A Fan’s Notes from the Upper Deck

The first home game of the 2006 season is now behind us. Some things went right, some things went wrong, and some things went ugly. After a beautiful drive down to Scott Stadium, hours of scorching sun, and a Chicken BBQ Combo, here are this fan’s notes from the upper deck coming straight at you from the 500s.

Bottleneck: So, how do I think the team entrance was? Cavman? The first kickoff? How the heck should I know? I was stuck outside, waiting in the masses of humanity piling up at each gate. Apparently, the Athletic Department has taken a high-tech step backward in crowd control, now using scanners to log us into the stadium. Gone is the tried-and-true “tear off the ticket stub” method. Now, each ticket barcode is scanned with handheld devices – the kind you’ll find in the hands of cashiers at Costco or Home Depot. As one would expect with these machines, the infrared beam doesn’t pick up the barcode on the first try and often the second, causing the entry time per fan to triple.

Now, I understand that we shouldn’t expect immediate entry right before game time. And maybe these scanners serve some sort of marketing or public safety service. But when a fourth of your fans are stuck at the gates at kickoff, something is wrong. The game day atmosphere suffers, the concession sales suffer, we suffer. They should’ve bailed on the scanners and returned to the old “tear ’em” method yesterday when the system failure became apparent. I’m hopeful that they either fix or scrap the scanning method by the next game.

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