57 YEARS AGO TODAY: The story of Philadelphia Eagles fans throwing snowballs at Santa Claus.
The Eagles, only six years removed from an NFL championship, started 0-8 in 1968 under coach Joe Kuharich and seem poised to finish with the worst record in the league and earn the No. 1 draft pick in the draft. That meant a chance at selecting USC running back O. J. Simpson.
Only once the Eagles won two straight games — hadn’t anyone heard of Tankadelphia? — essentially surrendering the top spot to Buffalo, disillusioned fans were fed up headed into the finale. And when the Eagles needed a pinch-hit Santa to fill in for the real-deal halftime act either stranded elsewhere in a snowstorm or simply no-showing because of one, they plucked a fan out of the stands who happened to dress as Saint Nick to toss candy canes into the crowd.
As instructed, 20-year-old Frank Olivo ran downfield past a row of elf-costumed “Eaglettes” and the team’s 50-person brass band playing “Here Comes Santa Claus.” Only fans turned on him in his disheveled outfit, angry over another lost Eagles season, and cold, tired and feeling a bit churlish, they booed and chucked snowballs at the woeful Santa impostor.
“Certainly,” said Eagles fan Ray Didinger, sitting at the Snowball Game in Row 24, “no one was trying to hurt Santa Claus.”
Yet, here they are, 55 years later, still atop the naughty list for sports fans everywhere.
The Eagles themselves sure don’t hate Christmas — they sing all the holiday classics instead. Led by Lane Johnson, Jason Kelce and Jordan Mailata, the Eagles have released Christmas albums in consecutive seasons.
The snowball story, though, stuck to Philly, so when the Eagles host the New York Giants on Monday, the incident surely will be recycled on the TV broadcast, or on local news, or on national sports highlights — Hey! The city that hates Santa played on Christmas!
“It’s never going to go away,” said Didinger, a journalist who went on to cover the Eagles for 53 years. “Just don’t let it bother you anymore. If you don’t think the Philadelphia fans are like that, and I don’t, then just sort of say, ‘oh well.’ It’s not me. It’s not the way I approach things.”
The legend of Eagles fans booing Santa Claus certainly the bar extremely high for rowdiness at Philadelphia sporting events: Eagles Fans Behaving Badly: The Decade-by-Decade History.
And then there was the broadcaster behaving badly at an Eagles game:
To be fair, you almost would have had to be drunk to watch the 1970 Philadelphia Eagles. https://t.co/J2gZ8xnE1H
— Dave Morrison (@sddsports) November 24, 2023