Are football fans subject to hysteria or just rich?

I do believe that many of the better seats are owned by corporations. My employer PVH Corp licensed the 'Izod' Center when the Nets were still playing there; as a result, we also got season tickets to various games at the Meadowlands. When the tickets weren't given away or taken for corporate use, they are raffled to us employees. Now that the Nets have moved to Brooklyn, we have 2 corporate boxes at the Brooklyn Center as a concession and the tickets are raffled to employees . I've also gotten free tickets to family events at the Izod Center for Disney ice shows and WWE wrestling - I really wish I had asked for the Tribute to American Skating, but I was away in HK.

Anyway, yesterday, they announced a raffle of Super Bowl tickets, which included bus transportation from NYC and a pre-party. Unfortunately, they are outside seats! I'm sure the corporate execs and sales people claimed the box indoor seats. One of my co-workers is a Broncos fan and he doesn't want to put his name in because it'll be too cold!

Super Bowl is truly an 'Event' for football fans. I think very few people would pay that much money if they weren't at least a fan of football in general...... of course, there are people who are just there because they have the connections or money, but same is true of skating. I went to SOI and noticed 2 Mom's and 2 little girls with on ice tickets - none of them was really paying attention to the skating - they only time the little girls perked up was in Steven Cousins skated near them.

I would certainly agree that there are mean beligerant figure skating fans....mostly anonymous cowards behind the scenes, but a few in the open as well. And I have seen my fair share of rude ones also. Way too many, in fact. But I stick to my guns that the violence and open negativeness, as evidenced by booing one's skater's competition for instance, has been pretty rare at the comps I have attended. Do fans trash skaters to their friends at nats? Sure they do. And booze does make the rudeness/negative remarks worse. I do like figure skating cause there is no sanctioned interpersonal violence as yet.

Tonichelle said:

yeah figure skating fans just resort to death threats and cyber-bullying...

and I've seen fans go at it at nationals with beer (2008 while in line for some fries)... and I've been threatened by fans of a certain skater because I didn't give a standing O (2005 ladies final). don't tell me skating fans are above the others.

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I dunno, bashing a sport or group of fans to pump up your own group of fans and sport seems to be just as bad. But maybe I'm off base. :disapp:


As for ticket sales and weather - I can imagine that's a big factor. The Greenbay game (Niners WON! w00t!) was incredibly cold, but it's greenbay and the fans there are used to it. With the Superbowl you have fans of teams that may or maynot be used to the temps (Colorado should be more used to it than Seattle... but really I don't think any of the states down there are used to the temps coming from the vortexes).

Football has been played in the cold for as long as the sport's been played...

Another reason for decreased attendance is that very few fans from New England or the Middle Atlantic States are Seahawks or Broncos fans- and therefore not rushing to sit outdoors at night in the cold to watch them.

Tonichelle said:

As for ticket sales and weather - I can imagine that's a big factor. The Greenbay game (Niners WON! w00t!) was incredibly cold, but it's greenbay and the fans there are used to it. With the Superbowl you have fans of teams that may or maynot be used to the temps (Colorado should be more used to it than Seattle... but really I don't think any of the states down there are used to the temps coming from the vortexes).

Football has been played in the cold for as long as the sport's been played...

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THe local news was reporting that Denver's weather has not been as cold as it's been here. Looking at today's weather, NJ had a high in the mid 20's and Denver had a high in the low 50's. Depends on the chinook winds. Polar vortex isn't hitting them....

We've had so many mild winters.... I'm definitely tired of all the snow and these frigid temps.

Well, alchohol certainly changes people's behavior. That is for sure. Yet, skating used to be popular here and it still is in Canada and Japan. But the very demographics of the fans in each sport can not be discounted. Perhaps if college age boys, for instance, were to decide that figure skating was THE sport, testosterone and booze filled young men would change the fan behavior. I hope it wouldn't change what happens ON the ice....I do believe you are correct that generalizaitons about the personalities of the fans is dangerous....but the fan psychology of any sport would be an interesting field of study.

louisa05 said:

Chris--I was in Liverpool in 2002 the day England beat Argentina in a World Cup soccer game. I saw it all. My assessment then was that the atmosphere is very much influenced by massive amounts of alcohol and very large gatherings of like-minded equally drunk people. If skating was that popular, we'd see much different responses from fans.

I watch almost any sport and yet remain a card carrying introvert and a pink-wearing girly girl. I'm not sure that generalizations about the personalities of fans can be made.

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Interesting factoid...I wonder if that has inflation figured in? Just checked out some deep deal Caribean cruises....with airfare, I could be walking the deck in the sun and over eating for a week for less than $2000....(too bad there aren't single occupancy rooms.)

dorispulaski said:

On the subject of the Super Bowl, I heard this morning that 20% of the seats are still unsold. And the ticket prices are such that this will be the cheapest Super Bowl to attend (not including hotel, of course) since 2002.

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heyang said:

I do believe that many of the better seats are owned by corporations.

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Funny you mention that, heyang, as I had been wondering what happens with the *owners* of the luxury boxes and season tickets at MetLife Stadium in the case of the Super Bowl. Similar to your situation, my brother works for a corporation here in northern NJ, which used to have a box at the Izod Center for the NJ Devils hockey games, before the Devils moved down to the new facility in Newark.

I wasn't aware of this, but some research revealed that the NFL controls all tickets related to the Super Bowl. Part of the agreement between the NFL and the host of the SB is that the NFL requires the stadium and all parking to be made available, rent-free, to the NFL, which controls 100 percent of all tickets and luxury suites.

This article includes a breakdown of how the NFL distributes tickets:

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/20...rimary_market_takes_luck_and_connections.html

According to what I found (in another article), only 1 percent of tickets go on sale to the general public. The Mayor of East Rutherford, where MetLife Stadium is located, is a season ticket holder for the Giants. When the Giants had the lottery for their portion of tickets, he didn't *win* the opportunity to buy tickets, so he'll be watching the game at home.

I think it's great they are trying a cold weather venue for the Super Bowl; and I agree with Toni's statement re: football and cold weather.