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editor

steeltown south

I like living along the Grand Strand, don't get me wrong.

It has many big city amenities without many of the big city hassles.

I especially enjoy the upcoming off-season, where we as locals get our beaches back, to some extent.

But one thing that irks me about this place is that it has no real sense of place.

It becomes more irksome when it comes to sports teams' followings - i.e. if you go watch an NFL game at a local sports bar, you're more likely to see more New England Patriots, N.Y. Giants, Washington Redskins fans than folks supporting teams from the South, such as the Carolina Panthers (hey, we live in one of the Carolinas for god sakes), Atlanta Falcons, Tennessee Titans, Jacksonville Jaguars or Miami Dolphins.

I got a little taste of this last Saturday, although it was the college game, as I went to Spencerz Sports Pub between Myrtle Beach and Surfside Beach, to catch some of the Coastal Carolina University-Penn State matchup, and Nittany Lions fans easily outnumbered those pulling for the Chants. (Of course, Chants fans didn't have much to cheer about, but that's a different story.)

But no professional team has quite the local following as the Pittsburgh Steelers.

With the NFL's regular season kicking off tonight and the first full weekend of action on tap Sunday and Monday - you're going to see more and more black and gold jerseys with names such as Roethlisberger, Ward, Polamalu on the back floating around here. Maybe some throwbacks, too, sporting the monikers Bradshaw, Swann, Greene, or Harris. Surely you won't see: Stewart, O' Donnell, Pegram, Brister, or Malone?

It's sort of taken for granted around here that there are tons of Pittsburgh Steelers fans. You know, it is what it is, to use the new worn out sports cliché. But why, really, are there so many Steelheads here, a good 12-hour drive away from Steeltown? Seriously, we're in the heart of what should be Carolina Panthers territory, yet there are more Steelers bars and watering holes than any other NFL team. Granted, the Steelers are one of the most popular NFL franchises across the board, fueled by their 1970s dominance and the fact that people who watched Terry Bradshaw and Franco Harris as kids now have kids. Besides the bandwagon effect of the Steelers winning Super Bowl XL a couple of years ago, there are gobs of folks from the Pennsylvania, Western Maryland/Eastern Ohio/Northern West Virginia area now calling the Grand Strand home, and they often pull for the Steelers too.

I looked it up and Pittsburgh has 16 official sister cities. Should Myrtle Beach be added as one of them?

Pittsburgh, meanwhile, has lost nearly half of its population from 1950 to 2000, despite it ranking high on several best cities to live and work in surveys. What gives?

The Steelers strap it on at 1 p.m. Sunday vs. the Houston Texans, so we tapped seasoned local sports writer Terry Massey to explore the phenomenon and find out why and how the Grand Strand became, "Pittsburgh by the Sea.'' Turn to page 12 for his report.

And if you're like me, and you're not a fan of the gold and black, we've got a list of area sports bars that are home to factions of other NFL teams' fans on page 13.

Also, if you go online to www.weeklysurge.com, you can find a breakdown of area sports bars along the Strand so you can find a cool spot to watch the big games in your 'hood.

Are you ready for some football?

-Kent Kimes, Editor