I’m here to tell you that Philadelphia’s sports fans’ bad reputation is wrong and undeserved.
Confession: I am a huge fan of all four Philly teams. Even so, I have never lived there, so I have a distant perspective.
I’m sure you’ve heard this narrative hundreds of times, as it gets brought up every time any little thing happens at a sporting event in Philadelphia. But in reality, every team and city has its crazy fans that take things too far and go a bit out of control. It’s only when incidents happen in Philly that the national media picks up on the story, because it fits into the stereotype of the boorish Philly fans.
First, let’s address the infamous Santa Claus incident. On one fateful day — Dec. 15, 1968, to be exact — the Philadelphia Eagles planned a Christmas halftime show for the fans who showed up to watch their 2-11 team. The snowy weather prevented the planned parade from happening. Instead, the event was reduced to a 20-year-old kid named Frank Olivo dressed as St. Nick in between two columns of cheerleaders.
As he walked on, Olivo was greeted by a shower of boos and snowballs as the fans vented their frustration with their pathetic team onto the hapless Santa. It is this act that is brought up whenever Philly fans are crucified as the most despicable thing, the thing that only those Philly fans would do.
Did Olivo deserve to get booed and snowballed? Probably not. It was the new owners and general managers who were at fault for the team’s problems. Olivo was just a scapegoat for the team’s rapid decline from the classic 1960 championship team to a joke of a franchise after an early-1960s, post-championship ownership change. The unfortunate Santa Claus with a terrible beard was an easy target.
But all Howard Cosell showed on his national football show was footage of snowballs being thrown at Santa, and thus the myth of the terrible Philly fan was born. Cosell, of course, neglected to mention that 54,000 fans showed up to watch their team — which ended up losing to fall to 2-12 on the season — in the freezing cold and snow.
Today, whenever any small incident happens in Philadelphia, the national media cannot resist bringing up the snowball Santa incident, even though it happened more than 40 years ago. Even Olivo himself says now that he thought the whole thing was funny.
The second big myth about Philly fans is that they boo their players out of town. I’m not going to say that Philly is an easy town to play in, but I can tell you one thing: Love earned in Philly will last your entire life. Just ask any member of the 1970s Flyers teams — the infamous Broad Street Bullies. Even today, they never have to buy a drink in their hometown. They came in unloved and unwanted — some thought that a soccer team would do better in Philadelphia than a hockey team — and seven years later they were champions and the city’s darlings.
Because Philly teams have never had much success — no city has been as tormented — teams that do succeed are all the more cherished by the city. The same thing has happened with the recent Phillies teams; they will be remembered for years because of their World Series victory in 2008.
On the other hand, Philly teams or players that do not try will hear about it from the crowd. Sometimes they can be a bit harsh, it’s true, but most of the time, the booing is not without cause. Fans have a right to boo players if they are underperforming: After all, they are the ones paying for the players’ exorbitant contracts.
I will not deny that there are some fans, like Matthew Clemmens, an overweight 21-year-old who purposely vomited on a child, who go too far. What I will say is this: The behavior I see at Philly sports games is never any worse than what I see when I go to games in New York or Boston. Incidents happen there as well, but the national media just doesn’t pick up on them. There are a few bad apples in Philly, but there are similar people in every other city.
Most of the fights or incidents that happened in Philly have occurred because fans of the opposing team start trash-talking. While a bit of trash-talking isn’t necessarily a bad thing, those fans of opposing teams should know not to run their mouths too much when away from home. I find it hard to believe that fans of away teams who do not talk or cheer excessively would have a bad time at any game in Philly.
Unfortunately, the national media’s obsession with painting Philadelphia as a terrible sports town will probably prevent the truth from coming out, but all rational Philly fans will agree with me that it’s not really as bad as they say. You won’t get a welcome with open arms, but you won’t be hurt, or vomited on, either.
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