The NFL's 10 Most Raucous Home Crowds

If you want to know how crowd noise impacts visiting teams, you don’t need to focus on the game itself.

It’s better to look at the midweek practice sessions. If the soon-to-be visiting team cranks up stadium-sized speakers on the workout field and then imports sound that it’s an approximation of an overlapping of a hurricane and a volcano erupting, that’s how you gauge the impact the noise level.

Get the opponents to be thinking about the noise 96 hours before they ever hear it is the biggest compliment home team fans can get, and we’ve got a list of places that crank it up.

Taking Pride in the Noise

For almost the entire duration of the franchise, the "12^th man’" theme has focused on the unrelenting and loud fans of the Seahawks.

The number 12 has been retired for a quarter of a century already, and before each home game a flag with the numeral 12 is raised.

The Seattle fans took the move from the Kingdome to Century Link Field seriously, pumping up the volume even without a dome.

Slings and Arrowheads of Outrageous Noise

This is a place where they chant "we’re going to beat the hell out of you, you, you,’" so it’s safe to say they take their roof-raising seriously in Arrowhead Stadium.

The Chiefs talk all the time about the intensity of their fans, and so do Kansas City's opponents.

It's one place that other teams don't like to have to play just because of the crowd's ability to interrupt things.

Raising the Roof Against a Miserable Season

It doesn’t hurt to play in a dome. The roof of RCA Dome holds in sounds as well as any, and despite this year’s downturn in fortunes with quarterback Peyton Manning being hurt and unable to play, voices here shatter glass.

That the Colts are still drawing over capacity speaks loudly for the support they get at home.

Voices from on High Support the Saints

The Saints had troubles back in the early days getting their fans motivated because of an endless succession of losing seasons.

But the rise of the Saints under quarterback Drew Brees and in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the place sounds like a hurricane for visitors.

Winning the Super Bowl two years ago has only made this group get louder.

Under the Roof, the Vikings Fans Make It Tough on Opponents

It’s hard to say whether it’s the sport or the facility that brings the noise.

When the best Twins teams were still playing baseball in the Metrodome, you couldn’t hear yourself think.

It’s like that all the time when the Vikings are at home in a sea of purple and an ocean of raised voices.

Winning Ways in New England Extend to the Fans

Gillette Stadium plays music about as loudly as any stadium anywhere.

It has to if the music is going to be heard over the raucous Patriot fans, who have unbridled themselves in recent years as the Patriots have become one of the NFL’s dream franchises.

The Patriots, like their baseball compatriots the Red Sox, routinely sell out and make them a very tough ticket.

Tradition Lives in Green Bay, Where They Grow Their Fans Loud

Tradition dies hard in Lambeau Field.

It's a place where they play "Roll out the barrel’" at the drop of a hat, and where fans tune up for the game with legendary tailgates, cold and miserable conditions notwithstanding.

They are some hardy and vocal folks up on the western shore of Lake Michigan, and opponents know only too well what an obstacle a Loud Lambeau can be.

They Don't Make Them Much Louder Than They Do in Texas

Jerry Jones’ baby in Arlington, Texas is supposed to be state of the art.

The Cowboys' fans certainly are, and they have been for decades now.

In Texas they just can’t get enough of the Cowboys, and when 87,000 of their more fervent fans get together under the dome, brain cells will be crushed by the noise.

Oxygen May Be in Short Supply in Mile High, but That Doesn't Slow Fans

Mile High Stadium is where all of Colorado seems to come to let their frustrations and their joys loose.

It’s been more frustrating than the Broncos would like this year, but if Tim Tebow ever gets this team up and running, Mile High won’t have to take a back seat to any NFL stadium in the noise derby.

As it is, the Broncos have 75,000 vocal fans on their side on any given Sunday.

Discordant Voices Find a Way to Unite Behind the Redskins

It may well be that the left and the right in the nation’s capital can agree on just one thing – how fond they are of their Redskins.

FedEx Field positively rocks when the Skins are at home, and players will tell you there aren’t many places where fans have the kind of impact they do in D.C.