Super Bowl hype will bring a bunch of Rocky Balboa look-alikes to Jack Demsey’s pub in Midtown on Thursday to devour Philly cheesesteaks.
The connection, tenuous at best, is that Sly Stallone’s iconic pugilist is a symbol of Philadelphia, whose Eagles are playing in Sunday’s big game.
Since Rocky Marciano’s hometown of Brockton, Mass., is rooting for the Patriots — and the mayor of Brockton has a bet with the mayor of Philadelphia — Jack Demsey’s pub jumped in with a Rocky look-alike contest, even though Dempsey was long retired before Marciano scored his first knockout.
Stallone will stay far away and watch the game at home in Beverly Hills, Calif., because he has such traumatic memories of helping to open the Eagles’ stadium, Lincoln Financial Field, in 2003, when the Eagles were shut out of the Super Bowl by Tampa Bay.
“They got pounded,” Stallone told the LA Times.[1] “So they were in the locker room going, ‘Rocky’s nothing. Rocky got knocked out. Eye of the potato.’ I felt so bad. It was Rocky Day, and I thought, ‘I’m going to be stoned to death here.’ ”
If the Eagles win, the statue of Marciano in Brockton will be fitted with a Philly jersey. If the Patriots win, the Rocky statue in Philadelphia will be clad in a New England uniform.
References
- ^ Stallone told the LA Times. (www.latimes.com)