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Instead of talking about how great South Philly’s new football stadium was, fans left Monday’s Philadelphia-Tampa Bay opening game questioning the Eagles’ efforts — or lack thereof.
Why were the Birds just 2-for-11 on third-down conversions? How could they fail to get any points when the ball was on the Buccaneers’ 1-yard line?
The Eagles had more than seven months — since their loss to Tampa in the NFC Championship — to prepare for this contest, and left the lovely new Lincoln Financial Field with nothing to show for it.
Monday’s nationally televised opening game was meant to be a proper christening for the Linc. At the very least, the scores of fans who pitched tents before the game didn’t expect their team to be scoreless.
Rich Doughty and his crew of 15 from Pitman, N.J., arrived by 8 a.m. to put up their tent along the Pattison Avenue fence — and, in the process, beat the traffic that clogged local streets by eight hours. By 4 p.m., as area travelers fell into gridlock, Doughty and friends had grilled up the traditional menu of lobster tail and steak and were gathering in front of their "Early Morning Kick Stands" for a cheer.
They didn’t care about no stinkin’ fireworks and laser light show.
"[The pre-game show] is all nice and good, but we are more into football than anything else," said Doughty, a 10-year season ticket-holder. "We just want to see the Eagles win."
Maybe next time.
By midnight, those pregame cheers had turned into jeers and even silence as Philadelphia failed to score a single point in the 17-0 loss to Tampa Bay. By then, many of the 68,000-plus fans had cleared out of the arena, and no one seemed to care about how the Eagles cheerleaders looked in their new Vera Wang outfits, or how exciting it was to see the F-16 military jets fly over the new Linc, or what a surprise it was when the green-bedecked Sylvester Stallone rallied them on before the game.
What they did painfully recount was how Buccaneers kicker Martin Gramatica scored the first field goal in the history of the Eagles’ new home.
While opening night at the Linc won’t be remembered with any real fondness, it is only the first of eight home games for the Birds. They will host the New England Patriots on Sunday, with kickoff at 4:15 p.m.
Then, local fans will get to witness two teams who were outscored by a combined 48-0 in week one.
In all, the Eagles still have 15 games to go, while South Philly’s new stadium is ready to host a January NFC championship.
A soon-to-be husband-and-wife team from Delaware were more concerned Monday with the NFC East race between Philadelphia and the New York Giants. Talk about diehard football fans, this duo spent all day Sunday at Giants Stadium and was tailgating in South Philly by the next morning.
Elizabeth Moodie is the Eagles fan; her fianc�, Keith, is rooting for New York. Come Nov. 16, he will be dressed in full team garb as they tie the knot at Dave & Buster’s and then take 65 friends and family members to the Eagles-Giants game.
Their wedding cake will be topped with mini Eagles and Giants helmets instead of the traditional bride and groom figurines.
The couple has tickets for 25 NFL games this year, including all the Eagles’ home games, and will honeymoon in Houston so they can attend Super Bowl XXXVIII. They went to last year’s Super Bowl anticipating that the Eagles were going to make it.
For them, the big question now is, who will win out in the war of sports and love on Nov. 16?
"It might be the first wedding in history where the bride and groom sleep in different rooms on their wedding night," Keith said with a laugh.
