To be fair, Alec Bohm just spoke for thousands of Philadelphia athletes who came before him.
As Bohm walked past shortstop Didi Gregorius after Bohm — a butcher at third base — had made a routine play, cameras caught him muttering, “I [expletive] hate this place.” Know this: Bohm in that moment spoke for Mike Schmidt and Scott Rolen and Ben Simmons and Carson Wentz and, at least occasionally, Eric Lindros.
And, oh, about 5,000 others.
Bohm had committed two errors, and he would commit another, but in this moment he’d made a routine play and he’d been mockingly cheered for doing so. It was a predictable crowd reaction, and a humiliation well-earned.
Dozens of athletes have whined about Philly fans, but this? This was different. He said the quiet part out loud.
This wasn’t a complaint; it was an indictment of a demanding city, a frustrated region. It insulted the very marrow, the guts, the soul of the fan base that considers itself the best on the planet.
Nothing like this had ever been said before; not ever. Not “For who, for what?” Not “If we don’t, we don’t.” Not “baseball heaven.”
How do you come back from that?
Damage control. That’s how. Immediate, emergency damage control.
As soon as the game ended, Bohm was waiting at his locker to tell the world he was sorry. Veteran teammates told him he had one chance to salvage his career in Philly, and he listened. He wore a hair shirt, self-flagellated, and mortified his character until it seeped blood onto the carpet.
It was a master stroke of face-saving. If Hillary Clinton had un-deplorabled herself the way Bohm de-hated himself, the past six years might have been very different.
Was Bohm’s apology sincere? Maybe. Maybe Bohm was sorry he said it, but more likely, Bohm was sorry he got caught.
Whether or not Bohm was sincere, Philly forgave him. When he was announced as a pinch-hitter in Tuesday’s game, about 3,000 of the 26,045 fans at Citizens Bank Park gave him a standing ovation. When he grounded out, a few hundred applauded that, too.
“I appreciated it,” he said.
And he’s appreciated.
For now.
Foot-in-Mouth Disease
Chase Utley, Jason Kelce, and Bryce Harper learned early: No matter how you might feel about the paying and braying customer, they’re paying to keep you playing, so biting the hand that’s feeding you makes no sense. Hence, “World [expletive] champions” from Chase, and “No one likes us, We don’t care,” from Kelce, and Harper’s ceaseless expressions of his Phanatical Brotherly Love affair.
This is a lesson legions of others, like Jimmy Rollins, Joel Embiid, and Simmons, ignored.
Rollins called Philly fans “front-runners” in 2008, then led the team to a World Series win.
Simmons told fans to “stay on that side” after deafening boos rained down when he missed two free throws in the first game of the 2019 playoffs. Simmons helped win that series and was an All-Star the next two seasons. (Of course, he since refused to dunk in the 2021 playoffs, then forced his way out of town in February, so he will always be persona non grata in Philadelphia).
Embiid shushed fans at a 2020 game against the Bulls after he sank a clinching three-pointer, then called himself a “good [expletive],” but he’s spent the past two years making amends.
Even Claude Giroux cracked. The fan-friendly captain admitted in 2018 that players often “try to do too much” when Flyers fans boo. Nobody seemed to care much. The boos continued, but they were never directed at him. Giroux went to two more All-Star Games, and, by the time he was traded in March, he’d cemented himself as an all-time Flyers great.
The legends
Most of the recent gaffes pale by comparison to the all-timers.
No one did more damage than Michael Jack Schmidt, who, in 1985, called Philly fans “beyond help” and asserted that his Hall of Fame-level career would have been even more prolific had he played in front of “grateful” fans in Los Angeles or Chicago. Schmidt quickly apologized, and since he’d won a World Series and two MVPs, and he’d go on to win another in 1986, he was forgiven.
In 1994, the late Jim Fregosi was the Phillies manager, and, in a moment of pique, he issued what he believed to be an off-the-record reflection of the town and its sports talk radio station: “People who listen to WIP are a bunch of guys in South Philly that [sleep with] their sisters and the people that work at WIP [sleep with] their mothers.” He apologized a few days later — to the fans.
The next year Ricky Watters rode into town as Jeffrey Lurie’s first big-name acquisition. In his Eagles debut, Watters declined to try to catch a pass over the middle late in a game that had long been lost, then defended his decision thus: “I’m not going to ... get knocked out. For who? For what?” For the fans, of course.
Watters apologized two days later, and subsequently went to two Pro Bowls in his three seasons as an Eagle, and even named his autobiography after his infamous utterance.
Plenty of other Philly sports figures never recovered.
After Scott Rolen forced a trade to St. Louis in 2002, he told ESPN that “I felt as if I’d died and gone to heaven.” Which, of course, implies that Philadelphia was the opposite of heaven.
Phillies president Andy MacPhail, in explaining why the mediocre Phillies would probably not makes a big trade at the looming 2019 trade deadline, said if the current team made the playoffs, great, but “If we don’t, we don’t.” This not only enraged the people who buy tickets, it provided comedian Joe Conklin the material for the best parody song of his illustrious career.
And, of course, my personal favorite: The 2014 crotch-grab by closer Jonathan Papelbon. He’d blown a save, and was being booed, so he resorted to a vulgarity that perfectly represented his character, and was ejected. That, plus later making contact with an umpire, earned him a seven-game suspension from Major League Baseball, but only because league rules didn’t allow the Phillies to suspend him themselves.
Papelbon pitched just once more for the Phillies in Philadelphia.
What’s next?
Will the goodwill last? Perhaps.
Consider the factors that sped the fans’ forgiveness.
No. 1: The Phillies didn’t lose the game Sunday. In fact, they staged a thrilling, eighth-inning comeback, which Bohm began with a six-pitch walk.
No. 2: Bohm has reached base in six of his nine plate appearances. He’s producing. Production produces absolution.
No. 3: The fans in Philly are generally empathetic.
They understand his frustration. Not only had he committed two errors, after a scintillating 2020 rookie campaign he got sent to triple A for the home stretch of the 2021 season. He also just spent three weeks watching top prospect Bryson Stott, a shortstop, steal his job at spring training.
He’s also just 25 years old. There’s only so much humiliation any 25-year-old can take. How much would you pay to lip-read what a 25-year-old John Kruk, Dick Allen, or Pat Burrell muttered during games?
It is remarkable how quickly he seems to have been forgiven. Or, at least how quickly initial forgiveness has been afforded him.
But just let his OBP get down to around .300 or so.
Bohm has no idea how much he’s going to hate this (expletive) place.
