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should have, but what must it have?

I'm saying some type of bread to keep your fingers somewhat clean from whatever is in the bread

No. Not a sandwich. A sandwich should have:

- Sliced bread from a loaf
- cured or prepared meat
- a crunchy vegetable, preferably pickled
- a creamy spread and/or cheese

So a peanut butter and jelly sandwich is not a sandwich?

A grilled cheese sandwich is not a sandwich?

I think when a thing becomes enough of its own thing it can be considered not that other thing.

So although a hamburger meets many definitions of a sandwich, it is its own thing, and therefore not a sandwich.

If you said, "Hey, we're having sandwiches brought in for lunch today" and what is brought in is in fact a bunch of hamburgers, that would be surprising and confusing.

If you said, "Hey we're going out for lunch today, we'll go grab some sandwiches" then I'd assume you're going to hit a deli or Subway or Jersey Mikes, I would definitely not assume you were going to Five Guys or McDonald's for burgers.

This gets to it. Trying to come up with rigid "classification" criteria misses the point. The reason we have words in a language is to facilitate the exchange of information.

Your goal when communicating should be to use language that limits the likelihood that you will be misunderstood.

Sure, you can say a burger, or a hot dog, or a taco, is a sandwich. But if you say "let's have sandwiches" and a plate of tacos shows up, you didn't use as clear of a word to get your point across that you could. Granted, I'm not gonna be mad; tacos are delicious. But I will be confused. 

And when someone says you need a "protein" between bread to make it a sandwich, well, wheat has protein. So by that definition you could stick a slice of bread between two slices of bread and call it a sandwich. But that's not how we use the term "protein"--we typically use it to express the concept that meat, poultry, or fish is involved. 

So the entire debate is pointless IMHO. A burger might technically be a sandwich, but there is a better word to describe it than sandwich; call it a burger. 

Definitions from Oxford Languages · 
sand·wich
noun
an item of food consisting of two pieces of bread with meat, cheese, or other filling between them, eaten as a light meal.
"a ham sandwich"

Nope. It is a grilled cheese and a PB and J.

"Do you want a sandwich?"
"What ya got?"
"Well, PB&J."
"Sure."

----

"Do you want a sandwich?"
"What ya got?"
"Well, not much, but I can make a grilled cheese."
"Sure."

----

"Do you want a sandwich?"
"What ya got?"
"I was thinking cheeseburger."
"Umm... I mean yeah, but if you were gonna make burgers why didn't you say so?"

Hey man, I haven't been to Philadelphia in forever.  Let's go to Geno's and get a Philly cheesesteak sandwich!

Uh, why?  Geno's doesn't make sandwiches.

So the entire debate is pointless IMHO. A burger might technically be a sandwich, but there is a better word to describe it than sandwich; call it a burger.

Well of course.  That's why I brought it up as an offseason topic.  It's just a silly and amusing debate.

This gets to it. Trying to come up with rigid "classification" criteria misses the point. The reason we have words in a language is to facilitate the exchange of information.

Your goal when communicating should be to use language that limits the likelihood that you will be misunderstood.

And unsurprisingly, you cut quickly to my main point.  On the B12 board in the State Fair Foods thread, CD and I were discussing what makes a taco, a taco.  And it got me thinking about the larger point of definitions and specificity of language.

Incidentally, my definition of a taco was:

A taco must consist of some kind of filling, within a tortilla. The tortilla can be flour or corn, and it can be soft or hard-fried.