Photo via Flickr user Eva Rinaldi
Wings are on the collective US brain this weekend, as the Super Bowl—aka National Day of Sports Bar Snacks—draws ever-nearer. Americans eat 1.25 billion chicken wings on Super Bowl Sunday, a staggering number even by our nationally gluttonous standards.Today is the 23rd annual Wing Bowl, a Philadelphia-based show of beer-guzzling, scantily clad "Wingettes," and wing-eating power that truly crushes any estimate you ever had about how much chicken flesh could fit into a human stomach. In its first year, winner Carmen "The Beast From the East" Cordero consumed 100 wings; last year, champion Molly Schuyler ate 363. And this year, there were even some celebrity contestants. Like Mick Foley, also known by his pro wrestler name of Mankind, and now, also known as a dirty rotten CHEATER and WING HOARDER.Former World Heavyweight Champion, maybe. But Wing Bowl Champion of 2015, he is clearly not.
Advertisement
This morning, Foley was ejected from the Wing Bowl after being caught red-handed (literally) for trying to bolster his wing count by stuffing uneaten chicken wings into his fanny pack. The Jumbotron even displayed his shameful foray into rule-breaking for the disapproving crowd to see.Nervous in front of the crowd of 20,000 people, Foley says that he was afraid of throwing up and thought it better to cut some corners. Wing Bowl viewers took to Twitter in fits of bemused rage, dubbing the incident "inflate gate" as a nod to the New England Patriots' recent scandal involving deflated footballs."I didn't want that to be my legacy," Foley commented. "So I stretched the rules. I thought people would appreciate that, right here in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania!"On the plus side, the non-fanny-pack-stuffing champs at Wing Bowl were record-breaking, with Patrick Bertoletti of Chicago taking down 444 wings in 26 minutes, and competitive eater Molly Schuyler following close behind with 440. (If you've never seen Schuyler in action, I strongly recommend watching this video of her gnawing on a 72-ounce steak with her hands and downing the whole thing in less than seven minutes.)MAKE IT: Spicy Blackened Chicken Wings with Chile-Honey Glaze
When TMZ attempted to further put Foley on blast on Twitter, he responded by tweeting back at them, "Guilty as charged. Legacy shattered. Life in shambles".The most embarrassing element of this ordeal is not that Mick Foley cheated brazenly in front of 20,000 people, but that he used a fanny pack as his co-conspiratorial garment. For shame.