Unwritten Baseball Fan Rules

[Anonymous]

There is a list miles long of the official rules of sports and for fans attending sporting events, but there are also some unwritten rules that many baseball fans adhere to.

1. Never snatch from a child or their grandparent

If you are a fan and a player tosses up a baseball or other memorabilia to the crowd or you're both going for the ball at the same time, and you as a fully grown adult proceed to violently wrestle, punch, kick, and snatch said item out of grandma's clutches or the tiny clutches of a small child, expect to be booed, to end up as a meme, to have your address posted on the web for all to come and find you, to end up on the news, and to have security potentially force you to give the item back if the pressure from the fans didn't already shame you into doing it. YOU WILL NOT WIN. No one likes to see an adult elbow a grandpa in the face to get a t-shirt or to see a toddler crying so hard their face is red becuase you stole 'their' baseball. Don't do it!

2. Clapping for the fallen

This is often a point of confusion to some as to why fans clap when a member of a team, whether your own or the opposing, is injured. Fans will clap when he rises to be carted away after being injured or shakes it off and keeps playing. It's just a respect thing on both sides whether a fan or the players, to clap to say, we're glad you're okay or we hope you will be because at the end of the day no one wants to see anyone be horribly injured, or have a career ending injury. Also off the field, a lot of players from opposing teams are really good friends.

3. Give it back, give it back, all the way back

One of the greatest things you can do is catch a ball in the stands....for your own team that is, but to catch a home run ball from the opposing team is sacrilegious and must immediately be thrown back on the field in disgust. As funny as this is for fans, a lot of stadiums have begun to ban this practice. Boo!

4. Don't drop the beer

You do not under any circumstances drop the beer! It is a source of pride to see a person get pelted with a ball but somehow still manage to keep their beer upright and intact because as a baseball fan, beer is life baby!

5. Catch a ball with your beer, chug

It's become tradition that if a baseball lands in your beer, you must then chug that beer. Expect lots of fan appreciation and to make the highlight reel FOR SURE!

6. Don't cross the line, ya friggin' moron!

If you are going to attempt to catch a baseball you better make darn sure that you do not cross the line or partition between the field and what is acceptable for you to catch. You do not reach over and snatch a baseball from a player or attempt to get it out of his glove or wrestle him for it, you lune! You do that, and you will get kicked out for interrupting game play not to mention booed out of the stadium especially in hot ticket games.

7. Pay attention

People have been very badly injured for not paying attention. Literally balls are flying everywhere not to mention the occasional bat that slips from a players hands. So if you're texting your friend instead of watching the game even high up in the stands, you could potentially get a ball or bat to the head.

8. Take off your cap during the anthem

It's a sign of respect to remove your cap when the national anthem plays.

[kespethdude]

Good take, I will break down each one with my opinions:

1. Agreed totally. Any scumbag who would steal a ball (or anything else) from a child should be banned from ALL BASEBALL PARKS, under penalty of trespass.

2. Again, it's nice to do that. If you can't clap then remain silent in this case. No booing! Now if the player got ejected for a scumbag move, you can boo all you want.

3. Fenway Park is NOTORIOUS for this type of crackdown, especially when the Yankees are in town.

4. More importantly, don't drive immediately after drinking the beer.

5. Ok, then this makes getting beer ikind of a risk, but I agree with this one. (Can't drink beer or alcohol due to medications, though, but I won't get in the way of anyone doing it)

6. You're a BIGGER moron if you actually run onto the field (with that one guy that actually got away [You can find it on yourtube] being the SOLE exception, although I think they arrested him when he got home).

7. If you can't get off your phone to pay attention, you shouldn't be out in public, anyway.

8. Yes, definitely remove your cap. As for standing vs. kneeling, I'm not going to give an opinion on that as this isn't the plague that is politics forum.

Also, an honorable mention that you didn't put here.

Do NOT take public transportation. It will be too crowded and there are almost NO TRAINS running at all. Most noticably in Boston, other cities might be better at this. Obviously you do't want ot drive to there, either. Uber, Lyft and Taxis are the answer. OR walk if you live close enough (although most games end very late at night).

[MrOracle]

Baseball trivia:

Originally, in professional baseball, the entire game was required to be played with the original game ball, no matter how bad its condition got throughout the game, and no matter how long it took to retrieve the ball before continuing game play. Balls hit into the stands were required to be returned to the field.

Eventually it was realized that this was impractical, especially with radio broadcasts of the game that generated revenue for baseball (this was before TV), and the rule was changed. Today, baseball games use about 120 baseballs for an average 9-inning game, and so even more have to be on-hand and prepared in case the game goes into extra innings.

[Hermes-Paris]

And if you are an attractive woman do not sit behind the catcher and flash your boobs to distract the pitcher. None of us want to see that. Its unsportsmanlike! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[Miristheiss]

Agree... except 3.
I am keeping the ball.
F the crowd.

[nodnol32]

Is there such a thing as a baseball world cup? I'm British and I've only ever heard about this sport from American movies or tv shows.

[zagor]

No, they call the championship of the US major leagues the World Series, but it is between teams in the US. Unless the team in Toronto makes it that far.

Baseball is also popular in Mexico, Venezuela, Dominican Republic, Cuba, South Korea, Japan, and some other countries. But there is rarely any international competition.

[0112358]

Just a note: it's not the world series out of hubris, but because it was originally set up by a newspaper of that name.

There are in fact two baseball leagues in America (one of which has a Canadian team), and they play under slightly different rules. The 'world series' has the champions of the two leagues play each other. They also now play a certain number of interleague games per year, though they didn't use to.

There are other leagues, obviously minor leagues throughout Canada and the U. S. as well as leagues in latin America and east asia. The top stars in Japan and Korea are certainly good enough to be regular players if not stars in the U. S., but generally, there's a notable gap between the leagues and so league vs. league competition wouldn't be all that serious. In football terms, would be like seeing champions league vs latin American league teams. Much like in football, most of the top non American players are playing in the American leagues (as the top south American players tend to end up in Europe).

There are some 'country vs country' tournaments but they've struggled to really have the cream of the crop of players participate consistently (some do, but they're definitely not 'dream rosters' for the top countries.

[TadCurious]

Thank you for including #8.
And not kneeling. 👏🙏

[Massageman]

Don't take a bite of the hot dog or steal any change when you are passing things "down the row" to/from the vendors.

[Eagle_93]

Great myTake.

The American pastime.

Go Cubs!

[Anonymous]

Don't take off your cap for God Bless America; it isn't the National Anthem. At least not presently. It isn't even the Canadian Anthem if your at a Blue Jay's home game.

[Cryptic-Game]

Those are good. Yes. I don't root for injuries, even against teams I don't like. I want to beat them fairly.

[sunnybh]

Very good