When you are at that status of his, you need to keep appearances of your status.
Imagine Lebron James watching the Super Bowl up in the "rafters".. people would be ridiculing him.. asking why of someone of his stature be all the way up there.
Someone like Eric teeters on having relevance to a mass audience. While Lebron can recover from rafter-gate because of his current status, someone like Eric wouldn't be able to.
If would further showcase his slide to irrelevance in the grand scheme of "stardom"
So, strategically, it's a good move for him not to sit up there to further prove that he isn't a "star" of importance to a general audience.
