The Upstate Life

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Alienating Local Fanbases Is the New Hotness

Willie & Reed's in Bethesda, which unexpectedly closed last spring, was recently replaced by a chain called Blackfinn. W&R was one of my favorite sports bars to watch Maryland games so you could easily imagine my disappointment when I found out they closed their doors. Anyway, I heard that this place Blackfinn recently took over so I glanced over their website and it looks nearly identical to W&R sans the Irish theme. I mean as long as they have a vast assortment of TVs to watch the games I don't care, but then I came across this:

Whether it's a Hokies' game or a Redskin's game, the Finn is the best place in town to watch it. With 30 large flat panel TVs, a state-of-the-art sound system and flat panel TVs at every booth, you have no excuse for missing even a minute of the game.

So you're telling me that this establishment, just minutes away from Maryland's campus, is going to be a Virginia Tech bar? WTF. I hope Blackfinn realizes that the place used to not only hoist a UMD flag outside its doors, but hosted the Gary Williams radio show for crying out loud. Then again, after looking over the website some more, apparently every Blackfinn, from Indianapolis to Royal Oak, MI (?!), are Redskin/Hokie bars. So maybe it's an across the board thing, I don't know. If, for one reason or another, Blackfinn does in fact turn out to be a Tech bar, then Cleveland Park Bar and Grill will be getting a lot more of my business come gameday. I'm still willing to give it a shot since I obviously haven't stepped foot into the place yet, but if it turns out to be JABB (a newly created acronym which stands for Just Another Bethesda Bar – Union Jack's easily falls into this category. Essentially any place with a high level of douchiness and/or actually scans IDs) please, please count me out.

Update - OK, either it was an error on their part or this blog exudes a hell of a lot more influence than originally thought. Anyway, they updated the website and Hokies has thankfully been replaced with Terps. The verdict is still out on the JABB part, though.

Posted by Brett at 12:07 PM |