The Mercedes Benz Superdome: Really?

New Orleans Superdome

((ht: nola.com))

Well, I guess it helps to have somebody to pay you money to put their name on your stadium. So you can't fault the fine folks in New Orleans for that.

For the next 10-years the Superdome in New Orleans will have a sponsor name in front of it. Mercedes Benz and the Saints agreed on the deal which will also get the state of Louisiana out of their obligation to pay subsidies for the team to live out their 15-year lease at the Dome.

And yes, hosting this years BCS Championship game, the 2012 Final Four and the 2013 Super Bowl certainly helped move this along.

Read the full story from NOLA.com RIGHT HERE

Falcons/Saints 2006/Courtesy: me

We are genuinely glad to see that the city has all but completed its re-birth from 2005. Yes, we still remember the pictures of the Dome after Hurricane Katrina. For that matter, we can still picture the 1st game back at the Dome when the Saints played the Falcons in 2006 (I was there). 

While this is a good thing for the state, the city and the team, we still don't get the whole "Stadium Naming Rights" thing. It must make money for these "Mega-Companies" or they wouldn't do it...we think. It just bothers us (yes, political/economic rant) that so many of these "Mega-Conglomerates" are adding fees and additional charges to basic services (see: bank of america) in the name of keeping up their profit margin, all the while paying millions of dollars a year to have signage put on stadiums.

We generally try and avoid using corporate names for events and stadiums here at OSG HQ and we'll continue that practice. It may be a bit "Don Quixotie-ish"--but we'll ask you this: How many of you will change the name of a place you've been going to all your life just because a sponsor added their name to it?

Yeah...thought so..

Check out this cool timelapse of the field being installed back in 2006 before the return game: