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THE HERD INVADES THE GEORGIA DOME
BY RAMSRULE (Oct 18)
To make a short story long...
 |
| Myself and Dr. Snook proudly display The
HERD's colors at the Georgia Dome |
I hadn't really thought about going to
any games in person this year. But upon seeing a post on the Rams board about trying
to get 20,000 Rams fans in the Georgia Dome, I thought that this was a great opportunity
to see one of the better Rams teams that I've seen, and one that is undefeated to boot.
So I acquired my tickets through Ticketmaster... section 128 row 21 seats 1& 2.
Too cool!! Corner of the endzone..perfect view of the field. Of course since I
purchased my tickets so late, I had to get them via will-call, which was supposed to open
at noon. We got to the stadium at 10:30 AM and found the will-call windows just in case
they opened early. There was a good sized gathering of Rams fans already in this
area. Dexter McCleon had about 10 or so family members attending and they were hanging out
along with the rest of us.
Sure enough.. around 10:45 the windows open. Too cool! I get our tickets and
then we are just hanging around when I see this guy in a Rams coat, hat, and a Jim Everett
#11 jersey. He looks at me kind of funny and asks "Are you Troy?"..
I said "DOC!!"..I didn't expect to find him so easily outside.
So we exchange introductions and talk up the Rams, both past and present. Man, it was
great just having another fan as knowledgeable as the Doc to talk to. There arent
many Rams fans here in North Carolina.
The gates opened at 11:30 and we made our way to our seats. We parted ways with the
Doc so he could find his seat (he was supposed to be sitting in the opposite corner of the
endzone) but he ended up sitting with us, jumping from empty seat to empty seat
(there were plenty to choose from).
SIGN-GATE 99. Once my
wife and I found our section, I asked the usher if signs were permitted. He said
"yes, on the lower level only...no upper level signs." We trotted down the
steps to our seats and then went down to the field railing to hang the sign. There
was some tape already in place in a perfect location. So we taped up the sign as a
security guard commented "Man, that sign will be covered up by a dirty birds sign I'm
sure. Do you realize you are sitting in the "Dirty Birds"
section??!!?!". I'm like "So, big deal! Who cares where we're
sitting!" But I was scared that the sign would be messed with so I ran to the
other side of the stadium to get a picture of it.
When I got back to my seat, I noticed Paul Justin (click
here for image)warming up in the endzone. So I ran back down to get a picture of
him. After taking the pic, I asked him if he was going to get some 3rd quarter
action today. He replied "I sure hope so." Way too cool!!
As I turned around to go back to my seat, another security guard pointed at the sign and
asked me if it was mine. I said "Sure is, why?" He said that
signs are not permitted on the lower level in any manner, and that you can only hang them
on the upper level railings. I told him what the usher said, but he insisted that I take
the sign down. Reluctantly I took the sign back to my seat. :-(
Right before the game started, some Falcons fans put a banner up about 20 feet over from
where The HERD sign was earlier. I never noticed if they made them take it down, but
I seriously doubt they had to. It was a conspiracy, no doubt.
London Fletcher's Aunt and a bunch of his cousins were sitting in front of us. They
were very nice and we talked about London for several minutes. They commented that
they were going to the Cleveland game and that London is originally from the Cleveland
area and that he grew up a Browns fan, so this week's game will be special for him. He is
flying in a big crowd for that one!
 |
| Man, Ike is even faster in person!! |
GAMETIME! As for the
game, we were psyched and cheered every play. We even gave the Falcons credit for
their great plays, which made for friendlier neighbors as we were surrounded by a mix of
both Falcons and Rams fans.(click here for
image)
Bruce caught his TD in our corner of the endzone, and Marshall's TD(click here for image) was in front of us
too. Way, way, way too cool!
Also got to see Horne's run back start from our end along with Carter's fumble recovery
and Wistrom's INT (he ran it back the other way).
It was amazing to see the O-line runblock like they did...for the most part they were
opening up holes that you could have driven two team buses through side-by side(click here for image)! We were loving
every minute of it!
It seemed every time the Doc made a "drain and replenish" trip, something good
happened for the Rams. He missed Wistrom's int. return and also missed the Carter fumble
recovery.. I was reachin' to give the guy a high five after the play and
he was nowhere to be seen. TOO FUNNY!!! I thoroughly enjoyed watching the game with
him.. We seemed to be the loudest of the Ram fans in our area. The game
wouldn't have been the same without his presence! (click here for Horne fixing to go all the way)
We were rubbing it in to the Falcons fans about the 3rd and 20+ conversion by Marshall.
That was a morale killer!! And watching the Falcons kick those two field goals was
just too much!! Dan Reeves needs to give it up if he doesn't have the cajones
to go for it in those situations (they were down by 31 with 5 minutes left when they
kicked the last FG...GIMME A BREAK!!
As for the Falcons fans, they were very courteous for the most part. I had a beer-jockey
tell me that if bought beer from him it would be a dollar more. I just laughed at him and
bought my brew from the guy next to him. Most Bird fans in our section were leaving
at half time. They made comments to us like "You guys are going 16-0" and
"You guys are by far the class of the league...have a great season." Man
did it feel good to hear them say things like that about us!
SORRY, NO AUTOGRAPHS: We made our way over to the opposite corner on the
field with 5 minutes left in the game. The Rams' tunnel was there and we wanted to
try and get some autographs after the game. We made our way down to the field with
about 30 seconds left...just in time to get into position. We were in a crowd of
about 150 Blue and Gold bleeders... gotta love it! The players threw gloves and
sweat bands into the crowd as they ran by. As Faulk ran by I yelled "RUSH"
and he looked over at us and smiled! Az came over and got a kid out of the crowd and
took him into the dressing room. I assumed he was family of some sort. We
tried to get him to autograph the HERD sign....my wife had it dangling over the
railing. But alas he wouldn't do it. Ike also came over and talked to a group
of people to the right of us, but he didn't sign for us either. ;-( We struck
out on the autographs, but I understand the player's side of it so no hard feelings from
me(click here for image).
 |
| Man, if I only knew how to use the camera!!
This would have been a nice picture. |
But something did happen, and I didn't
find this out until later. My wife said that as the camera crews were coming off the
field, one of them stopped and got a good shot of the sign! So maybe it will end up
on the HBO show or in a highlight video somewhere! Who knows!
POSTGAME: After the game, we took the film to be developed and decided to
get some grub. There was a sports bar down the street from the hotel. I wanted
to see a little of the Whiners/Panthers game.
There was a huge crowd, with the NLCS and the late football games on. As we walked in the
door, with me still proudly sporting my Pace jersey, we got the biggest reaction!
The whole place went to booing us! I loved it! I yelled out "It's not my
fault!" Way too funny...that was 100% pure respect for our team and I was
grinning from ear to ear as we found our table!
We had the best time and are looking forward to hooking up with Dr. Snook and anybody else
that makes the trip to Atlanta next year. |
