February 01, 2018
MINNEAPOLIS — The Mall of America is a wonderful place, especially if you’re a sports fanatic junkie who’s heavily into jerseys, caps, or any kind of sports collectible. There are Minnesota themed memorabilia shops, filled with rarities like sweet, old-school Minnesota North Stars’ and Hartford Whalers’ jerseys and old-school NFL jerseys, with the fluorescent orange John Elway No. 7.
It’s enough to make a sports nut’s head explode.
But if you’re visiting here from Philadelphia to see the Super Bowl, you better look a little harder for any Eagles’ stuff or be willing to go deep into some of these shops.
Featured prominently in almost most of the sports stores are, as you can guess, New England Patriots’ gear. You name it, jerseys, hats, thermoses, T-shirts, etc.
As 97.5 host Mike Missanelli and I found it, not too many of these places have Eagles’ gear featured prominently in their storefronts. Missanelli was looking for a T-shirt when a store manager directed him to the many Eagles’ shirts hanging in the back, a few feet behind the Patriots’ gear up front.
When Missanelli asked why the Patriots’ stuff was up front, and the Eagles stuff was in the back, the manager answered him with, “see, we have Eagles’ stuff.” To which Missanelli replied, “Yeah, in the back, with all of the other Eagles stuff, I noticed.”
It wasn’t just a one-shop deal. Walking around the mall you consciously notice the conspicuous absence of featured Eagles’ gear placed up front.
When this “coincidence” was mentioned in passing to a mall cop, he replied, “Can you blame them? Some people around here won’t let go. You beat us on the field and beat our fans on the way out."
