On the Fine Art of Heckling

 I imagine there were hecklers at the first Olympics, sideline warriors certain they could do it faster, higher, stronger than the guys on the field.  Such is human nature.

Which is why I hesitate to say heckling is a bigger problem today than in the past.  I’ve read too many accounts of baseball in the 19^th and 20^th centuries where players and umpires alike feared for their lives; after reading that, you would think bottles were invented for the sole purpose of tossing at athletic events.  Sorry, but no one gets to be judge, jury and executioner, half-tanked or not.  That we’re still doing this kind of stuff three centuries into the national pastime only goes to show humans don’t evolve all that fast.

Over the weekend, somebody tossed a bottle at the Phillies’ Ryan Howard, he of the 5-year, $125 million contract and batting average in the vicinity of .153.  Apparently, blasting a player on social media isn’t enough; in Philadelphia, they still have to do it old school.  This isn’t progress, folks.  Lord knows, there were times in Clare’s softball career I was tempted to go at it with umpires, but I didn’t.  I tossed brickbats, not composite bats. 

It keeps you out of jail, which is where that Phillie bottle tosser is most likely headed—and belongs.