By scheduling a game on a winter night in Buffalo, the NFL declares war on its most loyal fans

Twice, I've attended games of the ill-fated-but-earnest Buffalo Bills football team, the truest sports analogy for upstate New York. Both were afternoon games in December. I wore heavy coats, thermal boots and long underwear. Both times, I froze my ass - I mean - shivering, shaking, taking refuge in the piss-heated restrooms. I don't remember the games at all. I just remember the cold.  

In Bills games, there are moments when you might think the crowd is doing The Wave. A spontaneous roar shakes the stadium, untethered to the game. It is the collective shrieks of people reacting to a gust of wind, which whips across the field and freezes the beer in your bladder. People scream, literally, in pain. 

Then, if you're from Syracuse - and I know many who make the pilgrimage - comes a two-hour ride home on the NY State Thruway, the worst place on earth to be caught in a snowstorm. I've been there. There is no whiteout quite like a whiteout at night. A while back, I was an embedded reporter with the 10th Mountain Division during the war in Iraq. The guys in the 171 Cavalry would ask if I was scared. I always gave the same answer: No, I've been on the NY State Thruway during a blizzard, and this is nothing. They thought I was joking. Honestly, I wasn't...   

Tonight, upstate New York will watch the Bills play the hated - no, make that "despised" - New England Patriots, who once defined "cheating," at least before the Houston Astros entered the chat. The TV networks will regale us with shots of coatless young men with painted bellies - why paint your belly if you don't plan to take off your coat? - mugging for the lens. Just point the camera, and the fans will comply. It's a proud tradition.

Tonight, by the 8:15 kickoff, the temperature at Highmark Stadium will hit the single digits. By halftime, the wind-chill factor will plummet well into the minus-teens.  It will fall all night. The players will use on-field heaters. The fans will have nothing. 

And I must break from our regular Yankee discourse to ask one question:

How the fuck can the NFL do this to its fans?

What kind of rancidly evil corporation not only forces employees to work in dangerous conditions but - worse - threatens the health of its most loyal customers? 

The saddest part of this is that today will be a glorious winter afternoon across upstate New York - sunny, a slight wind, and, yes, brutally cold. Still, a great day for football.

Why in hell do they subject fans to a night game? 

Of course, we all know why: Ratings, advertising, TV money. It's fun to watch the spectacle of people freezing.

But if anybody suffers hypothermia, or frostbite, or worse, I hope they - or their families - sue the living hell out of the NFL.