A Philadelphia sports fan, who went on a misogynistic tirade against a female Green Bay Packers fan in viral video, lost his job and won’t be allowed to ever attend another Eagles home game, officials said Tuesday.
The ugly scene was captured on cellphone video during the Eagles’ NFC wild-card round victory Sunday night at Lincoln Financial Field in South Philly.
The “individual will not be permitted to attend any future events at Lincoln Financial Field,” a source familiar with the matter said Tuesday.
The widely shared video showed a man in an Eagles jacket bending over, cusping his hands over his mouth and verbally abusing the female fan in the row in front of him. That fan did not appear to respond to him.
Online sleuths connected the offending fan to a New Jersey management consulting firm, BCT Partners, that denounced its employee’s behavior.
And by late Tuesday night, the company said it had parted with the employee it identified as Ryan Caldwell, a business analyst with a speciality in information technology.
“The language was vile, it was disgusting, it was unacceptable and horrific,” BCT Partners founder Randal Pinkett told NBC News on Wednesday.
“It was diametrically opposed to the values that we espouse at BCT. We’re a company that’s founded on inclusion, on respect, on dignity and the behavior was just in complete contrary to everything that we stand for at this organization.”
Pinkett, who reality TV fans might remember as the Season 4 winner of “The Apprentice,” declined to discuss Caldwell’s work performance.
But Pinkett wished his now-former employee well and hopes he can pick up the pieces from Sunday night’s incident.
“It’s not just that we have parted ways with Mr. Caldwell, but we were very clear in our statement that we extended grace and support to him, that he could be better,” Pinkett said.
“What troubles me is his behavior, but what also troubles me is the cancel culture that we live in, that doesn’t afford people grace that we don’t have the opportunity to be better people and learn from our mistakes.”
In a statement to NBC News on Wednesday, Caldwell apologized for his behavior.
“While attending an NFL game last Sunday to support my beloved Philadelphia Eagles, an incident occurred that I deeply regret. What began as banter with two Packers fans sitting near me escalated to something more serious, and I said things that were unacceptable,” according to his statement.
“In the heat of the moment, I chose unforgiving words to address one of the fans, Ms. Ally Keller. I want to sincerely apologize to Ms. Keller for those words, and to my wife, family, and friends, my former employer and colleagues, Packer fans, Eagle fans, the Philadelphia Eagles, the City of Philadelphia, and all who were offended.”
The Eagles won the game 22-10, advancing to play the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday afternoon.
The fan targeted by Caldwell’s rants, Ally Keller, and her fiancé, Alex Basara, told NBC Philadelphia they were initially having a good time at the game, even enjoying friendly banter with rival fans.
“He started out with playful jabs at first or kind of just saying things to us right when we sat down,” Basara told NBC Philadelphia. “I chatted with him for a bit. But then he just kept saying some of the same things. Continued through the entire game. It got worse and worse as the game went on. We were surrounded by Eagles fans. We were getting all the attention.”
The man’s comments became nastier as the Eagles’ lead grew, the couple said.
“And then he just said, ‘Actually, you’re not even good-looking enough to be talking to me,’” Keller said. “And then I said, you know, ‘What does that mean?’ And he said, ‘You know what that means.’ And so I said, ‘Have you looked in the mirror yourself?’ And he said, ‘Yeah, but I’m a man. I’m allowed to be ugly. You’re a woman.’”
Basara said recording the incident is what ended up de-escalating it.
Keller said she was hesitant to say too much to the home team’s fan because the atmosphere was hostile.
“If it did turn into an altercation or something physical, all they see is me messing with an Eagles fan, and then I become the target,” she said. “And then what happens with my fiancé at that time in that scenario? It’s a dangerous situation.”
Philadelphia fans, and Eagles supporters in particular, have long had a rough reputation they believe is overblown.
At one point in the late 1990s and the early 2000s, an arraignment court was established in the basement of the team’s former home at Veterans Stadium to deal with fans apprehended for drunkenness, fighting and more on Sundays in the fall.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
