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Brett Friedlander
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CHARLOTTE — Mike Wahle has been with the Carolina Panthers long enough to know what to expect.
But that didn’t stop him from hoping for the best, anyway.
“Hopefully we’ll have some Carolina fans in the stands,” the veteran offensive guard said earlier in the week. “I know that when Dallas comes to town, they get a lot of fans here, so hopefully we can even it out.”
Judging from the tailgate parties along Morehead Street west of Bank of America Stadium on Saturday, “breaking even” is probably all the Carolina Panthers could have realistically hoped for.
There were enough blue and white jerseys with stars on the shoulders to make the gatherings look like mini Dallas Cowboys team meetings. Even old timers Troy Aikman, Emmit Smith and Thomas “Hollywood” Henderson — or at least, people impersonating them — were there.
And when the visitors were introduced in the moments before their 20-13 victory, the favorable reaction of the crowd of 70,272 suggested that this game was being played at a neutral site. If not worse.
They don’t call the Cowboys “America’s Team” for nothing.
This, of course, shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who has followed the Panthers for any length of time.
Home dates against the Cowboys, Steelers, Patriots and any of the National Football League’s other marquee teams regularly bring out droves of opposing fans — their numbers and passion rivaling that of the pilgrims at a Billy Graham revival.
Tickets available
Saturday’s game was worse than usual, though.
With the Panthers reduced to playing out the string of a disappointing season on a cold night the week before Christmas, many PSL holders simply chose to stay home and recoup some of their investment by selling their tickets on eBay.
That left plenty available for all those Cowboys fans among us, especially those without access to the NFL Network.
You have to wonder what must have been going through Panthers owner Jerry Richardson’s mind as he sat in his box watching his team getting outnumbered in its home stadium.
Something like this would never happen in Green Bay, where fathers will their season tickets to their sons like a treasured family heirloom. Or in Pittsburgh, where the Steelers aren’t just a football team, they’re the glue that helped keep an entire city together when everything else was crumbling around it during hard times of the 1970s.
Fickle fans?
In New York or Philadelphia, a fan in an opposing jersey would be lucky just to get out of the stadium under his own power, let alone be among friends.
So why is Charlotte so different? It can’t just be Southern hospitality.
Perhaps the fans in the Carolinas are simply too fickle or sophisticated. More likely, they’ve invested so much time, money and passion on their respective college teams that they don’t have much left to give to a franchise that has only been around for 13 seasons.
Many of those who do come, do so to be seen and are often gone by the start of the third quarter. Regardless of the score.
By NFL standards, the Panthers are still only in their infancy.
They’re nothing more than an unwanted nuisance to those who grew up rooting for the Washington Commanders or Atlanta Falcons, the teams of choice in this area before Carolina got one of its own.
To them, the good old days have nothing to do with Sam Mills or former team president Mike McCormack — the only two names to grace the Panthers’ “Ring of Honor,” but rather, when they were able watch their teams’ games in the comfort of their own home without having to buy a satellite dish.
Eventually, that will change. The longer the Panthers are around and the more success they enjoy, the more solid a foundation their fan base will build.
At some point, those fans might even be in the majority whenever opponents such as the Cowboys come to town.
But for now, the “home” team will have to settle for breaking even.
Staff writer Brett Friedlander can be reached at friedlanderb@fayobserver.com or 486-3513.
http://www.fayobserver.com/article?id=281261
ADVERTISEMENT
CHARLOTTE — Mike Wahle has been with the Carolina Panthers long enough to know what to expect.
But that didn’t stop him from hoping for the best, anyway.
“Hopefully we’ll have some Carolina fans in the stands,” the veteran offensive guard said earlier in the week. “I know that when Dallas comes to town, they get a lot of fans here, so hopefully we can even it out.”
Judging from the tailgate parties along Morehead Street west of Bank of America Stadium on Saturday, “breaking even” is probably all the Carolina Panthers could have realistically hoped for.
There were enough blue and white jerseys with stars on the shoulders to make the gatherings look like mini Dallas Cowboys team meetings. Even old timers Troy Aikman, Emmit Smith and Thomas “Hollywood” Henderson — or at least, people impersonating them — were there.
And when the visitors were introduced in the moments before their 20-13 victory, the favorable reaction of the crowd of 70,272 suggested that this game was being played at a neutral site. If not worse.
They don’t call the Cowboys “America’s Team” for nothing.
This, of course, shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who has followed the Panthers for any length of time.
Home dates against the Cowboys, Steelers, Patriots and any of the National Football League’s other marquee teams regularly bring out droves of opposing fans — their numbers and passion rivaling that of the pilgrims at a Billy Graham revival.
Tickets available
Saturday’s game was worse than usual, though.
With the Panthers reduced to playing out the string of a disappointing season on a cold night the week before Christmas, many PSL holders simply chose to stay home and recoup some of their investment by selling their tickets on eBay.
That left plenty available for all those Cowboys fans among us, especially those without access to the NFL Network.
You have to wonder what must have been going through Panthers owner Jerry Richardson’s mind as he sat in his box watching his team getting outnumbered in its home stadium.
Something like this would never happen in Green Bay, where fathers will their season tickets to their sons like a treasured family heirloom. Or in Pittsburgh, where the Steelers aren’t just a football team, they’re the glue that helped keep an entire city together when everything else was crumbling around it during hard times of the 1970s.
Fickle fans?
In New York or Philadelphia, a fan in an opposing jersey would be lucky just to get out of the stadium under his own power, let alone be among friends.
So why is Charlotte so different? It can’t just be Southern hospitality.
Perhaps the fans in the Carolinas are simply too fickle or sophisticated. More likely, they’ve invested so much time, money and passion on their respective college teams that they don’t have much left to give to a franchise that has only been around for 13 seasons.
Many of those who do come, do so to be seen and are often gone by the start of the third quarter. Regardless of the score.
By NFL standards, the Panthers are still only in their infancy.
They’re nothing more than an unwanted nuisance to those who grew up rooting for the Washington Commanders or Atlanta Falcons, the teams of choice in this area before Carolina got one of its own.
To them, the good old days have nothing to do with Sam Mills or former team president Mike McCormack — the only two names to grace the Panthers’ “Ring of Honor,” but rather, when they were able watch their teams’ games in the comfort of their own home without having to buy a satellite dish.
Eventually, that will change. The longer the Panthers are around and the more success they enjoy, the more solid a foundation their fan base will build.
At some point, those fans might even be in the majority whenever opponents such as the Cowboys come to town.
But for now, the “home” team will have to settle for breaking even.
Staff writer Brett Friedlander can be reached at friedlanderb@fayobserver.com or 486-3513.
http://www.fayobserver.com/article?id=281261
