Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
November 01, 2005
Kicked Off the Team

This comment at Soxaholix is the best fan reaction I've seen so far:

God Damn! They are now just another team. Here's the thing, kids. Here's what's different about Boston. Yankee fans are frontrunners, we all know that. They root for the 27 World Championships. Angels fans want to play with their thunder stix and Rally Monkey(r). Cubs fans want a party; the team is the medium for that. Sox fans aren't fans of the team. Rather, every Sox fan thinks he/she is ON the team. Theo was our guy who was ON THE TEAM. They could sell dirt from the '04 field, or blow up Fenway Park,or sell those silly membership cards, we didn't care. They could jam that effin' Sweet Caroline down our gullets every day (twice on the split admission day-nighters).

We didn't care. We were ON THE TEAM. Theo was our surrogate. He got Papi; he had dinner with Curt; he got rid of that pain in the ass Nomar.

We have all been kicked off the team. God Damn.


Posted by David Pinto at 08:31 AM | Management | TrackBack (0)
Comments

"Yankee fans are frontrunners, we all know that."

The 'fans' who come and go with the championships are not 'fans' at all - and IMO, EVERY team has their share of fair-weathers. Here in Connecticut, I must have seen more 'B' caps in the span of a calendar year than I've in my entire life...

Posted by: Pete at November 1, 2005 10:19 AM

What does it take to fire Lucchino, get Henry to reopen negotiations w/Theo, and bring him back?

Posted by: Chris at November 1, 2005 11:12 AM

I get it: other fans merely root for their teams; Red Sox fans are actually ON the team. Ludicrous. Another example of Boston exceptionalism that turns the stomachs of the rest of the country.

Posted by: Jack at November 1, 2005 11:23 AM

It is not debateable that the Red Sox produce more books, more blogs, more comments in these forums than any other team -- all despite the fact that Boston is maybe the 20th largest city in America. We're everywhere. We're exceptional.

Posted by: Josh at November 1, 2005 11:30 AM

Come on, everyone, Boston fans are just plain better than everyone else. They're true blue, really there, really, you know, different. And special. They're all made out of delicious candy, have IQ's of 175, and can fly. But you can't be one, because, you see, they're full.

Posted by: Dave S. at November 1, 2005 11:45 AM

Yeah exceptional...puhleeeeze

i met you(not literally) and thousands of your redsox nation buddies at the phillies game this yr...you were a total jerk...one of you sat(stood half the game) in front of me flexed muscles the whole time with a big B (for bozo?) painted on your back, talking on your cell phone to your other exceptional friends about how exceptional you all are

by the way - i dont remember 3 yrs ago when sox came to town very many boston fans at the vet

hmmmmmmmm
i guess that's because you only became "exceptional" recently

give us all a break and shut up.....and get some pitching or people will be even less interested in how great you are!!!

Posted by: Ken at November 1, 2005 12:28 PM

"It is not debateable that the Red Sox produce more books, more blogs, more comments in these forums than any other team -- all despite the fact that Boston is maybe the 20th largest city in America."

Maybe those books were produced because of one HUGE thing: Until '04, the no team with the name Sox in it had won a championship in 86 years.

And if you all have 175 IQs, why can't anybody spell Socks correctly?

Posted by: Jesse at November 1, 2005 12:39 PM

Slate actually had an article explaining why the Chicago and Boston AL clubs spell their teams that way:
http://www.slate.com/id/2128744/?nav=fo

Yeah, Red Sox fans are exceptional. Exceptionally annoying. Ditto Yankees fans and Cubs fans.

Posted by: Adam Villani at November 1, 2005 12:56 PM

I don't know why I'm continuing this discussion, but as luck has it, I was at a Sox games at thet Vet.

This one. If I had only known to boo Jeff Brantley, in advance.

Posted by: Josh at November 1, 2005 01:14 PM

Never posted my link, so I'm posting again:

http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/B06040PHI2000.htm

Posted by: Josh at November 1, 2005 01:21 PM

I was there the night before, wakefield i think pitched and phils hit him for once

Interesting to check your link, phils beat cormier, must have been why wade picked him up..phils started shilling as well...

ok so you arent the guy with the B on his back, but let me tell you, the sox fans were unbeleiveably obnoxious in sect 135 on that sat afternoon...made me root for the yankees for the rest of the year..kinda ruins the our fans are exceptional angle...

Posted by: ken at November 1, 2005 01:38 PM

Yankee fans are frontrunners? I live in California and last October I saw more Sawx hats that all the Cali teams combined!

Posted by: Mike A at November 1, 2005 01:59 PM

Note to Dave P. It's only 26 World Championships. Just wanted to correct that. Of course if you make the same mistake with Boston they would have an increase of 50%!

Posted by: Zip at November 1, 2005 02:01 PM

yeah, well what i wanna know, what i really really wanna know is did any RED sox fan beat on a 40 year old 5' tall woman from the visiting team like some WHITE sox fan did to mrs. biggio?

unless you can say how proud yall are to beat up 100 lb middle aged ladies, sorry, WHITE sox fans are the absolute worst "exceptional" fans there are.

Posted by: lisa gray at November 1, 2005 02:04 PM

I forgot to mention this is my last post - Red Sox fans are riding the first WS in 86 years to the max. they aren't even defending champs anymore, curt schilling still doesn't shut up (5+ ERA this year I believe, Pedro was sub 3 I think), and besides the fact, the Florida Marlins have won twice as many WS the last 87 years.

Posted by: Mike A at November 1, 2005 02:04 PM

David:

I saw the same comments this morning and reacted just as you did. It's not often that reader comments strike a chord like that.

(see some of the previous comments here for examples)

I don't care if fans of other teams are annoyed or bored by the Red Sox and the fans. We are exceptional. But we don't have exclusivity on it. The truth is most teams and their attached culture are sadly forgettable.

Posted by: Joe in Philly at November 1, 2005 02:09 PM

Lisa, "we all" didn't beat up a 100-lb. woman -- one idiotic fan did. That doesn't prove that all White Sox fans are reprobates, anymore than the Boston Strangler proves that all Beantowners are serial killers. And you should know that.

Posted by: Scott at November 1, 2005 03:02 PM

Joe in Philly

You are the perfect example of what is making everybody else want to puke...

"...most teams and their attached culture are sadly forgettable" ?????????????? ouch...i havent seen a more arrogant clueless statement for a long time ..those poor poor tiger fans, aww shucks if only the A's had some history!!!..and those twins fans, gotta feel for their forgettable past history of ws championships!!too bad the orioles fans have no interesting teams to look back on!! blue jays are new they only have a couple of ws to look back on!!

now i remember

IT WAS YOU!!!! you are the smacked aXX sitting in the stands this summer that soured me on redsoxnation!!!!!

Posted by: ken at November 1, 2005 03:08 PM

If this stuff keeps up, I could get to hate the Red Sox as much as I hate the Yankees. And that's saying something.

I don't give a fart and a half about Theo Epstein quitting. The entire hoo-hah is just one more irritating example of the media taking the Red Sox 88 zillion times more seriously than they deserve.

Posted by: Casey Abell at November 1, 2005 03:19 PM

scott, you right, you ALL did not beat up a 100 lb (if that) middle aged woman

but i didn't hear of ONE single white sox fan, male or female, who came to her defense.

people just standing there while some MAN whales on a defenseless middle aged woman. would you have helped her out or cheered on the guy beating on her?

that would NOT have happened in our stadium. my husband woulda had that guy by the throat. that is if he somehow managed to get there ahead of all the others who woulda done the same. including me and i'm about mrs. biggio's size (younger, yes)

and folks just standing there watching some MAN beat on a woman is what i'm talkin about. that and the fact that the guy wasn't even arrested and charged with assault.

Posted by: lisa gray at November 1, 2005 04:18 PM

The jerk didn't "whale on a defenseless middle aged woman." He slapped her on the back of the head and ran. Patty Biggio and another family member caught up to him. The guy denied doing anything, the Biggios declined to press charges, and Patty Biggio (through her husband's agent) later commented that the incident was blown out of proportion.

I'm not saying the guy's actions should be condoned. Far from it. But there's no need to get hysterical about what happened, given the facts.

Posted by: Marcy at November 1, 2005 05:20 PM

Lisa's right except that "beat" should be "slapped and ran away". Most of the fans probably didn't even see it as it happened right after Podsednik ended the game with a walk off. The man in question was released because the Biggios declined to press charges. He is currently banned from the Stadium.

http://www.suntimes.com/output/worldseries/cst-nws-biggio25.html

They say everything is bigger in Texas. Having been there many times I can say this is true. I didn't realize that it applied to imaginations as well.

Posted by: Scott Janssens at November 1, 2005 05:20 PM

This is an amusing comments train, primarily b/c some of the Red Sox fans are doing a better job of arguing for their own obnoxiousness than even the non-Red Sox fans. So I won't beat that horse, but I would like to clarify something Josh pointed out about Boston being the 20th largest city in the country. He's absolutely correct, but in most market-size studies, the Red Sox are considered a regional franchise that draws from Hartford, Providence, and other cities throughout New England. According to these studies, Boston's market size usually comes in around 4th or 5th among the 30 MLB teams, after the Mets, Yankees, and Dodgers (and sometimes the Angels).

The passion that Red Sox fans have for their team is undoubtedly impressive, but it's hard to say quantitatively whether they get the most support (despite Josh's claim that it's "not debateable" [sic]). Over the last several years, the Yankees have sold the most merchandise, the Braves get the highest ratings on ESPN (they're also the most commonly cited "favorite team" in Gallup Polls over the last ten years), and the Cardinals have the best attendance, merchandise sales, and national TV ratings in relation to market size. The Red Sox probably fare best in each of these categories over the past two years alone, but it's difficult to tell if this is a temporary consequence of their recent World Series win or a permanent condition.

Posted by: Brian Gunn at November 1, 2005 09:42 PM

The out-of-state teams I see the most caps for probably go in something like this order:

New York Yankees
Boston
St. Louis
Atlanta

Posted by: Adam Villani at November 2, 2005 01:14 AM
Post a comment









Remember personal info?