If you climb up to section 437 at State Farm Stadium, take a set of stairs up to Row 1 and walk down to seat 6, you’ll find a man who’s part Arizona Cardinals superfan, part Arizona Cardinals encyclopedia.
Rob Freedman has had this seat since 2011 and season tickets since 2007. Freedman was still in college at Arizona State then, but with the Cardinals in their second year at State Farm Stadium, he took the leap on tickets.
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That’s the year his encyclopedic knowledge began.
Want to know who won when the Cardinals played in Cincinnati in 2007?
“We won that game,” Freedman said. “And Antrel Rolle had a forward flip in the air.”
A fact check will say that the Cardinals won 35-27 and Rolle returned two interceptions for touchdowns. But fact-checking Freedman is a waste of time. Everything he recites is accurate.
In 2011 at Minnesota? “Oh man, we lost that game. We haven’t won at Minnesota in a very long time, which sucks.”
In 2011, home against Cleveland? “We beat the Browns that game. I just remember it was a close ending, we won at the very end.”
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In 2012 at Seattle? “That was one of the worst losses on the road. It was a very ugly game. It was a blowout game. I was at a family holiday party and it was painful to watch.”
In 2012, home against Detroit? “We won that game. I just know we beat the Lions in that game.”
In 2016 at Carolina? “We lost at Carolina. It was an awful, blowout loss.”
Freedman’s memory, as usual, went 5 for 5.
That wouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who knows him. The Cardinals, after all, are the driving force in his life.
“It’s something I revolve my life around 365 days a year,” Freedman said. “I put everything Cardinals in my calendar, from mini-camp, OTAs, training camp, all the games. I’m OCD. I have obsessive Cardinal disorder.”
Ultimate Arizona Cardinals fan Robert Freedman at State Farm Stadium before the team plays the Las Vegas Raiders in their final preseason game of the season on Aug. 23, 2025.
Freedman’s story begins back in 1984, four years before the Cardinals arrived in Arizona. He was born 11 weeks early and weighed just one pound, 10 ounces. The doctors didn’t think he would walk or talk.
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And while he blew past those expectations, the medical challenges of being a premature baby made life difficult for him at a young age. He was in a self-contained special education learning system until fourth grade, when was, as he says, “mainstreamed.”
That experience ultimately led him back into special education as an adult. These days, he works at Washington High School in Phoenix, serving as a helping hand on assignments and testing.
“I feel like I’m giving back,” Freedman said. “Just like educators were there for me from preschool through college.”
It was in those difficult early days that Freedman built his connection with football. The game served as a bonding agent with his dad and his best friend in the neighborhood. In 1993, his dad took him to his first game, a 24-13 win over the Rams at Sun Devil Stadium. He was hooked for life.
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His fandom, though, went into overdrive when he got his season tickets.
In 2015, he founded a Facebook page, AZ BirdGang Nation, to connect with other fans. It now has over 13,000 members. In 2016, he began traveling to road games. He’s now up to three or four trips most years and has hit 22 stadiums in total. And in 2021, he was named the Cardinals fan of the year, which he describes as “the experience of a lifetime.”
Most importantly, he’s built a community at State Farm Stadium.
Every gameday, he goes to the same tailgate, then meets up with friends in the lower concourse before heading up to his seat. When he gets there, he spends the game talking to the friends and families sitting around him — people who he’s developed a bond with over the past decade and a half.
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“I have friends I go see every game for the last 10 years,” Freedman said.
And, like most things in his life, it all revolved around the Cardinals.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Cardinals fan has encyclopedic memory, but mainly about his team