Red Sox yank moron’s tickets
I’m happy to see the Red Sox have revoked the tickets of the guy who took a swing at Sheffield and the other guy who poured beer on him. That’s totally awesome.
Of course, the fan, House, denies any kind of wrongdoing (“It is ridiculous for anyone to even suggest that I punched him or even attempted to,” his statement said. I’d like to be ridiculous for a second and suggest that he either punched Sheffield or took a good shot at it.). As if he’d fess up (“The Red Sox are entirely justified in yanking my tickets, and I am a doofus.”).
I’m not sure if this is going to be some big thing where the fan base splits between support for this poor, victimized fellow and running away from being associated with that kind of behavior. I hope not.
The Red Sox aren’t dumb, and they’re fully aware that this kind of thing could expose them to legal action, all kinds of criticism, and yet they probably also felt like they needed to do something. And while it’s easy for me to watch it replay on Tivo and say “boy, it looks like a swing but it’s not conclusive” I’m sure the Sox spent the last week arguing this and looking at all the footage and photos they could get before making a decision.
I hope this is the start of something, though: if you can’t behave reasonably in seats where your behavior is so important, you don’t get to sit there any more.
Comments
42 Responses to “Red Sox yank moron’s tickets”
I’d also like to see a small fine for Sheffield ($500 or so) for shoving House. It’d send a message that MLB won’t stand for players getting into it with fans, but that the fans deserved the greater punishment.
The more I’ve looked at it, the more I’m just not sure about what House was doing. But he shouldn’t have stuck his arm over the wall and onto the field of play with a live ball.
The guy who threw the beer, though… you notice that he throws the beer, then flops and yells “HOLY S**T!” a second later? Sign him up for soccer!!!
Whatever the guy’s intent was, he DID interfere with on-the-field play – and leaned over the wall to do so. If you are sitting in the front row, you have to make an effort to avoid interfering, whatever you may or may not be trying to do.
DMZ: I do think there will be a division among Sox fans on this. I have heard (though confess I have not read) that he was a longtime season ticket holder, and getting good BoSox tix is (as you know) difficult, at best. I think there will be a portion of the Sox fan base who will believe they aren’t returning the loyalty a longtime season ticket holder has showed them.
Like you, I’ve looked at this many times and I can’t say conclusively that there was a punch, or even that the guy had bad intentions — though I lean in the direction of those conclusions. In light of all that, I think the penalty was a bit harsh. Move him out of that location? Absolutely, if you can switch him with somebody. Suspend him from attending games for a while? Sure. But this was more extreme, and I think it will end up pitting fans vs the organization.
DW: I would also like to see Sheffield fined, and more than you suggest. Most opinion against House is defined by Sheffield’s reaction to him — yet there is no doubt in my mind that Sheffield could well have misinterpreted House’s actions. I agree with you that he had no business reaching into the field of play, but had Sheffield ignored his actions (as he should have), how much do you think would have been made of this? Some, but not much. I doubt the guy would be losing his tickets. Whatever the provocation, it is becoming clearer and clearer, across all sports, that fan-player (hostile) interaction during games is A VERY BAD IDEA and that message has to be communicated to players *without exception.*
#2 (another great name!). He did, and I’d like to see the same action taken against the Safeco fan who grabbed the foul ball in front of Ichiro — and the fan in centerfield who ruined Sexson’s homerun. I’m still voting for “no baseball mitts in the first two rows” or “no baseball mitts on fans over the age of 12.”
Sure, he had his 2005 season tickets revoked. But it’s not like he really PAID the price for his idiocy.
From the ESPN story: “The team said it would reimburse Chris House when he returns the tickets and would consider reinstating them for 2006….The two fans were not prohibited from attending games this year, and House “has not decided yet” whether he will go to court over the revocation.”
Imagine that! The guy’s thinking about suing the Red Sox for their reaction to his idiocy!! Doesn’t ANYONE take responsibility for their actions anymore?
Well, at least it’s highly unlikely that House will get seats anywhere near the field of play if he returns with single-game tickets….
Jeff makes a good point – you see fans reach into the field of play and interfere with or attempt to interfere with a fielder so often that it’s hard to know how to begin dealing with it. I would have thought the Sheffield situation would alert fans to this, but I saw it again in the Angels game last night – a Mariners’ hit (I can’t remember the batter) to the RF wall over Vladimir’s head; as he races back a fan reaches into the field to try to nab the ball. The fan misses and Vlad gets the ball off the carom, but they might easily have collided. Since I’m not sure what can be done about this, let me ask a question: why are people so crazed to get a game ball? Anyone?
I’d also like to see a small fine for Sheffield ($500 or so) for shoving House.
Did Sheffield make contact with him, though? At the time, it seemed like it, but subsequent reports have said ‘no’.
And again, on whether it was a poke or inadvertant and Sheffield over-reacted, it’s reasonable to assume the Red Sox had a lot more evidence, photographic and otherwise, that they used to make their decision as compared to the Tivo replays.
My simple solution to problems like the Sheffield incident and the Guerrero play in right last night is to simply change the architecture of the stadiums so that fans cannot lean into and interfere in the field of play. Such changes would be modest and not limit views and enjoyment of the game. And it is a fairly simple solution that could prevent something truly nasty from happening in the future. Look at the outfield wall in White Sox park. Fans are still in the bleachers, enjoy the view, yet are structurally prohibited from interfering with a player making a play on the ball. But, like English soccer in 80s, MLB will wait until something really bad happens before instituting mandatory changes.
Sheffield’s word is all you have to go on to form the opinion that he was “punched.” (Video is inconclusive, witness testimony says the opposite.)
Sheffield’s last major statement was that he didn’t know they were steroids.
Draw your own conclusions.
I think a fine on Sheffield would be a BAD idea. I think Sheffield showed admirable restraint. He had an understandable reflex action to having a guy’s hand on his face (think about that for a minute), but immediately stepped back and let the guard deal with it. Remember, he says the first thing he was thinking was “Ron Artest”.
I think in the heat of competition the players deserve the benefit of the doubt against these yahoos. I can tell you what I’d do if some bozo I barely knew was there reached out and grabbed me while I was going behind some computer at my job, and I wouldn’t want to see it on TV.
The punishment on the fan is harsh, but within the bounds of fair. I don’t think he was trying to punch Sheffield. But I do think he was not only interfering with a ball in play, but doing so deliberately. I think the contact with Sheffield was deliberate, if not a “punch”.
The beer-tossing yahoo should just be cuffed behind his back and airdropped into the Yankee Stadium bleachers from 1000 feet the next time the Sox play there.
All in all, I think it’s a pretty good decision in a tough situation. I would have been happier with a slightly milder punishment, such as taking his tickets away for fifteen games, or letting him keep them but barring his own presence, so he could give them to family and friends, but it’s OK the way it is.
I’d like to see a pithier, more explicit and more concise announcement at the beginnings of games, and not in public-announcement-ese, but in English: “If you reach out of the stands to interfere with play, you will be ejected and barred from the stadium for the entire season.”
I’m not sure about the Sheffield fine. I suppose you should fine the players on principle whenever they make contact with a fan, but only if you’re consistently doing the same thing to the fans.
I probably haven’t viewed the incident as many times as you others, but from what I saw it was pretty hard to see the actual inital contact between the two. I certainly don’t know what the fan was doing, because it didn’t look like he was taking an actual swing at Sheffield but it also didn’t look like he accidentally bumped him while going for the ball. From Sheffield’s perspective, it’s very possible he was heads-down and focused on the ball (as you pretty much have to be, especially in a hostile field) and suddenly had a hand come out of nowhere and smack him in the side of the head. Now, under other circumstances it isn’t much of a blow, but when you’re down digging for a ball it would be pretty startling and I could certainly understand a reflexive lashing out just to clear some space to make the play. So while I have a very low tolerance for fighting between or among players and fans, I can’t say I’d support more than a token fine for Sheffield in this case. If he’d gone back and punched the guy, as he restrained himself for doing, I’d want him suspended for the rest of the season.
As for the fan, the rule would seem to be: interfere with a ball in play, you’re ejected from the game; interfere with a player, (or interfere with a ball more than once) and you’re ejected for the season. That seems reasonable (actual fighting, of course, is an entirely different thing with greater penalties not to mention potential legal action). If those are clearly the rules under which you purchase the tickets, then you (and anyone you give your tickets to) better abide by them — and you shouldn’t expect a refund/compensation if you break them.
I see the movie potential here: “Fevered Bitch.”
The important thing is that teams pick the right place to draw their line. As we know, the M’s of the recent past have gone a bit too far the other way with their crackdown on derotagory signs and slogans. In 2000, during the third game of the division championship series with the White Sox, I had a sign that said “HEY, GRIFFEY, WE NEED YOU … TO BRING US SOME BEER” and during the fourth inning, an usher asked me to put it away. I asked why, and he asked me to give him the sign. I backed down at this point, unsure of my ground and unsure of the rules, folded up the sign and stowed it under my seat. But I have no doubt that if I had kept waving the sign, I would have been removed from Safeco Field. Would that have been right? Who did I hurt? Not even Ken Griffey Jr.’s feelings.
Each team should have firm policies, available to their fans, with detailed descriptions of what will and will not be tolerated.
Fan got what is fair. I think Boston did the right thing to serve both the fan and future fans. Booted him but are also reserving his seats for next year if he chooses.
They have to do something as this type of intrusion has been escalating in pro sports for a few years now. I think they are drawing a very distinct line that all fans can recogize. It was harsh but not really punitive as they are giving him his money back and they are allowing him to maintain his seats. Tough love baby.
Sheffield reacted in a manner that I think is valid. He was watching the ball and out of the blue he sees someone’s fist come by his face? Most people would be upset by this and rightfully so. If a fan doesn’t want an athlete to come after them, don’t do anything to warrent an attack such as attacking first. No matter what the fan’s intent was, Sheffield read it as an attack. He didn’t have the benefit of hindsight to reflect.
Fan’s keep your hands, fists, feet and butt’s inside the wall, you’ll be fine. It’s not like Sheff was looking for a fight, the fight came to him.
Jim, thats ridiculous they asked for your sign. How many people do they have with binoculars scanning the crowd? Especially considering the crap fans get away with (diving for balls). You know its just about looking good…no bad signs, media coverage = $$$.
I’ve always thought a real simple solution to any interference with a ball in play would be an automatic switch. Someone with 4th or 5th row ST on a waiting list gets an in-season upgrade, you get a demotion. Simple and fair. These tickets require a higher standard or behavior and restraint, and they’re a limited resource lots of people want.
Shoeless — if such a rule (interfere with a ball in play = ejection, interfere with a player = banned for the year) were articulated, I would be OK with that. But it isn’t. Fan interference policy is enforced in such a haphazardly way that it is meaningless as a deterrent. That is one reason why I think there may be a backlash here — Gary Sheffield (“a freakin’ YANKEE!!”) throws a fit and the team throws out a guy who has probably been giving them $85-$100 a seat for 15 years (yeah, it is *spendy* in Boston). It’s not just the inconsistency in the way this is handled throughout baseball (and even in Fenway, I would guess), it’s the fact that the team may be perceived to be kow-towing to the Yankees and the ever-petulent Sheffield. [Yes, I admit I am a BoSox fan and I hate the Yankees.]
And as to not supporting any more than a “token” fine for Sheff: the guy makes $13 million a season. What would a “token” fine be? Do you agree that fines are meaningless unless they get the fined person’s attention enough to serve as *some* kind of deterrent? Even if the goal is simple punishment, how punishing is it to fine a guy who makes $13M $500?
If MLB really want to stop hostile fan-player interaction, it can only address those who are under its jurisdiction: the players. Sure, the teams can (and should) come out with harsher and more clearly communicated penalties for ticket-holders violating interference policies that are consistently enforced. But MLB can only deal with the players, and IMO should deal with it as the NBA has with players leaving the bench in a fight — don’t bother with the explanation about why you were justified, just sit your ass out for a game and pay the man. We can argue about whether there is a consistent deterrent when the fine will pinch rookies but hardly faze stars (financially), but the message will be clear and that is a good thing.
I think the psychology of being involved in the game even with physical contact with superstar player$ is occasionally a real draw for baseball and basketball fans. The negative side is they want to take out their anger on the opposing team, however silly it is (thrown beer). Its noticable how razor close shef was to completely losing it, you could tell he was so wanting to kill that guy, buy the photos taken in front of his face buy a phone camera, which were posted on bostondirtdogs.com. I don’t buy his pacifist stick – he’s a hothead, I think he wasn’t sure himself if he got slapped accidentally or not.
As with any sport, if you are trying to get a ball, you have to defend your area to get it. Sheffield protected his space by doing what is natural. He reacted in a physical way, and I don’t see why people are getting so hot about fining him. He did not do anything wrong and was in every way right to do what he did. After pushing away, he threw the ball into play. Good for him, and good for the fans who were being stupid.
1) I think the ESPN line has gotten to a lot of you guys. it’s hard to say what House’s “intent” was, though i don’t think he intended to jostle Sheffield. everyone was looking at the ball. sheffield (and ESPN) assumed that the fans were attempting to block him. i don’t think so — they were playing the ball.
2) the fans SHOULDN’T have been playing the ball. It was in play. They should have been ejected (both House and the guy next to him).
3) Sheffield did NOT show restraint — at least not enough. He assumed there was deliberate interference, then confronted a fan and pushed him. He should have been ejected, and subsequently fined.
4) the beer. impossible to tell from the video that it was deliberate. i suspect, given the price of beer in major league parks, that it was inadvertent. that’s valuable stuff!
5) ESPN’s coverage of this was predictably despicable,though not as bad as the Pacer debacle. Sheffield had NO business going back to confront the fan. He’d already made the play, gotten the ball back in, so he should have kept on walking.
He should lose his tickets for the simple reasons that he almost cost them a run. If he would have made contact with the ball, the runner would have gone back to 3rd base. If it was a Yankee hit, I have no problem with him going for the ball, but against your own team? All “Bartmans” should have their tickets revoked for stupidity alone.
Kudos to the Bosox management. This guy was a 12-year season-ticket holder. He should know better than to stick his hand into the field of play during a live ball.
I remember a play a couple of years ago at Safeco. A line drive landed (fair) just past Third Base and spun off towards foul ground in the corner. It was headed right in front of where the stands just out down the left field line pretty close to the fans. One fan in the front row (wearing a big ol’ Mariner’s jacket) spread his arms out sideways, motioning everyone back. At least two people around him started to leaned forward, and the stopped and sat back down after he stuck his arms out. The ball went within inches of the stands and into the corner for a double.
I think they ought to play that clip on the scoreboard before every game. “This is how you behave in a front row seat…”
And as far as the ushers asking for the sign in 2000 – I remember back then the ushers were, in general, obnoxious and bossy. Enough of us must have complained because it seems Management put the ushers through a significant attitude adjustment a couple of years ago. If you don’t like the way you are treated by stadium personnel (assuming you’re not being an idiot), go find a customer service table and complain. They’ll listen.
The problem I have with Sheffield is that he escalated the situation by confronting the idiots. Any player should be able to just point out an abusive fan to security and have that fan ejected. Let security handle the problem–that is their job.
For those who think Sheffield did all that was expected, and for those who wonder what actually deterred him (from the Boston Globe):
“. . . Give us rights so they can’t sue us for hundreds
of thousands and millions of dollars. If I had brought
him onto the field and bashed his head in, then all of a
sudden, I get sued. *That’s just the unrealstic part about
all this.* . . . If you’re going to be man enough to dish
it out, you’d better be man enough to take it.”
(Emphasis mine). So, Gary Sheffield thinks when some guy’s arm hits him in at best a glancing way, whether or not it is intentional or inadvertent (we can’t tell, and he couldn’t have known — he wasn’t even looking at the guy), he ought to have the right to pull the guy out of the stands and beat the shit out of him, AND that he ought to have immunity from suit so he feels like he can do just that.
http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/articles/2005/04/19/red_sox_restrict_2_fans_for_incident?pg=2
This is why MLB needs to set mandatory, meaningful fines for these kinds of altercations — how else will idiots like Sheffield get the message?
If you get doused with beer, what are you supposed to do? I wouldn’t want to go right back in to play the next play, wet and smelling like that. It was just an overall sad situation though. I just wish fans would be more considerate and smart. The players should not have to put up with all of that. People blame the players, but people getting in the way of them being able to play the game is what needs to be looked at. People can say what they want, but shouldn’t be allowed to do what they want. They pay to watch, not to play.
“Did Sheffield make contact with him, though?”
Does it matter? He tried to shove the guy. Should we reward him for failing?
Basically, this whole situation has been blown way out of proportion; the two fans should not have had their season tickets revoked for what went down.
re 25: “If you get doused with beer, what are you supposed to do?”
How about act like a grownup? Didn’t your Mommy teach you that two wrongs don’t make a right? “He started it” didn’t fly with Mom and Dad, it doesn’t work with the police or the judge, and it doesn’t apply here either. A player has every right to protect themselves from fans interfering with play, they have absolutely no right to retaliate against them.
As for the fan, I didn’t see anything like a punch. It looked pretty obvious to me that he was attempting an “A-Rod” by trying to slap at the glove to prevent the play. A clear violation of an important rule, and I think the BoSox punishment was fair. It’s a huge punishment, even if he gets refunded the face value of his tickets this year and gets to renew them next season. Those tickets are worth a whole lot of money on the open market this year. The guy could probably have paid for the entire season by selling every 4th game.
Sheffield still needs some measure of punishment. Otherwise MLB is saying that retalitating against unruly fans is acceptable, and the next time it happens we’ll see a more violent reaction, and it’ll be Ron Artest all over again. Sheffield’s comments in the last few days only prove that he simply doesn’t get it.
First off, you can’t change the architecture of the Red Sox RF without changing how the game is played in Fenway. That’s a key difference between a baseball stadium and the other ball stadiums — the architecture of the park dictates the size and shape of the field.
In order to get the fans out of the field, your options are to extend the backstop chickenwire clear around the park, put a “moat” between the wall and the first row of seats, or to raise the walls to a minimum of 10 feet high. All of them remove seats. Most of the affect views in the expensive seats. All of them cost the owners cash money.
None of these would prevent the “crush of people” disasters we saw in Europe in the 80s and 90s. In fact, it could exacerbate one kind of these disasters. If there were a crush of people pushing downwards toward the field, you would end up with people getting crushed against the chickenwire or pushed off the high walls.
The best solution is to do what the Bosox did — punish yobbish fans.
Punish Sheffield? For what? Pushing a fan out of the way right after someone went for his eyes? Or for glowering at said fan afterwards?
I think the play should have been dead the second the fan touched Sheffield. Varitek should have been sent back to 2nd along with the last runner who scored being sent back to 3rd. Better yet, send Varitek back to 1st and put the other two runners back on the field at 2nd and 3rd. They wouldn’t have had to throw the guy out or revoke his season tickets. The other fans would have kicked the crap out of him.
#30 — Sheffield SAID he got smacked (and where did the eyes come from? Sheffield said it was his lip). Considering the source, the video, and considering every eyewitness says that at the time Sheffield was yelling that the guy only TRIED to hit him, I would tend to take his word as less than gospel.
The guy TOUCHED him. But Sheffield was also leaning in with his head practically against the stands — the video looks like the guy was trying to get out of his way (which is what the fan and eyewitnesses all agree happened).
Players should avoid confrontation. They have to deal with the public all the time; they don’t go after people who swear at them. Sheffiled screwed up, in fact, he screwed up TWICE – once before he threw the ball, and once after.
I hope House gets his seats back next year. The guy with the beer, I can’t say.
#31: People who look at the HDTV replay in slow motion have different ideas about what happened, or at least the motivation of the idiot in the stands who touched Sheffield. You think the umpires should be able to make a call like this in real time from more than 100 feet away? Remember, they also have to verify that the runners are touching every base in case there is an appeal play before the next pitch.
I think umpiring is hard enough as it is.
re 30
Look at the angles. Even if the fan only touched his lip, he’d have had to have bring his hand across Sheffield’s eyes…and when he’s in the middle of a game and not expecting it, it’s easily construed as something malicious.
re 33
Sheffield did NOT screw up the first time. No way, no how. The minute a fan intereferes with a player who’s entirely in the field of play, then they should expect a reaction. A shove is entirely appropriate.
The punishment of the fan is completely out of proportion for what he “apparently” did. No sane person can reasonably conclude that he was trying to punch Sheffield. Was he interfering with a ball in play? Yes. But this happens all the time to singles out this guy simply because of Sheffield’s reaction and the overexposure of ESPN. Sure it “sends a message” but that message isn’t don’t interfere with the game, it’s our decisions are arbitrary and governed by our perceived public relations needs not on the actual events themselves.
There is no comparison between this incident and the Ron Artest situation on either side. To dish out similar punishments (at least in the case of the fan) is unfair and unjust.
#30 — exactly my point, Roger. Sheffield said nothing about the eyes, leading me to believe that he was touched only lightly, if he was touched at all.
I just flat find Gary Sheffield to not be credible, based on his past, which includes steroid denials and mysterious and sudden pre-game back pains.
I meant #35…so much for minimizing discussion reply times.
I have to join in with those who don’t buy Sheffield’s story about actually being hit. I see no evidence of that on the video whatsoever, and he sure did try to play it up with some bad acting, rubbing his face and what not after talking to Torre. Further, Sheffield didn’t keep his cool. Very little actually happened to him. He let it get in the way of his concentration and affect his game, as well as the fans around the guy who interfered. There’s no reason for that. Players have dealt with far worse in the past, so let’s not try to turn this into some modern-day version of reminiscing about “the good old days” that never were.
The fan made a mistake, no doubt about it. He shouldn’t have had any part of his body over the fence. Whether it was celebratory gyrations (as it appears to be by watching the video ad nauseum) or intentional interference, makes little difference.
Let me see if I get this right: Because Sheffield has denied taking steroids and has had “mysterious pains,” therefore he must be a ‘roids user, and therefore the incident on Sunday never happened, because he’s a liar and your TiVo NEVER lies. In-fkn-credible.
I’d call you idiots, but that would be an insult to clue-challenged Americans.
dw, I admire that you would be the only townsperson to run out and help the little boy when he actually cries wolf for real, but you really should stop listening to sports talk radio. It’ll make you crazy.
Oh, I almost forgot that when the Brewers moved Sheffield from short to third, it was racism. Wolf, wolf, wolf.
And I’m wondering how my TiVo *would* lie.
Ugh.