How does fan behavior affect
a professional football franchise?
Of course we've all heard
the stories when the Philly fans peppered Santa with snowballs. Almost all of
us have seen the footage of Sam Wyche chastising the Bengal fans in a 1989 game
against the Seahawks.
During a game in December
1989 against Seattle, Bengals fans -- unhappy with the officials -- started
throwing snowballs and beer bottles onto the field. Wyche took the public address
microphone and admonished them, saying memorably, "You
don't live in Cleveland, you live in Cincinnati!"
That was the scene 20 years
ago.
The event has slid into
the annals of forgotten football lore. If those comments were made against a
media darling like the Cowboys or Redskins the footage would be played almost
daily on the ESPN media machine.
Over the past 20 years,
we've heard horror stories about fan behavior in certain stadiums around the
league. Oakland is infamous. Philadelphia has had to install a courthouse in
the basement of Lincoln financial field to quickly attend to overzealous fans.
The topic of bad fan behavior
has been discussed ad nauseum as of late (as proven by the latest mandate from
NFL Commissioner Roger Goddell). Everyone understands that there are certain
bad elements in every fan base. The nature of every NFL fan is to engage in
heavy ribbing against an opposing fan, but it is a rare occurrence when those
altercations become physical.
More often than not, when
there is an altercation in a stadium where home team fans are against a visiting
fan, level headed locals step in to stop any perceived physical threat.
You may be wondering why
this is suddenly a topic for discussion. After all, there have been no reports
of noteworthy violent fan behavior so far in this young NFL season.
In this age of Instant Internet
Gratification, it is easy to type out your thoughts in real-time and to engage
in mostly friendly "smack talk" with fans of the current week's opponent.
Most of the time all of this talk is taken and responded to in jest.
An event last week may have
changed the scope of so called "smack talk" forever.
The internet was buzzed
last week when a person who claimed to be a Seahawk fan took it upon himself
to try to fire up the Seahawk fan base by poking fun of the New York Giant fan
base by referring to 9/11.
I will not link to those
incredibly tasteless comments, as most of you have probably read them already.
If you have not read them, don't go look. It would be a waste of your time.
And it will make you very upset.
I have had some interaction
with Giant fans over the past few days since those sick comments have been posted
for the world to see. I'd like to state for the record that I've developed the
utmost respect for their fan base as they understand that one sick person can
never speak for the legion of fans that were sickened by those despicable, disgusting
words.
Every fan base can provide
a fine example of knuckle-headedness, but to post it online for the world to
see like this particular Seahawk fan did is beyond forgiveness.
On behalf of the entire
Seattle Seahawk family, I'd like to offer my sincerest apologies to everyone
that had the misfortune to read what one wayward fan wrote.
Back to the original question....
How does fan behavior affect
a professional football franchise?
Individually, it has little
to no effect whatsoever. It is not news worthy when single fans who have had
too much to drink get kicked out of the stadium. That happens in every single
NFL stadium every single Sunday.
Collectively though, a fan
base can make a huge difference on the short and long term fortunes of a franchise.
67,000 screaming fans on
a Sunday in Seattle have proven that time and time again.
Let's ignore the bigotry,
racism, sexism, and general ineptitude of single individuals that choose to
root for a particular team. We all know that the vast majority of all NFL fans
are good and decent people who would rather lend a helping hand than to make
fun of those who suffer.
I do know this.
9/11 and pro football should
never, ever be discussed in the same sentence ever again. On that day.... we
were all fans of New York.
Mark Salois is known
to NET Nation as acer1240. If you would like to drop Mark an email, you can
do so at: saloisd@mtintouch.net