Being a Fan

I was amongst the witnesses to a great deal of unpleasantness last night, and I'm going to give you my take on it.

Last night, the Dallas Burn beat Columbus 3-1 in overtime in the U.S. Open Cup. Both teams played a good game, it was entertaining, and the Crew seem to be continuing on their fine form of play for the most part. However...

The fans at the game (the COLUMBUS fans) need to learn what sportsmanship is, and what being a fan is. Now I've been a passionate fan of the Crew and many other teams before them, so I feel I'm not speaking out of turn when I talk about passionate fandom. I've actually broken furniture celebrating a Notre Dame national championship. I'm NOT a casual fan of either the Irish or the Crew - I love 'em both to death.

But I also know the difference between being a good sport and being a pathetic whining loser.

To explain: the score was 1-1 when Columbus and Dallas went into overtime to settle their game (as it's tournament play, there had to be a winner in this case). Danny Szetela and Frankie Hejduk were ejected for bad tackles at 101' and 103', respectively. I didn't think Szetela deserved a red for his tackle, though a friend of mine who I respect as a fan said that a former referee he watches the games with thought Szetela did deserve it. I won't go into detail. I will say that Szetela didn't seem to be arguing much as he left the field.

Hejduk most CERTAINLY deserved it. Bad tackle on the same guy that Szetela took down - studs up and all. Very dangerous, and I agree with my friend Keith who said that if he was the Crew coach, he'd bench Frankie for the next game for that stunt.

Anyway, when these things happen, it's just part of the game. You have to take it in stride, even if you don't agree with it. But the "fans" of Columbus decided not to do that - the whining of every single call the referee made for the rest of the match commenced immediately. This continued to the point where Kyle Martino got called for an obvious offside and the folks in front of me started whining about it. I blurted out "Oh, come on. If you don't think that's an offside then you need to go back and read the rulebook." That didn't get a lot of smiles, I'll tell you. It got a "shut up" from the moron who was doing the whining, that's for sure.

And after the game, most of the fans stuck around to berate the referee as he left the field. After he actually called a good game. And the absolutely stupidest thing I heard on the way out was (to paraphrase): "I'm not saying the red cards weren't valid, I'm just saying that sometimes those calls need to go our way."

Um... no. Not if the offense wasn't there. But the Crew fans in general (and generally NOT the folks I watch the games with, but most of the people around us) got so mind-numbingly blinded to the idea that the Crew might actually have been at fault on those calls that they couldn't see anything but that Dallas played a good game, took advantage of the situation that Szetela and Hejduk put us in, and won. To them the fault HAD to be with the refs at that point.

This is where sportsmanship takes over. Yes, it was an unfortunate loss. But if you've got such a hard-on for your team that rational thought leaves you when a game is going on, then you probably need not to go to any more games. You probably have larger issues than just soccer in your life. That's not being a fan, that's being an issue-laden moron who's put way too much importance into a useless form of entertainment like pro sports.

Yep, that's all it is, folks - entertainment.

And I know that today the Matchnight forums are lighting up with anti-ref banter and calling for the heads of the referees for U.S. Soccer, but I'm not adding to it by going over there and talking to those chuckleheads. To me, they're not fans. They're just as bad in their way as the hooligans who fight over soccer in Europe (or, to some extent, here). They just don't use knives and fists for it.