I've been debating it for weeks now and can't decide if I want to go and have the long drive home after midnight. Are any of you fine folks going?
id love too but id rather go see a team that I could careless who wins lol, I don't wanna fly 3k miles to be pissed and let down I can let my wife down from a lot shorter distance lol
I think we have several other members in the Charlotte area and in the Carolinas, so it would be cool to make an impromptu get together. There's always a strong Fins turnout at the Carolina games as well.
Yeah, I've seen the Fins play there 3 or 4 times and I've went to a few Panthers games over the years as well. It's a great stadium- the area is just hard to get in and out of.
I've said before, I have had a better time and been treated better as a visitor in half a dozen different stadiums than I ever was in Miami. Last time I went may have been the last time, although I must admit I would like to see the new stadium. 6000 mile round trip to Carolina for me so not happening Monday, unless Fridays lottery ticket hits anyway. I've seen this team in DC, Dallas, Denver, Oakland , San Diego, and Seattle so far. I was unemployed this year for the two LA games or I would have gone to those. I'll drive out next time we go to Lambeau. Bucket list I'd like to go to a game in NE, New Jersey and Buffalo at least once. And every NFL stadium would be cool.
Carolina Panther fans are 95% good people, even when drunk. Been to BoA stadium a couple times now to see the Dolphins. I think you're right it's probably safer than Dolphin stadium. Opposing fans there either want to start fights or make you start a fight by being so obnoxious on home turf. It's pretty sad down there. But i can't blame the locals, I don't even want to pay to see the Miami Browns anymore.
I stayed at the Westin right next door. It was easy just to walk to the stadium. Funny story was I was wearing my Wake jersey (I always wear my dolphin gear to any game even if they're not playing) and this guy yells "Hey Dolphin! Come here!". So I walk over thinking I'm going to get the usual you realize they aren't playing comment. The guy is running this huge corporate tailgate, all fenced off. He says " I'm a long suffering Dolphin fan too. Here's a wrist band to get in, free food and drinks to a fellow sufferer". Good stuff come to those that wear their colors, sometimes.
Lambeau is a great stadium too. It's like going to a college game. Another funny story about wearing a Dolphin jersey to a game they weren't playing in. I saw the Lion/Packers play at Lambeau with some vendors. I was doing an audit and the guy calls and says if I come out a day earlier he has tickets to the game, will drive and pay for everything. My response - IN. So they pick me up at the hotel and I come out in my Wake jersey and a Dolphins hat and they collectively say "Your wearing THAT????". We get to the stadium and we parked on a guys lawn for $20. Everyone sells lawn parking as the stadium is in the middle of this little town. He comes out with a six pack of beers and says "anyone want one?" Almost every single person going to the game had a Packers jersey one. I've been to a lot of games but never saw the team jersey on fans like they wear them there. It's impressive. So they take me to this bar right next to the stadium to get some cheese curds (told them never had em and they were aghast) and drinks. One of the ladies was selling raffle tickets for charity and I buy $20 worth since I'm not paying for anything. About 30 minutes before they game the lady gets on stage and all the patron in the bar crowd around as the start the raffle. They raffle off a bunch of Packers scarfs, plush toys and the like. They get to the grand prize which is an signed Antonio Freeman authentic NFL jersey. She holds it up. The crowd goes "oooohhhhhh" in anticipation. She pulls the ticket. And I won. They start looking around for who won and I walk to the stage and come up. From the back of the room you hear "Are you Fn kidding me, the Dolphins guy won it????". A collective groan went up in the bar as I held aloft the jersey for all to see as I strode off the stage. Good times.
Ive seen them in San Diego, LA, AZ, Oakland, SF, and Denver. In all honesty the best place ive ever been to to watch a game was AZ the stadium is ridiculous. I am planning on going to Minn next yr to watch the phins at the vikes new stadium.
I've seen the Dolphin in AZ also (and all of the same places you listed). You're right its a great stadium to watch a game. You're inside but it feels like you're outside with all the windows and light coming in. You must live on the Left coast too.
best coast of course ya its nice and loud the people aren't too obnoxious and its just a good atmosphere all around.
wasn't even talking about the fans. The people that work at Dolphins stadium the three times I've been were rude to downright hostile and unhelpful. The venue itself is not very friendly
I think my favorite stadium of all time was the Orange Bowl- and it was easily the most beat up, dangerous stadium I've ever been in too. I remember going to so many Notre Dame/Canes games as a kid and the crowds were electric with anger....you'd see fights before, during and after the game because people were so passionate. I do have a great of Dolphin memories as well, but nothing has ever matched the excitement of those Canes games in the 80's. FSU, BC, the Irish...they always showed up for a war and the fans echoed those feelings. My favorite football story of all time has to be sneaking into Joe Robbie stadium to watch Super Bowl 23 though. My high school worked the games and you'd get workers passes, which were supposed to be turned in after each game. One week the pass would be blue, the next week it would be yellow.....I went to every game from 89-92 and I had a collection of every color under the rainbow. So when the Super Bowl came to town, I figured, "What the heck? Let's go to a game dad!" For usual games, you had to be there 2 hours early....so that's about when my dad and I showed up to the game. And the first thing we do is start looking at worker passes, what color will they be this time? But they were special printed Super Bowl passes and there was absolutely no way we were getting through security with the ones we had- there were actual cops up there checking badges. The other problem was that we found out employees had to be there 3 hours early this time, so it was feeling like a wasted trip. So we had two choices- either head home OR try to work the game with my former high school team if we could somehow get a message up to them. Working isn't bad....you sell food/drinks for three quarters and then you're free to find seats and watch the 4th. My dad always sold beer at one of the outside kegs when he went- the parents loved that because they inventoried the cups, not the beer itself. So all the dads would drink away starting around halftime and be nice and happy watching the 4th quarter. So I went up to a security woman, told her we were there to work the game for Nova High, and she hopped on her walkie talkie to figure out what to do. After some back and forth on the radio, she finally pulled off her personal badge and handed it to me- this was like an all-access security badge that we've never seen before. You could go anywhere with it- the underground tunnels, the staff elevators, the skyboxes, etc. She told me to go to the Nova booth, get two passes, then bring one back down for my dad. And if I could find her, then go ahead and give her the security pass back. I knew right then that I definitely wasn't going to find her- I still have it somewhere all these years later. Now we're faced with a dilemma....what do we do? I went up to the employee entrance and there were hundreds of people trying to get in, but a cop saw my badge as I approached and waved me right through. I didn't even go in through the employee line...they had me loop around security. Now, I'm 19 at the time and still stupid in life, so all this newfound power is going to my head. I get on the other side of security, wave my dad over to the fence, and then pass him the badge and walk away. His eyes were saying, "NOOOOOOO!" but he took the badge anyway....thirty seconds later we're both in the stadium and wandering around. The only problem was, it's still a little over two hours before kickoff and the stadium was empty- only employees were inside at that time so it wasn't like we could just go sit down. And we couldn't go up to the upper deck because if my old coach saw me, he'd put my butt to work for three quarters. So we walked every inch of the stadium- from the locker room areas to the skyboxes. Now, we didn't get too close to the players area because we only had one pass (and because my dad kept telling me how stupid I was being with the bravery) but still, it was a day I'll never forget. There's a definite art form in squatting in other people's seats- we started out in club in the 2nd row right at the 50 yard line. But we got up just before halftime to wander and someone else was in those seats once we got back, so it's like crap...what do you do? So we started hunting again. We had great seats in the lower deck for about 10 minutes and a security guy busted us, so I pulled out the worker pass and said we were just taking a quick break. My dad could have killed me because he didn't have a pass and I was playing with fire, but luckily the security guy didn't seem to care and let us go. We watched the rest of the game in the nosebleed seats though and it was a great game- signature Montana driving for a last minute win. I still have a few seat cushions from that game, some tickets we found afterwards (w/ $750 a seat printed on them), a few programs, and a disposable camera that we never bothered to get developed. This was all stuff people just left in their seats after the game so we happily brought them home with us.
