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Look, I'm not going to argue. I understand what you're saying, and yes, in terms of wind velocity at US landfall, Sandy was Category 1, which is obviously not "major" when you consider the wind velocity of a Cat4 or Cat5 storm.

I'm only pointing out that "major" is a matter of your units of measure. Consider this as an alternate metric for "major". This is from Wikipedia:

Hurricane Sandy was the deadliest and most destructive hurricane of the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season, and the second-costliest hurricane in United States history... While it was a Category 2 storm off the coast of the Northeastern United States, the storm became the largest Atlantic hurricane on record (as measured by diameter, with winds spanning 1,100 miles (1,800 km)). Estimates as of May 2013 assessed damage to have been over $68 billion (2013 USD), a total surpassed only by Hurricane Katrina. At least 233 people were killed along the path of the storm in eight countries.

Sandy was clearly "major" in size, and in cost (in dollars, and in human lives). And I can tell you from personal experience that it had a devastating effect on a good part of the Eastern US seaboard.

So we agree that wind velocity at landfall is important, but IMO it is not the only important unit of measure. NOAA can still kiss my a$$.