The Boston Bruins just played in this year's version of the Winter Classic, the NHL's annual outdoor game. The game was played at Gillette Stadium, home of the New England Patriots, and was watched by more than 67,000 people who were in attendance. That type of spectacle for a regular season game is something that might be intriguing for the NBA and the Boston Celtics are considering doing a similar type of outdoor game at Fenway Park in the future, according to Adam Himmelsbach of the Boston Globe.
Celtics head coach Brad Stevens mentioned that he had heard whispers of an outdoor game potentially coming to Boston for the Celtics and it seems like it is actually a realistic possibility. An outdoor game will not be happening anytime soon as there are a lot of things to be worked out but Celtics president Rich Gotham thinks it is at least worth considering.
"I've gotten into it. I really do like the idea. I think if you can find a way to sort of differentiate the game and make it fun for fans, that's a great thing. And the Winter Classic certainly does that. Even when Fenway stages certain events, like football games, it just makes it more special for people involved and the fans. I think if you can do it, great. At the same time, my job requires me to be pragmatic, so you'd need to look at the hurdles," said Gotham.
Gotham and Boston Red Sox president Sam Kennedy have had preliminary discussions about the Celtics playing at Fenway in recent years but have a lot of obstacles to overcome in order to make it happen. The main obstacle to overcome is the weather as the majority of the NBA season takes place in the winter and it gets very cold in Boston during the winter.
Scheduling could also be a problem as the most practical times for this to happen for the Celtics would be April or October and at those times the Red Sox will either be getting their season started or potentially playing postseason baseball. The most logical option would be to have a preseason game outdoors as a test run but Gotham said that would not be as interesting to fans.
A regular season NBA game has never been played outdoors but the Phoenix Suns did play preseason games outdoors from 2008-2010 in Palm Springs, California. Palm Springs is quite different weather-wise than Boston is though. From 2011-2012 four college basketball games were played outdoors on aircraft carriers but almost every outdoor game in college basketball has run into issues with condensation on the floor, making for a very dangerous game.
The idea of playing an NBA game outside is a very interesting and exciting one but it may not be practical. The Celtics seem like they will do everything they can to make it happen at some point but for now it may be nothing more than a pipedream.
