Anyone have any good heckling stories?

[redsmetz]

These aren't really heckling stories, but here goes.

Last Friday night, my wife & I went to the game with my sister & her husband. After Frazier's throwing error, my sister yelled out, "OK, boys, settle down!". Three teenagers sort of jumped and turned around. I said, "someone's got a guilty conscience." Turns out it was a group from Milan High School ("Hoosiers") there with their Spanish teacher for the Reds Hispanic night (which I thought was pretty cool). We had a good laugh.

My family was at a game at Riverfront in center and when Michael Tucker tossed the ball up to me. With the glove on my hand, it glanced off and fell behind the wall. Tucker just put his hands up questioning and shook his head. My family hasn't let me live it down ever since.

When my son was about nine, we went up to Columbus for a Clippers game against Rochester. We're right down at the field and my son yells at the pitcher (Brian Shouse) the usual "we want a pitcher, not a glass of water," that Little League heckle. The game finishes when Augie Ojeda catches the final out at short and heading into the dugout hands it to my son. He asked him to autograph which he did. Then Shouse comes by and he asks him for an autograph too. He's signing it and I say, "yeah, he didn't mean that 'glass of water' thing. Shouse just chuckled.

Another time we went to Riverfront when we played the Cards. We went early to see if we could meet Tom Henke who is my wife's second cousin (they'd never met). Henke finishes shagging flyballs and is trotting in and the kids are hollering "Hey, Tom," but he continues on. Then my wife yells loudly, "Hey Tom Henke, we're related." Our oldest daughter dives under the seat, she's so mortified (pre-teen). Henke comes over, he and my wife trade notes "you're Grandma's Aunt Lettie; my Grandma's your Aunt Christine." He leaves my son with the ball autographed. [unrelated side note - both Henke's and my wife's grandmothers were both Rackers; Neil Rackers, the NFL kicker is from the same family - think he's my wife's 3rd cousin, once removed - little known trivia].

Finally, the only heckling of mine, was more a retort. When I coached my son's very young baseball team, we had a teenaged umpire who was calling everything a strike. One kid on the team, our shortest player, knew the strike zone fairly well. The kid umping keeps calling strikes on balls that in their eyes. He'd been doing it the whole game, basically telling me they ought to be coming up there swinging (me: "how will they learn the strike zone if you don't call it?"). He calls this poor kid out on a ball that was just over his head. I said to the ump, "young man, that won't be a strike on him for at least five years."

[Spitball]

Was it a magic loogie coming from that gravely road?

A classic scene from television history:

Seinfeld - The Magic Loogie, Reconstruction - YouTube

[cumberlandreds]

The only heckling story I have is one that sorta backfired on the hecklers. Shawn Abner was a number one pick of the Mets in the 1980's. He was assigned to Kingsport of the Appalachian League in his Rookie ball season. The night I was there to see him, there were a couple guys just riding him all night long. Telling him he was no good,overpaid etc... IIRC, Abner was having a bad night up until the 8th inning. In the 8th he came to bat and hit a game tying HR. Next time up in the 10th with the score tied he launched a long HR over the CF fence to win the game. I don't remember if Abner looked their way or not but he had every right to. I remember kinda chuckling thinking those guys look like real boobs now.
For me I never got into heckling and never liked being around anyone doing it. Whenever I was around someone like that it just sucked the enjoyment of the game right out of me. Never really understood the great joy it brings some to yell and deride a player that's just trying to do his job.

[IslandRed]

I absolutely HATE hecklers. They are one of the main reasons I watch more on TV and attend less. If the game I attend is not crowded I move and if it is I speak to an usher. My theory is that they are either inebriated or so insecure that it is a search for their 'fifteen minutes". Either way I do not want to be in their presence.

Yeah. There are such things as entertaining hecklers, but 95% of the heckles are just lame, or crude rather than funny, or maybe borderline funny but not nearly as funny as the drunk yelling them thinks they are.

I do like some of the college baseball cheering sections where the ragging is more of a group activity and they generally keep it clean. But even group heckling isn't foolproof. My wife, a Braves fan, used to note every time the Mets fans would start with the "Larry" chant for Chipper Jones: "He's killed the Mets his entire career. Shouldn't they have figured out by now it doesn't work?"

[Johnny Footstool]

The "hey, you suck" hecklers really get on my nerves. They're not being creative, and they're not addressing real game situations. They're just trying to be annoying.

Creative, informed hecklers are usually very entertaining, though. The kind of people who would wait for Chris Carpenter to give up a homer, and then yell, "Hey Chris, how are you going to explain that to you kids?" are always welcome in my section of the ballpark.

[Vottomatic]

I didn't really heckle anyone on the court, but I egged on some opposing fans at a UC basketball one time.

UC was playing Marshall at 5/3 Arena. Marshall actually had a respectable team that year. It was a close game and the fans were standing for most of the second half. I had two Marshall fans in front of me. Everytime something good would happen for UC, I'd overexaggerate my excitement, and they'd kind of turn and look back at me like I was crazy, or more like annoying. Everytime something bad would happen, of course I was screaming it was a horrible call in overzealous emphasis, to more annoyment by them, I'm sure. Then they picked up on it and started doing the same for any call for or against their team. It kind of became a friendly, if not silly, competition of who could go more bonkers over their team. I had a good laugh.

UC won in a close one. We all shook hands and chuckled.

I have a tendency to get a little excited over my favorite teams.

[crazybob60]

This really isn't a heckling story but fits right in here with some of these. Mind you my papaw is a die hard Reds fan. I was about probably 6 or so years old, as it was one of, if not the first year that Tom Browning was in the league. I remember our seats vividly. We had Green seats at the old stadium in the OF area, first row. Well, it was a hot summer day and of course Browning was out there and he had already given up at least 1 if not 2 gopher balls in the first few innings. All I remember happening after that was Browning giving up another homer, and the boos started, and my papaw stood up and yelled as loud as he could:

"Way to go Browning!!!"

I then looked up at him, as a befuddled youngster, and wondered why in the world did he just tell Browning, way to go, if he just gave up a homer. Inside my head, I thought way to go was if you did something good.

So I then tug on my papaw and ask him...

"why did you say way to go browning?"

We still talk and laugh about that game every time we see each other (which isn't often enough since I live 3.5 hours away now)

[kheidg-]

I've done my share of heckling in my day. I've since retired since my wife is now the one that primarily goes to games with me.

I will say that all the times I heckled, I never was too obscene or used profanity as to ruin the enjoyment of the game for kids and parents.

A few of my favorites

A.J. Pierzynski - I'm in Minnesota and attend a lot of Twins games. At the Metrodome my favorite spot to sit was in the first row next to the visiting team's on deck circle. I'd get on A.J. continously all game about playing cards in the clubhouse instead of going over game plans with pitchers. This was a knock on him in some ESPN type article that players in SF didn't like him for. There were other things I got on him for but this was #1. He'd always turn around and give me a mean look and say I didn't know what I was talking about. The next year, I went to another White Sox game and started the same routine. First time coming up, he turned around and said "Oh god, not you again!" You know you made an impression when a player remembers you a year later.

Timo Perez - We started the game in the LF bleachers and he concidentally was playing left. He picked a wedgie out right in front of me and a friend and we got on him for it for several innings. The game was out of hand and after the 6th inning we moved to our normal seats by the on deck circle. When he came to bat, we continued our normal routine we were giving him in LF. You wouldn't believe the look on his face when he turned around and saw us. He double taked wondering how we were out there just a 1/2 inning before and now were where he was at in the on deck circle.

Gary Sheffield - Sitting on the first base line when he was playing RF for the Braves. 17 inning game, every inning when he walked past us we'd razz him. He did not show any reaction - until... 16th inning he stopped dead in his tracks turned to us like Reggie Jackson in the Naked Gun and started walking over. He looked mighty upset. Needless to say, we promptly (cowardly) turned around and walked away.

Jack Cust - Sitting above the visitor dugout. Everytime he came out of the dugout I'd get on him about steroids. Simply do a "steroids, steroids" chant. You could tell he was livid. After he struckout he came back to the dugout stood directly underneath me and asked where I got my info. I made something up and said I read it online in a Peter Gammons article. He believed me. Then promptly took his bat and smashed it up the side of the dugout overhang narrowly missing my fingers. One of his A's coaches then took him into the clubhouse. I didn't see him the rest of the game.

Flip Saunders - Twolves were training in my college hometown and Wally, KG and Flip came up to one of the local clubs on a Friday evening. The place was packed but I saw Flip talking with 2-3 young college girls and proceed to write down something on a piece of paper for them. When he did this, I walked over and just said "Hey Flip, I bet your wife and kids would love to see this". He came over and grabbed me around the shirt (granted he's shorter than I was) looked up at me, gave me 5 bucks and said "go get yourself another drink, you need it." I ran into him at a Gophers game last year, went up and said, do you remember who I am? He promptly shook my hand and said "of course I do, good to see you again." He had no idea who I was.

[wolfboy]

Ran across this and thought I'd share:

[bigfunguy]

Well, not baseball, but pretty good...had seats right behind the 76ers bench for a game with the Atlanta Hawks, a week after they'd traded Iverson. Mo Cheeks was the coach.....76ers are blowing em out. The whole game me and my buddies---all well lubrcated---are giving Mo hell by saying "put Iverson in!! Where's Iverson? You'd be ahead even more if you'd put Iverson in." Their whole bench is laughing at us, Mo's trying to ignore it....finally we get tired of that and start urging him to put hte 12th guy in the bench in. Entire 4th quarter we keep yelling "its not fair! How's he supposed to stay fresh? Come on Mo, put him in!!" Even the poor 12th man is looking back and laughing at us....We continue "put him in!!!" Finally, wht literally 30 seconds to go, Mo spins on a dime and says "WHO?!" We point at him and Mo puts him in....poor guy had to peal off all his warm up crap to go run out 20 seconds. Fun stuff...

[Tom Servo]

Well, not baseball, but pretty good...had seats right behind the 76ers bench for a game with the Atlanta Hawks, a week after they'd traded Iverson. Mo Cheeks was the coach.....76ers are blowing em out. The whole game me and my buddies---all well lubrcated---are giving Mo hell by saying "put Iverson in!! Where's Iverson? You'd be ahead even more if you'd put Iverson in." Their whole bench is laughing at us, Mo's trying to ignore it....finally we get tired of that and start urging him to put hte 12th guy in the bench in. Entire 4th quarter we keep yelling "its not fair! How's he supposed to stay fresh? Come on Mo, put him in!!" Even the poor 12th man is looking back and laughing at us....We continue "put him in!!!" Finally, wht literally 30 seconds to go, Mo spins on a dime and says "WHO?!" We point at him and Mo puts him in....poor guy had to peal off all his warm up crap to go run out 20 seconds. Fun stuff...

Mo Cheeks, Mo Problems.

[TOBTTReds]

I absolutely HATE hecklers.

Thanks for being the first to mention it. I tend to find hecklers extremely immature and annoying*. I understand people are doing it "just to have fun." Sometimes that can be the case, if it is funny, but most of the time it's just stupid. Fans who heckle their own team are really the dregs for me.

*I know I am looking like the "holier than thou" or too good type. Sorry, that's just my opinion of how hecklers present themselves amongst the general public when behaving that way. Please don't take that personally here.

[Red Buckeye]

In 2006 3 of my friends and I went down to a Wednesday night Reds-Nationals game. It was one of my friends 21st birthday and we were all pretty buzzed by gametime. By the 6th inning the friend celebrating his birthday was officially wasted.


Soriano was playing LF at the time for Washington and for some reason my friend thought the names Alphonso and Fonzy sounded similar
c and started yelling at Soriano from our seats which were front row right next to the foul ball pole in LF. After yelling "Fonzy" over and over again a handful of Reds fans started joining in. Within 2 minutes it seemed like everyone sitting in section 107 was joining in.

And Fonzy didn't like it. He kept looking over at where we were sitting and putting his glove up to his face. I'm pretty sure it he was flipping all of us off.

But the icing on the cake was when in the same inning he dropped a routine fly ball hit right to him. From that point on for the rest of the game section 107 had no mercy on Soriano.

[lidspinner]

I don't have a problem with hecklers as long as they are considerate to the people around them....I have heckled many a cardinals and cubs players in my day and I have always tried to read the people around me and I always make sure there are no small kids around who might be scared of the loud yelling.....since I don't drink I really don't get to carried away with the language but I have told Matt Holiday he sucks more than a few times....

Here's my favorite heckler story...Griffey junior is playing right field, and this is like the first year he was thrown out there....we were playing the cubs, some of you might remember this.....anyhow, we were sitting right next to the RF line ball boy, first row. These cubs fans are sitting next to us and heckling junior all game....they were funny and kept it clean so we all thought it was funny, not to mention we were winning big. KG jr even acknowledged them a few times and gave them the thumbs down sign once......about the 8th inning a foul ball gets hit right at us, high fly ball....Griffey comes running over and he jumps in the first row and gives the cubs fan a good forearm to the stomach area and knocks dude plumb on the floor, the ball was touched by his cubs friend sitting next to him and junior complains that there was fan interference....junior is yelling at the ump while his friend is laying on the ground catching his breath and the cub fan that caught the ball was being booed by what seemed the entire stadium since they showed the replay about 10 times on the big board..........umpires never called fan interference and the batter proceeded to fly out....on the way in for the 3rd out, junior runs over to our area, out of his way mind you, and tells the cubs fan he is in the wrong stadium to be talking junk like that....junior was laughing in his junior way and having fun with it..........during the bottom half of the inning, the reds went 1-2-3 and while running to right for the 9th, junior brings a signed ball to the cubs fan that he knocked down...the ball read, "kid, if you get knocked down, dust yourself off and get back on your feet...." Then signed his name, ken "nighttrain" Griffey junior with a big smiley face.....hands the guy the ball and says "I hope your ok".

I always thought that was a good story of who junior truly was as a man....these guys heckled him pretty good and he good have been a ton more mad that the dude was in his way and made more of a gripe about it....but since the 2 of them were booed by an entire stadium and even had security down in our section watching over them, I think junior felt the need to cheer them up.....now, had the batter hit a homerun on the next pitch it might have been a different ending to the story, who knows.....but it sure showed me a different side to kg that I will not forget.

[MrRedLegger]

Last year when we played the Cardinals before the ASB. It was the game of the Ludwick 10th inning walkoff HR. David Freese was at the plate late in the game and I was right behind the Reds dugout with my friend. As every pitch approached the plate during that at-bat my friend and I yelled "SWIIIIING" as loud as we could. Everyone could hear us.

After Freese struck out he gave us a pretty big glare before he walked back to the dugout. It was awesome and the entire section LOL'ed when it happened.