Tundra Tale

So this last weekend, as you may have read, I took the Shooter Mom to see the Eagles' opener -- on the road in Green Bay for her birthday. My mom is a huge football fan, a strong pool player, knows her stuff and has been watching the team since they won their last NFL Championship -- 1960, with Norm van Brocklin leading a prehistoric version of the West Coast offense to a win at home against the young and emerging Green Bay Packers. (The last time anyone beat Vince Lombardi in a championship game.) Here are my notes on a trip that was a few punt return attempts away from being so much, much better.


Saturday

I left the Five Tool Ninja's place (did you know we were all friends? did you care? should I write up funny things he says and make you want to hurt yourself with smug douche baggery? OK, moving on) to pick up the Shooter Mom. The plan is an afternoon flight to Milwaukee, and overnight stay there, and a morning drive up. We'll see the game, then fly back that night. Things go smoothly, save for some plane turbulence, and we got in on time.

For car rentals, I like to use Priceline; I don't care who rents me the car, really, and it's especially good if you want to with an exotic request (in this case, a convertible). We got the car for 40% of the list price, and after some good-natured trash talk from the counter person, we were off to downtown Milwaukee, about 12 miles from the airport.

Downtown Milwaukee reminds me of Seattle (some similar architecture) crossed with New York, on a small scale, then remove 99% of the people. It is, of course, not fair to judge a downtown on a Saturday when the office commuter folks are all gone, but I work in New York, where you could go outside at 4am on a Tuesday and find enough people to to play a full football game. In Milwaukee, we walked around for an hour and saw, at most, a half dozen people. Of course, it may also be that people don't walk anywhere in all of Wisconsin, which, given the food they eat and the quantities in which they eat it, may be entirely true.

We wound up in a classy steakhouse, where the Shooter Mom was worried about us being underdressed. As we walk in, we saw two guys in Eagles jerseys, and stopped feeling self-conscious. The smallest steak on the menu was a 16-ouncer, and I swear I was still full 36 hours later. Crippling Obesity and Heart Disease: Catch It!

Being a Road Fan is an interesting experience. Since it costs serious cash, you don't get the same kind of complete yokel doing it. But to pull it off also means a certain monomaniacal focus -- along with a distinct Lack of Life, since you're giving up time along with the money. I'm not saying it's a bad way to blow cash and time, but it does attract a different kind of fan.

Sunday

It takes about 2 hours to drive from Milwaukee to Green Bay; it's a pleasant enough drive, assuming you are OK with the smell of manure. As Eagle Fans through the Kotite Era, this was nothing new.

About halfway up, the weather starts to cloud up and threaten rain, so I pull over to put the top of the convertible up... only to discover that the right side isn't quite airtight, due to a missing piece. We wind up stopping at a convenience store and getting electrical and duct tape to make sure that the rental returns in more or less the same condition we got it.

Green Bay is, honestly, a small suburban town; you may know it's a little place, but actually driving to the stadium brings it home in a way that television does not express. How small is it? There really aren't signs on how to get there. Seriously; you go north on 43, and if you don't know to go towards the airport, you miss the stadium. Think about that -- there isn't a sign. Why would there be, really? Everyone's from here, so... yeesh. Luckily for road fans, the locals are really mellow and nice, and will tell you how to get to the stadium -- it's over that way, past the mall. (Honestly.)

As you get closer to the stadium, you see people waving flags and selling spots in their front yards. So why not? We pull in and walk for about ten minutes to the stadium, drinking in the atmosphere. As you walk to and from the stadium, you are literally in the back yards of people who live there; it's like Wrigleyville for pro football, and as far as I can tell, completely unique to Green Bay. There's something to be said for community ownership.

The lesson of Green Bay is this: you really could have an NFL franchise just about anywhere. If you can have it here, you can have it anywhere. Brooklyn? Sure. Portland? Absolutely. Vegas? Of course. Birmingham? Green Bay south. Sacramento? Bigger than Green Bay. Syracuse? I went to school there; definitely. The taste for pro football in this country is under served; the amount of talent produced at the college level is sluiced down to an extraordinarily sharp level. Are there enough quarterbacks to go around to fill 60 to 100 teams? Probably not. But there are more than enough of everything else, most especially fans. You are telling me that everywhere there isn't a big college football team, there could not be a pro one? I call manure.

Football stadiums do not really matter that much; you don't hear about people making cross-country pilgrimages to see them all. And then there's Lambeau. Opened in 1957 and the longest continually occupied stadium in the NFL, it is a perfect jewel; there is no waste space, no seats are really bad, and the luxury boxes are where God intended them -- in the upper reaches. According to Wikipedia's page on Lambeau, over 74,000 people are on the waiting list for season tickets. I can see why.

We got there about 90 minutes before the game, and wandered around until game time. As with all NFL places, there's plenty to eat and buy, but it's a very different environment; it all feels very local, with a strong definition of space. There's no franchised food, and while stuff at stadiums is never going to be good for you, Green Bay takes it up a notch. Triple cheese pizza. Bratwursts the size of your lower intestine, unwrapped. Sodas with extra cheese. Complimentary EKGs at the end of every aisle. I'm only making some of this up, along with the fact that the only non-obese woman at the game was fronting a rock band. (The obese ones dancing to them? Oh dear.)

As the game started, we headed up to what we thought were our seats -- and found ourselves at the 50 yard line. Huddled in a Lambeau Field pullover and hoping that the rain would stop, we watched as dozens of surviving Congressional Medal of Honors winners were applauded, then given bratwursts and monstrous steaks to finish them off. Next was the de rigeur military jet flyover, to see if any of them got flashbacks. I've been to a dozen games that did that, and still don't understand why the hell people like that. But I'm clearly Un-American or something.

As the Eagles were introduced, there was a strange moment -- beeping through the PA and technical problems. We thought it was just gamesmanship from the Packer management, but then the PA started asking people to evacuate in a canned voice, repeating the same message over and over again. Some folks started to move, but I looked at the field -- and as the millionaires down there weren't being hustled out, it seemed obvious to me that this was false alarm. And it was.

As for the defining play of the game -- which is to say, the Pack's only touchdown -- of course, the returner (Greg Lewis) should have called for a fair catch. But how this isn't interference, I'll never know... and the fact that the replay was never shown in the stadium seemed Highly Suspicious. From what I understand, it was all Tony Siragusa's fault.

After falling behind by ten from a bad McNabb pick, the Eagles seemed to get their bearings; they stayed patient enough to gain some good yards running, completed their only real long ball of consequence, and then got the touchdown to Avant. By the half, the Birds had outgained the Pack by 100+ yards, Favre looked like he had never met his teammates, and while the Pack defense was playing well, they were also starting to look worn down.

At the half, we got our bratwurst, then headed back to the seats... only to discover that we were, in fact, in the wrong ones all along. Moving down to the 30 seemed less difficult to take, as the Eagles were driving, but in retrospect, this was really where the game was lost, because this was where the Eagles brain trust lost patience in running the ball, and when McNabb started looking good enough that the team started putting the ball in the air too much.

The Akers field goal gave the team its first and only lead of the day. Packer Fans, to their shame, started doing the Wave. This is always sad, and the crowd's interest in that actually helped the Eagles, who seemed to have a quieter field to work against. (On the whole, the Lambeau crowd isn't nearly as loud as Philly, actually. They also say bad words a lot less; I wouldn't bring my kid to a game here either, but if I did, it would be much less obvious child abuse.)

Newly settled at the 30, we had a pretty good view of the Favre Schoolyard Plays that led to the Pack's only real drive for points of the day. How either of these didn't result in a turnover is, frankly, big luck for the home team. The Crosby field goal tied it, and we were knee-deep into the stomach turning fourth quarter, as the sun came out and I started to feel my sunburn rise.

Packer Fan wasn't enjoying this game much, either. Exhorted to wave some giveaway towels, they did, but when your offense consists of Favre trying to pull stuff out of his ass, it doesn't breed happy confidence. My takeaway from the game, and from talking to more than a few Packer Fans, is that they really don't worship the ground that he walks on. There's just been too many interceptions for that. They know they'll miss when he's gone, but judging from the number of Hawk and Barnett jerseys in the crowd, a strong percentage won't miss him that much. It's not like they won't sell out the place after he's gone.

Also, Favre's play in this game was kind of befuddling. He kept taking long counts and motioning people around like a Peyton Manning impersonator... which really doesn't work when you've got an incredibly young offense around you. The Pack will be a false start nightmare on the road if Favre doesn't adjust, and quickly.

Besides, this whole Retire Or Not thing? Really not a Midwestern move. There no team in retirement, but there is an I in Quitter. The unconditional lovefest for Favre begins and ends with the national media.

With four minutes or so left, I remember saying to the Shooter Mom (quietly, as the seats at the 30 had many more Packer fans, and many of them were casting dark glances at our restrained rooting) that the defense was going to have to win this game. And they nearly did. Trent Cole and Jevon Kearse combined to separate the Favre Legend from the ball, giving the Birds the ball at the Packer 40... and then, finally, the team decided to run it. Right into the line with their backup running back (Buckhalter), and then again with Westbrook. A holding penalty, an incomplete pass, and a bad punt later, the team's best and last real chance to win the game was gone, and the Sense of Doom was heavy upon us.

Once again, the defense held; had the Eagles simply decided to not try to return punts today, they would have won 13-3, and maybe pitched a complete shutout without the two Favre Sandlot plays. But since they did, and JR Reed and Greg Lewis did the impossible and made Eagle Fan long for the return of Reno Mahe, it was all over. In 30 years of watching football, I've never seen a team lose for the sin of trying to return punts.

We got out of there as best we could, listened to the Chargers take out the Bears on the radio, and caught the flight home without incident. My sleep schedule is still kind of out the window (I'm writing this at 5am), and it would have been a much better memory with a win.., but hey, there's no script in sports. Bad things can happen too.

Despite the loss, I still feel good about the team for the following five reasons:

1) The defense. Green Bay's not good, but it was their home opener and they still got more or less trashed. Kearse looks like his old self, and so long as Lito Sheppard isn't out for a long amount of time, they're going to be very, very good. For once, I really liked the linebackers, and I can' tell you the last time that was true.

2) The coaching staff. I'm still kind of astounded that Brian Westbrook wasn't back to fair catch every ball in the second half, after it became obvious that nothing good was going to happen on punts today, but the Reid Era has never seen a Dumb Problem like this stay unfixed. It's ridiculous to lose a game like this, but when you look at their track record, they won't keep this up.

3) Donovan looked bad, but he looked ordinary bad. He wasn't limping, favoring the leg, or missing in a way that was out of the ordinary. He played a terrible game, but he played his game. I think he bounces back; I don't think he's gun shy on the knee at all.

4) Luck. When you look at last year's team, they had unlucky losses (New York, Tampa Bay) in the first half that were balanced out by fortunate wins later (Carolina, the second Washington game). Most fumble recovery is a 50-50 luck game; had the Eagles recovered either of the muffs, the game is very different.

5) The schedule. Next week, they've got Washington, in Philadelphia, on a Monday night. It's a huge game, but if they get it (and as always in the Reid Era, I don't really fear the Skins), they'll have Detroit and the suddenly crippled Giants before the break. With a better game from the offense, they'll be 3-1, which is where you'd have to think they were going to be at the start of the year. (Besides, it's not like we haven't seen this team crap the bed on Opening Day before -- in 2002, it was a three-point loss at Tennessee, in 2003, it was the sloppy fart of a game in Atlanta.)

The Reid Era has been about bad losses that create drama, then division smackdowns to get right. If the same pattern holds, Eagles Nation will get off the ledge and move on.

A final word: if you ever have the opportunity to take in a game at Lambeau, you just have to. It may ruin the Linc for you, though. And I'm out. (Pictures at some point with luck. Thanks for indulging too many words.)