Bulls vs Knicks (My Experience) (Back to The Forum)

Bulls vs. Knicks

Monday, March 12th
7PM, Home Game #21
Latin Night

A good friend of my roommate’s has season tickets to the Bulls. She had something going on tonight and couldn’t find anyone to buy the tickets from her so she gave them to him for free, and he invited me. He didn’t get off of work until 6PM, so we were going to miss tip off, but definitely be there early in the 1st quarter.

It’s her first year buying season tickets, so they’re pretty shitty. 300 level, squared up behind the basket. A majority of the seats around hers are owned by fellow season ticket holders. I’ve been to a few games with her or my roommate this year so I know/recognize the people surrounding us. Because this is a “bigger” game, a lot of the season ticket holders will sell their tickets for good money.

Her seats are right in the middle of the row, so when we first arrived (only 3 minutes into the 1st quarter), 6 people in the row had to stand up to let us in; I recognized none of them and one couple were New York fans. So we squeeze our way through the row and the seats are cramped because it’s a packed house… And the shitty 300 section.

Parking

We pull into a lot across from the stadium, we’re late so the lot is just about full, pull up and the guy leans into the car,

Him: $30 gentlemen
Me: Whoa, whoa, it was twenty last week!
Him: Yeah it was also $20 an hour ago. Game’s started.
Me: (getting my wallet) Shouldn’t it be $10 then, since the car won’t be in the lot as long? (Hand him a $20)
Him: $10.
Me: Alright, man, thanks. (Put my hand out for change)
Him: Nah, nah, it’s $30
Me: You just said $10. I’ll settle for $20.

He waves me on to the next guy who SCREAMS at the car “PULL IT HERE (points to where he’s standing) AND THEN BACK IT IN — THERE!” (points to the spot we obviously are going to be parking). We park the car after the screamer thoroughly directs us on how to park, regardless of the backup camera in the car.

We then walk to the stadium. Let the games begin…

1st Quarter

As soon as we sat down and got settled, the guy directly to my right mumbles “thanks for making me uncomfortable.” He’s middle aged, scruffy, just overweight, so normal, wearing a Bulls/McDonald’s shirt (I think one of the free ones they shoot from cannons into the crowd), a gold chain and some Adidas sweatpants… After sizing him up I return with, “Sorry, about coming in late — won’t happen again, I promise.”

I’m chatting with my roommate, the games going on, the crowd boo’s at bad calls and then cheers when a Bull makes a shot — standard shit. The guy next to me however…

Boozer misses a shot: Fucking LOOZER. That’s what we should call you. LOOZER. Fuckin' bum.

Jeremy Lin at the free throw line: Me so horny Jeremy. Fuckin' faggot.

The guy in front of us then turned around and gave shitty look. Afterwards, the guy next to me mumbles to his lady friend “He must like cock.” She said something back, but I couldn’t hear.

Timeout gets called and the Luvabulls get on the floor and J. Lo comes over the speakers and they perform a dance routine.

• Nothing makes Latin Night more Latin than white girls dancing to Jennifer Lopez songs.

The idiot next to me is cat calling and whistling at the dancers. Let me remind you that we’re on the 300 level… After the dancers leave the court he slams his beer and gives his empty cup to his lady friend to hold. Again, it’s the shitty 300 section so there aren’t any cup holders, so he’s literally making her hold his trash.

2nd Quarter

The idiot on my right has now ordered a second beer. After getting his beer from the vendor he flops back down, sloshing beer onto the shoulder of the guy in front of him and says “My bad bro. Fuckin' eight dollars just splashin' around.”

By now he’s gotten pretty comfortable and starts talking to me. He mentions something about knowing some guy that’s worked for the Bulls for 32 years and how he usually hooks him up with 100 level seats but couldn’t get a hold of him before tonight, blah blah. Then says he’s paid $180 for his ticket. Face valued at $50.

The game continues on, it’s close, so no one is running away with the score. The idiot to my right:

Jeremy Butler (rookie) gets subbed in: This fuckin' guy. Fuckin' bitch. Looks to his lady friend, He’s a bitch.

Foul called on Kyle Korver: What the fuck ref? You must suck dick because that call blew.

Randomly turns to me and says: You know, if Boozer is worth 15 mil, I’m worth at least thirty.

I’ve now caught onto a tradition he likes to do… Any time a Bull’s player takes a shot, he puts out his right hand, faces it down, cups it, and hooks it to the right and says “swoosh”. I think hooking his hand to the right is supposed to be the net? Whatever it is… It was goddamned stupid.

He turns to me (as I’m talking to my roommate), nudges his leg because I didn’t acknowledge him turning to me, I turn and we discuss:

Him: You know the coach though, I like him. He’s a good coach, ya know? D'Antoni
Me: Really? I don’t think he’s all that good
Him: Are you kidding? (raising his arms and beer up) The Knicks used to be terrible and now they’re contenders.
Me: Yeah, well… They’re 18 and 23. They were also terrible before they had Amare Stoudemire and Carmelo Anthony.
Him: Yeah but you need a good coach to maintain them two.
Me: They should be significantly better with the talent they have and the money they spend.
Him: I see you’re point, they should be better.

Some time goes by where he mumbles out shit about bad calls and ref’s sucking. At one point with 2 minutes left in the half he looks at his half full cup of beer and says out loud, “Oh shit, don’t want it warm” So he then chugged the rest of it and again, handed his empty to his lady friend.

Game goes on… Nothing really super funny or exciting.

Halftime

The idiot to my right started to say something, but I just got up and hopped down a seat so I could walk out. My roommate and I are going to get a beer, run into a friend of ours, he’s 6'4", his blond girlfriend is 6'5". Fucking ridiculous.

Giant line at the closest concession stand, so we get in line, notice that 2 other registers are on each side of the line yet no one is going to them. So we walked to the one on the left, right after another guy got in front of us, so this cuts our wait time by a lot. While waiting for the guy in front my us to finish up I get a hand on my back from some fat white guy “are you in line?” I didn’t even answer, my roommate, being nice, said “Yeah — we think so.” (His fat hand is still on my back).

Walk up the the register, some beefy Mexican dude comes to my assistance:

BFD: What can I get you boss?
Me: Bud Light and a hot dog
BFD: ID, boss?
(take out my ID, hand it to him, he takes .3 seconds to look at it and hand it back)
BFD: (comes back with a cup and begins filling it) Boss, we out of hot dogs.
Me: Out? Really? Putting anymore on or no?
BFD: (yells back to some workers behind him) YO! DOGS GON' BE READY?!
Random worker: 15
BFD: (hands me the Bud Light) You gon' wait?
Me: Nah, thanks though.
BFD: Sorry boss.

Needless to say… I’m a boss.

After we each get our beers, we decide that using the bathroom now would be the best time. So we walk back towards our section and enter a bathroom along the way. Of course, there’s another line. Like 7 urinals, so 7 lines with 7-8 people per line. Bathrooms are goddamn packed. I wait, when I finally get up to the urinal, there are posters above each urinal, the one above mine is of Derrick Rose and says “Love it live” and some more shit about buying tickets, I then notice that someone signed the poster (not framed) and wrote #19. The name signed wasn’t readable, upon further inspection, I see that the bottom left corner of the poster had been torn about an inch up from the wall… My conclusion was that some dipshit thought this Bulls poster was actually signed and hanging above a urinal in a men’s bathroom on the 300 level by someone important, so they tried to rip it off the wall and failed. I can dream, right?

After the bathroom we make our way back to our seats, realizing that the idiot next to me isn’t in his seat, but his lady friend is still in hers. We take our seats, conversing, the game’s is just about to start back up, and I feel a kick on my shoulder, I turn to my right and the idiot is climbing down from the row above us to sit and isn’t flexible enough to do this calmly. When he sits back down he says,

Him: Sorry for the shoulder bro.
I just nodded, but maybe he didn’t see, so to break the silence…
Him: Hope you weren’t hittin' on my girl, HEH?! and nudges my arm with his. I just smile back,
Me: I would never.
Him: Fuckin' right, never. Y'know?

(Really though… She’s twice my age and twice my weight…)

*I should note that when he came back, he was double fisting beers

3rd Quarter

The second half begins, they shoot shirts off into the crowd during timeouts, I was stunned that the idiot next to me wasn’t hootin' and hollerin' for a shirt. He’s still badgering refs that obviously can’t hear him.

Again, it’s Latin Night, so everything is Latin themed, on the jumbotron they’re showing some Hispanic children on the screen dancing to some mariachi music, the idiot on my right of course, “Fuckin' Spics. Get off the screen. Pussies.”

Rose didn’t get a foul call his way: Open your eyes you faggots! That was a foul.

Some time goes by, he finishes a beer (Per usual, the empty goes to his lady friend), he’s getting chummy with me,

Him: Cubs or Sox?
Me: Neither, Cleveland. But if I had to choose, I guess the Cubs.
Him: Cleveland?! … They ain’t bad. That Mexican 2nd baseman they got is good… Astro, astrio, astrol…
Me: Asdrubal Cabrera. Yeah, he’s good.
Him: At least you don’t like the Sox. Fuck the Sox.
Me: Sure
Him: I’m a Cubs fan, thick and thin.
Me: Cool.
Him: Really though, ever since I was a kid. Fuck the Sox.

I just laugh and don’t say anything. Game goes on, he whines about more ref calls and then yells that Amare Stoudimare is a giant bitch a few times.

During a time out, the Luvabulls come back onto the court and do another clumsy routine to Ricky Martin’s “Livin' la Vida Loca” (Like I said, Latin Night.) I was looking forward, down at the court, not really looking at anything in particular, which the idiot on my right took as me staring aimlessly at the dancers,

Him: Little boy want a Luvabull for Christmas?

I didn’t even respond.

4th Quarter

Anytime Carlos Boozer has his hands on the ball, the idiot on my right says loudly, “LOOZER”… Still.

Jeremy Lin gets in bounded the ball: Here we go… The gook-fag.

Now multiple people are offended and all give him shitty looks, he does not acknowledge. Instead, mumbles more to his lady friend about how gay Jeremy Lin is.

The guy in front of us was walking back to his seat with 3 things of popcorn in his arms and a Coke (Really? … 3 popcorns? You didn’t want to take someone with you for help?). So, obviously when climbing over people, he spilled two of the three popcorns, one onto the floor and the other onto his friend’s lap. Luckily, he Kung Fu gripped the Coke and didn’t spill that shit everywhere. Of course, the idiot to my right had to comment, “HEY! HO! BIG GUY! $40 ON THE FLOOR!” The popcorn spiller wasn’t pleased with the idiot’s commentary and gave him yet another dirty look. The idiot didn’t acknowledge.

The game goes on, it’s actually a good game too. The idiot on my right orders yet another beer. He takes a sip, “Fucking Bud Light. Tastes like shit — I’m a Miller man.” (Note: He said this to himself)

Taj Gibson earns a double-double, Jeremy Butler has a few excellent plays, Rose is being Rose.

Jeremy Lin is now at the foul line, the crowd starts slowly chanting “Over-rated!”. Eventually, EVERYONE (not the Knick fans that attended, obviously) began chanting it. After Lin sinks both shots, the crowd dies back down and the game continues. The idiot on my right leans towards me,

Him: Man, I started that chat. Can’t believe everyone got in on it.
Me: Are you serious? You didn’t start that!
Him: I was right here, were you deaf?
Me: That shit started from across the arena. I would have definitely heard you yelling to start the chant.
Him: Whatever bro (with a super shitty grin on his face)

At Bulls home games, if they score over 100 points and win, everyone in the crowd gets a free Big Mac. Guess who was losing his mind when we were at 98 point? Once we hit 100, the idiot to my right celebrated by high fiving everyone within 5 yards while chanting “Big Mac! — Big Mac!”

Big Macpalooza is over with and the game goes on, the guys in front of us turn back to me and have their Big Mac vouchers in hand and say, “Hey, we’re not from around here, do you want our Big Mac things?” I politely turn them down, as I’m saying no thank you, the idiot on my right just reaches out and takes the paper from the guy’s hand. The guy in front of me looks surprised and just turns back around. The idiot on my right then nudges the guy and says, “Your friends gonna want theirs?” I stop paying attention because the game is winding down, but I do notice that the idiot on my right has gathered 5-6 Big Mac vouchers from various people.

The game goes on and like I said before, it’s been close so it’s coming to the wire now. There’s two minutes to go and everyone is on edge. The idiot next to me looks at his final beer that he’s been nursing for the last 10 minutes and realizes it’s flat and time is about up. He leans towards me,

Him: Yo you want half my beer?
Me: No, I don’t share drinks with guys.

Final score Bulls 104, Knicks 99

Long ass post, i someday aspire to write something like this

I thought something awesome was going to happen at the end. I am disappoint.

Typical Bulls game at the United Center…..this guys not exaggerating I’ve been in his place before, anyways GO BULLS

Hey 6x, what shirt did your friend end up wearing? Was it super offensive?

I ended up stopping at Sports Authority and bought him a Kids XL Carmelo Anthony shirt.

I was expecting him to say something gay about Ricky Martin and he never did. I am dissapointed.

Guys like that are 75% of the reason I don’t go to the United Center. I’d rather just go get drunk and watch the game at a bar.

This is how I imagine Americans man. And not just me.

Also 6x, great job. Read it all without stopping once. Was interesting.

In New York about 1 in every 4 fans are like that. The icing on the cake was 2 weeks ago at the Notre Dame vs St Johns mens bball game at the Garden. St Johns had a guy cheerleader and the guy behind me (a miserable Notre Dame fan) was ripping him the whole game. His best line was “what a fucking country, first let them in the military and now they are cheerleaders”. He was getting kind of annoying but it was hilarious. Sometimes fans like that can either make or break your time at an event.

“Jeremy Lin gets in bounded the ball: Here we go… The gook-fag.”

Really? Sheesh I thought it was 2012

“Him: Yo you want half my beer?
Me: No, I don’t share drinks with guys.”

haha me neither

You need to get season tickets, do more of these, and publish a book… this was well written. .

you took what sounds like the most typical night out at a basketball game and made that the most entertaining thing ive read in a while haha.