From Lambeau passion to Dome doldrums
Fans experience the highs, lows of NFL atmosphere in Green Bay, Atlanta
By STEVE HUMMER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 12/15/07
In just two days, Steve Brumer had traveled the extremes of the NFL experience. He bounced from wurst to worst, from Titletown U.S.A. to the NFL's version of "Les Miserables."
On Sunday, he awoke in Green Bay, Wis., and ate brats for breakfast. He communed with people who consider cheese a fashion statement, then watched Brett Favre start his umpteenth consecutive game at Lambeau Field while his receivers regularly hurled themselves into a mosh pit of happy third-generation ticket-holders.
On Monday night, he went to the Georgia Dome to watch the Falcons stage a farewell tribute to Michael Vick — a humbling loss before a national audience, fully depicting the scorched earth the convicted quarterback has left behind. All while Bobby Petrino was looking for the nearest exit.
As Brumer waited back by his SUV in a seedy tailgating area, with the Dome emptying before the third quarter was done, he summed up his strange trip: "In 24 hours I went from Mecca to the pits."
Another way of viewing the state of the Falcons is to compare them to the ideal. In November, SI.com released a poll ranking the NFL's 32 teams in order of overall fan experience. The criteria ranged from tailgating to team performance, from concessions to ticket prices.
Green Bay, the little market that could, was No. 1.
Atlanta was No. 29. And that was before Monday night, when some players were driving another wedge between the team and the town with their tributes to Vick while getting filleted by rival New Orleans. And before the coach left skid marks getting out of town with three games left. Would a new vote drop the Falcons another notch or two?
Take the trip that Brumer did, and see for yourself.
Football paradise
There is a little house that backs onto Lombardi Avenue, its picture window framing a football dreamscape. Some men fantasize about the temptations of Polynesia or the primal thrill of the safari.
Then, there's Mike Holton.
"He wanted to be able to wake up, look outside and see Lambeau Field," said his wife, Lynn.
Holton grew up in Milwaukee but came to Atlanta to make his money. The 41-year-old private equity entrepreneur has struck another kind of gold with this home he secured after a door-to-door search unearthed one couple willing to sell.
Once he owned it, Holton transformed it. He built a deck over the garage, where he could grill the famous sausages of Wisconsin while facing the Packers' legendary stadium.
He decked the walls with black-and-white photos of Nitschke and Lombardi, Kramer and Starr. The carpets in the bedrooms are Packers green and gold.
The sole purpose of this perfect party house is to give Holton a place to come eight times a year when the Packers are at home, where he can commute from Atlanta with family and friends to enjoy essential pro football, Green Bay style.
"I love everything about Atlanta — except the football," Holton said with a little smile.
For the second time this season, he invited the Brumers, his Gwinnett neighbors, to the party. For seven years, Steve Brumer has held four season tickets to the Falcons. He says he'll stick it out through this sad, sad season. This occasional trip to Green Bay is great therapy — all Falcons fans should get the chance, if just to recover from their wounds.
Game day at Lambeau, especially when times are good like they are now for the 11-2 Packers, is pure joy.
Imagine a team that binds a community instead of rending it into factions. In Green Bay, the quarterback — former Falcons draft pick Favre — was just named "Sportsman of the Year" by Sports Illustrated. In Atlanta, the quarterback was just sentenced to 23 months in the federal pen.
The 50-year-old stadium has been sold out since 1960, season tickets passed along like heirlooms. There is a ticket waiting list bearing more than 75,000 names.
Fans fortunate enough to gain entrance seem determined to savor the experience.
Sunday, with the temperature in the teens and snow piled all around the margins, they began gathering in the large surrounding parking lot four hours before game time. Folks in the middle-class neighborhood ringing the stadium already have kicked off their own parties while beckoning customers to park on the lawn.
Long before the Packers blew out old Super Bowl II opponent Oakland this Sunday, Scott Schwartz, 44, from Pulaski, Wis., had set up his portable bar outside Lambeau. And every hour or so he mounted the open tailgate of his truck and recited anew the epic poem, "Tim The Diehard Packer Fan." It always ends with Tim consuming so much beer and bratwurst that he basically explodes, ascending to heaven where he might grill out with Vince Lombardi.
Jim and Rita Oudenhoven, from DePere, return to a place they have occupied, according to a sign over their SUV, since 1961. That's five years before the Falcons were born.
It's inside where Lambeau reveals its truest nature. There are no dancers, only cheerleaders from a nearby university. No fireworks. Despite a modernization finished in 2003, the bones of the old bowl are intact. The majority of fans still sit on a bare aluminum bench.
By the time the national anthem was performed, you could roll a wheel of cheese down any concession concourse and not hit a soul. Everyone was in the stands. And there they remained until the final minute, even with the Packers comfortably ahead.
And the visitor from Atlanta is blown away.
"This is another culture," said Jessica Brumer, Steve's wife. "It's like going to the 'Twilight Zone.'"
From glory to The Gulch
The Falcons' experience never can hope to match that of the Packers — few NFL cities can. Where else is there the depth of history and the almost hereditary connection with a community (112,000 fans own stock in the Packers)?
What can be measured is the distance any team has fallen from the Packer plateau.
There was Steve Brumer on Monday night, in the middle of the tailgate section known as "The Gulch," light years from Green Bay. Maybe the lot would be full like past seasons if the Falcons weren't such a mess. Maybe he wouldn't notice the busted streetlight over his spot or the shabby surroundings in this hole beneath the Spring Street overpass if he hadn't just returned from Wisconsin and the Falcons weren't about to go 3-10.
When the Falcons are going well, the Georgia Dome can pulsate with energy. But at times like this, especially after just returning from the open-air celebration in Green Bay, the Dome interior is "plastic, a little artificial," Brumer admitted.
There is no music in The Gulch these days, no team effort to dress up the sparse urban setting. And plainly, the season has worn on Brumer and his group of friends who have gathered here faithfully since 2001.
"There's no product here," said Brumer, who owns his own wireless company. "Nothing exciting."
"It seems everything else has fallen off with [the quality] of the team," Atlanta's Chris Lawrence said between bites of lowcountry boil that the group was sharing. "We just want the organization to give us what they want the players to give it."
Feeding that restlessness is a string of games like Monday night's 34-14 loss to New Orleans. While players like DeAngelo Hall and Roddy White flashed their support of Vick for the cameras, their team imploded by early in the second half.
A "sellout" crowd that left the Georgia Dome about 85 percent full in the first quarter was staging a fire drill by the third. Bright empty chairback seats made up the backdrop for the conclusion of that nationally aired game. And the theme of a Falcons franchise in ruins dominated the telecast.
Wearing his new Packers sweatshirt, Brumer rejoined his group in The Gulch with most of the fourth quarter left to play. The view from an overgrown parking lot was better than that inside the Dome. One heck of a way to finish a football odyssey.
For an encore, 24 hours later, Petrino was calling the hogs at a late-night news conference announcing him as Arkansas' next coach. Smiling and yelling "Soooey!" like the Falcons were nothing but a bad dream.
"I was excited when Arthur Blank took over the team [in 2002], excited about what he was going to bring to the product," a slightly weary Brumer said. "Well, a quick note to Mr. Blank: You've reached the bottom now."
