It’s been a frustrating year for Los Angeles-based National Football league teams. Both defending Super Bowl champion Rams and the perennially underachieving Chargers have been struggling, with neither likely to make the postseason. This past weekend, tensions finally boiled over on video for Charger fans.
Fan violence in NFL stadiums has been on the rise. Though never the safest of places, especially considering the copious amount of alcohol consumed and the propensity for NFL fans to be jerks, violence in stadiums against opposing fans has become a scourge on the league. The incident in Los Angeles has put the issue on blast because of the video and the heinous nature of the assault. Check this out.
Just when you think NFL fans have settled down with the fan fights, along comes a particularly disturbing video from after Sunday night’s Chiefs-Chargers game.
In the video recorded outside SoFi Stadium, a fan is thrown off what appears to be a pedestrian bridge that goes over part of Rivers Lake, the body of water outside the stadium that TV networks use to set the scene for Rams and Chargers games.
CBS2- Shocking video of a man being thrown off a bridge at @SoFiStadium during the @chargers vs. @Chiefs game. Details @11 @CBSLA pic.twitter.com/dNATgZwyqx
— Pat Harvey (@Patharveynews) November 23, 2022
What caused the attack is unclear, but I’m pretty sure I can break it down. Fans drink too much, opposing fans talk trash after a particularly close win, frustrated home fans mouth back, man gets thrown off a bridge. It’s really as simple as that.
Why was the fan thrown over the railing onto the concrete steps leading down into the water? It’s unclear, but those witnesses who claim they saw the incident take place say cops weren’t interested in making arrests.
Having been to multiple NFL games in multiple cities, it’s not surprising that the police didn’t intervene and, according to reports, don’t plan to make any arrests. We all know Los Angeles more closely resembles the dystopian hell of the movie “Escape From Los Angeles”, but Snake Plissken was nowhere to be found Sunday night. Instead, it was just a bunch of thug, frustrated Charger fans pitching a Kansas City Chief fan off a bridge. While the fan didn’t appear to be seriously hurt, landing wrong on a concrete pad could put the lights out forever. And for what? Because he ran his mouth a little too much in Chief’s gear? Nonsense like this makes NFL fans and Americans no better than the soccer hooligans famous in Europe. I actually understand hooliganism more than this because, after all, they are forced to watch soccer and live in England. That alone would make me think of throwing myself off a bridge and saving these boys the trouble.
Cody Danks, who recorded the man being thrown over the fence, claimed on Twitter that police “wouldn’t do anything cause it didn’t happen in front of them.”
This is a sad statement about Los Angeles and the shape the city is in. Residents know that police won’t do anything, likely because they know city leadership and state leadership aren’t really interested in public safety. Until either people’s behavior changes or the city and state start holding people responsible for violent assaults like this, it’s not going to change. Sadly, I’m not sure if either will happen.
Featured Image screengrab from embedded Tweet.