Chicago Blackhawks fans pulled a wily stunt in an LA restaurant last week. Silvio' Brazilian BBQ, which has somehow become a stomping grounds for Chicago transplants. A trusted regular asked to play a Blackhawks video highlight reel and the restaurant played it on the TV's around the restaurant. At the end of the video was a message in response to Chicago's Game 7 loss to the LA Kings in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. That portion of the video immediately went viral.
The video, roughly 20-25 minutes, ended with a with a screen shot with the message "Hey Kings: Go F**K Yourselves". As there were locals and more importantly, Kings fans, in the restaurant there was an instant backlash on social media as well as hospitality review site Yelp.
Hockey fans are no doubt some of the most loyal and fervent in all of sports. But things got out of hand last week when patrons of Silvio's Brazilian BBQ decided to send that message to the LA Kings and their fans. Owner/Manager Doug Howarth, who is an LA native and a Kings fan, was appalled by his customer's betrayal of his trust. He did, however, take responsibility for the incident since he didn't review the video ahead of time (via TMZ):
"'Unfortunately, we had a negative incident here at Silvio's after Game 7 of the Blackhawks/Kings game that has offended pretty much everyone in our community...
"Howarth added, 'I sincerely apologize that something this stupid, un-sportsman like, and vulgar appeared on the TV's at my restaurant. We were not aware that this message was attached to the end of the video.'"
Kings fans who were offended took to Yelp to slam the food, the service and the incident. Howarth had more to say about the situation (via Yahoo):
"'It's something we never thought would happen,' Howarth said. 'We're in LA. We're from LA, and to have something like that go up on the screen -- it was a stupid thing that nobody was aware of until it had already happened...
"'We're trying to do some damage control,' Howarth explained. 'We're very family-friendly and to have something vulgar like that up on the TV screen, it makes me want to throw up. I'm pissed off.'"
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