May 27, 2008

Finally, Vilification For Philly's Boobirds

Cheer up, Phillies fans! Not only has your team scored thirty-five runs in the past two games, but it appears your hearty boos over 125 years of the franchise has actually paid off. So, uh, rather: Get angry, Phillies fans! Boo anything you can think of!

The idea that a team's passionate fans helps a team win -- or, rather, helps a team avoid long losing streaks -- comes from superb baseball writer Joe Posnanski. While he goes over the league-leading 11 losing streaks of eight games or more by the Kansas City Royals since 2002 -- 9 since '04! -- he notes that only three franchises haven't had a losing streak of eight games or more since then: Yankees, Red Sox and (!) Phillies.

Yes, somehow the Fightins haven't lost over a week's worth of games since Terry Francona skippered eight straight defeats in late August and early September of 2000. (It wasn't a September swoon, as the Phillies weren't even above .500 all season; that team had both Ron Gant and Desi Relaford.)

I wonder if the booing fans, the angry media, the intensive talk shows, the angry Internet boards — I wonder if these things keep the players a bit more on edge. I'm not saying this can make the players BETTER over the long term — I'm not saying boos can turn a 73-win talent into an 89-win team. But we’re not talking about that — it only takes one victory to break a losing streak. And maybe in the angriest towns there is a heightened sense of awareness when the losses start to mount, a greater sense of agitation, a feeling like, "Um, we better freaking go out and win a game already or it's going to get really ugly around here."

I'm not one to take a throw-it-out-there blog post -- where the author writes, "I suspect that if someone did study it they would find there's nothing to it" -- and treat is as gospel, but... wait, yes I am. Okay, Philadelphia fans, let's all use this as an excuse to boo the players mercilessly after a single loss. After all, we wouldn't want them to go into a two-game losing streak.

Fans Who Boo Loudest Suffer Least [Joe Posnanski]

Posted by D-Mac at 12:20 PM | Comments (1)

May 30, 2006

I was saying 'Boo-urns'

A paragraph in a review of Pearl Jam's weekend shows in yesterday's Inquirer:

Their audience certainly has a clear idea of what Pearl Jam is and is not. Just ask the poor auxiliary keyboardist who accompanied Vedder on show opener "Life Wasted," drawing prolonged boos.

I know we're kind of assholes, but even Philadelphians don't boo random band members at concerts, do we?

Oh:

Editor's note: A review of Pearl Jam that appeared in Monday's Inquirer incorrectly characterized the audience's reponse to the keyboardist at Saturday's show. The audience was not booing Kenneth "Boom" Gasper, but cheering him on by chanting his nickname.

Fortunately, Duce Staley, Clarence Weatherspoon and Hugh Douglas didn't suffer the same editorial misjudgement during their time in Philadelphia.

Pearl jam gets refreshingly direct [Inky]
funny review of saturday's philly show [The Sky I Scrape]

Posted by D-Mac at 12:07 PM | Comments (60) | TrackBack (0)