A story from the game last night...

[JT96912]

My Wife, 16 year old son and a buddy of mine went to the game last night. I've went to every Flames game in Nashville for many years. I live in Bowling Green, Kentucky which is about a one hour drive from Nashville.

We had great seats, about twelve rows off the glass. My wife and son are Flames fans, and all three of us wore Flames jerseys. It was a great game, but things got interesting after.

After the furious finish and the Flames won, we walked out to the concession area on our way out. There were multiple Flames fans walking with jerseys on that congratulated me and I back to them. I walked up to one group of about five Calgary fans and we high fived each other and said "great game" to each other.

This is where it gets interesting. A random Preds fan in a Preds jersey walked up to me and started yelling "F-you" five or so times and then yelled "You F-ing Canadians are all Fascists" another couple times. This was right in front of my family. I looked at him a moment and walked away with my wife, son and buddy. We kept walking and I was talking to my buddy with my Wife and Son in front of us. I noticed my wife and son were looking behind and to the side of them every so often. After about ten seconds I looked.

The guy was looking at my Son and Wife, walking stride for stride with us saying "what", "what are you gonna do?" The second I saw this I walked over to him and him at me. We bumped chests and he bounced off me. I'm 5'10", 245lbs and have worked out pretty much my whole life. I don't know how big he was because in the heat of the moment I didn't notice. He was smaller than me though, Noticeably. I was very, very mad that he made my family scared. He walked away down a tunnel towards the ice after he bounced off me and never looked back.

A security guard came up to me and gave me a hard time right away. My buddy filled him in on what went down and he followed my Wife, son and buddy out. Never in all my years of going to sporting events have I had a crazy person verbally attack me and follow me and my family and scare the hell out of them. They were honestly scared until I confronted him, I could see it in their eyes.

It sucks because I know most Preds fans would never do this. Just a really disturbed fan. It really sucks when it happens to you. I can tell you I would've done more if my family wasn't with me.

Just thought I'd share my story. Hopefully more fans don't go through this watching their favorite teams play on the road.

[Mathalete]

Scary stuff! Glad to hear that it didn’t get too far out of hand. I would have never thought Predators fans would be like that. Some other fan bases, sure...... but Nashville???

I guess it only takes one idiot to make things crazy though.

[CaptainCrunch]

Nothing says I love you more then a devastating headbutt to the bridge of the nose from outta nowhere.

[Otto-matic]

Originally Posted by Mathalete

Scary stuff! Glad to hear that it didn’t get too far out of hand. I would have never thought Predators fans would be like that. Some other fan bases, sure...... but Nashville???

I guess it only takes one idiot to make things crazy though.

We have moron Flames fans, every fan base has a few bad eggs that ruins the experience for others.

Glad nothing really escalated in front of your wife and kid. Deep down I wish the games had a limit on how much booze can be sold per person. Some people just can't handle alcohol and turn into massive d-bags.

[Manhattanboy]

There are bad apples in every bunch. Try to put it behind you.

Maybe you will get to see some Flames playoff hockey there later this year!!!

[JT96912]

He definitely had crazy in his eyes. If it was just me, fine. I lost it a little when my family got scared though. You never know what's gonna happen in today's world.

I'm from NY. A little hockey town in Northern NY named Massena. Transfered to Bowling Green for my job about 10 years ago. Saw many games in Montreal and Ottawa through the years. Canadians and fascist do not go in the same sentence. My son even said afterwards that the guy needed a history lesson.

[calgarywinning]

Would be nice for the NHL app to incorporate an Arena map and allow patrons to summon security if they feel threatened like this. Or even in app texting to local security that can investigate the threat a bit quicker. Seems like the incident just kept going and escalating for too long a period. Normally I would head right to security. Was there a lack thereof present?

[memphusk]

I know that feeling. I once attended a playoff game in Edmonton vs Dallas. I was the only one in the rink cheering for Dallas. You could hear me beller throughout the whole arena. It was great. Lots if threats afterwards though. Needless to say I carried on. Dallas won.

[savardandjokinen]

I’m glad the Flames fans are better about this. In the 10 years I’ve been going to games I’ve only seen one fight and it was a bunch of people at a flames vs Canucks Years ago

[CaptainCrunch]

The best way to disarm these idiots is to just say a lot of confusing nonsensical things

Bully - "Bargle bargle bargle"

You - "Look man, nobody puts baby in the corner"

Bully - "You want your a$$ kicked"

You - "Its just been revoked"

Bully - "what"

You - "I'm Canadian what the hell do I know about Nascar"

Bully - "Ok man, you crazy"

You - "My butter tastes like cheese whiz"

It actually really works well if the bully is completely drunk

[JT96912]

Originally Posted by calgarywinning

Would be nice for the NHL app to incorporate an Arena map and allow patrons to summon security if they feel threatened like this. Or even in app texting to local security that can investigate the threat a bit quicker. Seems like the incident just kept going and escalating for too long a period. Normally I would head right to security. Was there a lack thereof present?

The first security I encountered was after the guy walked away. He was eyeballing me like I was at fault. I'm pretty sure he only saw the end, but at least he was there. He walked us out.

[GoJetsGo]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

The best way to disarm these idiots is to just say a lot of confusing nonsensical things.....

Something that's worked well for me in the past in similar situations:

Lay on a thick North Dakota type accent like William H. Macy / Frances McDormand in Fargo and act like one of those people who couldn't be happier to strike up a mundane conversation with a stranger.

If they tell you something, respond with "Oh yea, eh?" and go into an extremely polite, yet nonsensical story. For the one in the original post, "this is my first time at a hockey game and gosh darn it are they fast" would be a good jumping off point.

You need to be able to pull it off in a convincing fashion, but this has worked well for me on several such occasions in the past.

By no means am I afraid of confrontation, but this shtick above leaves bullies and loudmouths confused and wanting to stop conversing with me as quickly as possible.

[Beninho]

I know everyone raves about their crowd but that type of atmosphere is gonna make stupid people to do stupid things. It’s not a place I would want to go with my family from just hearing their fans on TV. I understand having a loud crowd but the chants they do against the goalies during regular season games are bit over the top. In the playoffs I get it, but the regular season? I like to enjoy the hockey game, not listen to screaming lunatics yell stuff at goalies. I’m glad nothing crazy happened to you

[GoJetsGo]

Originally Posted by Beninho

I know everyone raves about their crowd but that type of atmosphere is gonna make stupid people to do stupid things. It’s not a place I would want to go with my family from just hearing their fans on TV. I’m glad nothing crazy happened to you

Any time you have 10,000+ people in the same place with alcohol, you stand a chance of running into a moron like the one in the OP. I really see no way to spin this into an indictment on attending a game in Nashville. I've been to a hundred something Flames games at the dome. Have run into a fair share of drunken idiots.

[Beninho]

Originally Posted by GoJetsGo

Any time you have 10,000+ people in the same place with alcohol, you stand a chance of running into a moron like the one in the OP. I really see no way to spin this into an indictment on attending a game in Nashville. I've been to a hundred something Flames games at the dome. Have run into a fair share of drunken idiots.

That’s fair, I’m sure 99% of the fans that go to their games aren’t looking to start trouble. I just think that type of atmosphere could incite that 1% of people do something stupid. Idk, maybe I’m talking out of my ass, but everytime I watch the Flames play in Nashville I always think that it must suck being an away fan in that arena.

[JT96912]

Originally Posted by GoJetsGo

Something that's worked well for me in the past in similar situations:

Lay on a thick North Dakota type accent like William H. Macy / Frances McDormand in Fargo and act like one of those people who couldn't be happier to strike up a mundane conversation with a stranger.

If they tell you something, respond with "Oh yea, eh?" and go into an extremely polite, yet nonsensical story. For the one in the original post, "this is my first time at a hockey game and gosh darn it are they fast" would be a good jumping off point.

You need to be able to pull it off in a convincing fashion, but this has worked well for me on several such occasions in the past.

By no means am I afraid of confrontation, but this shtick above leaves bullies and loudmouths confused and wanting to stop conversing with me as quickly as possible.

Sounds like fun. I love doing accents! I guess the problem for me would be to calm down and think of it in the heat of the moment. When I get angry I guess my mind isn't thinking like that. I did walk away from him once. You're right though, I need to calm down and think of methods like this. Better for everyone and sets a more intelligent example for my son.

[JT96912]

Originally Posted by Beninho

That’s fair, I’m sure 99% of the fans that go to their games aren’t looking to start trouble. I just think that type of atmosphere could incite that 1% of people do something stupid. Idk, maybe I’m talking out of my ass, but everytime I watch the Flames play in Nashville I always think that it must suck being an away fan in that arena.

The fans are usually great in Nashville. Never had this happen in the past. Probably one crazy fan in a million. It sucks that I will be forever aware from here on out and be on my guard because of this guy though.

[stazzy33]

Man, that sucks that happened to you JT96912.

I would imagine this was one rotten apple out of the whole batch. I was at the Nashville-Calgary game on Oct 24 this season and I had an amazing, away fan, experiences at Bridgestone arena. Most people that we talked to were very friendly and were just excited to talk about how well the Preds did last season. They wanted to talk about hockey and their City to someone from out of town as the sport is pretty new in to most people in Tennessee. The in-arena stuff is pretty funny and even the "you suck" chant got a laugh out of everyone I was with (my parents and gf all decked out in Flames gear). Even though the game ended in a Flames SO win most of the Preds fans we saw after the game came up to give us high fives or say it was a really good game. We went out after the game on Broadway and ran into a bunch of other Flames fans in jerseys and had a few drinks and there we had no issues partying the rest of the night. Just wanted to show a perspective from the other side of things.

I would highly recommend going to Nashville for a game. The atmosphere is a blast and the City is really cool.

[Beninho]

Originally Posted by JT96912

The fans are usually great in Nashville. Never had this happen in the past. Probably one crazy fan in a million. It sucks that I will be forever aware from here on out and be on my guard because of this guy though.

Ah ya that’s most likely the case. I’ve seen many away Flames games in many different places (Anaheim,Chicago,Van, San Jose) and I usually always have a guard up. I’ve seen some very interesting fans in Anaheim and San Jose who had no issue telling me what they thought of the Flames and my jersey.

[JT96912]

Originally Posted by Beninho

That’s fair, I’m sure 99% of the fans that go to their games aren’t looking to start trouble. I just think that type of atmosphere could incite that 1% of people do something stupid. Idk, maybe I’m talking out of my ass, but everytime I watch the Flames play in Nashville I always think that it must suck being an away fan in that arena.

The fans are usually great in Nashville. Never had this happen in the past. Probably one crazy fan in a million. It sucks that I will be forever aware from here on out and be on my guard because of this guy though.