It seems like the Mets and Phillies are dead-set on making their rivalry the National League's answer to the Yankees and Red Sox. Unfortunately, that includes fans of both sides acting like drunken buffoons and turning a day at the ballpark into a reason for violence.
Saturday's game between the teams turned into a bit of a melee according to a pair of on-scene reports. The first comes from The Fightins, a Phillies blog, and features a photo of a bachelor party being escorted from the game by park security. Their orange t-shirts make it clear that they're Mets fans, and the blow-by-blow has them being a bit too obnoxious in their celebration of the Mets' sixth-inning comeback. That led to a flood of beer and invective from Phillies fans and, ultimately, their removal from the game.
That's pretty standard stuff, but The 700 Level tells a more disturbing story that left a Mets fan bloodied, reportedly by a glass bottle.
When the commotion started he was standing up, but he fell to the ground soon after I started watching. He was on the ground for a while and it took about 10-15 minutes for an EMT to arrive. They bandaged his head and helped him walk away. Apparently the perpetrator was immediately led away by the police.
What fun for the whole family. It would be silly to paint one side's fans as worse than the others, since there are obviously idiots on both sides, so everyone gets a failing grade. You have to wonder if these kinds of situations should be anticipated when Major League Baseball comes up with the schedules.
A weekend series is much more likely to have this kind of behavior than one that falls in the middle of the week, and the safety of fans and players (it isn't hard to see baseballs and beer bottles fly from the stands in these games) should trump the desire to highlight these games. Fans shouldn't keep being given chances to prove that they are incapable of keeping their emotions and blood alcohol levels in check.
Josh Alper is a writer living in New York City and is a contributor to FanHouse.com and ProFootballTalk.com in addition to his duties for NBCNewYork.com.
