Early exit.

Photo by Ted Hesson

About 10 minutes before kickoff yesterday, my girlfriend Sara and I sat down in our seats in section 22X of Lincoln Financial Field, amused by the Eagles' ridiculous powder blue and banana uniforms. After that, though, we didn't crack another smile all game. "What's the over-under on the 'N-word' today?" the guy next to me asked his friend.

I soon found out.

The Eagles took the field, their then-underperforming quarterback greeted by a mix of cheers and boos. In our section, I heard mostly boos.

"MCNABB, YOU FUCKING NIGGER!" the guy directly behind me yelled, not once, but several times.

I wouldn't print that word here, except that I hope it can incite the same shock and disgust that I felt when I heard it. I turned around and saw a middle-aged white guy who appeared to be with a group that included a freckle-faced kid. I don't know how old the kid next to him was, but I wouldn't have sold him a pack of cigarettes.

Sara and I looked at each other. She's a rabid Eagles fan who wears green eyeliner and flies the team crest on top of her car. I've followed the Eagles my entire football-cognizant life. But we're not season ticket holders, so we've only been to games when seats float our way. It's usually a pretty exciting event.

Needless to say, this wasn't the type of excitement I'd expected.

Before the Birds kicked off, Sara decided to go tell the nearest red-shirted security guard what had happened. I just wanted to leave and go home. The security guard told her that he wasn't responsible for that section, but that if it happened again she should tell the guard on the other side of our section.

McNabb and the Eagles took the field and the abuse continued. "Waaa, I'm black," a couple guys shouted from overhead. "We want more white players in the NBA," one of them continued.

The use of the N-word stopped, however, and we assumed that someone must have seen her talking to the security guard.

Meanwhile, the game was still in the first quarter and McNabb had already marched the team downfield for a couple of touchdowns. He was nearly flawless, but some fans continued to deride him along racial lines. I scanned the crowd in front of me. Nearly all white, with the exception of one or two black guys. Later, we wondered how an African American fan could tolerate listening to that sort of commentary for an entire game.

We decided to leave our seats--worth a cumulative $130--at the end of the first quarter and say hi to a friend in another section before we headed to the parking lot. Even though the Eagles were on their way to setting a franchise record for most points scored in the first half of a game, the day was ruined. For the first time that I can ever remember, I didn't cheer when the Eagles scored.

We had planned to stay for the last few minutes of the quarter, but tensions boiled over sooner than that.

Fed up with the race-related banter, Sara turned around and shouted at the crowd behind us (it wasn't just one person), using a regrettable bit of profanity and asking them why they come to games if they're just going to spew racist remarks. "We're not racist," one of the guys said. "[McNabb]'s racist. We're reacting to comments that he made."

The fan was talking about the recently aired HBO interview, in which McNabb said that black quarterbacks face pressures that don't exist for white quarterbacks. When I read about the interview earlier this week, I sided with many sportswriters, thinking that black, white or green, Eagles fans didn't care about the color of a quarterback if the player performs well. At least in this case, I was dead wrong.

Sara was upset and walked out of our row. Before leaving, however, I turned around and told the fans behind us that I was planning to write an article and include what they had said during the game. I asked if anyone wanted me to take their name for attribution.

"Freedom of speech...we paid for these seats..." a few of them had said. But no one wanted to give their name. The guy who had shouted the N-word wouldn't make eye contact with me; he just brushed me away with a wave of his hand and looked off toward the field.

As I walked away, I heard boos in my direction. The rest of the fans in our section—many of whom had been chuckling at the comments made during the game—didn’t say anything to either of us.

When I met Sara on the concourse she had already spoken to the other security guard, who wrote down the seat numbers of the offending parties in a little book.

We were both flustered and felt pretty sickened by the whole thing. I've watched thousands of Philly sports games, and lambasted hundreds of players along the way, but I'd never endured anything like that. As we walked the concourse to file our complaint with guest services, the stadium echoed with cheers as our team thrashed the opposition on a beautiful September afternoon.

But we just wanted to leave.

Eagles wear blue and yellow, but the issues are still black and white