DAN RASPATELLO's TOP FIVE: TRASHIEST FANBASES

by Dan Raspatello, draspatello@rivalfish.com

In light of the Detroit Pistons fan throwing a thing of Carmex at the Bulls' freakishly-athletic rookie, Tyrus Thomas, I have been inspired to name the Top Five Trashiest Fanbases in all of sports. Unfortunately I am going to have to swallow my love for Chicago, and be honest to the fact that one of our beloved teams belongs on this list.

5. THE Ohio State University: The best college sports teams money can buy. Your right, OSU fans; Any basketball program can pull a complete 180 in their recruiting capabilities while following NCAA guidelines. Keep lying to yourself as much as Bob Huggins has been for twenty years.

In case you had any doubt about the trashiness of this fanbase, their current "celebrity fan" is Animal from the ‘90’s tag-team powerhouse Legion of Doom (or Road Warriors) who owned the WWF tag-team titles multiple times. His son is a stud starting linebacker for the football team. The fans were so excited that a WWF alum was representing their school that it became very popular to wear the spiked shoulder pads and paint your face just like Animal at all of the games. Nothing reeks of trashy quite like dressing up like a WWF wrestler on a Saturday afternoon. It isn’t like pro wrestling’s fan base is comprised solely of13 year olds and hicks…

4. Chicago White Sox: This one hurts to admit because I am from Chicago and my entire family is in love with the White Sox. But nothing solidifies the trashy stereotype of your fanbase like a shirtless father-son duo attacking the lowly Royals' 54-year-old first base coach, Tom Gamboa, with a knife. Nothing quite says "father-son bonding" like taking off your shirt and attacking an old man with a knife on live TV. God, My dad and I haven’t even committed a felony together, let alone a televised felony. He must not love me.

The father was 34 years of age, and impressively had a 15 year old son. Apparently White Sox fans get after it at a young age. Is there any doubt that both of these guys have their ex-girlfriends name tattooed somewhere on their body, and they have both hooked up with at least one of their first cousins?

Let’s not forget that a fan has also attacked an umpire at “The Cell,” but the ump was an ex-military man and easily handled the fan.

The highlight of ChiSox trashiness was when they gave out tickets to games as an attachment to “Biggie Fries” from Wendy’s. I can’t remember what year it was, but I believe it was a year or two before the 2000 Division Championship year (aka “These kids can play.” era). I wonder how this conversation went with Jerry Reinsdorf (Sox and Bulls owner) and Dave Thomas of Wendy’s.

“Hey, Dave, it’s Jerry Reinsdorf. How would you feel about a cross promotional deal in which for every ten Extra Value Meals a customer buys they win a free Sox ticket! We can work on the details of the deal later.”

“Jerry, how about you just give me all your extra tickets and I will give them to people who order fries.”

“Deal.”

It’s a wonder how the White Sox don’t attract classier fans with promotions like that. If it wasn’t for Snoop and Dre repping the ChiSox in the early ‘90’s than they would have been #1 for sure. I mean, AJ “7^th grade rocker or pro wrestler haircut” Pierzynski is the fan favorite. The Sox fans must feel like they've won the lotto: “He is our favorite player and he participates in pro wrestling?!?! The only thing better than this would be kissing my 2^nd cousin while watching The Fast and The Furious.”

3. Philadelphia Eagles: They booed Santa Claus off the field (The Actual Santa Claus), and cheered as Michael Irvin got carried off on a stretcher. Eagles fans also showed up to the 1999 draft and booed Donavan McNabb when the Eagles selected him in the first round. Donavan McNabb would later bring them to 4 straight NFC Title Games (’02-’05). Good call on that one.

Alright, so maybe you guys were right to cheer when Irvin got a potentially life-threatening injury. Philly fans probably saw the future, and knew before the rest of us how terrible he would make ESPN’s NFL coverage. But the Santa Claus incident? Come on. Did a lot of NY Giants and Jets fans drive down for that game? Or does Philly just have way more Jews than often thought?

2. Detroit Pistons: It is kind of hard to blame Pistons fans for their trashiness because it isn’t entirely their fault. I believe their trashiness began from mimicking the “Bad Boys” of the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. The "Bad Boys" era was led by the two biggest dirtballs in the history of the NBA: Bill Laimbeer and Isaiah Thomas. Isaiah now is the head coach and GM of the biggest dirtball team in the NBA, New York Knicks.

As the Pistons have dominated The Eastern Conference for the past few years ,they have fielded some of the classiest players in the NBA (Rip, Ben Wallace , Tayshaun Prince, Chauncey “horse mouth” Billups, and Lindsay Hunter). However, the fans haven’t followed the lead of their team. I guess for every Jimmy 'B-Rabbit' Smith, Jr. Detroit has there are ten Clarence 'Papa Docs’ (he went to Cranbrook - that’s a private school).

Detroit fans have gotten in a seat clearing / bench clearing brawl with the Pacers, and recently threw lip balm at Tyrus Thomas and hit him in the face. Impressively, they are the only fanbase to actually physically antagonize a pro team into fighting them. Even their homosexual fans are a bunch of bad asses, which explains the lip balm throwing.

It’s alright, Detroit, at least your inner-city area is prosperous and not filled with a bunch of burned out buildings or anything like that.

1. Youth Travel Hockey: For those of you who didn’t grow up playing hockey year-round at a creepy level of intensity, this might come as a surprise to you. But, for those of you who are like me and played 100 hockey games a year starting in 1^st grade, this is no surprise at all. What sane parent drives their pre-pubescent son to every surrounding suburb and state all year, forbids them from other sporting events, and spends thousands of dollars on their equipment? An out of control fan with actual control over one of the athletes and effect on the team, that's who.

After my 11-year old Select team beat another Illinois Select team in the state playoffs, a group of parents from the opposing team hovered over the tunnel as we walked out, and started calling us “blue-collar trash.” (All of our parents could put us through a 100-game hockey seasons, so we weren’t exactly poor, but we also weren’t as rich as most teams.) We weren’t even old enough to check or take slapshots yet, but these "fans" were inclined to express their views on our parents' wealth and its correlation to our level of societal worth.

One time, in high school, I saw a dad start a fight with a high school kid in the stands, and his son, the goalie, hopped the boards and jumped into the fight. The kid, in full goalie gear, was then escorted in 'cuffs alonside his shackled father out of the rink as the on-ice action paused to gawk.

Keep in mind that all of these people can afford to spend upwards of $5,000 on their kid’s equipment and another $5,000 for their ice time annually. These are a bunch of upper-middle to upper-class parents doing this. As you can see, trashiness has no economic boundaries.