To Boo Or Not To Boo?

By Taryn "The Coop" Cooper
Posted Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Are you one of those fans? Those meaning one of two things.

One being the fan who boos certain players, or a certain performance (e.g. blowing a save, striking out with ducks on the pond in the bottom of the ninth inning, grounding out into an inning ending double play) or heck, the team when things are not going as well as they should?

Or are you the fan who just quietly heckles his own players -- oftentimes, in the company of other fellow fans -- but never ever loudly boos the man in the favored team uniform (of course, all bets are off once said player is traded… merciless booing is not only encouraged but also mandatory at that point). Special exceptions are made for certain team efforts that fail miserably.

I call the latter fans “Modern Day Hildas.” For those not in the “know,” Hilda was the famous loudmouthed Brooklyn Dodger fan, who gave her boys a dose of “tough love” each and every home game. She was so famous – or more aptly, infamous – to the Dodgers themselves that Duke Snider once told her to “go home and shave.”

This still holds in modern times and is most definitively a New York baseball fan trait. Case in point: when a fellow fan and I followed our beloved Mets team to Milwaukee, the local fans got a good laugh out of us. You see, we heckled our own players more than the opposing team.

But you see, the difference between making fun of certain non-performers and outright booing their performances is vast.

Carlos Delgado has been having some…struggles at the plate, to put it mildly. Batting a whopping .245 by August 25 is not only disappointing, but disheartening. Compared to last year when he seemed to be the catalyst for the Mets’ driving offensive force, especially in the post-season, this season, he seems to be a shadow of his former self.

So when the opportunity arose on Saturday during a bases loaded, two out situation that would give the Mets some insurance runs, what does the crowd do?

Stand up and cheer!!

To which Delgado responds with a two2-RBI single. Essentially, this won the game.

But yet it makes me wonder – how much does our ragging on our own players get their psyches?

Take for example our favorite (okay, my favorite) whipping boy, Carlos Beltran. Now, I do have to say while I am a heckler, I never boo my own players. Not even Kaz Matsui! And I have to say I felt pretty awful that my fellow mates were ready to cut Beltran Opening Day in 2006.

When he hit his first home run of the 2006 campaign, the fans cheered and begged for a curtain call. If not for Julio Franco being there, we might still be waiting for Beltran to acknowledge us. But to me, he said something very interesting to reporters after the game. Mainly, the idea was – I am your friend in bad times, and your friend in the good times.

Translation: I am going to be here for a while, so you better get used to my streakiness.

But it made me realize, that these players are human, and they do hear the boos. And it may impact their game.

In the 1980s, George Foster and Doug Sisk had to endure the Shea faithful’s Bronx Cheers.

And look at Scott Schoeneweis. Is it just a coincidence that his stats are much better on the road?

And let’s not go there with Guillermo Mota.

That’s not to say Mets fans corner the market on booing their own players. Look no further than our cross-town rivals, the Yankees. Even the best player in modern day baseball is not exempt from their taunts.

A-Rod may put up gaudy numbers in the regular season. Heck, he may even win an MVP. Due to his non-performance in the various postseasons (which mostly Yankee fans ONLY care about or even start to pay attention to), this has led to wide mocking not only with his own fan base, but major league baseball fans. Typical mob mentality, I guess.

My point is, why do we do it? Boo, that is? To me, it’s perfectly acceptable to boo the opposing team. But our own?

There are some theories abounding. One is the tough love stance. We are simply letting the team know that anything less than perfect is unacceptable. We like to think this psychology works. But rarely does it ever, and then it fuels even more booing down the pike.

Another theory is the paying customer attitude. If we pay for a product (and New Yorkers definitely pay a HUGE premium for their baseball product) and it is unsatisfactory, we have certain courses of action. One is to return the item. The other is to write a letter to the CEO and let them know of the problem. Either way, you are either refunded your money or given some kind of incentive to return. For years and years, and especially with the Mets, if you charge a premium for tickets, food, beer, souvenirs, etc, and put out a shoddy product, the fans really have nowhere to turn.

So we let it out in a primal scream.

BOO!

But don’t you go bad mouthing our guys, ya hear? Cause those are fightin’ words.

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