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Ecuador Learned that You Just Can’t Put Your Jersey on the Rocky Statue, Even if it’s Done Respectfully
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World Cup 2026. Ivory Coast beat Ecuador 1-0 at “Philadelphia Stadium” on Sunday night, which we all should have seen coming after they placed their jersey on the Rocky Statue Saturday evening:
It was quite curious indeed, because while we all know about the Rocky Statue curse as it applies to reprehensible 49ers and Vikings fans, this situation was different. Ecuador wasn’t playing the Eagles in American football. Their fans were being respectful and they did this without any kind of malicious intent.
So we were wondering if the Rocky curse still applies, and it turns out it does, because Ecuador hit the post three times and failed to score despite playing in front of a crowd that was 95% yellow. They were essentially the home team and looked like they’d walk away with at least a point before Ivory Coast scored in the 90th minute to win the game. Go figure.
This list may be incomplete, but to the best of my knowledge the Rocky Statue curse looks like this:
- 2015 regular season (Giants) – Eagles win
- 2018 NFC Championship Game (Vikings) – Eagles win
- 2018 Super Bowl (Patriots) – Eagles win
- 2023 NFC Championship Game (49ers) – Eagles win
- 2025 NFC Championship Game (Commanders) – Eagles win
Chiefs fans did put their gear on Rocky before Super Bowl 57, and won, so the curse is not perfect. But it’s pretty consistent, and now we’ve learned that it holds whether you are being respectful or disrespectful. That means visitors from Brazil, Haiti, Croatia, Ghana, France, and Iraq are just gonna have to hold off for now. Unless you want to lose.
Kevin has been writing about Philadelphia sports since 2009. He spent seven years in the CBS 3 sports department and started with the Union during the team's 2010 inaugural season. He went to the academic powerhouses of Boyertown High School and West Virginia University. email - k.kinkead@sportradar.com