St. Louis Blues hype man draws on Pittsburgh roots during Stanley Cup run
Share this post:
Jason Pippi remembers the thrill of standing in Downtown Pittsburgh and watching the Penguins Stanley Cup victory parade in 2009.
Pippi might soon get the chance to not only see the Stanley Cup up close but raise it over his head.
“Every time you see the Stanley Cup, it just takes your breath away. It’s such a historic trophy,” he said.
The West Mifflin native and Central Catholic High School graduate doesn’t play hockey, but he works for the St. Louis Blues organization as the team’s director of entertainment.
The Blues tied the Stanley Cup Final series with the Boston Bruins at a game apiece Wednesday with a 3-2 overtime victory in Game 2 in Boston. St. Louis now finds itself three wins away from the franchise’s first Stanley Cup championship as the series shifts from Beantown to the Gateway City for Game 3 on Saturday night at the Enterprise Center.
Pippi, now in his fourth season with the Blues, is busy preparing the music and other entertainment for one of the biggest nights in St. Louis sports history.
“The passion that Blues fans bring and that hockey fans bring to the arena is electric,” said Pippi. “That energy is something that attracts somebody like me who wants to put on a show and wants to get people excited about sharing moments.”
Pippi has been stirring up excitement for sports fans since his days as a student at the University of Pittsburgh. He played the trombone in Pitt’s Varsity Marching Band and also spent a couple of seasons as the Panther mascot.
“Being a mascot is fun,” said Pippi. “You get a lot of opportunities to just be obnoxious and crazy and people just go ‘Oh, that silly Panther.’”
Pippi now passes on his best advice to the Blues’ mascot “Louis,” a big blue dancing bear.
“He and I do a lot of collaboration for in-game skits and things like putting a pie in a Bruins fan’s face. Those kinds of ideas he and I develop together. So, I’m still very much a part of the mascot culture,” Pippi said.
One of Pippi’s fondest memories as the Panther mascot was being on the sidelines in 2007 during Pitt’s monumental 13-9 upset that derailed arch rival West Virginia’s bid for its first football national championship. But it’s also a bit awkward for Pippi that one of the rallying songs for the Blues improbable march from last place to the playoffs is also a state anthem for West Virginia, John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads.”
“Every time we play it, I hear those first chords, and I roll my eyes and I’m like ‘Why is this the song that we had to fixate on?’” Pippi said.
Pippi’s rise in the sports world began in 2010 when, at the age of 25, he got a job in game operations with the NHL’s New Jersey’s Devils. But he had a hard time letting go of his attachment to his hometown Penguins.
“I got in trouble when we were sitting at dinner one night with our chief marketing officer in New Jersey, and I said ‘In Pittsburgh we do it this way’ and he said ‘Hey, it’s time to change your pronouns. It’s they do.’ I’ve been in the business for about 10 years now so I’ve kind of been able to put my fandom aside.”
Pippi has found St. Louis to be a good fit in more ways than one after working for other NHL teams including the Tampa Bay Lightning and the New York Islanders and baseball’s New York Yankees. Pippi is gay and said one of his former employers, which he won’t name, made it clear that he was not welcome.
“I actually was told because of my sexual orientation that I shouldn’t work there,” said Pippi. “I was always very afraid at other organizations to let people know about me or see behind the curtain.
“The fact is that I can just live my life here and people’s opinions, one way or the other, of my sexual orientation don’t weigh in on the overall evaluation of my skills or what I help to produce. It’s great not having to live in fear.”
The Blues have hosted a Pride Night each of the last three seasons.
“One thing I’m very proud of is being able to get out there and extend our reach from just the 19,000 fans in the arena out into the community,” said Pippi. “My position gives me a unique ability to reach out to organizations and help activate their message as well as tie it into the story of the Blues franchise.”
Now Pippi is enjoying the culmination of a lot of hard work in a city that is excited about the possibility of celebrating its first Stanley Cup.
“It takes so much hard work to win it and being a part of a team that gets crowned the champion would be a real feather in my career cap,” Pippi said.