just terrible.

Is that the year that they, they got Zonka too, when he came out.

Of the World Football League, sonica came in 76.

76.

Okay.

Yeah, 76.

He came.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I was just trying to put the Miami connection there with the defensive coordinator.

Came in 76.

And I think he.

76.

77.

78.

I think he left after the.

The fumble of Meadowlands.

Yeah, right.

Which you know, of course he was part of that play.

Yeah.

So 74.

So let me go back just a little bit.

So 73.

The first game at the Yale bowl was against the packers and saw a crowd, actually.

They like the capacities of 74,000.

70,000.

Actually had more than I think they had 74,000.

The first game at the Yobo against the packers, it's a tight game and comes down at the end and packers win on a game winning field goal by Chester Mark Holt.

And fans are pretty upset.

They're throwing things at the Giants bus, they're throwing drinks at the starting Giants bus.

And they're asking the coach about the game, Alex Webster.

And he said, the coach, what do you think about playing at the elbow?

And he said, well, you know, it wasn't bad, but to be honest with you, it kind of felt like an away game.

And a couple other players the same thing.

It felt like an away game.

And why not?

Because, you know, it's not New York City, it's New Haven, so.

But, well, the good thing for New York fans, if they were used to watching at Yankee Stadium, and like you said earlier, you know, they had some.

Some poor visibility of watching a football game in a baseball stadium, the Yale bowl is, like, almost like a perfect oval that goes all the way around the field, so.

Right.

Pretty good views, I think.

I've never watched a game there, but I just walking around the stadium, it looks like it'd be a great place to watch a ball game.

Yeah.

And if you were in New Haven, if you were in that, you know, area, it's obviously much easier to go there and catch a game there as opposed to, you know, having to travel into the city.

And I know.

I spoke with a couple of other guys about the podcast, and he said some of the players stayed at a local motel, like, right up the street from them.

They could see.

They think he ran into one of the Redskins players, Charlie Taylor, and he said he asked him for a pack of cigarettes.

So different time then.

You get players a lot more accessible, especially in a small town like that.

You know, it's not like playing in New York City.

Yeah.

Maybe Charlie Taylor was getting a pack of cigarettes to smoke with Len Dawson of the Chiefs, who.

A famous picture of him catching a smoke on the sidelines in between plays or something.

That's right.

Totally different era.

Yep.

For sure.

Yeah.

Wow.

Fascinating times, for sure.

So you have some other.

You have another podcast.

You said that was your first.

Now you have another podcast that's out recently.

Maybe we can talk a little bit more in detail, maybe on another episode, but why don't you give folks a little bit about what that is and where they can find that?

Yeah, yeah.

So again, you can find that.

The Patriots from Boston to Foxborough, you can find that on the class on the Sports History Network.

1960, From their time in Boston and then the first few years in Foxborough.

And I have to thank you for putting me in touch with Upton Bell.

So I got the chance to speak with him on a couple of occasions and get his insight into what it was like being the general manager for the team at that time zone.

He'd come from the Colts.

He was the scout of the leads.

I think he started out as a scout for the Colts, and then he was assistant GM the Colts, and he came over the Pat.

Pat.

The Colts had won The Super, Super Bowl 5, they beat the Cowboys.

And he got hired as the general manager for the Patriots and was the youngest general manager of the league at the time.

And he told me when he got hired and he moved, went to Foxborough, people were asking like, why would you want to go there?

Just leave the team that just won the super bowl to a team that was one of the worst teams in the league.

Stephanie.

They, I think they won two games that year.

And so he goes to Foxborough.

And I thought it'd be interesting to go back in time to see what that time period was like.

You know, Pats this weekend notwithstanding, sort of now looked at as sort of one model franchises of the league.

But back then it was constant turmoil.

Got it.

Had his finger in everything.

And people in Washington and Dallas can probably tell you about those kind of stories.

Yes, yes, yes.

He was one of the first to do it.

I mean, cycle through coaches pretty, pretty frequently.

You know, one of the funny stories.

Well, not funny the New England fans, but they had a chance in right after the jets won Super Bowl 3.

You know, the super bowl teams, the coordinators, offensive coordinators, defensive coordinators are always the hot commodity for coaching gigs.

So the Pats needed a head coach and you know, they had a chance.

They interviewed the coach for the defensive coordinator for the Colts, who, I can see his face, but he went on coach the Steelers and the offensive courier.

For the Jets, Chuck Knowles, who you're talking?

Yeah, Chuck Noel.

Thank you.

So they had a chance to hire Chuck Noel, you know, defensive career for the, for the jets, for the Colts.

And then they are hired the guy, the offense of coordinator for the jets.

And Billy Sullivan thought, well, this will play better if I hire the offensive career for the team that won the super bowl first.

The team instead of getting the coordinator for that lost the Super Bowl.

That'll play much better at home.

Well, you know, that'll go down as one of the biggest coaching administrative blunders of all time.

So the higher, you know, like the, the offense recorded for the, for the jets and he was just a disaster.

Lasted two years.

And you know, Chuck Noel goes on to win what, four Super Bowls in Pittsburgh and one of the, one of the best coaches, greatest coaches of all time.

Well, he had a 1 in 13 season.

I think his first year he was.

Well, yeah, he did, but, you know, you gotta start somewhere.

I think Jimmy Johnson won one game his year as a coach of the Cowboys.

That's true.

So.

Yep.

So you got to start somewhere.

So that was sort of symbolic of how the Pats were operated those days, you know, so up and bell kind of gave me a lot of insight to his time there.

And, you know, you've talked to him a lot of funny stories.

So I thought it was interesting to kind of go back time to.

To see what that was like and those early years in Foxborough and, you know, it wasn't really until Chuck Fairbanks came on in 73, where he brought stability to the team and, you know, some coaching presence.

And they.

They drafted John Hannah, Steve Grogan, Stanley Morgan and those guys, and they finally got some success.

And that sort of set the foundation for the.

For the years later on when, you know, parcels came on and then Belichick and kind of where they are now.

But yeah, for the.

For a long time.

And again, they were.

They were homeless as well.

They played through, you know, they started playing their games at Boston University in Nickerson Field, and then they went to Fenway park for several years.

Fenway park, believe it or not.

Then they played at Boston College for a year or two, and then they played at Harvard for a year or two and then they ended up in Fox Girls.

They will get with Foxborough, finally have a place of her own.

And Foxborough was kind of like the Yield Bowl.

A lot of benches, not very many seats.

It barely met the code for the league.

Had a mandate that the stadiums had to have 55,000 seats or more to pass the mustard, and they barely met that.

And there were all kinds of problems their first year when they opened the stadium.

That pretty funny.

And that's kind of wild to think about that that stuff actually happened to a professional football team.

But that's how it was run.

It was.

It was like the clowns, like the clown car thing, you know, it was pretty funny.

Yeah, I'll bet.

Yeah.

All right, folks.

Joe, we, you know, appreciate you coming on here and sharing these stories.

We appreciate you preserving football history with your podcast.

And do you have anything like in the works?

Maybe you want to give us a tease that maybe we can look forward to hearing from you soon.

Yeah.

So, you know, obviously a big history buff and like you say, all about preserving NFL history.

I don't have anything definitive right now in the works, but I got some ideas that I've kind of kicking around and, you know, when I get more information on that and get a better idea of exactly which direction I'm going to go, and I'll let you know.

Fair enough.

Fair enough.

I didn't mean to put you on the spot, so.

No, that's fine.

That's fair.

I've got some ideas in my head, but not exactly sure where I'm going to land.

And I've talked with Scott about maybe he and I tag teaming on a potential podcast as well because he's a big history NFL history guy as well.

So yeah, of course he's talking about Scott Perry, Professor Perry, that you hear here on many Fridays coming on Pigskin Dispatch to talk about some various NFL teams.

So that'll be a an interesting show as well when teamed up with Joe.

So that'd be some great stuff.

Stay tuned for that and some more of Joe's work on Sports History Network and we'll try to give you some highlights here when we we have some news and Joe breaks it to us.

So we'll get you tuned into that as well.

Joe, we really appreciate you coming on here and sharing all this about, you know, the Giants without a home, the Patriots looking for a home with your podcast and with us today.

And I'd love to talk to you again real soon.

Great.

Thanks for having me on.

Darren was a pro.

It was a pleasure.

I enjoyed it.

Hope to talk to you again real soon.