For the time being, First Energy Stadium is a “Factory of Happiness,” and apparently a haven for opossums.
On Thursday night, a fan went viral on social media after capturing an opossum with his bare hands before the winning game.
That fan, Greg Pleasant, does not even have a Facebook page.
The season ticket holder was in Section 149 with his wife when he noticed an opossum creeping around the aisles and fans refusing to sit.
“And I found a supervisor and I said, ‘Look, you want somebody just to grab it? I’ll grab it,’” he said.
Watch the full interview with Pleasant in the video at the bottom of this story.
It was then that he looked up “How to grab a possum” on YouTube.
Video shared millions of times showed him then following those rules.
“Right from the tail,” he said. “It wasn’t anything malicious towards me and it was very calm.”
By halftime, fans were asking if they could take selfies with Pleasant and began referring to him as “The Possum Guy.”
By Friday, there were hashtags on social media, such as “PossumPound” and “Victory Possum.” New Twitter accounts popped up in honor of the marsupial, while t-shirts marketed it as the Browns’ new rally mascot.
“People were coming up to me telling me that ‘it’s all me that caused the win!’” Pleasant said. “I’m like, ‘I doubt that’s the case, but maybe!’”
The franchise confirmed on Twitter the opossum was humanely released outside the stadium.
Though Pleasant said he was not offered any kind of compensation for his removal services, which he was happy to provide, he would not say “no” to a game football from the team, if offered.