Broncos superfan hangs up the barrel

An age of Orange Crush is ending... It kind of brought a tear to my eye for real, and I am not even a football fan.

clipped from www.9news.com Broncos superfan hangs up the barrel VIEW SLIDESHOW DENVER - Tim McKernan, known to generations of Broncos faithful as "The Barrel Man" is retiring after thirty years as the oddly-dressed informal cheerleader for the home team. Chances are, you wouldn't recognize McKernan with his clothes on, but that suits him just fine. He began wearing an orange aluminum barrel to Broncos games in 1977 because of a bet with his brother. "He wanted to see me on TV out in California," McKernan said. "I had painted a barrel to make a drum out of it to look like an Orange Crush can, told him about it and he bet me 10 bucks that I didn't have the guts to wear nothing but the barrel to a ball game." He did have the guts to wear it and keep wearing it, through snow and sub-zero temperatures for 30 years worth of Sundays. "The older I get, the harder it is to handle the cold," he said. "I always thought I'd go until the day I died in it."