There's a beginning for everyone, I just think that there's less respect for learning the game.
Some people think that spending the money automatically gives them the right to be an asshole.
Perhaps people in Chicago just don't know how to act and it's a meatball mentality.
Bandwagon? Were the fans any more knowledgeable at the old stadium?
There were still turds in the seats when the place was drawing 9K.
For most fans: beer+sports fan = disaster
My tolerance for the stupid has thinned over the 14 years I've been going to games. I ignore most of it.
I've been to my fair share of barns around the NHL, and Chicago ranks as one of the worst for how fans act. The last game I was at two 30-something semi-drunk ladies were sitting behind me belting out mom-like screams, belches, and other atrocities that required a few Tylenol when I arrived home. The positive was two fans to our left that bought broker seats were very knowledgeable, nice fans. I turned the third the affair into an insult fest targeted at the two females behind me. The whole row was laughing, the women had no clue, and the Blackhawks won 3-2. Win-win.
I love the live experience. I've made many friends that make it enjoyable when I see them at a game. I could care less about the shit-for-brained fan that doesn't even make one ounce of an attempt to enjoy the greatest game on earth.
You can say that Chicago has had an "expansion" type of feel since WWW passed, and the marketing team has made it "cool" to travel over to the west side to take in a game.
The brokers have brought in the "here and now" people. Consistent winning does that too.
I don't expect all fans to have a huge fountain of resources when they're at a game, I just expect them to be respectful of others around them-- and group stupidity usually takes over.
I'm fine with staying home over 50% of the time.
I was itching to get to the game once the lockout was over, and 10 minutes into the 1st I didn't care to be there anymore. I'm fine with selling my tickets to some random Tyler and his dumb girlfriend Emma that are celebrating navigating I-290 for the first time, and remembering to lock their car while they drive down Damen to feel just a bit safer because dad said it's a sketchy area.
The people that want to see a puck dropped and hockey played are disappearing. Everything needs to have an entertainment feel because people have attention spans of a duck fart. People cannot enjoy something for 3 hours without having some sort of contrived "game experience." Isn't the game an experience enough? "No," say the people that put the bars in all four corners of the UC, and stuck a shitty house band in the rafters, and various other window licking activities.
