Driven By Boredom – Dear New York Islanders.

Congrats on the win today. Great game on the ice despite the outcome. Would have liked to see a little more overtime but that’s hockey. Unfortunately the fan experience left something to be desired. In fact it was the worst experience I have had in 30 years of attending sporting events.

I am a member of the New York City Capitals Fans and a dozen of us decided to take a trip to Long Island to see our Capitals play. We paid $158 each for terrible seats way up top with an obstructed view of the score boards but not quite high enough that we didn’t have drunk Islanders fans screaming at us to shut up.

Anyway, the day started out well. We got there early and tailgated and were greeted with plenty of smack talk but 90% of it was good natured. We had a great time before the game and even got to meet up with Caps play by play announcer John Walton who interviewed us for Caps Radio.

Unfortunately once the game started things went decidedly downhill. We were told to shut up and yelled all manor of things at us. The fans directly around us were pretty friendly but the people a few rows in front and a few rows behind were not. When the Islanders scored their first goal one of the guys behind me poured beer all over me. Homophobic bullshit was shouted at us all game and my friend Fatou had a number of racist comments directed at her.

Our group had bought seats in two different sections so during the second intermission we all met up at one of the out door smoking areas. We walked in together and were booed by everyone. It seemed good natured at first but then we were surrounded and things took a much darker turn. We were surrounded by several dozens of Islanders fans, some of whom blew smoke into the girls in our group’s faces. Several of them were actually pushing us but we clearly weren’t about to start a fight with that many people. I just held my Caps “Unleash The Fury” towel above my head (as seen in the above photos) and just took all the boos and chants of asshole and fun stuff like “fuck you faggot”.

At some point a drunk Islanders fan grabbed the rally towel out of my hands and as I tried to get it back Islanders fans swarmed me and it looked like it was going to turn into a brawl but security was quick to break it up. Of course the security guard blamed it on me for “instigating a fight” when all I was doing was silently holding a rally towel and smiling. When someone threw a bottle at our group I told the same security guard about it and he said “no one is throwing anything at you” despite the bottle landing at his feet.

It should be noted that a few Islanders fans defended us and gave us props for holding our ground but the racism and homophobia and near violence wasn’t exactly a positive experience… and of course it would get worse.

When the game went to overtime and the Islanders won the fans around us started kicking our chairs and pounding on the seat backs on either side of our heads. The guys in front of us turned around and gave us the middle finger. As we left I had people yell “FUCK YOU” in my face and of course more “faggots” and comments about Fatou’s “black hair”.

When we made it to our cars we noticed that our friend Justin’s car had been keyed twice and his rear license plate had been stolen. A few Islanders fans could’t believe it and were pretty great about it but another drunk fan started screaming and bumping up into the face of several of our crew. At some point one of our members pushed him away after he jumped into us and that nearly started another brawl. I fortunately broke it up since I had no interest in going to jail but the guys still pissed right next to my friends car so that he had to stand in a puddle of urine to get into his car.

There was of course almost no security in the parking lot so when a couple of security guards finally came by in a golf cart we stopped them to let them know what happened to Justin’s car. They just told him to call the cops and as they drove off I saw one of them turn to the other and started laughing about the stolen license plate. It was pretty infuriating.

On top of that some of Islanders fans we had tailgated with earlier said they saw the guys who did it. As soon as we left they keyed the car and said “Fuck these Caps fans” as they took the plates off in front of a bunch of other fans who did nothing to stop them. I don’t know why they told us they saw it because they wouldn’t tell us who took it.

I have been to hundreds of professional sporting events in my life, mostly as an away team fan. While I have had some problems with fans in the past (Jets fans mostly) I have never had so many people be so shitty to me and my friends. There were a ton of Islanders fans that were cool to us but we had incident after incident today in a way that I have never seen. The combination of racism, sexism, homophobia, vandalism and violence was something almost impressive to behold. I even heard that some Isles fans were abusing a disabled child in an Ovechkin jersey.

Hopefully when you guys come to Brooklyn, the city I have lived for the last decade, you will do a much better job of controlling your drunk abusive fans and hire some security guards who do their jobs instead of just treating the visiting fans as the enemy. At the very least I am glad there won’t be any seats where you have to duck to see how much time is left in the game.

Thanks and I hope we are the last team to ever play in that awful “barn” you currently call home,

Nate “Igor” Smith

NYC Caps Fans

_____________________________

This went pretty viral amongst Isles Twitter last night after game 3. I’m sure it’s blown up way more than they ever intended. Its a long letter, but it details the day these Caps fans had pretty well. I’m sure there are two sides to this story, and certain things sound exaggerated i.e. getting a bottle thrown at you when its a plastic bottle. Regardless, nobody should have to go through that at a game.

Being a rational, adult human being, I’m not gonna defend anything that these handful of Islanders fans did. Nobody deserves to be called a faggot, nobody deserves to have racial hate spewed at them, and certainly nobody deserves physical vandalism to any of their property. But here’s the thing – this letter perfectly outlines the reality of this situation, and all live sporting events:

“We got there early and tailgated and were greeted with plenty of smack talk but 90% of it was good natured.”

“The fans directly around us were pretty friendly but the people a few rows in front and a few rows behind were not.”

“It should be noted that a few Islanders fans defended us and gave us props for holding our ground”

“A few Islanders fans could’t believe it and were pretty great about it”

“There were a ton of Islanders fans that were cool to us”

Some fans are cool. Some fans are dickheads. Some people know how to talk shit and bust balls and some people are scumbags that take it over the line. Sounds to me like these Caps fans ran into a lot of friendly people, and a lot of assholes. Which is going to be the case any time you go anywhere with upwards of 20,000 people in one spot.

Now will I say that the group of Isles fans that were dicks clearly took it to the next level? Yes. Of course. Literally all morning leading up to the game yesterday I was blogging and tweeting about the Islanders fans being vikings. Just complete and total barbarians. And while that was somewhat of a joke, in some ways I was being dead serious. Islanders fans are fucking crazy. They take this shit way too serious. Thats why they’re fucking awesome. But unfortunately its why it can lead to shitty situations like with these Caps fans. There’s a fine line between passion and anger, busting balls and harassment, and I think Islanders fans are such goddam maniacs that for the 10% of the assholes in the crowd, thats a line they cross.

But my main thing here is that you have to recognize and understand that. These are NYC Caps fans. They should understand the dynamic of hockey fans in this city. You gotta know whats in store for you when it comes to an Islanders playoff game. I’ve said all along that if the Rangers and Islanders somehow meet in the playoffs, I wont have one watch party for both teams. I am fully aware that if I pack Rangers fans and Islanders fans in a bar during a game against each other, there will be problems. Multiple fights. Lots of harassment and violence. I wish that wasnt the case. I know that about 90% of the bar will be cool and they’ll chant at each other and talk shit and all will be good, but there will be 10% that throw punches. OK its more like 75-25. Alright its 50-50. But I am fully aware of that. I jumped on this hockey bandwagon just a few years ago and I already understood the dynamic when it came to the fans. These guys have gotta know that too.

Dont show up to the rowdiest trashiest stadium maybe in America and make a spectacle of yourselves rooting for the other team. You’re giving too much credit to the Islanders fans. I’m being dead serious when I say these problems result from everyone having too much faith in the people around them. I understand that if you roll into a place like the Coliseum or Philly or anywhere with the real diehard fans in this country and you’re talking shit and outnumbered a zillion to one, you’re putting yourself in a very precarious position. I wish it wasnt that way, but it is. Better to just acknowledge that and steer clear of the whole scene, or else you’re just subjecting yourself to all that harassment. Everyone else needs to recognize that as well.

Again, not defending it. Just acknowledging it. Like part of me wants to invite these guys to our next watch party to show them that not all Islanders fans are scumbags and prove that we can all watch the game together in harmony, but we probably cant. Being dead honest, there will probably be another incident. Because like I said any time you gather a lot of people somewhere and involve alcohol, there will always be a contingency of people that ruin the fun and take it to a dark place. So rather than create another hostile situation, I’m just going to avoid it. Wish the world was a better place but its not so lets act accordingly.

PS – Truth be told me reaction when I got to the end of the letter was “Wait a minute nobody got beat up?” Thats what I expected. Primarily because I have no faith in this world, and you shouldnt either.