First, so the National League West gets a World Series to itself and the American League gets left out. Other than feeling bad for Starlin Castro, now of the Yankees (Starlin deserves to play in a World Series), that’s fine with me. The American League is, after all, the “junior circuit”. As for who I am be rooting for, I don’t care. The main thing is that pitchers and catchers report in less than four months.
Second, a couple of comments on Cubs fans. The difference between Cubs fans and fans in other cities was pretty clear in the postseason this year. During the NLDS with the Nationals, Nats employees walked through the stands in Washington with signs telling the fans when to cheer or that there were two strikes on the opposing team’s batter. Things were different in Chicago, as even the Nationals players noticed:
“Nationals third baseman Anthony Rendon didn’t love the 2-1 outcome in favor of the Cubs in Game 3 on Monday.
But he gave love to the fans who were there to see it.
Rendon said he was so impressed by the atmosphere at Wrigley Field that he and first baseman Ryan Zimmerman had a conversation about it during the game.
Rendon noticed that fans needed no prompting from video boards to show their enthusiasm.
‘I love it. I love how the crowd’s always in it,’ Rendon said. ‘They don’t have to put up “Two strikes!” or “Cheer!” or whatever. The fans already know. That’s exciting not just for the home team, but for us as well.’”1
Maybe this is because Washington has only had baseball since 2005, but it also seems to be true in Los Angeles (where the Dodgers have been for 60 years). Paul Sullivan wrote about the DJ they have at Dodger Stadium. Yes, apparently the Dodgers need a DJ to keep their fans interested in the game:
“When Yasiel Puig stepped up in the second inning of Game 2, a sound bite was played of Christopher Walken asking for ‘more cowbell.’ And the video board gets more attention than Cody Bellinger2. Actors Ice Cubs and Ken Jeong, radio personality Big Boy and a muppet all appeared in taped segments exhorting fans to ‘Make noise’ or chant ‘Let's Go Dodgers.’”
Curtis Granderson explains why this is apparently necessary for Angelenos:
“‘Sometimes you have fan bases that feed off it [i.e., the game, itself], and sometimes you have fan bases that need (prompting) to know when … to cheer.’
‘You've got new fans and so many things fans have their focus on —whether it's their phones, their kids, or they're hungry or going to the bathroom.
‘They may miss something, and may not know there's two outs and two strikes and a runner on base, and if you put “Get loud” (on the video board), [they're] thinking “I need to get loud for some reason. I don't know why, but it's telling me to get loud, so I'm going to do that.”’”
Obviously, fans at Wrigley Field do not need to be told when to cheer – or boo. In the eighth inning of Game 4 of the NLCS, the home plate umpire made an absolutely horrible call on a swinging third strike by Curtis Granderson of the Dodgers. The ump initially called it a strike, the third strike, but Granderson protested, claiming he had fouled the ball. The umpires, all six of them, got together, and the home plate umpire changed his mind. He changed his mind, deciding that Granderson had foul tipped the ball, while everybody in the park was watching multiple replays of the swing on the videoboard clearly showing Granderson missed the ball and had struck out. The umpires, however, couldn’t (or wouldn’t) look at the replay because ball and strike calls can’t be challenged under the replay system. And so they got the call wrong, giving Granderson an extra swing in a postseason elimination game with the Cubs having a mere one-run lead. It didn’t make a difference because Granderson struck out – again – on the next pitch. But it could have made a big difference.
And Cubs fans remembered that call the next night when the umpires were introduced. The entire park booed the umpires loud and long. One wonders if Nats fans would have known enough to boo the next night, at least without a sign telling them to. There wouldn’t have been much booing at Dodger Stadium, either. After all, the umpires are introduced shortly before the game starts, and many of the Dodgers fans wouldn’t have been there in time to boo them.
----------
1 Paul Skrbina, “Fan Appreciation,” Chicago Tribune, October 10, 2017 (print edition).
2 Cody Bellinger is going to be the National League Rookie of the Year in 2107; probably unanimously.
UPDATE (10/23/17 10:10 pm): I replaced the last sentence of the original post with two paragraphs that are now at the end of the post.
Comments