Chargers fans feel like they are falling into Black Hole with possible move
QUALCOMM STADIUM PARKING LOT, SECTION K1 – Steve Martinez has loaded up his custom Chargers party bus with his wife, Cheri, and their two sons, eight Sundays a fall for 13 years, driven the 100 miles or so from their home in Redlands and parked in this same spot, underneath the trolley tracks.
The bus’s exterior is a giant picture of the field that Cheri took from their seats in section 39, and two satellite dishes are affixed to the roof, one that runs the Sunday Ticket package when the bus is parked, and another that allows the family to watch any of four televisions while on the road.
Once parked, Martinez mounts nine televisions to the rear of the bus, and lines up three rows of folding chairs to create arguably Qualcomm’s greatest tailgate theater. Their friends swing by, and strangers – even those wearing Oakland Raiders jerseys, are welcome to grab a beer or a shot of liquor.
But Martinez knows these tailgates might soon end. If the San Diego Chargers relocate to Los Angeles, the Martinez family is done. Though the proposed stadium sites in Carson or Inglewood are closer to home, Martinez won’t buy tickets there. It’s San Diego, or nothing.
“I’m selling the bus,” Martinez told Paste BN Sports. “I’ll take the wrap off, make it all black, and send it on its way.”
Martinez isn’t ready to believe the Chargers will leave, and remains optimistic the team is using the threat of relocation as leverage to get a new stadium built in San Diego.
But many of the other Chargers fans interviewed before and during San Diego’s 37-29 loss to the Raiders on Sunday seem far more resigned to their team’s eventual departure, which could happen as early as next season.
It’s made this an extremely weird year to root for the Chargers, especially on a day when visiting fans filled Qualcomm Stadium by the thousands, so much so that it often sounded and looked like a Raiders’ home game.
And there is irony in that, too, because the Raiders are one of the three teams – with the Rams – interested in moving to LA.
In fact, the Chargers and Raiders could be sharing a stadium in the Los Angeles area – which is pretty much what they did Sunday, much to the chagrin of Chargers fans.
That’s part of what made Sunday afternoon inside Qualcomm Stadium so odd, with one set of fans so hopeful their team could be moving, and the others so full of dread.
One section in the lower bowl had been overtaken by Raiders fans, clad in black and silver jerseys, some in face paint and costumes. It looked like the Black Hole. When Raiders rookie wide receiver Amari Cooper caught a 44-yard pass on a third-and-14 in the second quarter, the crowd chanted “Cooooop.” When Cooper took a screen pass and weaved his way through and past the Chargers defense for a 52-yard touchdown a few minutes later, Raiders fans leapt to their feet and danced.
Adam Danielski put his hands on head and looked at his feet.
“This is embarrassing,” said Danielski, who has owned Chargers season tickets since 2000.
The Raiders led 37-6 early in the third quarter, by which point plenty of Chargers fans had seen enough. By the time the Chargers started their rally in the fourth quarter, when quarterback Philip Rivers led the Chargers to 23 unanswered points, many seats in the club level were empty, and few fans in blue and white jerseys remained.
Indeed, this wasn’t a day to find much optimism from Chargers fans, and Raiders fans, many of whom traveled south from Los Angeles for this game, reveled in it.
Richard Leon, a Raiders from Orange County, was ridiculed for wearing a black and silver jersey in San Diego before the game. He quickly found a way to get retribution as he watched the game from seats in the lower bowl of the stadium behind the Raiders’ bench.
“You just say, ‘I’ll see you in LA,’” Leon said. “They’re devastated. You can just see that look in their faces.”
Yes, you can.
“It’s bittersweet,” said Scott Favero, a season ticket holder since 1978. “I just think this is going to be the last year.”
Favero owns a closet-full of Chargers’ jerseys – he wore a blue No. 37, for safety Jahleel Addae, on Sunday – and has a large collection of memorabilia, much of it dating back to his childhood. But he’s prepared not only to give up his tickets if the team leaves for Los Angeles, but to renounce his fandom altogether.
“I will burn every piece of Chargers memorabilia I have. Everything,” Favero said.
That includes any memorabilia in Pete’s Place, the bar he owns in La Mesa. If the Chargers leave San Diego, he vowed that he won’t even show their games on television. He’ll spend the money he would have spent on his tickets on trips to other NFL cities. Maybe Philadelphia one week, and Green Bay another. Maybe he’ll eventually pick a new team.
“My friends, and the people I hang out with, the people who come to my bar, they are pretty much like F the Chargers. We're done. They’re dead to us,” Favero said. “I've talked to people who are like, ‘I'm a Chargers fan, I'll still root for them.’ But no one's going to LA.”
So maybe Gonzo Ramirez of Spring Valley is an exception. He fashions himself a “diehard” fan – and that’s the word he has printed on the back of his navy blue jersey. The jersey, with the number 00 on the front, is covered in patches, including D2 on the shoulder to indicate where he’s set up his elaborate tailgate for the past 23 years.
He figures he’ll drive two hours north on the 405 to see them if they move to L.A.. His only breaking point would be if the team were to leave and also change its name.
“I’m not a San Diego fan, I’m a Chargers fan,” Ramirez said.
Ramirez’ seats are just a couple of sections away from where San Diego residents Ted Claudat and Danielski have owned seats since 2000. To these friends, their fandom – or at least to the extent to which they’ll pay money to go to games -- does have geographic limits.
“Once you get out of the county, it’s not your team anymore,” Claudat said, from his seats in Section 16, in the lower bowl of the stadium behind the goal posts in the north end zone.
In the 15 and a half seasons since they first bought their tickets, they haven’t missed a single game. Claudat said he used to know all the other season ticket holders with nearby seats, but in recent years, the tickets have changed over so many times, his neighbors are strangers.
And that’s when they even show up at all.
There were two empty seats to Claudat’s left on Sunday, and a pair of empties in front of him.
“They want to say that 25% of our fans are from Orange County? That’s BS. You know who the Orange County fans are? Them,” Danielski said, pointing at the empty seats.
Follow Lindsay H. Jones on Twitter@bylindsayhjones
