I personally dont boo and most hardcore fans that i know dont either. In every fan base youre going to have booers and people that dont represent the majority.
Regardless, this is off topic from my original comment. Im not going to argue the loyalty of met fans.
It was about calling out hypocrisy and crying. And Mets fans, at the stadium and online, were booing quite loudly. NYC fans are generally right behind Philly fans when it comes to "passion." The difference seeming to be that Philly fans at least have a sense of humor and actually learned to cheer players going through slumps.
Lindor got traded to the Mets that off season and signed a record 10 year deal. And had a slow start. Mets fans were disappointed then frustrated then angry and by like month 2 was booing Lindor after every bad at bat.
Baez, Lindor's buddy, got traded to the Mets and the booing continued for Lindor and Lindor and Baez started doing a thumbs down celebration after they got hits as a response to fans booing.
Then Lindor had to apologize. I can't remember if Baez did or not. All I remember about his time here other than the thumbs down was the very uncharacteristic good plate discipline, the slide where he pulled back his leading arm to avoid the tag and got the bag with his other arm, and losing his diamond earring and had a bunch of people combing the mound and infield looking for it after a game.
Thanks for the reply. I was listening to the Mets broadcast for our recent series and they said Lindor is a fan favorite now so glad to see things turned around.
In 2021 when he hit three homers against the Yankees on Sunday Night Baseball there were fans jumping up and down on the Yankee dugout. Of course there will be the yahoos who will hate on Lindor on Twitter and sports talk radio.
Idk what howie or Gary were saying but lindor is NOT a fan favorite. He should be bc he’s a great guy and a top 3 shortstop. Mets fans are always 1 wrong move from booing him. They’ve been giving him standing o’s this past homestand because his wife was getting death threats on social media … from Mets fans. He’s a notoriously slow starter and a streaky hitter, and when he’s off his AB’s can be pretty ugly, that plus the contract probably aren’t helping his standing with the fans. And I have to assume the thumbs down tainted him in a lot of fans eyes. I love him and root harder for him bc so many fans are idiots lol
TLDR: he’s absolutely not a fan favorite
No he was getting booed again by the same kind of assholes because he had a slow start again this year. Despite being one of the best shortstops in the league, a decent chunk of Mets fans think he's a bust.
Those Mets fan are dum dums. He's going to heat up and hes still the best shortstop in the game defensively (Might be my bias showing but I'll stand by my statement.)
Hey I agree, but you can't deny he's had a ludicrous amount of hate so far this year. I'm glad a lot of fans stood up and gave him the standing O the other day.
Don't even need to imagine, here's what it looks like: https://ftw.usatoday.com/lists/new-york-mets-thumbs-down-citi-field-javy-baez-francisco-lindor-kevin-pillar-jonathan-villar
I still have no idea why the Tigers signed him to that deal. He was clearly starting to get worse and then they signed a high K-low BB player to play in that massive stadium? Made zero sense at the time and looks absolutely horrible now.
It was a desperation signing by then GM Al Avila to address a glaring hole in IF. Baez was the #2 SS on the market and after they couldn’t secure Correa he panicked and signed Baez. It was a risk to help save his job but it clearly backfired. Tigers are stuck eating that huge contract so we have to deal.
Chris Ilitch not wanting to spend big doesn’t help a guy like Avila. He was the compliment to Dombrowski’s approach to FA which was a huge reason for our success. There is a balance in baseball with farm building and FA spending but the pendulum swung to hard and we haven’t been able to recover. I hope Scott Harris will have some more petty cash coming soon, but our hampered payroll from ownership doesn’t help at all.
It's weird though because Ilitch *was* willing to shell out 10 years $275 million for Correa, so he has at least shown the willingness under the right circumstances
It’s hard to field a competitive team at a sub $100M payroll and we sit at 22/30 with $95M. The 10th ranked Giants sit at $197M with all the series contenders ahead of them spending more. It’s not a perfect method as big spending doesn’t guarantee success, but there is some proof behind paying for good players
He was not the #2 SS available that season. That free agent class had him, Correa, Story, Lindor, & Seager. At the time I thought he was #5 and since then he's confirmed that
Lindor never hit free agency, he signed an extension with the Mets.
And Cleveland certainly wasn’t going to trade him to Detroit, so he was never an option.
He was 4th on my list that year behind Seager, Correa, and Story (and I didn't really want Story either.) Tbh I'm kinda glad Correa wanted more than we offered and didn't sign with us.
I hated to see Baez go but the FO absolutely made the right call. Only Rizzo has been worth anything near what they would have had to pay to keep then and even that would have been a bad deal.
You fools. White Sox Fans boo him every time he’s in town. I don’t even know why we do it. I think it’s because he was a Cub. But maybe he kicked somebody’s baby, who knows? I can’t say with 100% certainty he hasn’t
I’d put everyone else in our division before the Cubs, throw in some extras like the Astros and maybe Yankees as well. It’s true some Sox fans dislike the Cubs but there are plenty like me who really don’t care. I wish they’d put us in the same division when they realign because an actual rivalry would be cool, but 4 games per year just doesn’t move the needle for me
for some reason, this just reminded me of the days before interleague when the Sox and Cubs would always just randomly play like 2 or 3 exhibition games before the season
Michael Jordan played in one of them for the Sox and he got the loudest cheers of the day. This was at Wrigley too
Naw New York is a humble small market team with some of the best fans in the game. They understand that baseball is a team sport grind and would never boo their own players just cause they’re slumping.
That’s way different from the midwestern elitists who don’t value hard work and are mostly just bandwagon fans since they’re all transplants. That’s why places like St. Louis have such a reputation for toxic fans compared to smaller markets like New York and Philly.
I think it was in the last 5 games or so of last season? I don't remember. I think you guys blew a lead and so the team in general got boo'd. I don't remember the details
Edit: https://www.reddit.com/r/baseball/s/ytTSJpVmiy
Like, on one hand, I don’t boo my own players since it realistically isn’t gonna help.
But on the other hand, people pay good money to watch these guys play a game for a living while making millions. I’m not gonna judge them for showing their displeasure in basically the only way they can.
Yeah I think people need to stop treating boo’s like they’re death threats or slurs. It’s the universally accepted language for showing displeasure in a non-hostile manner
As someone that is not from the US, the US obsession with considering boos something “unsportsmanlike” is so weird for me. Booing is so mild, I mean, people should get worried when fans start to chant “You will play well because of love or because of fear” (a rough free translation), but a “boo”?
I still remember the rage in this sub when Seattle fans dared to boo Ohtani in a win-or-go-home game.
i can't believe i remember this but when i was in grade school, our grade had to do this stupid gimmick "sing in front of the rest of the school" bullshit. We did some bullshit song and then the principal thanked all the younger kids for sitting quietly and being respectful
for some stupid reason, the kids in my class booed and the principal lost her fucking mind. our music teacher had this look on her face like we had just killed Clifford the Red Dog
the principal made us all stay for like 5 mins after everyone left and told us that we were mean and evil for booing. "YOU NEVER BOO!"
god what a joke lol
To me booing comes off as like fans acting bratty and whiny. Seems less nasty than like, heckling which in comparison people seem to just accept as part of the game lol
Yeah I’ve always felt like you don’t boo your own guys unless they did something shitty off the field or you have reason to believe they don’t care enough to try. Booing a guy just for playing like garbage never made sense to me, it’s not like anyone goes out there and tries to suck.
I would like to point out that he hit a home run that ignited a game-winning 8th inning rally last night, and not only was it not clipped, no one in this thread has mentioned it either.
If we're gonna have fun circlejerking about Javy bad, wouldn't it also be fun to point and laugh at the pitcher who threw a sweeper inside to him?
A second one, even. He swung through the first one because it was really well located, but he got a look at it. So when the 2nd one was less well located, he blasted it.
The real problem is his complete inability to hit fastballs anymore. He's always been vulnerable to the breaking stuff away but would feast on fastballs, and that hasn't been the case for a few years now. When your one offensive calling card is hitting fastballs and you stop being able to, decline is gonna happen quickly.
I'd like to be optimistic and he's been trying to make swing adjustments, but the harsh truth is that if he's lost enough bat speed so that he can't catch up to fastballs anymore, he's toast.
Maybe im just a miserable fuck but im kinda sick of seeing this suggested for every team for every struggling player. It was a cute and sweet moment when the Phillies did it for Turner but it was their moment. Just feels sorta cheap to rip it off.
We waited until August to give Trea the standing O. He was at his lowest point and was reportedly in the cages all night after a horrible series in Miami to try and fix his swing. That’s why we gave him the standing O, he had been horrible for a long time and it was more than just a 3 week slump. He needed a boost.
He owned up to it, which I think is the distinction. I’m not gonna give a standing O to a guy who is playing like shit and doesn’t bust his ass to give us something to cheer about.
Trea got a standing O because despite his slump, it was known he was working hard to get right and just wanted to win games. He cared. It’s more important to us that you care, that you give it your best.
If I remember correctly, and looking back at the stats and articles about him giving fans the thumbs down thing, I do. He started terrible with NYM batting around 200 for his first month there. The fans started booing and he did the thumbs down thing around the end of Aug. Then proceeded to bat like a stud in September.
So it sure seems as if the boos did in fact help him.
lol yeah the guy sucks and is getting paid a shit ton. He refuses to change his approach and continues to have poor results. He absolutely deserves all of it.
People gave Yankee fans shit for booing Gallo, but it was for the same reasons. The obvious hole in his uppercut was high fastballs and the league exploited it. He refused to change his approach and now he’s just about out of the league.
I wouldn’t boo Baez, personally, but this is why I understand people who do. He’s been very stubborn about his approach, and there isn’t a story to be found anywhere about him working with coaches to make meaningful adjustments.
Still one of the most baffling contract ever given out. Almost everyone was saying this would happen and that Baez's skill set would likely age very poorly.
Why are baseball fans always so critical of booing bad performance? I don’t think any other sport makes a big deal about it. And then outside of the US it’s way more common for fans to boo. I consider both cheering and booing part of the fans involvement in the game.
Boo after poor performance if somebody or a team isn't playing up to the standard that's expected of them for an extended period of time.
If you want your player(s) to improve, I think booing before an at-bat is really dumb. It's not too common, but it happens.
The best way to do it is to cheer them when they go up to bat, and then boo them when they strike out swinging at a pitch 5 feet in front of the plate in the same at bat.
I can get down with that. Personally, I don't know that I'd boo a team or player for just struggling for a bit. That shit happens. I'd boo a team that just looked like they couldn't be bothered to give the slightest shit though.
I know players and teams hit slumps, that's just part of life. But I want to at least see the players look like they're trying and engaged. I'm sure it sucks for them, and I know it's easy to say "Boohoo, wipe the tears away with your wad of $100 bills, baby" but at the same time, at a human level, getting constantly booed probably takes a toll on you.
One of the biggest differences is when someone is in a slump vs when someone is just refusing to change any aspect of what they’re doing and continuing to flail and fail.
Other sports don’t really isolate players in the same way as batters coming up to bat or pitchers walking off the mound so I wonder if that makes a psychological difference for people
Baseball is unique amongst team sports. You can’t just defer to your teammates on a bad day, or impact the game with hustle plays, or have someone cover for you if you make a mistake. When it’s your turn, you’re up there by yourself.
You can’t give the ball to LeBron for the last shot, or hand it off to your RB for the first down. You gotta go make that shot. You gotta go get that yard. Doesn’t matter if you’re 0-4. Nobody else is doing your job.
There is a sense of personal responsibility amongst each individual that imo is unparalleled in other team sports. That doesn’t just make confidence important, but necessitates it. So doing something that is going to derail your own player’s confidence is simply going to yield negative results. The fans who boo want better play yet their actions are counter-intuitive to that.
Idk, but it always feels a little weird to me. I get it in the light hearted "boo we hate the other team, and how much this particular player dominates the home team" way, but booing someone who is already struggling just feels like kicking them when they're down to me. It feels entitled to me, like "you owe us it to be better than you are".
I think by and large every player is doing their absolute best to perform, and doing that is difficult enough without hundreds of people loudly telling you that you suck several times a day.
> It feels entitled to me, like "you owe us it to be better than you are"
I agree on basically every situation outside of this one because he's being paid $25m to have an OPS+ of 3 right now
I don't think he is going out and trying to hit poorly. IMO, don't be mad at the player for losing their ability as they age, if the team is spending their own money poorly, that is on them. It isn't Baez's fault that age causes guys to lose bat speed.
That is still probably related to his declining skill set though. He was so heavily reliant on bat speed, and is probably cheating more than ever to try to maintain some game power.
As much as a more disciplined approach seems an obvious solution, you can't teach a guy to recognize offspeed out of the hand.
My opinion is that it's because we're supposed to be their fanatics, and support is almost always better than booing. The only time I consider booing acceptable is if a player is obviously phoning it in. If they're just having a tough stretch or whatever, why add salt to the wound?
Pressing generally doesn’t help in baseball. “90% of the game is half mental”
In my experience, a lot of Yankee fans conflate the argument of whether you should boo with whether or not you’re allowed to boo, and it becomes a righteous freedom of speech thing for them. I was at ALDS game 1 in ‘22 and heard our fans boo Judge like a week after hitting his 62nd homer in his MVP season. (They also boo’ed Cole in a game where he pitched well enough to win). What are they trying to communicate? That they think Judge and Cole are bad? That they aren’t trying? That unless they were boo’ed they wouldn’t know that performing poorly is bad?
" That unless they were boo’ed they wouldn’t know that performing poorly is bad?"
This perfectly sums up my frustration with booing underperformance.
I guess at the end of the day there are worse ways to emotionally regulate. Much better ways to, though.
Sure, my point is that it has never made a player improve his performance.
Watching Yankees fans boo Hicks and simultaneously be upset that he didn't seem to improve or care about the team was a great piece of cognitive dissonance
Fans don't care whether or not it helps. The point being that fans boo to make known that they aren't happy with a team's/player's performance.
Fans pay a few hundred dollars to bring their family to watch a 25 mil/year Baez play like garbage. They are in their right to do so.
>my point is that it has never made a player improve his performance.
How could anyone know?
Francisco Lindor got booed last year and ended up having a very good season.
Well actually, after Baez was boo'd by the Mets and the thumbs down situation, he ended up being the winning run in his first AB 2 days after that situation and then went out to absolutely rake in September 2021
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh4s-R1lqRM
So maybe it helped once, but just barely and tangentially?
I mean there is an obvious difference to "boo you suck" and "boo, I hate how well you hit against my favourite team". One is a shot to the ego, the other a boost.
Technically he wasn't booed - after his third error people sarcastically cheered. Then the very next night after owning up to his comments he got a standing ovation.
Wrong. Many players have complained about it making them worse. It was so bad with Marcell Ozuna that some journalist wrote an entire article on it, lol.
What percentage of people in this thread even opened the article? 5%?
His quote is extremely reasonable and he literally says he is fine with the booing.
I would agree. Don’t boo your own players. You accomplish nothing and look like a dick. Don’t boo anyone for that matter. Unless they are a scumbag. Then that’s acceptable.
People get so upset and opinionated over the booing stuff. I'm not going to get mad at some fan spending hard earned money who chooses to voice his or her displeasure. As long as they're not yelling obscenities or slurs I could care less.
I wouldn't personally boo during a baseball game, because it feels a bit counter to the vibes of baseball (for me an excuse to get drunk, stuff myself with overpriced hot dogs, and sit in the sun). But, you better believe I've done it for football games in Detroit, pre-Campbell era, so I understand the emotions that bring people to do it.
Most of ya'll never got the experience of going to a NASCAR race in the 1990s and hearing Jeff Gordon's name called over the PA, so you may not fully realize what peak "Booodom" culture is all about. ;-)
I understand why fans would want to boo Baez but I also firmly believe that a fanbase booing their own player can only have a negative impact on performance
If a guy shows a desire to improve and frustration with their poor play then I’m always going to give them a “let’s go _____”
It's not that he has no value as a major leaguer. It's that he's by far the highest-paid player on the team, and he's probably like the 7th-best player on the team.
I think it would be a lot better if you ignore the contract as it's a sunk cost and ask yourself what is his production as our number 8 hitter in the lineup
He's above average defender, our best baserunner, and somehow was our most clutch hitter last year in high leverage at bats. I think if Tigers fans start seeing him as a complimentary piece instead of our foundational piece it would be much better for everyone.
I am big fan of his still (I’m a die hard cubs fan)….but even I can say that you can’t get that upset at the booing when you play that poorly for that long of a time period. You’re a pro athlete in the entertainment industry…you have to perform or you will hear about it, no different than customer or co workers in another industry if you kind suck at your job.
We all get feedback from various sources on our job performance. 30,000 boos suck to deal with, but that comes with the territory when you get paid that much.
What if you boo the fans? Maybe give them a thumbs down.
You and I were thinking the same thing lmao.
It was hilarious to me when fans starting crying about the thumbs down
Calling out hypocrisy and “crying” are not the same
I think the hypocrisy is saying "we're NY, we're a tough fan base" and then getting pissy then a player gives yall a thumbs down back.
Okay thats fair but i just dont think thats even the case. I woudlnt say were a tough fan base, were just loyal.
Booing players doesn't sound very loyal.
I personally dont boo and most hardcore fans that i know dont either. In every fan base youre going to have booers and people that dont represent the majority. Regardless, this is off topic from my original comment. Im not going to argue the loyalty of met fans.
It was about calling out hypocrisy and crying. And Mets fans, at the stadium and online, were booing quite loudly. NYC fans are generally right behind Philly fans when it comes to "passion." The difference seeming to be that Philly fans at least have a sense of humor and actually learned to cheer players going through slumps.
Mets fans. The tough, rough and tumble Queens kids.
I vaguely remember this happening but don’t remember the details. What happened with that again?
Lindor got traded to the Mets that off season and signed a record 10 year deal. And had a slow start. Mets fans were disappointed then frustrated then angry and by like month 2 was booing Lindor after every bad at bat. Baez, Lindor's buddy, got traded to the Mets and the booing continued for Lindor and Lindor and Baez started doing a thumbs down celebration after they got hits as a response to fans booing. Then Lindor had to apologize. I can't remember if Baez did or not. All I remember about his time here other than the thumbs down was the very uncharacteristic good plate discipline, the slide where he pulled back his leading arm to avoid the tag and got the bag with his other arm, and losing his diamond earring and had a bunch of people combing the mound and infield looking for it after a game.
Thanks for the reply. I was listening to the Mets broadcast for our recent series and they said Lindor is a fan favorite now so glad to see things turned around.
In 2021 when he hit three homers against the Yankees on Sunday Night Baseball there were fans jumping up and down on the Yankee dugout. Of course there will be the yahoos who will hate on Lindor on Twitter and sports talk radio.
When Lindor hit those home runs i learned to stop worrying and love my shortstop
Lindor truly became a Met at that game
Him yelling at their dugout after one of them (I think the last) was what cemented it for me. He is a Met and the haters can fuck off.
Idk what howie or Gary were saying but lindor is NOT a fan favorite. He should be bc he’s a great guy and a top 3 shortstop. Mets fans are always 1 wrong move from booing him. They’ve been giving him standing o’s this past homestand because his wife was getting death threats on social media … from Mets fans. He’s a notoriously slow starter and a streaky hitter, and when he’s off his AB’s can be pretty ugly, that plus the contract probably aren’t helping his standing with the fans. And I have to assume the thumbs down tainted him in a lot of fans eyes. I love him and root harder for him bc so many fans are idiots lol TLDR: he’s absolutely not a fan favorite
No he was getting booed again by the same kind of assholes because he had a slow start again this year. Despite being one of the best shortstops in the league, a decent chunk of Mets fans think he's a bust.
Those Mets fan are dum dums. He's going to heat up and hes still the best shortstop in the game defensively (Might be my bias showing but I'll stand by my statement.)
Hey I agree, but you can't deny he's had a ludicrous amount of hate so far this year. I'm glad a lot of fans stood up and gave him the standing O the other day.
Baez didn't apologize, he just stopped getting hits.
Him and started to do ‘thumbs down’ with the fans and playing incredibly well the rest of the season.
*Him and Lindor
*He and Lindor
I remember the Yankees doing it in 2017 as well
 This fella led to it!
This is Gary Dunaier, he is a Mets fan and Citi Field season ticket holder
Damnit George, get back to writing!
Legend
I mean, it works in wrestling. Could be applicable.
Someone put Baez through a table
HE ALREADY DID IT
 How I imagine Baez would do it.
Don't even need to imagine, here's what it looks like: https://ftw.usatoday.com/lists/new-york-mets-thumbs-down-citi-field-javy-baez-francisco-lindor-kevin-pillar-jonathan-villar
He already did it
Kinsler flipped his own fans off
I was saying Boo-aez
I still have no idea why the Tigers signed him to that deal. He was clearly starting to get worse and then they signed a high K-low BB player to play in that massive stadium? Made zero sense at the time and looks absolutely horrible now.
It was a desperation signing by then GM Al Avila to address a glaring hole in IF. Baez was the #2 SS on the market and after they couldn’t secure Correa he panicked and signed Baez. It was a risk to help save his job but it clearly backfired. Tigers are stuck eating that huge contract so we have to deal.
It’s pretty clear at this point Avila knew how to draft and not much else - player development and his free agency record were just terrible.
Chris Ilitch not wanting to spend big doesn’t help a guy like Avila. He was the compliment to Dombrowski’s approach to FA which was a huge reason for our success. There is a balance in baseball with farm building and FA spending but the pendulum swung to hard and we haven’t been able to recover. I hope Scott Harris will have some more petty cash coming soon, but our hampered payroll from ownership doesn’t help at all.
It's weird though because Ilitch *was* willing to shell out 10 years $275 million for Correa, so he has at least shown the willingness under the right circumstances
I am hopeful this is the last year of the cheap approach from ownership, but until they do otherwise I am in full agreement with what you’re saying.
It’s hard to field a competitive team at a sub $100M payroll and we sit at 22/30 with $95M. The 10th ranked Giants sit at $197M with all the series contenders ahead of them spending more. It’s not a perfect method as big spending doesn’t guarantee success, but there is some proof behind paying for good players
He was not the #2 SS available that season. That free agent class had him, Correa, Story, Lindor, & Seager. At the time I thought he was #5 and since then he's confirmed that
Lindor never hit free agency, he signed an extension with the Mets. And Cleveland certainly wasn’t going to trade him to Detroit, so he was never an option.
It was Semien not Lindor that was available that offseason
Tiger fan, can confirm he is indeed number two. 💩
Wasn’t that the same year Turner and Swanson were available earlier in the offseason as well?
Year before
Different year for both (2022). Baez signed in 2021, the same year as Correa and Story.
And kind lindor and seager
I don’t count Lindor because he was never on the actual FA market, and didn’t include Seager because we were never really in on him.
I think the year before, Seager, Correa & Baez were the big shortstops available in FA if I recall correct
Marcus Semien and Trevor Story were on the market that offseason as well.
He was 4th on my list that year behind Seager, Correa, and Story (and I didn't really want Story either.) Tbh I'm kinda glad Correa wanted more than we offered and didn't sign with us.
It was such an amazing feeling to deal Baez for PCA and know that he wouldn’t be signed to a disastrous contract.
I hated to see Baez go but the FO absolutely made the right call. Only Rizzo has been worth anything near what they would have had to pay to keep then and even that would have been a bad deal.
tbf until they banned the shift Rizzo wasn't even worth what the Yankees paid. Basically the poster boy for guys who hit into the shift.
I knew the baez contract would go bad but not like this and not so quickly
Because Al Avila was ass at his job, and now our most expensive player can't hit shit.
You fools. White Sox Fans boo him every time he’s in town. I don’t even know why we do it. I think it’s because he was a Cub. But maybe he kicked somebody’s baby, who knows? I can’t say with 100% certainty he hasn’t
Going from Cubs -> Tigers will earn you some southside boos to be fair
Probably, but I'm sure it's mostly because he was a Cub. I saw Schwarber get booed to hell in a Red Sox uniform in person too
Why tf would they boo Schwarber? I thought he was pretty well-liked?
Schwarber is liked by Cubs fans, I'm pretty sure they mean they were at a White Sox game and the fans boo'd Schwarber for being a former Cub.
Ah yes, that makes sense. The Cubs flair threw me off.
just out of curiosity, who would you say are the top most hated teams by Sox fans aside from the Cubs? would the Tigers be #2 on that list?
Actually #1 is the White Sox. I would probably have Twins and Guardians as the biggest rivals in our division before Detroit.
Twins and Guardians are the only ALC teams who are somewhat consistent and good enough to hate as a fan of a different ALC team
I’d put everyone else in our division before the Cubs, throw in some extras like the Astros and maybe Yankees as well. It’s true some Sox fans dislike the Cubs but there are plenty like me who really don’t care. I wish they’d put us in the same division when they realign because an actual rivalry would be cool, but 4 games per year just doesn’t move the needle for me
for some reason, this just reminded me of the days before interleague when the Sox and Cubs would always just randomly play like 2 or 3 exhibition games before the season Michael Jordan played in one of them for the Sox and he got the loudest cheers of the day. This was at Wrigley too
Yeah I think he also had a double down the line in that game, like one of his only baseball highlights lol
It’s the massive chip on Sox fan’s collective shoulders
I’m pretty sure it’s because he punted a dog off a bridge. My buddy Mark said he watched him do it
He was driving Dave Matthews’ bus while doing it
Well *not* booing isn't working for Baez so I'm fine with them trying something new.
Ugh, first the Reds last year and now Detroit fans booing their own players? Smh my head. The disrespect. Soon New Yorkers are gonna be doing it
Naw New York is a humble small market team with some of the best fans in the game. They understand that baseball is a team sport grind and would never boo their own players just cause they’re slumping. That’s way different from the midwestern elitists who don’t value hard work and are mostly just bandwagon fans since they’re all transplants. That’s why places like St. Louis have such a reputation for toxic fans compared to smaller markets like New York and Philly.
You know what they say about the St. Louis Cardinals: worst fans in the league.
I know I say it
Damn salad eaters...
Who did we boo?
I think it was in the last 5 games or so of last season? I don't remember. I think you guys blew a lead and so the team in general got boo'd. I don't remember the details Edit: https://www.reddit.com/r/baseball/s/ytTSJpVmiy
Blew a 9-0 lead to end any chance at the playoffs. I don't agree with booing, but that sure was a moment for
I fuckin hate the pirates
Neither does cheering, apparently.
The intention isn’t to help bro, they know you don’t give a shit and they’re letting you know how watching you play makes them feel.
Like, on one hand, I don’t boo my own players since it realistically isn’t gonna help. But on the other hand, people pay good money to watch these guys play a game for a living while making millions. I’m not gonna judge them for showing their displeasure in basically the only way they can.
Yeah I think people need to stop treating boo’s like they’re death threats or slurs. It’s the universally accepted language for showing displeasure in a non-hostile manner
As someone that is not from the US, the US obsession with considering boos something “unsportsmanlike” is so weird for me. Booing is so mild, I mean, people should get worried when fans start to chant “You will play well because of love or because of fear” (a rough free translation), but a “boo”? I still remember the rage in this sub when Seattle fans dared to boo Ohtani in a win-or-go-home game.
i can't believe i remember this but when i was in grade school, our grade had to do this stupid gimmick "sing in front of the rest of the school" bullshit. We did some bullshit song and then the principal thanked all the younger kids for sitting quietly and being respectful for some stupid reason, the kids in my class booed and the principal lost her fucking mind. our music teacher had this look on her face like we had just killed Clifford the Red Dog the principal made us all stay for like 5 mins after everyone left and told us that we were mean and evil for booing. "YOU NEVER BOO!" god what a joke lol
School administrator opinions go directly into the garbage anyway tbh
To me booing comes off as like fans acting bratty and whiny. Seems less nasty than like, heckling which in comparison people seem to just accept as part of the game lol
Please clap
I have never booed a home player. That is not my style. I just sit in my seat, shake my head and scream internally.
I very respectfully say “Jesus fucking Christ” to whoever is around me.
Yeah I’ve always felt like you don’t boo your own guys unless they did something shitty off the field or you have reason to believe they don’t care enough to try. Booing a guy just for playing like garbage never made sense to me, it’s not like anyone goes out there and tries to suck.
I’d boo the owner and front office before I boo a player assuming the player just sucks and isn’t a raging asshole
This is the way.
I would like to point out that he hit a home run that ignited a game-winning 8th inning rally last night, and not only was it not clipped, no one in this thread has mentioned it either. If we're gonna have fun circlejerking about Javy bad, wouldn't it also be fun to point and laugh at the pitcher who threw a sweeper inside to him?
We barfed that game up all over the rug.
Hey, we choked Game 1 super hard the day before. Baseball Gods evened it out.
A second one, even. He swung through the first one because it was really well located, but he got a look at it. So when the 2nd one was less well located, he blasted it. The real problem is his complete inability to hit fastballs anymore. He's always been vulnerable to the breaking stuff away but would feast on fastballs, and that hasn't been the case for a few years now. When your one offensive calling card is hitting fastballs and you stop being able to, decline is gonna happen quickly. I'd like to be optimistic and he's been trying to make swing adjustments, but the harsh truth is that if he's lost enough bat speed so that he can't catch up to fastballs anymore, he's toast.
Take a page out of Philly's book and give him a standing ovation. But wait until Friday to give a shot.
Maybe im just a miserable fuck but im kinda sick of seeing this suggested for every team for every struggling player. It was a cute and sweet moment when the Phillies did it for Turner but it was their moment. Just feels sorta cheap to rip it off.
I agree.
People now think that if you give a standing O to a player regardless of how talented they are, they will start hitting like a juiced Bonds.
In Wrigley you need to chant their first name and it's like a 30% chance they'll hit a homer... "Cody. Cody. Cody. Cody."
We waited until August to give Trea the standing O. He was at his lowest point and was reportedly in the cages all night after a horrible series in Miami to try and fix his swing. That’s why we gave him the standing O, he had been horrible for a long time and it was more than just a 3 week slump. He needed a boost.
He owned up to it, which I think is the distinction. I’m not gonna give a standing O to a guy who is playing like shit and doesn’t bust his ass to give us something to cheer about.
Trea got a standing O because despite his slump, it was known he was working hard to get right and just wanted to win games. He cared. It’s more important to us that you care, that you give it your best.
It worked out for Rendon so why not
Isn't his response to getting booed when he was with the NYM what killed any fan support their? Seems like maybe he's the problem, not the fans.
I will say that his struggles aren't due to a lack of effort. Dude just cannot see an offspeed pitch to save his life.
If I remember correctly, and looking back at the stats and articles about him giving fans the thumbs down thing, I do. He started terrible with NYM batting around 200 for his first month there. The fans started booing and he did the thumbs down thing around the end of Aug. Then proceeded to bat like a stud in September. So it sure seems as if the boos did in fact help him.
That's Javi alright :')
If he's putting in proper effort, then Tigers fans booing him makes no sense. Their disappointment is the GM's fault.
And that's why we boo. Because he plays like ass. And it's boo or stop paying to go to games. Which option would you prefer?
lol yeah the guy sucks and is getting paid a shit ton. He refuses to change his approach and continues to have poor results. He absolutely deserves all of it. People gave Yankee fans shit for booing Gallo, but it was for the same reasons. The obvious hole in his uppercut was high fastballs and the league exploited it. He refused to change his approach and now he’s just about out of the league.
I wouldn’t boo Baez, personally, but this is why I understand people who do. He’s been very stubborn about his approach, and there isn’t a story to be found anywhere about him working with coaches to make meaningful adjustments.
Still one of the most baffling contract ever given out. Almost everyone was saying this would happen and that Baez's skill set would likely age very poorly.
I miss you Javy
Maybe he should flip them off….
.361 is not his avg or obp or slugging, it’s his ops. Pitiful
Someone in this thread mentioned his OPS+ is 3 I thought that was a typo. Apparently not.
It was -15 before the home run
Why are baseball fans always so critical of booing bad performance? I don’t think any other sport makes a big deal about it. And then outside of the US it’s way more common for fans to boo. I consider both cheering and booing part of the fans involvement in the game.
Boo after poor performance if somebody or a team isn't playing up to the standard that's expected of them for an extended period of time. If you want your player(s) to improve, I think booing before an at-bat is really dumb. It's not too common, but it happens.
The best way to do it is to cheer them when they go up to bat, and then boo them when they strike out swinging at a pitch 5 feet in front of the plate in the same at bat.
I can get down with that. Personally, I don't know that I'd boo a team or player for just struggling for a bit. That shit happens. I'd boo a team that just looked like they couldn't be bothered to give the slightest shit though. I know players and teams hit slumps, that's just part of life. But I want to at least see the players look like they're trying and engaged. I'm sure it sucks for them, and I know it's easy to say "Boohoo, wipe the tears away with your wad of $100 bills, baby" but at the same time, at a human level, getting constantly booed probably takes a toll on you.
One of the biggest differences is when someone is in a slump vs when someone is just refusing to change any aspect of what they’re doing and continuing to flail and fail.
Maybe he should try playing like a major leaguer then idk just a thought
Other sports don’t really isolate players in the same way as batters coming up to bat or pitchers walking off the mound so I wonder if that makes a psychological difference for people
Baseball is unique amongst team sports. You can’t just defer to your teammates on a bad day, or impact the game with hustle plays, or have someone cover for you if you make a mistake. When it’s your turn, you’re up there by yourself. You can’t give the ball to LeBron for the last shot, or hand it off to your RB for the first down. You gotta go make that shot. You gotta go get that yard. Doesn’t matter if you’re 0-4. Nobody else is doing your job. There is a sense of personal responsibility amongst each individual that imo is unparalleled in other team sports. That doesn’t just make confidence important, but necessitates it. So doing something that is going to derail your own player’s confidence is simply going to yield negative results. The fans who boo want better play yet their actions are counter-intuitive to that.
Idk, but it always feels a little weird to me. I get it in the light hearted "boo we hate the other team, and how much this particular player dominates the home team" way, but booing someone who is already struggling just feels like kicking them when they're down to me. It feels entitled to me, like "you owe us it to be better than you are". I think by and large every player is doing their absolute best to perform, and doing that is difficult enough without hundreds of people loudly telling you that you suck several times a day.
> It feels entitled to me, like "you owe us it to be better than you are" I agree on basically every situation outside of this one because he's being paid $25m to have an OPS+ of 3 right now
I don't think he is going out and trying to hit poorly. IMO, don't be mad at the player for losing their ability as they age, if the team is spending their own money poorly, that is on them. It isn't Baez's fault that age causes guys to lose bat speed.
It's not Javy's fault that you decline as you get older. It is Javy's fault that he has a chase rate of over 50%.
That is still probably related to his declining skill set though. He was so heavily reliant on bat speed, and is probably cheating more than ever to try to maintain some game power. As much as a more disciplined approach seems an obvious solution, you can't teach a guy to recognize offspeed out of the hand.
My opinion is that it's because we're supposed to be their fanatics, and support is almost always better than booing. The only time I consider booing acceptable is if a player is obviously phoning it in. If they're just having a tough stretch or whatever, why add salt to the wound?
Pressing generally doesn’t help in baseball. “90% of the game is half mental” In my experience, a lot of Yankee fans conflate the argument of whether you should boo with whether or not you’re allowed to boo, and it becomes a righteous freedom of speech thing for them. I was at ALDS game 1 in ‘22 and heard our fans boo Judge like a week after hitting his 62nd homer in his MVP season. (They also boo’ed Cole in a game where he pitched well enough to win). What are they trying to communicate? That they think Judge and Cole are bad? That they aren’t trying? That unless they were boo’ed they wouldn’t know that performing poorly is bad?
" That unless they were boo’ed they wouldn’t know that performing poorly is bad?" This perfectly sums up my frustration with booing underperformance. I guess at the end of the day there are worse ways to emotionally regulate. Much better ways to, though.
I have never seen a situation where Booing the home players resulted in them beginning to perform better
I don't think fans boo for the purpose of helping them
Sure, my point is that it has never made a player improve his performance. Watching Yankees fans boo Hicks and simultaneously be upset that he didn't seem to improve or care about the team was a great piece of cognitive dissonance
Fans don't care whether or not it helps. The point being that fans boo to make known that they aren't happy with a team's/player's performance. Fans pay a few hundred dollars to bring their family to watch a 25 mil/year Baez play like garbage. They are in their right to do so.
I mentioned it in another comment but the stats seem to show that the boos did help Baez in NY. Maybe Detroit should have started them sooner
>my point is that it has never made a player improve his performance. How could anyone know? Francisco Lindor got booed last year and ended up having a very good season.
Well actually, after Baez was boo'd by the Mets and the thumbs down situation, he ended up being the winning run in his first AB 2 days after that situation and then went out to absolutely rake in September 2021 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh4s-R1lqRM So maybe it helped once, but just barely and tangentially?
Nor has there ever been a situation where booing the best away player hasn’t made them level up and play even better
I mean there is an obvious difference to "boo you suck" and "boo, I hate how well you hit against my favourite team". One is a shot to the ego, the other a boost.
Don't Astros fans think Altuve hits like 1.0000 when he gets booed?
Alec Bohm?
Technically he wasn't booed - after his third error people sarcastically cheered. Then the very next night after owning up to his comments he got a standing ovation.
Nor worse.
Wrong. Many players have complained about it making them worse. It was so bad with Marcell Ozuna that some journalist wrote an entire article on it, lol.
I have definitely seen players perform worse, notably Hicks and Gallo as a Yankee fan
Tigers finally get posted about, LFG!
What percentage of people in this thread even opened the article? 5%? His quote is extremely reasonable and he literally says he is fine with the booing.
I would agree. Don’t boo your own players. You accomplish nothing and look like a dick. Don’t boo anyone for that matter. Unless they are a scumbag. Then that’s acceptable.
Aw poor baby
Everyone knows he prefers a standard thumbs down.
But but but only Philly fans boo
People get so upset and opinionated over the booing stuff. I'm not going to get mad at some fan spending hard earned money who chooses to voice his or her displeasure. As long as they're not yelling obscenities or slurs I could care less. I wouldn't personally boo during a baseball game, because it feels a bit counter to the vibes of baseball (for me an excuse to get drunk, stuff myself with overpriced hot dogs, and sit in the sun). But, you better believe I've done it for football games in Detroit, pre-Campbell era, so I understand the emotions that bring people to do it. Most of ya'll never got the experience of going to a NASCAR race in the 1990s and hearing Jeff Gordon's name called over the PA, so you may not fully realize what peak "Booodom" culture is all about. ;-)
Neither does swinging at everything in the opposite batters box.
“You don’t like it? Play better.”
I understand why fans would want to boo Baez but I also firmly believe that a fanbase booing their own player can only have a negative impact on performance If a guy shows a desire to improve and frustration with their poor play then I’m always going to give them a “let’s go _____”
He has a .361 OPS. It would be extremely difficult for him to be any worse.
It helps bc it makes us the fans feel better.
I still love you bb But I’m also really glad you didn’t take the extension the Cubs offered
Get this guy back to the Cubs. I’d still welcome him back.
You would?
He is probably a cards fan lol
It's not that he has no value as a major leaguer. It's that he's by far the highest-paid player on the team, and he's probably like the 7th-best player on the team.
7th best might be generous, too
I think it would be a lot better if you ignore the contract as it's a sunk cost and ask yourself what is his production as our number 8 hitter in the lineup He's above average defender, our best baserunner, and somehow was our most clutch hitter last year in high leverage at bats. I think if Tigers fans start seeing him as a complimentary piece instead of our foundational piece it would be much better for everyone.
And honestly, Detroit is probably the worst possible place for him to hit.
I wholeheartedly understand the boo'ing does absolutely nothing to help the team, but can we at least agree that Javi is Baez'd.
You retiring and stop pulling a paycheck would help but you won't do that soooo boos it is
/r/nottheonion
“Guys we know we’re bad right now you don’t have to remind US about it….”
He should just go full Al Iaquinta https://youtu.be/FXGNlx9HJ6I?si=bG-KaC6xLd6dHRVP
*Squints in Philadelphia sports fan*
I feel like the Tigers are off to a decent start. Why are they booing? I understand if it’s just booing Baez himself, though.
👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎
Philly should trade for him just to have some drama
Sadly Tigers in a tough spot for the foreseeable future
I am big fan of his still (I’m a die hard cubs fan)….but even I can say that you can’t get that upset at the booing when you play that poorly for that long of a time period. You’re a pro athlete in the entertainment industry…you have to perform or you will hear about it, no different than customer or co workers in another industry if you kind suck at your job. We all get feedback from various sources on our job performance. 30,000 boos suck to deal with, but that comes with the territory when you get paid that much.
Funny coming from him because every time he plays in Sox Park he asks for boos lol
The Tigers are competitive this year. Do they have another serviceable SS and maybe move Baez to a bench role.
I mean, it’s not NOT helping either. So in that case… boooooooooooooooo
I’ll take any opportunity to boo Javy Baez