Chicago vs. Philly

I apologize for the extremely long gap in between posts. It’s not that I don’t have anything going on. In fact, the last couple of weeks have been pretty eventful for me. These things are still in progress, however, so I’ll wait to elaborate further until everything’s in place.

What I will tell you is that things are changing. One example, my lead for the past 10 months or so, Blake Christenson, is leaving us tomorrow for Carbondale, Illinois. After seeing him almost every day in that period, it will be hard to imagine that after tomorrow, he won’t be there.

His departure comes on the eve of Game 1 in the Stanley Cup Finals, which his beloved Chicago Blackhawks are taking part in. They’re playing the Philadelphia Flyers in what’s sure to be a fascinating series, if not for the matchup itself (Blackhawks were the second seed in the Western Conference, while Philadelphia was seeded seventh), certainly for the two cities involved.

I’ve been looking over posts at one of the Chicago Tribune’s sites, and notice an awful lot of trash talking between Chicago fans and Philly fans, who seem to have infiltrated the message boards. To people who follow sports closely, this shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, as both the Windy City and the City of Brotherly Love are very passionate about their teams.

Perhaps a little too passionate. No doubt you’ve read stories about fans from each city being obnoxious and doing things they shouldn’t. There was the Santa Claus incident during an Eagles game some time back, which I believe I discussed in an earlier post.

But more recently, there’s been the fan who intentionally vomited on someone during a Phillies game (that’s just nasty) and a reporter from a Montreal newspaper who returned to his car after the recent Eastern Conference Finals to find it had been messed with.

Chicago has also had its moments, perhaps the most notable being Disco Demolition Night. For those not familiar, it was a promotional stunt held in the middle of a 1979 doubleheader between the White Sox and Detroit Tigers at the old Comiskey Park in which a local radio station blew up disco records. Fans immediately rushed the field and caused so much commotion and destruction, the White Sox had to forfeit the second game.

In the last few years, members of the Los Angeles Dodgers got into a brawl with Cubs fans at Wrigley Field after a Dodgers player “was allegedly punched in the head and had his hat taken from him.”

There’s also the father-son pair who ran onto the field at U.S. Cellular Field and took out the first-base coach for the Kansas City Royals. Finally, last year at the Friendly Confines, a fan deliberately spilled beer on Shane Victorino of none other than the Phillies while the outfielder was in the process of catching a fly ball.

I’ve gotten to attend sporting events in both cities. I like Wrigley Field at the neighborhood surrounding it a lot, and I enjoyed my visit to Citizens Bank Park last summer (the Phillies house staff is one of the best in baseball, if you ask me). I did notice some fans acting up in each venue, though.

At Wrigley, we ended up seating next to this 20-something guy who came to the ballpark with his friend. I don’t remember his friend saying much, but the kid complained about Derrek Lee, dipped a dollar bill meant for someone else into a cup of beer during a beer-money exchange and called a red-haired kid wearing a St. Louis Cardinals shirt “ginger”. Not very nice, if you ask me.

Of course, the Cubs weren’t playing the Cardinals that night, they had San Diego. When I went to see the Phillies, it was the Pirates in town, and I seem to recall Philly fans getting into a verbal match with a guy from Pittsburgh.

I don’t remember what the Philly fans said about the city on the other side of Pennsylvania, but the Pittsburgh guy had a comeback, something about winning the Super Bowl. In the modern NFL era, the Pittsburgh Steelers have six Super Bowl wins, the most of any team. The Eagles, meanwhile, have not won a Super Bowl.

I’ve made it a rule not to pay attention to ESPN outside of live sporting events anymore, so I don’t know whether they’ve posed the question “which town has the worse fans: Chicago or Philadelphia?” on one of their shows or not. I wouldn’t be surprised if they did.

After careful consideration, I think it’s a question that’s better left unanswered. I’ve made arguments for both cities. As disgusting as I find the vomiting act, is it really any worse than running onto the field and hitting a coach who was just minding his own business?

It’s also foolish to think that this type of behavior couldn’t happen anywhere else outside of Chicago and Philadelphia. Just about anywhere you go, you’ll find a lot of friendly people mixed in with a small handful of people who I don’t want to say are bad, I just don’t think they care. And too often, it’s that minority who have the loudest voice and can garner the most attention.

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