Closing
By the late 1990s, Foxboro Stadium had become functionally obsolete by modern NFL standards. The facility was built cheaply as a "bare bones" stadium and had very few modern amenities. It also lacked luxury boxes, a major source of revenue for other teams in the league, and most patrons had to sit on backless aluminum benches as only a small fraction of the stadium had actual seats (painted blue, red, and white near the 50-yard line). With a capacity of just over 60,000, it was one of the smallest stadiums in the NFL.
After 31 NFL seasons, Foxboro Stadium was demolished in January 2002, after the conclusion of the 2001 season (in which the Patriots won their first Super Bowl). The last game played in the stadium — "The Snow Bowl" — was played in a snow storm; a Patriots win against the Oakland Raiders, which famously featured an overturned fumble call based on the tuck rule in the final minutes. The stadium's former site became the parking lots of its successor, Gillette Stadium, before being developed into the open-air shopping center Patriot Place.
Read more about this topic: Foxboro Stadium
Famous quotes containing the word closing:
“Our two eyes do not make our lot better; one serves us to see the good things, the other the evils of life. A lot of people have the bad habit of closing the first, and very few close the second.”
—Voltaire [François Marie Arouet] (1694–1778)
“It is closing time in the gardens of the West and from now on an artist will be judged only by the resonance of his solitude or the quality of his despair.”
—Cyril Connolly (1903–1974)
“We got to start thinking beyond our guns. These days are closing fast.”
—Walon Green, U.S. screenwriter, and Sam Peckinpaugh (b. 1925)