How the legend is growing for Pollo FC, Verde's good-luck rubber chicken

Trevor Blow, the 34-year-old Georgetown resident responsible for bringing the rubber chicken known as Pollo FC into Austin lore last August, asserts that the evolving good-luck charm started out as a “drunk idea.” 

Blow, who grew up a San Diego Chargers fan even after moving to Central Texas in first grade, revealed that he “didn't even consider [soccer] a sport,” but moved off football when his beloved team moved up the 405 first to Carson (playing in the LA Galaxy’s home stadium for a spell) and then to Los Angeles proper (by which we mean Inglewood). 

But after a friend took him to Austin FC’s home opener last June, he understood soccer’s appeal, declared himself a fan, and in appreciating the supporters’ section energy and color in particular, wanted to add to that.

“After four or five games, I'm just like, ‘We need something fun just to have.’ It’d be goofy to bring a big rubber chicken, it seems very Austin and very goofy. I thought about it. looked it up on Amazon, and was like, they do sell rubber chickens, but they're $100, so maybe not.” 

But, several games later, he was still thinking about it, and his girlfriend and another friend urged him to take the plunge. So, he bought the chicken, gave it a verde paint job, and as he observed, “I gave him his own little custom kit” — as Pollo has acquired he/him pronouns — ”gave him number one before [goalkeeper Brad] Stuver got the number one, and named him Pollo FC.” 

Blow started taking Pollo to matches — starting with the home match against Vancouver on August 18 — and opened an Instagram account to document fans posing with the mascot. 

Along the way, he also got some Austin FC players to hold Pollo, including No. 1 SuperDraft pick Dani Pereira and hometown hero McKinze Gaines, who was later whisked away by Charlotte in January’s expansion draft.

And, fairly early into Pollo’s existence, Blow somehow convinced Austin FC CEO Anthony Precourt to grab Pollo for a photo, memorializing his rather strong grip. 

But Pollo began to grow in Austin FC lore in the offseason, unexpectedly getting a major role in the club’s 2022 schedule release video, fashioned as a Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears music video and filmed at Hotel Vegas in East Austin. Gaby Navarro, president of Los Verdes, reached out to Blow about the video shoot and requested on the club’s behalf that he arrive with Pollo at the very specific time of 3 p.m.

“I signed my NDA and then went in,” Blow recalled, recognizing a few of the higher-profile fans milling about in the venue. “Then someone from the club just took him from me and walked away, and they're just like, alright, we’ll just set up some shots. I’m watching Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears on stage and I'm like, this is cool. I'm just sitting in the corner, watching him just being set up in shots, they hand him over to Joe and take him to the photo booth. I heard him being squeezed in the photo booth. I just felt like a parent of a little celebrity child.” 

That video shoot was really the first time that Blow, as Pollo’s “dad,” would also experience the anxiety of Pollo being off on his own adventures. But it was another incident of separation — at Austin FC’s away trip to D.C. United on April 16, that would take the legend of Pollo FC to a whole new level. 

Security at Audi Field had an issue with Pollo going in with the rest of the Austin fans, who were requested for safety reasons to file into the stadium and get into their places an hour before kickoff.

But security was also not keen on Pollo being part of the festivities, contending that Pollo is an inflatable, though fans immediately contended that he’s actually a deflateable. Blow also pointed out that while the rubber chicken was not allowed through, he and other fans managed to get boom-boom sticks through, which are actual inflatables.

After Blow stayed behind for a time to be with Pollo, most likely freaking security out a bit by talking about Pollo as if a real, sentient being, Blow was able to strike a deal — security would bring Pollo to the Austin FC section at the 80th minute if Blow went to his seat.

He took the deal, the security rep kept his word, and as the match approached the 80th minute, Blow and Pollo were reunited in the stands. As soon as Blow rushed down to meet the security guard, hug him, thank him for keeping his word, and got back to his seat, Austin scored the first of three goals that would cement that match into Austin FC lore. 

“As soon as I got to my seat, boom,” he recalled. “We're still celebrating, boom. And then it just came again, boom. Are you serious? Is this really happening? The whole time, we're just losing our minds, I can't believe this is happening. This is an insane comeback. Did Pollo do this? I don't know.

“I had no idea that, back at home, everyone is also engaging in the same conversation,” he continued. “I'm in the moment. I'm not looking at my phone. But I feel the heat in my pocket and I look at it, and it’s like, ‘Oh, I have a lot of messages.’"

“It entered a new ethos,” he remarked regarding that match. “It became meme-able. There were not really memes before that. It became the subject of conversation.” He said it also spawned, strangely, bootleg Pollo merch — competing with the merch store Blow runs with proceeds benefiting Austin Pets Alive. His efforts have gained about $4,400 so far, though he hasn’t counted what’s come in since the D.C. trip, expecting a significant haul from the excitement around that match.

And then, in last weekend’s away trip to Houston, another potential tradition that Blow hopes doesn’t become a tradition happened — Pollo was transformed into a celebratory drinking vessel, as happy Austin fans quaffed beer and even tequila from Pollo’s rubber body. At one point in the post-match celebrations, when head coach Josh Wolff came to a parking lot outside PNC Stadium to thank the Verde faithful, one fan offered Wolff a Pollo full of beer to sample. (Wolff understandably declined.) 

Blow notes that Pollo doesn’t squeak when he’s wet, and when he first saw Pollo’s misadventures — as other fans took Pollo to Houston in Blow’s absence — that was more his concern than the obvious sanitary ones. “He’s fine,” Blow assessed based on the intel he got from his minders. “I’ll just clean him.” 

It’s been a remarkable nine months for Blow, who works with his dad in their family pool-building business in between matches. 

What he first began to realize when the schedule release video came out has solidified for him, as Pollo has become woven into the narrative of what’s emerging as a successful sophomore season — and as he’s gotten Pollo into the hands of a range of personalities, including ESPN broadcaster Taylor Twellman, Texas gubernatorial candidate Beto O’Rourke, and Magna Carda’s Megz. 

“People see it as being more than just a drunk guy’s dumb idea to have at a soccer game,” Blow reflected. “It became part of the culture, part of the city, part of what people relate to going to the games. It solidified it and really made it in my mind that this is a thing. I need to treat it with a different level of respect. He’s being seen by people that I don't even know."