When Salazar ran 2:08.13 in 1981, EVERYone in the world, including the former WR holder, agreed that time was the WR, and better than Derek Clayton's time from the late 60s.
I don't think either of those courses (NYC, Antwerp) fit whatever bizarro IAAF rule about distance from start/finish.
And yeah, wind, whatever. Until the other day, Boston was a slow course ...
So sure, the course was a bit easier because of the wind.
But anyone who can't see that the pancake courses like Rotterdam are already every bit as ridiculous as the supposed 'all downhill' course some are imagining, they're already a lost cause.
Check out the first year of the Fifth Avenue Mile. Maree ran a WR, but nobody really treated it that way. That course is all downhill, etc., and that wasn't a track (I thought tracks were supposed to be faster?).
Bottom line here: Boston is what Boston has always basically been. It was windy when Rodgers did his first AR in 75, and it was windy Monday. The course is still a bitch, though. Mutai would have still run a WR Monday, had he been on Berlin. Deal with it, celebrate it. Someone's going under 2:03 soon anyway, now that this door is open.