Touching on Everything and Anything

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Experience in the stands at MSG

So I went to the Ranger game last night and had an amazing time. I went with my dad and got to see the Rangers play a really fundamentally sound hockey game to beat Montreal. The effort was there, in particular the seccond period. Drury did a great job crashing the net and being able to capitalize on rebound opportunities. This is his time of year and I am really not surprised to see him stepping up now to help the Rangers on their playoff run. The play on the ice was of playoff caliber but I want to comment on some things I saw in the stands.
Number one, I have to give it to Canadian fans they show up in numbers whenever their team is in town and are very vocal to say the least in support of their team. The jerseys of the opposing team are seen in many sections throughout the arena but most of the fans tend to stick together up in the 400s. The spirit of these fans is really great, they have chants and songs that they sing and engage in for all three periods. It is irritating as a fan of the home team to see the influx of vocal fans of the opposition in your arena. It makes me realize what fans of the Baltimore Oriole fans must feel like when the Yankees and Red Sox fans invade their ballpark.
The main event of the night in the stands was not watching the Canadian fans but instead a Ranger fan. The camera man stopped by our section to put some of the fans on the jumbo-tron. There was not enough time and so nobody in my section got onto the screen. This fan was not happy with that because he wanted a little girl and her dad on the screen. The man stood up and started yelling at the camera man as he walked away. He kept standing as people in our section yelled at him to sit down and watch the game. He then gave the section the finger, continued yelling about the camera man who walked away. Security then stopped by and told him to sit down which he did for about a seccond. As soon as the guard walked away he continued standing and yelling at people in our section. Security saw this and about five of them stopped by to throw him out of the game. When he sensed this he threw a near full beer into the middle of our section dousing everyone. People started throwing stuff back at him as it took all five security guards to pretty much drag this guy out of the arena. I just found it nuts how all this started as a guy trying to get the camera man to put a daughter and father on the screen and ended with him screaming at a section of angry fans while being dragged out.

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