A Philadelphia Eagles fan screaming at a Green Bay Packers fan at a Philadelphia stadium is now facing serious consequences for his actions.
During last Sunday’s NFL Wild Card round of the playoffs, Packer fan Alexander Basara posted a clip to X of an Eagles fan heckling his fiancée decked out in Packers gear. “I wonder what it’s like to go to Philadelphia just to cheer on your team,” he wrote along with a video of the interaction.
“For no reason, unsolicited. Packers Twitter, please help me find this guy…. This is not okay. My fiancé did this just to support his team. “I’m really sorry that this happened,” he added.
The video shows the man bend down and begin teasing Basara’s fiancée about what happened on the field. He continued to call her derogatory names, repeatedly using the phrase “she’s an ugly, stupid bastard” until Basara intervened and told him to stop.
On Tuesday, NFL reporters revealed that Eagles security has identified the man involved and he has now been banned from future Eagles games.
But that’s not all.
The man also has ties to New Jersey consulting firm BCT Partners, which released a statement late Tuesday saying it was his employer and that he would no longer work for the company.
“The language was vile, offensive, unacceptable and horrifying,” Randall Pinkett, founder of BCT Partners, told NBC News about Fan, who later became a business analyst specializing in information technology. It turned out to be Ryan Caldwell.
“It was the exact opposite of the values we stand for at BCT. We are a company built on inclusion, respect and dignity, and our actions are fully in line with everything we stand for at this organization. It was the opposite,” Pinkett added.
Caldwell could not be reached for comment.
Mr. Pinkett said that while Mr. Caldwell was terminated, the company communicated to Mr. Caldwell that it expected him to be removed from game events.
“We made it very clear in our statement that not only did we part ways with Mr. Caldwell, we extended our blessings and support to him and that he could be better. ” he said. “It’s his behavior that bothers me, but it also bothers me the cancel culture that we live in. In this culture, we don’t have the opportunity to become better people or learn from our mistakes. I won’t let people.”
In addition to the talk off the field, there was also an unusual incident on the field. One of the team’s wide receivers, AJ Brown, was caught reading a book on the sideline between attacks.
After the game, reporters asked Brown if reading on the sideline was normal or an expression of dissatisfaction with the team’s performance during the game.
“I wasn’t annoyed at all,” he said, according to ESPN. “Why do you always think I’m so irritable, Dan? I like reading.”
The Eagles won with a final score of 22-10. The team will face the Los Angeles Rams in the divisional round of the playoffs this coming Sunday.
