The first thing I noticed as I strolled through the parking lot of the South Philadelphia sporting complex was an intoxicated 30-something lugging around a gigantic jug of mystery juice that he was crowing about to his posse of faceless drinking drones. That about sums up the general experience I got from spending six hours amongst Philadelphia’s drunkest, the wing eaters they were coming to see and the 150-plus strippers that they REALLY came to see, during 610 WIP’s 2011 incarnation of the legendary Wing Bowl, founded in 1993 by sports radio personalities Angelo Cataldi and Al Morganti and beloved every year since.
What struck me second was the sheer mass of people who were tailgating at 4 a.m. when I arrived. I was expecting nobody. Instead I saw a rollicking crowd of SUVs as far as the eye can see filled to the brim with alcoholic substances, the people there to ingest them and the sea of beer cans they’d already consumed. That was my introduction to what I can only describe as a real life six-hour fever dream.
Some of the 'Wingettes' needed a gimmick to draw attention to themselves. Others just took their tops off.
As I grabbed my press pass and headed down to floor level where I’d have a firsthand view of all the carnage that was to follow, I noticed how palpable the excitement levels were for everybody around me. Most days I’m surrounded by a bunch of cynical bastards with sleepy eyes and grumpy attitudes (I live in Philadelphia, remember) but today, today was different. I saw some strange strain of happiness.
Members of competing wing eaters’ posses were flitting around in crazy costumes like a really fat Tony Romo and a bunch of guys in biblical togas busy making sure all of the muscles they wanted to display were showing. They were putting some finishing touches on the floats their hero of eating friend would ride out on all draped in ‘Wingettes’ and fake jewelry that littered the underground storage area that also kept hockey nets and basketball hoops at the Wells Fargo Center. That usually included a small cache of the skimpily-dressed ‘Wingettes’. Glorified strippers from rival Philadelphia strip clubs, some more enthused about attending than others. They might as well call Wing Bowl “Philadelphia’s Annual Stripper Reunion” because that’s basically what it turned out to be.
I witnessed one forlorn crew have the DeLorean they painstakingly crafted out of a junkyard Honda Civic for their excellent Back to the Future theme have two cases of beer confiscated by an overly zealous security guard who showed off some pretty clear ‘born to be hated’ tendencies as he marched around trying to throttle out every ounce of authority he wielded on people just trying to have a good time. Behind him was what looked to be a ‘assistant security guard’ teenager who really wanted to just get paid to hang out at Wing Bowl but by draw of the unlucky was assigned to the one security guard who wanted to crack some proverbial skulls with the law. He was told by the really angry guy to go track down a handle of vodka that was in his possession until an intrepid member of team Back to the Future politely asked for it back. It was soon hid at an undisclosed location, to be located on penalty of expulsion by a sleepy eyed teenager who really just wanted to spend a morning standing around while taking peeks at strippers. My guess is the kid promptly ditched and hung out by the stage instead. That’s the Wing Bowl course of action. As I stood next to the deflated members of team Back to the Future and their grey Honda Civic with cardboard for wings, I heard one moan, “DO WE EVEN WANNA DO THIS ANYMORE!?” as the others replied with variations of “I dunno man, I dunno.” That was pretty depressing.
Ron Jeremy told me he had the time of his life at the Wing Bowl. Here he displays a look of confusion while staring at Tony Romo.
As the fans started filing in, one thing was apparent: The whole point of the event wasn’t the wings, it was convincing hot women to take off their tops for the Jumbotron. For the entire six hours I was there, the main attention of the fans in attendance was dedicated to booing and cheering for girls to undress on the mega screen. As cameramen frantically searched for hot women anywhere in the stadium, fans mercilessly coerced the chosen found into showing flesh until they either acquiesced or were booed as they nervously freaked out at the fact that 19,000 men were commanding her to take her top off. As they clutched their jacket coats and pondered a shot at making a stadium full of people erupt, producers searched for a new girl to heckle showcase. Like fish in a barrel. Every now and then the old reliable Kiss Cam graphic was pulled out so the packed house of 20,000 of the manliest men in Philadelphia could take a break from the flashings to watch the girls make out instead. This never-ending loop of id continued until the wings were finally eaten, and continued during stoppages in play. As Ron Jeremy, one of the guests of honor for the event, quietly chuckled as he surveyed the packed stadium of people at 6 a.m., “Only in Philadelphia, man. Only in Philadelphia.” Jeremy later earned the respect of Philadelphia after wisely using his time on the Jumbotron to pull down the tops of any girls within grabbing range of his pudgy ham fists. This was a man born for Philadelphia’s Wing Bowl.
Also in brief attendance was Zack and Miri Make a Porno actress and former adult film star Katie Morgan, who served as a kind of ‘queen Wingette of honor’. Her role was to basically ride in on a gigantic car-float as she spastically perfected a jump up and down while waving at everybody combination that, topped off with a plastered on super smile, was one of the most impressive things I’ve seen this year. That’s one talented lady. Unfortunately, she didn’t top the ovation she received last year when she was introduced directly after Jersey Shore buffoon Snooki as a sarcastic crowd turned the massive boos they had rained down upon Snooki into a standing ovation as they cheered on a celebrity who had made it “The Right Way”. Ah, irony.
The Wingettes were everywhere, and boy were they air-headed. You’ll never reach the full potential of your capacity for entertainment until you’ve seen a couple of confused Wingettes stare at themselves on the Jumbotron for about ten seconds before realizing why in the world everybody was pointing and jeering at them and there were the words ‘Kiss Cam’ around their big picture in the sky.
Some of them spent their time idly combing their hair, some were jumping at every opportunity to smother the designated wing eater they were to baby for the night (and eventually serve sloppy buffalo wings to, to hilarious result) in order to attract attention and get the the posse that was ogling her to spend the rest of the day hanging out at the strip club they were dancing for. Little tiny cards were also thrown around by the dancer handlers that were also in attendance along with posters and rally towels emblazoned with ‘The Penthouse Club”. I got one of those. Others took sport in getting their breasts on the Jumbotron, only to be ripped away by a trigger happy producer so only a quick flash was seen. As the night progressed, the areola removal time became longer and longer. Others just complained about how cold it was in the stadium tunnel.
Here's an intrepid man trying to educate.
My favorite part of the night was when I got to sit near the famous hot dog eater Kobayashi himself for awhile as I witnessed his look of utter bemusement as he kept shaking his head in wonderment at the crowd of drunks voraciously alternating between begging, jeering and cheering depending on what women or the drunk men falling around the women did for the Jumbotron. When you’re a drunk man, there’s only one thing you want to do when you have your three seconds of glory on the big screen and that’s impress women by doing idiotic hip movements that pass for dance moves or flex your muscles. As I patted his shoulder and asked for a picture, I asked him, “Fun?” He breathed out a quick chuckle, put on a coy smile and slowly nodded. I wonder if he ever had that moment of epiphany when you stop, blink and think “How the heck did I get to where I’m at right now, visiting places like THIS in my day to day life. Where’d it all go wrong!?” At the end of the event he was brought up on stage by Cataldi to give out his big announcement: He’d compete in Wing Bowl 20 next year. I couldn’t figure out why he didn’t just do it this year, but to each their own. Instead he gobbled up a cheesesteak in a world record time of 24 seconds, cutting the former record in half then whipped up his shirt for a sarcastic satire of his signature celebratory eight pack abdominals display, as if to show his fat competitors, “I’m good at this and I didn’t even have to gain Hippo status!” He then spent the rest of the night half heartedly looking over the shoulder of El Wingador with a look of slight disgust painted on his face. I’d guess his first impression of Philadelphia wasn’t the best.
The greatest ovation wasn’t for a girl with tremendous breasts, however. That was reserved for five-time Wing Bowl champion El Wingador, the pride of every blue-blooded Philadelphian. A gigantic man with a bleach blond mullet and a built to order throne emblazoned with his nickname that was to be carried into the stadium so as to make him look like the royalty he was on Wing Bowl Friday, I could tell he wasn’t quite comfortable with the amount of attention that was laid upon him but there he was, the center of the circus. For one day a year, he was Mick Jagger. Even before he gorged himself on 254 wings to lose by one to ‘Super Squibb’ he looked like he was on the edge of puking. There’s probably a reason he’s retired from the competition almost as many times as he’s won it.
I ran into this guy before the competition and tried holding a conversation with him, but I couldn't understand a word he was saying.
The media section was a circus in itself, a little “cattle cage” as A.J. Daulerio informed me the night before I was to go that could be seen by basically everybody in the stadium. If there wasn’t 300 breasts to stare at instead of me, I’d be nervous. At the end of the night I did, for some reason, get a string of high fives as I was leaving, probably because they recognized my pioneering attempt at ‘pajama journalism’, where I wander around an event hanging out with everybody in clothes that look like, well, pajamas. I particularly enjoyed a crew of four fresh faced journalism students from Philadelphia’s La Salle University who dressed up in complete suit and jacket regalia with pseudo television anchor hair stylings to go along with their pile of wires and old plastic that passed for archaic camera equipment and never ending zeal to interview every porn star they were able to capture the attention of. When the extremely lopsided looking adult film star Mary Carey showed up in the media section I witnesses them quietly freak out at each other to get into interviewing position for their little student television station. When I first set eyes upon their sad sack ensemble I couldn’t help but start chuckling in their faces as they attempted to make it look like they were a legitimate enterprise by setting up their garbage ninth-grade quality film class camera with worse quality than the first generation iPhone next to the towering high grade cameras from HD FOX 29 and other local news programs. The kids didn’t seem to understand the humor of the situation, though.
The best action was when the floats were let out of the dark tunnel as competitors, the posse that accompanied them and the strippers that were hanging over them erupted in celebration at the fact that they finally got out of that cooped up tunnel to breathe the air and feel the excitement of 20,000 people cheering them on. Unfortunately for them, they weren’t informed that their moment in the sun was mismanaged and came LATER when WIP’s Rhea Hughes described what the float was and the skit that accompanied it for a radio listening audience. Wing Bowl may never be suitable for regular television, and for good reason. It’s a flash of insanity you can only really experience in person. As they gyrated around and did their little ‘WE ARE CHAMPIONS OF THE WORLD’ body movements, only the small section nearest to them were paying attention, and that’s where the fun was. A man in a warrior chicken costume that was probably the most intimidating thing I’d see all day spent his premature introduction tearing the head area off of a roasted chicken while simultaneously showering everybody in the vicinity with a never ending supply of chicken feed. I still don’t truly believe that memory was real. That is, until the float couldn’t quite make it past a little indent on the stadium floor that hampered a good deal of the ill-constructed floats that were probably drawn up by intoxicated “I took shop class freshman year” architects. As the strippers and wing eaters grabbed hold of rails for dear life, their posse buddies tried to lift the carts over the indent to the delight of everybody in the stadium who loved nothing more than exotic dancers in danger of toppling over. I was three feet away from the shaky floats with the topsy turvy wingettes next to a couple of African American fellows who used their press passes to take pictures with every dancer they could find while throwing out some flirty small talk. They were pretty cool.
The general idea I was left with as I strolled away from the carcass of WIng Bowl 19 and past the wingettes who had morphed their way back into regular women with regular problems and insecurities was that Americans can really, truly let loose is at a wing eating competition where the actual wing eating took a backseat to all of the naked lady theatrics and, well, just the naked lady theatrics. It’s an excuse for Philadelphians to get super drunk in the stands of their city’s basketball and hockey stadium so they can yell with their friends at strippers and drunk women to whip out their boobs. Americana!
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Part I: Off the Bench intern visits Wing Bowl 19, meets Ron Jeremy, Takeru Kobayashi [Off the Bench]
