T-shirt gets Bengals fan in trouble
Daugherty: Bengals and team security need to remember fans count

By Paul Daugherty • pdaugherty@enquirer.com • November 30, 2010


An angry Bengals fan covers up a portion of his sign with a censor after Bengals officials told him to take it down at the end of a game on Dec. 6, 1998.


Scott Arnold (left) and Frank Noel, both UC students and Cincinnati natives, sport paper bags projecting an 0-16 season goal during a game on Dec. 15, 2002.


Fans put up a banner showing the Cincinnati Bengals have lost 100 games in the 90's, during the Bengals game with the St. Louis Rams on Oct. 3, 1999, in Cincinnati. The Bengals lost 38-10 to become the first NFL team to lose 100 games this decade.


Season ticket holder Greg Coburn from Fort Thomas expresses his view of the season and GM Mike Brown on Dec. 15, 2002. The Bengals lost to Jacksonville 29-15 at Paul Brown Stadium and were 1-13.


A sign during this Bengals game on Oct. 16, 1978 shows how disgruntled fans were back then.

For three years, a lifelong Bengals fan who wants to be known only as Chris has sat in Section 122 at Paul Brown Stadium, just above the tunnel used by the visiting team, occasionally showing his frustration with the Bengals by waving a T-shirt.

Black tee, white letters, printed by a guy who sits in the row in front of him:

FIRE BOB BRATKOWSKI

Is this wrong?

The sentiment is not unique among Bengals fans. Bratkowski’s the offensive coordinator. The offense hasn’t been great. To many, the shirt states the obvious.

Think of it as the football equivalent of Save The Planet.

Chris and his father Tom have displayed their shirts several times in the last three years. “A way we get rid of our frustration,’’ Tom explains. Until two Sundays ago, it was OK. The offense would go three-plays-and-out by running Ced Benson off tackle right and left and Carson Palmer misfiring on 3rd-and-5. Chris and Tom would mark the occasion by displaying their shirts.

Acceptable behavior. Predictable, even. Like the team’s play calling.

Until two Sundays ago.

That’s when three people employed by Tenable, the Bengals security outfit, decided that Chris and his tee shirt had to go. According to Chris, Tom and four witnesses from Section 122 with whom I spoke, the exchange went like this:

Security: “You’re outta here.”

Chris: “Why?’’

Security: “You’ve been warned three times.”

Chris: “What law did I break?”

Security: “I’m having you arrested.:”

Tom: “Come on, Chris, let’s just go.”

And so they left, with about five minutes left in a loss to the Buffalo Bills.

Tenable’s Director of Security Operations Nick Whitecotton said Chris left of his own accord. Whitecotton said the message on the shirt wasn’t why Chris was asked to leave. “He was waving it in people’s faces,’’ Whitecotton said, “and he was warned the next time (he waved the tee) he would have to go.”

Chris admits to being warned, and he admits to ignoring the warnings. He denies he was in any way abusive, disruptive or profane. He says he hadn’t been drinking. All assertions backed up by others in Section 122.

“It was disturbing,’’ said Mike Geis, a 12-year Bengals season-ticketholder. “Chris wasn’t drinking, he wasn’t getting obnoxious. He just held the shirt up. He has been showing it for years.”

Added Geis’ brother, Doug, “It wasn’t obscene, it wasn’t offensive.’’

Whitecotton said Chris was not thrown out. Had he been, a written record of the incident would have been filed; none was. It’s semantics, say the fans in Section 122: “One way or the other, they were leaving,” said Doug Geis. “Either on their own or the security people were escorting them out.”

It doesn’t matter much what you think of the sentiment on the shirt, or even which side of the He Said-He Said debate you’re on. Liberally interpreted, the Bengals’ Fan Code of Conduct does suggest that the team was within its rights to toss the guy.

“Failing to comply with instructions from ushers, parking attendants, security or law enforcement … may result in being ejected from the stadium’’ it says, in part.”

The bigger issue is, “Why?”

Nobody has suggested Chris’ shirt was “obscene, indecent or offensive.” The Bengals offense on occasion merits that description. Not the shirt.

Chris maintains he wasn’t “unruly or disruptive.’’ He wasn’t doing anything “illegal’’ or using “foul or abusive language or gestures.’’ Nor was he “standing, sitting or loitering in the aisles” or “standing on seats or chairs.”

And so on. Any of the above indiscretions would be reason for the security folks to request his departure. He didn’t display any of them, not according to Chris himself, and four witnesses.

“They wouldn’t explain anything,’’ Chris said. “We weren’t being verbally abusive or anything like that. We hadn’t even started chanting ‘Fire Brat!’ yet.”

Is this a big deal?

Technically, no. For what it says about a team and the way it is perceived to treat its fans? Definitely.

The Bengals say they knew nothing about it. On Tuesday, team spokesman Jack Brennan said, “We understand the emotions of our fans. They’re allowed to wear anything they want on a T-shirt as long as its not obscene or disruptive.”

Nick Whitecotton says his people don’t usually consult with team officials when considering a fan ejection. Whitecotton said Tenable acted “entirely unilaterally” in Chris’ case.

OK, but they work for the Bengals.

Here’s why it matters. Here’s a lesson the club has fumbled on numerous occasions over years of mostly losing:

Fans count.

Their collective voice matters beyond the ballot box, where they spoke loudly to pay for your stadium. Their voice is relevant beyond the turnstiles, where they’ve chirped incessantly in your favor, to the tune of 57 consecutive sellouts, a streak broken just two weeks ago.

It isn’t that a guy says he was asked to leave PBS because he was displaying improperly a T-shirt. It’s that the issue ever came up.

“What did I do wrong?:” Chris asked, not unreasonably.

In this corner, we have Chris, whose family has had Bengals season tickets since there was a season. All the way back to ’68. Chris, who went to the Freezer Bowl at age 7, with his uncle. Who has had season tickets of his own since 1999.

In that corner, we have the Bengals and their hired security outfit, who judged Chris to be unruly and a disturber of the fan-friendly peace.

Here: Chris, who says he and his father “bonded’’ at Bengals games when Chris was a child; Chris, who says “to not renew (tickets) would be very painful.”
There: The Bengals, whose security arm shows Chris the gate.

Does a 2-9 team with a reputation for fan-unfriendliness need to be perceived as stifling the free speech of a long-time customer?

If a guy wants to display a FIRE BOB BRATKOWSKI shirt, by wearing it or waving it or running up his personal flag pole, he should be permitted that bit of civil disobedience. We’d give the Bengals the benefit of the doubt here, only they haven’t earned it. They’re not strangers to quashing dissent. Banners judged to be “negative’’ frequently are torn down at Paul Brown Stadium.

The team too often acts in a manner consistent with its entitlements. It leads with its head, not with its heart. If its fans believe ownership to be unresponsive to their wishes, it’s only because ownership gives them good reason.

“I like Mike Brown,” says Chris’ father, Tom. “I gained a lot of respect for him, for the way he handled Chris Henry’s death. But he has to remember that fans are a part of this team. We deserve a say.”

Meantime, Chris says he’ll be back in Section 122 Sunday, with his shirt. In fact, he says he’s talking about having more printed, to distribute to everyone in the section, an idea he says he mentioned to one of the security folks two Sundays ago. Chris says the security person responded, “Then we’ll have to throw everyone out.”

You don’t toss a long-time customer for waving a T-shirt. You just don’t.


Photo provided
Photo of the shirt that a Bengals season ticket holder was wearing when he was kicked out of a recent game at Paul Brown Stadium.

http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll...311300097/

That pretty much sums up the Bengals under Mike Brown.

Instead of focusing on people wearing t-shirts, perhaps the crack rent a cops down there should focus on the plentiful idiots who are on beer #15 by 2pm and starting crap with everyone they can find.

(11-30-2010 08:57 PM)Kenyon#4 Wrote:  Instead of focusing on people wearing t-shirts, perhaps the crack rent a cops down there should focus on the plentiful idiots who are on beer #15 by 2pm and starting crap with everyone they can find.

:ncaabbs: :ncaabbs: :ncaabbs:

What a crock! Another reason to avoid going to Bengals games. Still don't understand why so many people throw away that much money every year when nothing ever changes. Nothing will change until the fans stop giving that jerk owner their hard earned money.

Doh! Some security goons just showed up at my cubicle and want me to remove what I just wrote. Too late suckers!