First step taken to hold 2010 Super Bowl in New York

KAPALUA, Hawaii -- New York moved a step closer to getting the 2010 Super Bowl on Tuesday when an NFL committee approved the Jets' bid to get the game -- contingent on the construction of a new stadium on the West Side of Manhattan.\nThe approval by the league's Super Bowl advisory committee came a day after the Jets upped their bid for the rights to build on the land to $720 million, surpassing the $700 million from an energy company and the $600 million from Cablevision, which owns Madison Square Garden. The Dolan family, which owns Cablevision, has been in a bitter fight to block construction of the stadium.\nThe Jets initiated the move to get the 2010 game at this meeting, hoping it would help their chances of building the stadium. But whether it will be built is still a major question -- the city and state support it, but numerous political groups in New York oppose it.\n"It's a great step for New York, but the final step is tomorrow," Jets owner Woody Johnson said of the Super Bowl bid. "I hate to prejudge what the guys might do. But today is a good sign."\nCommissioner Paul Tagliabue, who has supported a Super Bowl in New York since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, backed the bid. League owners are expected to approve it on Wednesday, contingent on the stadium being built. The 2009 Super Bowl has not yet been awarded. Atlanta, Miami, Houston and Tampa are bidding for the game, which is expected to be awarded at meetings this spring.\nThe Jets, who currently play at Giants Stadium in New Jersey, have committed $800 million for the stadium project, with the city and state required to raise the rest of what is expected to be a $1.7 billion total.\nMeanwhile, the owners continued to debate the labor negotiations that are essentially three sided -- between the league and the players' union on one side and among the "have" and "have-not" owners on the other. There are some low-revenue teams that would like what amounts to a luxury tax on teams with considerable outside revenues for the pool that will eventually go to the players.\nTagliabue said Monday he would consider holding a special league meeting on April 19 if he could make progress in talks. NFLPA executive director Gene Upshaw, who is vacationing in Hawaii, said Monday that Tagliabue had contacted him about meeting here this week, although there was no indication there had been any talks on Tuesday.\nDallas' Jerry Jones, one of the leaders of the high-revenue group, said after Tuesday's owners session that there had been a lot of discussion of the subject.\n"We share more revenue than any sport ever has and it's been very successful," Jones said. "Players have benefited substantially from the system we have now."\nAs for the New York Super Bowl, NFL rules require that a championship game site has to be used by a team for two seasons before the game is played -- a rule that is expected to be waived for this bid because the new stadium with a retractable roof won't be ready until the 2009 season.\nThe $720 million bid by the Jets was made to the Metropolitan Transit Authority, which owns the railroad yards that would be the main site for the stadium. It is adjacent to the Javits Convention Center and three blocks west of Madison Square Garden.\nJohnson would not comment on bid details, referring all inquiries to the MTA.\nMTA officials said they received five offers for the property before bidding ended Monday, but two bidders were immediately disqualified. The MTA hopes to decide by March 31.\nA third bidder, TransGas Energy Systems LLC, previously made the highest bid, but the deal has several contingencies and would be the most complicated.\nThe city also hopes the stadium will help it land the 2012 Summer Olympics. New York is bidding against Paris, London, Madrid and Moscow, with the International Olympic Committee due to select the site on July 6.