Arrowhead Adventures: Opening Day

We had such high hopes!

Its never easy posting an “Arrowhead Adventures” after a disappointment like Sunday. Its worse when you consider the “I can’t even remember the number” of straight losses both at home and away. I wanted a win, I just can’t muster up my usual enthusiasm after this one.

To be perfectly honest, my game partner Jen and I had a more fun at the Stadium than I can remember having in a long time. This was Jen’s first Arrowhead Adventure and Im so glad we picked this one to introduce her to the experience. The old Arrowhead was back. The BBQ at Arthur Bryant’s was fantastic, and as usual more than I could even hope to eat in one sitting.

The parking lot and stadium was full of energetic, enthusiastic fans.

It’s a simple pleasure but I love tossing the football around, and its extra fun when the girl you bring to the game can throw the ball farther than most men I know, having been a near professional level softball player in years past.

Leaning over the rail near my new seats, you could literally reach out and touch the players and staff : Larry Johnson, who always practices with his shirt tail out, Brody Croyle who we half expected not to survive the pre-game warm ups without an injury, and Scott Haley who in person seems to have that kind of Labrador Retriever like “peaceful” look when not on camera. For me, he is a guy you instantly like in person.

Jen challenged the jumbotron cameraman to take a picture of her taking a picture of him taking a picture of…….well you get it and he cheerfully obliged her to the pleasure of the fans surrounding us.

Optimism in my favorite place on earth was as high as the noontime sun.

It’s always exciting to meet the people you will be sitting with for the season at the first home game, and my neighbors turned out to be an enthusiastic friendly bunch who not surprisingly know the game better than myself.

The fly over was fantastic, and it was an absolute thrill to hear that old defensive 3^rd down scream and to hammer the crap out of the seats in front and watch the opposing quarterbacks ears bleed.

I showed Jen the photo of myself with “Jenna” the tall blonde cheerleader that shows up in quite a bit of the jumbotron ads and we  had a fun time looking for her on the field.

As for the game, well your eternal optimist saw quite a bit of things to be optimistic about, and so did the surrounding fans.

The guy behind me pointed out that Matt seemed to focus on his very near surroundings while scattered receivers in the backfield went unnoticed, and I had to agree, though I can understand it, as I think he was expecting to be run over by big Richard Seymour and his ilk.

As everyone knows penalties killed us, and quite a few small things than didn’t go our way wound up making the difference between a win against the hated Raiders, and a loss.

The Raiders fans we did see were not the scary gangster types I’ve seen in years past, many were elaborately costumed, and we had civil discussions with  several couples dressed in the silver and black.

Makes you think that a lot of the Raiders fans have given up on their team like I know many Chiefs fans have.

We made great time after the game back to the car only to find the battery dead. Jen went into action and we soon had jumper cables connected up with a Dodge Ram, and were on our way to good old I-435 south, another example of the close-nit nature of the Arrowhead fans always looking out for each other.

It looks to be a long year and an even longer war gang. Each game is a battle, and the payoff is going to be several years down the road.

Anyone can be a Patriots fan when they are on top, but it takes a special kind of dedicated fan to stay on the wagon when the losses pile up.

This year, I’m going to treat each game as an adventure in itself, I guess I’ll kind of stop to smell the roses.

As always, I see way to many positives to even think about giving up my Arrowhead Adventures and Ill be back up in good old section 130 in two weeks for the Giants game.

See you then!