Take Me Out to the -- Mayday!

By Rick Horowitz

MILWAUKEE -- O Shame! O Stain! O Smirch Upon the Virtue of the People!

Oh goody! The spikes are on the other foot.

By now you must have heard the news: The local nine had its first home game of the season the other day. It was, by all accounts, something less than a total triumph -- or do you think that "baseball" is a plural noun?

In the actual, official game, the Milwaukee Brewers defeated the Texas Rangers, 5-3; that was the dull part. The interesting part, the part that made the highlight tapes coast to coast, was the energetic, personal involvement in the game on the part of certain Brewers fans. They had a ball, these Brewers fans did. Then they threw the ball.

At the start of the game, then in the second inning, then again in the second inning, dozens of fans tossed dozens of souvenir baseballs onto the County Stadium field. Twice the Rangers manager pulled his players off the field for their safety. Warnings were issued, forfeits were threatened, before order was finally restored.

"I've got it!" somebody in the commissioner's office must have said last winter, in what passes for judgment in the commissioner's office. "What if we give all these fans their very own baseballs when they enter the stadium? That way, if they get excited or bored or angry during the game, they'll have something to throw to disrupt things!"

"Or drunk." Don't forget "or drunk" after "excited or bored or angry." "Drunk" apparently played a major role in freeing Brewers fans from their inhibitions -- and their senses. The final count? According to the paper, 14 arrests for throwing objects onto the field; 42 for underage drinking; 34 for disorderly conduct (including public urination, a bit of a risk considering the subfreezing conditions, but what the heck...); two for possession of marijuana; and 27 for "other offenses," including "carrying intoxicants into the stadium."

Well, I just had to laugh. I saw the photograph.

And not just the photograph -- the beleaguered Brewers ball girl with a glove and a bucket, trying to collect the excess sporting goods the yahoos had sent her way. I also read the statements from all the embarrassed team officials and local politicians, trying mightily to distance themselves from these clowns.

I laughed because I remembered all the stories in years past about the little town I once called home (New York), and the ballpark I once called my own (Yankee Stadium). Baseball fans in my little burg were notorious -- so the stories went, anyway -- for hurling invective (and AA batteries) at opposing players. The fact that only a tiny band of crazies did anything of the sort mattered not a whit to the outside world; as far as they were concerned, the Apple was rotten to the core, and we were all worms.

That kind of behavior could never happen here, these other places liked to insist, smug as a bug in an Astroturf rug. We're better than that.

Oops.

So here come all the anguished letters to the editor: loyal fans desperately arguing that they hated what happened out there, that those jerks don't represent the vast majority of fans, that it isn't fair to condemn a whole city because of a handful of idiots.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

4/10/97

©1997 Rick Horowitz. All rights reserved.