Fans of the Philadelphia Eagles carry themselves in a manner that has resulted in their own lore.
There are the rumors of batteries being thrown at opposing players. Michael Irvin suffered a career-ending neck injury at the old Veterans Stadium, and Eagles fans cheered. In 1968, they booed a man dressed as Santa Claus and pelted him with snowballs.
Fans of opposing teams who dare wear their colors do so at their own risk – they may as well sign a permission slip for some verbal harassment. Just ask Los Angeles Chargers defensive end Joey Bosa.
If the Eagles win Sunday against the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl 57, every light pole in the city is on notice. The fan famous for running into a pillar before each game has already requested help in finding his next structural support collision.
Of all the passionate fan bases in the NFL, Eagles supporters stand out.
Super Bowl Central: Super Bowl 57 odds, Eagles-Chiefs matchups, stats and more
“The Eagles seem to take it to the next level,” said Brian Gordon, an associate professor in the health, sport and exercise sciences department at the University of Kansas who studies fan behavior. “The question is, why? Why is that fan base different?”
Greasing the light poles
The School District of Philadelphia will be on a two-hour delay the Monday after the Super Bowl. After the Eagles defeated the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC championship game, Philadelphia mayor Jim Kenney said of the estimated 20,000 revelers celebrating in the streets, there were eight arrests.
“What I saw from the coverage, it was diverse. People of all colors, ethnicities were out dancing with each other,” Kenney said. “Philadelphia Police were dancing with young kids. There’s a general spirit of goodwill when you’re successful, and hopefully we can keep that going all year.”
The NFC title game was a 3 p.m. ET start. The Super Bowl will kick off at 6:30 p.m. ET, and Kenney said clearing the streets in the wee hours of the morning was a possibility.
As far as greasing the poles, a phenomenon proliferated across social media, Kenney said he is “ambivalent” but it does keep more people from climbing them.
‘It was like football heaven’
On his podcast this week, NFL Network’s Kyle Brandt retold his experience at the Eagles’ Super Bowl 52 parade, a cold, gray day in the city.
“That was one of the most R-rated days of my life,” said Brandt, who was “offered chemicals, ingestibles, unmentionables, just because I was a guy standing there and they wanted to share it.”
That may sound scary, but the joyous celebration wasn’t a hostile environment. And so long as you’re pulling for the Birds, the locals will allow you to join in the fun.
Ex-NFL defensive end Chris Long, who was on that Eagles Super Bowl team, tailgated in the parking lots of Lincoln Financial Field ahead of this year’s NFC championship game. The atmosphere and intensity was “awesome,” he said on the ESPN Daily podcast.
“I was drunk in like 45 minutes,” Long said. “It just hit me like a wave.”
Long caught a man who was standing on top of a bus and fell. Before the divisional round matchup against the New York Giants, fans set off flares across the lots. The atmosphere and intensity can be considered “totally unhinged,” Long said.
“But that’s all you want,” Long said of playing in Philadelphia. “For me, it was like football heaven. A place that cares. A place that’s packed every Sunday.”
‘Self-fulfilling prophecy’
One of the basics of studying fan behavior, according to Dr. Chris Stankovich, is that fans assume ownership of their teams. That is evident in the use of pronouns, for example. Fans say “we” when the team is doing well, and when the team’s performance declines, they depersonalize to “they.”
“Really, what I would say is occurring, you begin with the identity of ‘this is my team’ but then it becomes a city-by-city competition,” said Stankovich, a researcher in the field of sport, exercise, & health psychology who also studies fan behavior. “I think there’s bragging rights to be known as the best fans in the country. I think you’ve got a bit of a group dynamic splashed in there as well.”
Behaviors by Eagles fans are not unique. Buffalo Bills fans have become known as “Bills Mafia,” famous for jumping off of cars and through folding tables. “The Black Hole,” supporters of the Raiders from Oakland to Los Angeles to Las Vegas, have long been considered one of the NFL’s more hardened fan bases.
There is a certain status that comes with that identity.
“I think it’s something that almost becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy over time,” Stankovich said.
“Now the public sees our fans as acting in a certain way and we kind of need to live up to that,” Gordon said.
For many fans, it’s personal
Data shows that Eagles fans are one of the most avid fan bases in terms of identifying with the team, Gordon said, and that’s usually a key factor behind influencing negative fan behavior.
“You’re taking a win and you’re taking a loss personally,” he said.
The passion for the Eagles is seen across other local pro teams, like the Phillies and the 76ers.
Cultural and historical elements have influenced this phenomenon over time, Gordon said. At the individual level, as one grows up a diehard Eagles fan, it’s like a family heirloom passed down from generation to generation. An aggressive type of fanhood evolves into a norm and reproduces. As they welcome new members and socialize, it’s the expectation for fan behavior.
“It’s almost like a vicious cycle,” Gordon said.
And this generation of Eagles fans has no intention of breaking the wheel.
“They’ve been branded as these rowdy, reckless, sometimes verbally assaulting, sometimes physically assaulting (other fans),” Gordon said. “Once you gain that reputation, you kind of need to live up to that standard that you set.”
Follow Chris Bumbaca on Twitter @BOOMbaca.
