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September 14, 2004
Fan Civility
If you haven't heard Texas Rangers pitcher Frank Fransico threw a chair at some Oakland A's fans yesterday. While throwing a chair was very wrong I understand his frustration at fans. Basic civility is sorely laking among some fans.
I was in a second row baseline seat at an LA Clippers game once, which is close enough for the players to hear you when you yell at them. One guy sitting next to me kept yelling extremely personal insults at Jason Kidd every time he came down to our end of the court. Eventually a friend that was with me encouraged the guy to shut up because the insults were so rude. At a soccer game in college an opposing team's player had to be restrained by his teammates from attacking some of my fellow students who had been insulting him all game long. Then there were the fans who assaulted some Dodgers in 2000, the cell phone thrower at along with the New York NFL fans who through ice balls at players. The worst part is I know of only one case where this resulted in a forfeiture and that was only because the umpires felt threatened.
Even then forfeits have problems. I could see a rival team's fans going to a game and trying to cause the team they hated to forfeit by throwing stuff on the field. But back to the insults, the worst part is that even at small division III events like the soccer game in college I mentioned no one did anything to correct the beligerent fans. The refs heard what they were saying, as did other school officials, and there were only around 100 fans in attendence so it was not like it was hard to figure who was saying what. And there was a policy allowing them to eject fans for abusive language. They just did not bother to enforce it until a fight broke out.
Posted by Pete at September 14, 2004 05:13 PM
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Comments
Opie... Opie... I wasn't there but I've heard of it. It's sometimes hard to hate verbal incivility at games when it's so darn funny.
Posted by: Dangerous Dan at September 14, 2004 07:23 PM
There's one fan's taunt that I heard and that I think will always remember. Back in high school, I was at a Reds-Astros game at the Astrodome; this was back when the Reds had both Deion and Reggie Sanders starting. My friend and I were sitting out in the outfield, and a guy behind us shouted, "BURN IN HELL, SANDERS!" Now, I think that hostile crowds are just of those unique job hazards that come with being a pro athlete, but wishing eternal damnation just crosses the mind in my book. Also, I doubt that the guy really knew that he was shouting his curse at REGGIE Sanders.
Posted by: Lennox at September 16, 2004 12:31 AM