To little surprise, the first Panthers home playoff game in five years will feature increased police presence. To some surprise, the locals haven’t been expressly warned that undercover officers will attend the game in 49ers gear.
Via the Charlotte Observer, the extra efforts will commence on Friday.
“What we see is a lot more hype – a lot more events going on, a lot more bars hosting parties, a lot more of our venues uptown that are attracting people to the game,” Captain Mike Campagna said. “We’re just going to have a lot more energy.”
There definitely will be more energy in the stadium during the game, and plenty of negative energy will be directed to anyone wearing a red and white 49ers jersey. So why not use undercover officers in San Francisco colors?
Some would say that letting fans know undercover officers will be in 49ers gear defeats the purpose of catching offenders in the act. But it also promotes deterrence, since any Panthers fan who abuses a 49ers fan will know there’s a chance the 49ers fan actually is a cop.
Of course, those nuances could be lost on a guy who has consumed multiple containers of the official NFL beverage produced by the saccharification of starch and fermentation of the resulting sugar.