Jonathan Papelbon Puts Foot In Mouth

Dude, don’t be dissing Boston baseball fans. Bad idea.

Jonathan Papelbon spent six useful, productive, starring seasons as the closer for the Boston Red Sox, seven in all. He has been a Philadelphia Phillie for a few months and hasn’t even played a game in Philadelphia. Yet Thursday he was dishing dirt on Red Sox fans by saying Phillies fans know the sport better.

How would he know? At least play a couple of months in the City of Brotherly Love before sounding off. As someone who has lived in both cities and been close to the baseball teams in both locales in one way or another, the reputations of fandom in the two Northeast United States communities have long been centered around notable contrasts.

Boston fans have been regarded as among the most knowledgeable in Major League Baseball for ages. Philadelphia fans have been considered to be among the rudest in professional sports. It’s difficult to swallow Papelbon’s theory that Phillies fans are more savvy when Philadelphia sports fans are best known for booing Santa Claus.

Don’t get me wrong. I love Papelbon. I love the job he did for Boston. He won 23 games and saved 219 in his seven years in a Boston uniform. I love the way he did his Irish dance celebrating the Red Sox’s World Series victories. I thought the Red Sox should have kept him. They may not ever be specifically haunted by him unless the teams meet in the World Series, but I don’t think replacing Papelbon’s anchor leg in the bullpen will be that easy.

That said, I don’t think he should have said what he said. Which was: “The Philly fans tend to know the game a little better, being in the National League,  you know, the way the game is played.” Presumably, what Papelbon means by that is the feeling that there is more strategy in the NL because there is no designated hitter. With the Phillies, Papelbon might even have to hit. If he strikes out all of the time he will surely be booed because booing is something that Philadelphia sports fans have raised to an art form.

Let me not overlook the good things Papelbon said about what playing baseball in Boston is like. He also said, “It’s a religion. It’s a way of life. It’s an environment where you put up or shut up. I enjoyed that. That’s what got my motor running every day. I’ve had a guy take off his prosthetic leg and throw it in the bullpen in Boston and want me to sign it.”

I sure hope he did–and threw it back.

Papelbon got a four-year, $50-million deal from the Phillies, so he darned well better produce out of the Philadelphia bullpen, or those never-very charitable fans will be merciless as they remind him just how much they know.

Really, I do not wish Papelbon any ill will. I merely wish he had stayed in Boston. But comparing the smarts of the fans in his tale of two cities before ever playing a game in Philadelphia is just plain silly.

You can follow Call to the Pen on Twitter at @FSCalltothePen or like us here on Facebook.