The world's greatest Arizona Cardinals fan is preparing to celebrate his team's appearance at this country's greatest sporting event.
From a Holiday Inn 85 miles away.
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The few, the proud, the Cardinals fans
BILL PLASCHKE
Perhaps no team in pro sports has had a smaller, more indifferent fan base than the Arizona Cardinals. But for the few who kept the faith, like James Donnelly, Sunday's Super Bowl is their reward.
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"Cheaper this way," said James Donnelly.
The world's greatest Arizona Cardinals fan is planning on attending today's Super Bowl between the Cardinals and the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Without a ticket.
"After all I've been through, I'll find one," said Donnelly, 42.
He wasn't picked in the Cardinals' Super Bowl season-ticket lottery even though he has missed only a handful of home games in 14 years.
"Don't know how that lottery works, never been through it before," he said.
He wasn't picked in a second lottery because, well, the Cardinals are so new at this, nobody told him about the second lottery.
"Big surprise there," he said.
He doesn't have any ticket contacts in the front office because the only involvement longtime Cardinals fans usually had with their front office involves the word "boo."
"We've kind of been alone for a lot of years," Donnelly said.
The world's greatest Arizona Cardinals fan has spent a huge chunk of his adult life cheering solo.
His license plate reads "1Cards1."
"Pretty easy to get, I guess nobody thought of it," he said.
His e-mail handle is "1cardsfan."
"Pretty easy to get that too," he said.
Like wildflowers in the desert, Cardinals fans are resilient, adaptive, isolated.
I have denoted Donnelly, a Phoenix investment consultant, as the world's greatest Arizona Cardinals fan for one simple reason.
I've never met another one.
In 28 years in this business, I have never had any contact with anyone claiming to be a Cardinals fan. Until I attended the NFC championship game two weeks ago in Glendale, Ariz., I had never even seen somebody who resembles a Cardinals fan.
Of course, after the game, a co-worker asked four of those jersey-wearing fans for directions out of the parking lot, and nobody could tell him.
And many of those fans still had price tags dangling from their caps.
But you get the point.
Dislike for aloof and eccentric owner Bill Bidwill, combined with frustration over more losses than any other franchise in NFL history, has left the team with what might be the smallest fan base in major professional sports.
