Ah! Tailgating is the best. It gets crazy around here at Syracuse too, especially with basketball season! That is a gorgeous outdoor stadium. I’m a fan.

I think people leave early if their team is losing and they don’t want to see the ‘other guys’ celebrate. And sitting in a ton of traffic would just be insult to injury.

As a Gators fan who had my car window smashed in and my Gators plate stolen at a game after a Miami victory, sometimes it’s about traffic, but sometimes it’s about safety. Night games are rough, and when the other team is riled up and drunk, it’s just time to go.

I can kind of see why sports fans do it but I never understand why people do it at concerts. When I’ve paid £50+ to see a show by someone I like enough to spend that amount of money on I am staying there until the lights go up!

As a Hokie (who is also married to a die hard Hokie), who travel 4 hours to most home games in Blacksburg, and many away games…if we are about to suffer a horrible, emotional loss (like last night’s), it’s really hard to stay and watch it all go down. It’s usually never until the 4th quarter when its clear we won’t win. But it usually has to do with how hard it is to watch your team fail over and over again. We’ve come up short in a lot of important games and it becomes harder and harder every time. It doesn’t stop us from supporting our team, but leaving early does save us the pain of watching it live and seeing others celebrate in our faces. And as someone said above, it’s the same as changing the channel when your team is losing – it’s sometimes just hard to watch and you don’t want to put yourself through it!

On the other hand, we stayed until the VERY end of the VT/Miami game this year in Blacksburg to watch one of the best victories I’ve been to in the 10 years I’ve been a Hokie! 🙂

We have season tickets and live an hour and a half from the school. I wouldn’t leave a championship early (probably) but we have definitely left a few regular season games early. We pay a LOT of money to have those tickets, so we think that our donation to the school’s athletic department is the most important thing. As far as physically being there the whole time, we often leave to ensure our safety on the long trip home. There is only one major way back and its absolutely packed….we frequently see people pulled over for drinking and driving. We prefer to get a little bit ahead of that if we can. Especially if its a night game. We stayed until the end of the last game of the season and did not get home until 1 AM….. ALSO we have a dog waiting on us at home or doggy daycare. Lots of reasons, few to do with disgust for our team.

I stay until the bitter end. I’m of the belief that anything can happen in a game. I’m a soccer fan, so it frustrates me especially in a soccer game when fans leave a 1-0 game with ten minutes left. Even if your team is getting dominated, there’s still a chance for a quick counter and goal to tie it up!

All that said, I honestly think a lot of the leave-early’s very often have young children, which ends up contributing to their decision (kids getting antsy, etc.) That’s my guess anyways!

My husband & I were there courtesy of our friends who are alumni of VT & die hard football fans. We wanted to leave in the 4th because we wanted to beat the traffic. We also didn’t have to pay for our tickets (again courtesy of our friends) & didn’t have a too much of a vested interested in the game. But we didn’t leave until our friends wanted to leave & like another commenter said our friends wanted to leave in the 4th because it was just too hard for them to watch. It didn’t help that there were some Clemson fans around us making fun of VT, and our friends didn’t want to be around that anymore. It was still a great experience, though!

Go Tigers!

Caitlin, you’re an excellent vegetarian tailgater, but as a non-vegetarians go, my brother’s best friend is the best tailgater that I know. On game day, we, Tigers, surround Death Valley with culinary delights. For morning games, we cook breakfast. For night games, we do lunch and dinner. At Brandon’s tailgate, I’ve seen everything everything from fried turkeys to frogmore stew (aka Low Country Boil) to an entire pig. One year, they steamed oysters. And of course, all kinds of pot-luck sides to go with it.

In fact, most southeastern schools have great tailgating scenes. Those of you from other areas should come visit us. 🙂

The only sports games I’ve been to I’ve left early. They all go way too late and I absolutely hate traffic more than anything. I usually have only gone because someone else wanted to and didn’t mind leaving. Although I never really thought about what actual sports fans might do or why.

We are Clemson fans and were at the game too!!! I have never seen more drunk people either!!! I would have loved to meet you in person!!!

The crowd probably appeared “more drunker” because you were totally sober! When I was pregnant and around people that were drinking, I often wondered if I got that stupid. Probably.

I left games early in college…but never because OU was losing! This was during the Sam Bradford era when we crushing opponents and hadn’t lost a game at home in years. Usually it had something to do with a paper that was due…and we had season tix anyway!

Good times.

we always stay to the end!

I went to VT and I’m not surprised it was a drunk crowd 🙂

I was so excited for my Tigers last night! They ended the season with that they deserved, the ACC Champ title.

My husband is a huge Houston Astros fan and while the Astros have totally blown it recently (awful last season) we usually stay until the bitter end. I agree – poor players need to see their fans stick it out with support – win or loose!

I don’t think I’d leave a championship game early, but we left early a few times at Penn State, when it’s freezing and raining, or snowing, and they’re losing bad and you’re just over it.

No leaving Kentucky games early for me – I have always stayed until the bitter end (which, in football, is frequently pretty bitter)! In fact, when I was a student at U.K., the student section used to taunt the early-exiters at basketball games by chanting: GO…..ALUMNI…..BEAT..THE..TRAFFIC!!!

For me, it can be too unbearable to watch! That’s what I would venture to guess, that hardcore fans just can’t bring themselves to KEEP watching when it’s already so bad. It’s the whole ‘kicking him when he’s down’ mentality, I think.

You guys look cute at the game!

xx
Esen
CookbooksandCake.blogspot.com

You have stopped documenting what you eat 🙁 me do not like that change… yes, it’s your blog, but it started out as a food blog. I wouldn’t want to see it “evolve” as Jenna’s Eat Live Run did

I support my team no matter what!! I do not leave games early, no matter if we’re winning by 60 or losing by 60, I’m there to cheer on my team. Same thing with the TV, I watch until the end. I only get so many games a year and I want to see all of them.

My husband and I (and a bunch of friends) get season tickets for our school every season. If I were only going to 1-2 games a year, then yes, I would stay the entire time. But when we are going to 7 games over 3 months, the team is getting destroyed or doing the destroying, and we have a tailgate complete w/ satellite tv a 5 min walk away, then I do sometimes leave early and watch it on the tv w/ a beer in my hand. Or more likely, stay at the tailgate from halftime through the 3rd qtr then come back for the 4th.

So I guess that’s a boredom thing? If it’s a close game, I stay for every minute!

Although it’s also sometimes a can’t-stand-to-watch-anymore thing. It’s frustrating when you give so much time (we live 4 hours away!) and money to watch your team on a multiyear downward slide.

My husband’s blood pressure gets so high when Tech is losing badly; so he turns the game off, ha ha. We always leave live games a tiny bit early (maybe when 2-5 minutes or so is left) to beat the crowd. Go Hokies!

Since you are a tailgate-lover and a runner, I thought you might appreciate this: when I was running our town’s rather large (25k runners) Turkey Trot, there were people actually tailgating along the course, mostly in the last mile toward the finish line! Full tailgate, with tent, grill, cooler & food, big group of friends. Have you ever seen that before! I totally loved them for that. (the tailgaters were great cheer-ers)