FOOTBALL has had plenty of eccentric mascots but none more so than a man with a chainsaw.
Portland Timbers of the MLS have a tradition that when the home team scores, a chainsaw is fired up and a piece is sliced off a giant log and placed on a stand behind one of the goals.
Timber Joey succeeded Timber Jim back in 2008 and has been firing his chainsaw up ever since.
The slice of wood is taken around the stadium with fans invited to touch it and at the end of the game the slice is presented to the goal scorer.
If a goalkeeper keeps a clean sheet then they also get a slice, sometimes players keep the piece of wood and other times they sign them and donate to charity.
Speaking to The Athletic, Joey whose full name is Joey Webber said: “There’s goal celebrations all over the world that have big traditions.
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“Spiking the ball and doing your dance for a touchdown in NFL, or a baseball player might point to the sky after they hit a home run.
“This is just a tradition that started with Jim, but it’s something that everyone can get involved with.”
The logging industry has played a huge part in Oregon’s culture and economy.
Joey added: ” I grew up in a town that had 16 timber mills when I was a kid, so everyone in that community for the most part was employed in the forestry industry.
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“If you walk out of our stadium and look up you see on the largest parks in the world inside city limits, Forest Park, which is full of the same trees I’m cutting.”
Joey feels the tradition is special and is glad people who didn’t grow up like he did can experience it.
He said: ” I think it’s even a bit more special because people who didn’t grow up the way I did get to witness it right there in downtown Portland.
“I think it’s a neat tradition, there are nearly two million people in the surrounding area and people travel from all over the state to attend games, which is another million.”
Joey is hopeful that every time he slices off a piece of wood, people who haven’t seen it before could become attached to the club.
“Every time we saw off a slice of timber there might be one new person who hasn’t seen it before and it could attach them to the team the way I was attached to it.”
Portland Timbers currently sit eighth in the MLS Western Conference.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
