September 08, 2005 

Uptight soccer mom goes to a Timbers game because her son is serving as a ballboy for the team and she got free tickets. Uptight soccer mom apparently has never been to a sports event before, or ever climbed out from under a rock, and is aghast to find that sports fans are rowdy, drink beer, and swear. Livid that her son heard the word asshole at the game, she yells so much about it to a reporter at the Oregonian that the reporter does a story about how Timbers Army are corrupting kids, ruining games and driving fans away.

Of course, if the facts had been checked, the reporter would have discovered that the Timbers have one of the highest attendance records in the league, that the number of people attending games has increased, and that uptight soccer mom is an active member of every ultra conservative religious group and is working to get feminists, birth control, liberals, gays, and non catholics banned from the planet. The Timbers Army? We're just the latest group she's decided to hate, but the reporter didn't figure that out, or just didn't care. Bad reporter!

Tonight, an angry Timbers Army responded. It was the first home game since the nasty article and, since it was claimed that the Timbers Army are ruining games for everyone, the T.A. decided to give people a chance to see what games would be like without them. Rather than cheer their hearts out from section 107, like they always do, the Timbers Army left 107 totally empty and instead sat quietly in sections 106 and 108. Would it make a difference? Would the game be better without us? Would other fans be happy we were silent? Pissy soccer mom would say yes, no matter what, but reality spoke otherwise.

The stadium was dead, totally quiet, and people were tweaked by it. Normally, there's anywhere from 500-1000 people in section 107, cheering with wild abandon throughout the entire game, but tonight it was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. While the Timbers Army only comprise about 1/6 of the attendance, they're part of what gets the crowd going, the rest of the fans sing and cheer along with the TA, and with the Army silent, the rest of the fans were as well.

It was bizarre, just plain wrong. Timbers games should not sound like a golf match. Timbers games should be full of the passion, devotion, and joy that the team inspires and deserves. If you want beer free gosh golly darn reverence, go to church. If you're uptight, repressed, and can't stand passion, stay at home. But whatever you do, don't bring your narrow minded, bigoted views into our stadium and demand that everyone abide by them. Because we won't, nor should we. People love soccer because of the passion, the fraternizing, the abandon, and it was well proved tonight that removing those things is wrong.

As if the silent, lifeless stadium hadn't already proven our point, the Timbers helped us out as well. Come the 75th minute of the game, the Timbers Army decided to break their silence and everyone simultaneously went screaming back into section 107 and spent the remaining 15 minutes cheering like they've never cheered before. And the Timbers responded with a scoring spree - three goals in the last 15 minutes - and both the players and Timbers Army were euphoric. And triumphant. The Timbers beat Atlanta and the Timbers Army beat evil. Er... Soccer moms.

We're ruining the games for everyone? I don't think so.

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