Writing-wise, I continue to include dialog, and create better scenes. The thrill of the event has waned, so my focus during an event, and consequently my writing about an event, has shifted to people. Not just myself, but to the unexpected characters and unexpected situations of an event.
This was originally written November 27, 2007
This previous week was a busy one for me. I worked four events in five days. Last Wednesday, Rhode Island nearly beat Boston College in basketball. Friday night, Northeastern beat BC hockey 4-3 in overtime, Miami lost in football to the Eagles, and the Philadelphia Eagles visited Gillette Stadium. I’m gonna start with the Patriots game and work my way backwards.
Before the season started, this game jumped off the schedule. Night games are always difficult to work, but the fact that this would be a holiday weekend, and a few thousand Philly fans would be in the house, made this game special.
Because of Thanksgiving, we were slightly understaffed. For a Sunday night game, the bosses would ideally deploy around 1,200 people. Last night, we had approximately 900. But we had backup. The police, as always, were there in force. And for the first time, they were authorized to use tasers in out of control situations. Our supervisors warned us that the police would repeat the word “taser” before using them so that we could get out of the way. If you’re at Gillette, and you hear a cop say “taser” over and over, run.
Although we were lacking in number, the Eagles fans were not. Judging by what I saw throughout the Stadium, and what I heard in terms of crowd reaction to plays; I’d estimate that of the 70,000 in attendance, 4,000 to 6,000 were Eagles fans. Without a doubt, this was the highest number of visiting fans we’ve had at Gillette this season.
I was working the ADA platform in the north end zone (ADA=Americans with Disabilities Act, we’re not allowed to say the H word). The end zones are great because I can watch the crowd while watching the game on the jumbotron. They also put the cheerleaders on the big screen during TV timeouts. Unfortunately the cheerleaders were wearing their jackets. The days of short shorts and skirts are over.
But the jackets and tight pants aren’t that bad, either.
The one thing that sucks about the end zone is the abundance of standing room people. These are the guys who don’t regularly come to games, wind up with crappy views of the field, and are also closest to the beer stands.
This game was the hardest to work all season. We had fights, shouting matches, bottles being thrown, people threatening me. There was a general feeling of unhappiness and misery at the Stadium. People were very mean to each other and occasionally vicious toward me.
The funny thing was, almost all of my problems were with Patriots fans, not Eagles fans. The Eagles fans in my section were drunk, loud, obnoxious, but extremely well behaved. They even joked around with Pats fans about Spygate, and McNabb choking in the Super Bowl.
I had a Patriots fan throw a plastic bottle at an Eagles fan, who took it in stride. I had two groups of Patriots fans jawing at each other because one guy kept calling Brady a homo. But there was one Eagles fan who really pissed me off. He was in my standing room area, and was a big dude, about 6’ 6” and 270, wearing a throwback Reggie White jersey. He gestured toward me to move because I was blocking his view. This set me off. No fan tells me to move, especially not some liquored up standing room Eagles fan. I spent the rest of the night telling him to move here and there. If he had one millimeter of his boots on the red line, I yelled at him.
I had another guy who refused to clear a path to the section. With a sh*t-eating grin he told me “I have a path, I’m fine.”
My reply was “There’s also a path to the parking lot, buddy, now move.”
He said “Alright, I’ll move, for your sake.”
“Gee, pal, thanks, I was really scared of you.”
Thankfully, we won the game, even though we played like garbage. As a fan, this was nice, but as an usher it was a godsend. As I said, there were a few thousand Eagles fans who knew how to make their presence known. Throw in 65,000 pissed off Patriots fans (40,000 of which probably had money on the game) and you’ve got a recipe for fights.
Apart from Asante Samuel’s game sealing interception in the fourth, the most satisfying moment of the event was when a trio of Eagles fans walked up to me and thanked me for dealing with two feuding groups of Pats fans. I had earlier talked to these drunk middle aged men as though they were 4 year old siblings fighting over crayons. “Just ignore him, if anything happens you just talk to me, you don’t want to spend the rest of the night in time-out (our holding cell), or be grounded (arrested), or go to sleep with no dinner (get tased).”
As much as I hate the Eagles and dislike their fans, I made a concerted effort to make their experience at Gillette Stadium an enjoyable one. I joked around with them, took their pictures for them, protected them when they needed protection, cooled them down when there was trouble brewing, and so on. I was extremely happy that these three Eagles fans would go back home and maybe tell their friends and family about the proactive security at Gillette Stadium, and how we treat visiting fans the way guests should be treated.
Then again, I’m glad those Eagle fans didn’t go home too happy… 11-0 BABY!
On Saturday, I worked the BC-Miami game. I was excited because the last time Boston College beat Miami was November 23, 1984; the day I was born. With BC being so good this year, and Miami being so horrible, I figured that I’d get a birthday present from the Eagles in the form of a win over Miami. I got that, but I didn’t get to see any of it.
Unfortunately for me, I’m reliable and I don’t complain. If given an assignment, I do it to the best of my ability. This reputation I’ve built for myself screwed me on Saturday. My bosses called me the day before and told me to report 30 minutes earlier (8:30 AM instead of 9). This means I’d be getting an early post position, usually babysitting a gate until the ticket takers arrive.
I got assigned to guard the zamboni door of the hockey rink. Alumni Stadium is connected to the Conte Forum, where the basketball and hockey teams play. During football games, the Forum is open for concession and restroom use. The zamboni door is where food is loaded and unloaded, spare parts are kept, an emergency generator is maintained, and so on. It’s a part of the athletic complex that is 100% utilitarian. Most fans will never see places like this when they attend a sporting event.
So I was going to be outside, and miss the entire game. That sucked, but I wasn’t too upset. My friend George was also working down there, the generator guy seemed cool, the BC employees were not bad to work with, I wouldn’t have to deal with any entitled Boston College schmucks, my supervisor told me I could smoke down there, and we could take turns going inside to warm up. Going inside was a very enticing notion as it was about 20 degrees in the morning, and 30 degrees by kickoff.
Then I got moved. I didn’t get moved inside the Forum, or inside the Stadium. I got moved to guard ESPN’s trucks just outside the Stadium. ESPN wanted a detail there to guard their equipment.
So now I had to baby-sit some trucks. The most important part of the job was to make sure nobody messed with the dozens of wires pouring out of these trailers. There was a game last year that experienced a 5 minute broadcast blackout thanks to a drunk BC student. Now I was pretty much by myself, in the shade (which made me even colder), unable to smoke, having to deal with BC people, missing the game, and having to guard four trucks. Anybody out there who watched the game on TV, all I have to say to you is “You’re welcome.”
It wasn’t all bad out there, though. They gave me an ESPN College Football hat, and when they had a free minute to talk, they kept me company. I developed a crush on Heather, the producer. She was kind of cute, but what really interested me was the way she carried herself. She was very confident and sure. It was clear that she was definitely in charge. I wouldn’t say she was dominating or demanding, but she was commanding. I like a woman who knows what she wants. Few women do.
The only trouble I had was before the game and after it. Boston College doesn’t allow public drinking anywhere but the designated tailgate area, and the entire campus is non-smoking. But these two policies are ignored by both students and campus security. Some kids were drinking from big red plastic cups, but most were casually carrying a can of Bud Light or a bottle of Heineken. At first, I yelled at anyone drinking to throw it out. Then I gave up. I’m not going to loose my voice enforcing a policy that 1) isn’t my policy, 2) is a somewhat stupid policy considering how difficult it is to enforce, 3) isn’t enforced by those who made the policy.
After the game, a BC student tried to get into the food the ESPN guys had outside their truck. “Hey buddy, you can’t go in there.”
“This is my dad’s,” referring to ESPN’s set-up.
“It’s your dad’s what?!?”
“It’s my dad’s tailgate.”
“No, it’s ESPN’s, get the fuck out of there, NOW!”
That was a very satisfying moment. I shouldn’t have sworn, but after a very long day, I had no patience to deal with some spoiled BC brat. But not all BC students are jerks. One offered me a can of Bud Light before he went into the Stadium. I couldn’t take it, so he left it for the ESPN crew. They gladly accepted it.
Two very funny things happened around the Conte Forum during the game. My friend Ron was working inside, making sure nobody snuck out onto the ice. Trainers, coaches, and even players from Miami would go out and take pictures of the rink. Apparently they don’t see ice too often in Florida, and this was probably the biggest patch of it they’d ever seen in person. It must have seemed like a glacier to them.
A very nice older woman walked up to me whilst I guarded the trucks and asked me if it was okay for her to pick up some leaves and take them with her. She was from Florida, and the descended foliage intrigued her. It took a lot of energy not to laugh because it seemed like a silly thing to ask permission to take leaves, as if each leaf were individually numbered and strategically placed to create an autumnal atmosphere.
The hockey and basketball games at BC have been fun to work, but both teams are struggling. The basketball team is 4-0, but has been trailing at half-time to UNH, Florida Atlantic, and Rhode Island. Against Mercer, BC was tied at half-time. There’s a stretch of 8 home games in 32 days coming up. Some of the games are against New England teams like UMass and Northeastern, but there is a big game against the Jayhawks of Kansas that I cannot wait to work.
A fringe benefit of working basketball games is that the BC cheerleaders are there, and are still wearing skirts.
The hockey team has been a disappointment. After starting the season ranked fourth, they’re on the verge of falling out of the Top 20 thanks to ties against bad teams, and a lack of wins against good teams. Northeastern is for real though, and the just might win their first Beanpot since 1988.
With both basketball and hockey struggling, I’ve been more inclined to volunteer to take tickets instead of ushering for the whole game. Taking tickets requires very little effort I also rarely have to tell someone that they can’t do something. The best part of taking tickets, though, is welcoming visiting fans to BC. I’ve been able to greet fans from Georgia, North Carolina, Florida, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island, and North Dakota. Eventually there will be people from Maryland, Kansas, and Virginia.
Up next for me is BC women’s basketball against New Hampshire, then a big event on Friday: BC hockey against BU. That could get raucous. We’ve also got a stretch of three straight Patriots home games in December, and with the Pats clinching the AFC East, we are guaranteed to have at least one home playoff game. The weather’s getting colder, which means Gillette Stadium will be heating up.
Ushering Statistics:
Events worked: 27
Ejections: 1
Ejection threats: 22
Uncomfortably hit on/fondled: 7
Times I’ve heard “Shipping up to Boston”: 75
No comments:
Post a Comment