CWS v. CHC: The Fans Edition
Here in the Windy City we have two minor major league baseball clubs. The Chicago Cubs by far and away enjoy the most media attention, make tons of money, and fill their ballpark day in and day out no matter how bad their record is. The White Sox... not so much. The meme among many White Sox fans is that their fans are the better fans (of course) and they are the more knowledgable fans. Allow this St. Louis Cardinals fan to provide the counter evidence.
This weekend was the second edition of the "cross town classic." Three games between the Cubs and Sox at The Joan (aka, US Cellular Field). I was at the Friday game. The Cubs were up after a couple of first inning home runs and were threatening to get some insurance runs later in the game. There were a couple men on base and the Cubs' batter attempted to bunt them over. In the first poorly exectuted attempt* he bunted the ball straight down, the ball bounces up and hits the batter. Six or seven White Sox fans sitting around me roar that the batter is out. They were accusing the home plate umpire of any number of inappropriate behaviors and questioning his knowledge of the game.
The reality is that the batter's box is FOUL territory. Being hit by the ball while in the box is not an out. It's just a foul ball and adds a strike to the count (assuming it is not strike three).
Then on Sunday there was one of the most F'd up running plays I've ever seen. The Cubs looked terrible. Men on 1st and 2nd and batter smacks a line drive out to right field. It apparently ended up as a double play with all three runner being in a run down at one time or another. BAD, BAD base running! But as it turns out the White Sox 2nd baseman Iguchi obstructed the runner that started on 1st base. Both the 2nd base and 3rd base umpires made the call. The umpires conferred. The decision: no one was out, bases loaded. It was a dead ball as soon as the obstruction occurred and all the runners stops where they were. Again, the Sox fans I was around at the time were having a coniption. They didn't understand/accept the dead ball rule.
* NOTE: The Cubs on Saturday executed a BEAUTIFUL suicide squeeze. WOW! It was awesome. I don't see any players on the White Sox that could have done that.
This weekend was the second edition of the "cross town classic." Three games between the Cubs and Sox at The Joan (aka, US Cellular Field). I was at the Friday game. The Cubs were up after a couple of first inning home runs and were threatening to get some insurance runs later in the game. There were a couple men on base and the Cubs' batter attempted to bunt them over. In the first poorly exectuted attempt* he bunted the ball straight down, the ball bounces up and hits the batter. Six or seven White Sox fans sitting around me roar that the batter is out. They were accusing the home plate umpire of any number of inappropriate behaviors and questioning his knowledge of the game.
The reality is that the batter's box is FOUL territory. Being hit by the ball while in the box is not an out. It's just a foul ball and adds a strike to the count (assuming it is not strike three).
Then on Sunday there was one of the most F'd up running plays I've ever seen. The Cubs looked terrible. Men on 1st and 2nd and batter smacks a line drive out to right field. It apparently ended up as a double play with all three runner being in a run down at one time or another. BAD, BAD base running! But as it turns out the White Sox 2nd baseman Iguchi obstructed the runner that started on 1st base. Both the 2nd base and 3rd base umpires made the call. The umpires conferred. The decision: no one was out, bases loaded. It was a dead ball as soon as the obstruction occurred and all the runners stops where they were. Again, the Sox fans I was around at the time were having a coniption. They didn't understand/accept the dead ball rule.
* NOTE: The Cubs on Saturday executed a BEAUTIFUL suicide squeeze. WOW! It was awesome. I don't see any players on the White Sox that could have done that.
Labels: MLB
posted by LP Cards Fan at
10:28 AM
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