On fandom, booing, Andrew Luck and (sigh) Markelle Fultz

We take a look at fan culture in 2019 and how it relates to recent high-profile cases like the retirement of Andrew Luck and the mystery of Markelle Fultz.

I have this recurring nightmare. It’s Sunday, April 5, 2020. Midday. My beloved Philadelphia 76ers, nearing the end of an undefeated season, are set to welcome the Orlando Magic into town for a 1 p.m. matchup at the Wells Fargo Center. Their final of three meetings on the year — but first at home — will provide the Philly faithful with their first and only opportunity to see Orlando and former Sixer Nikola Vucevic up close, save for a playoff series later in the month.

The “nightmare” portion of this dream comes in when another former Sixer is introduced by PA announcer Matt Cord: Markelle Fultz. The 2017 No. 1 overall pick trots out prior to tip-off (he’s starting at point guard for Orlando in this scenario), and is met with a hellacious cacophony of “Boo”s and “BUST”s from a Philadelphia contingent that’s been drinking and riding the bull at Xfinity Live since 8 a.m.

Suddenly I’m awake, drenched in cold sweat.

In recent days and months, the conversation about sports fans’ relationships with athletes has become more and more prevalent and, as a result, more nuanced. Using my aforementioned Fultz-ian apparition as a point of reference, let’s examine the kinds of incidents that have made headlines recently, and see what we can learn from them.

The black eyes

Sadly, there have been a number of incidents of late for which much nuance need not apply. These have been ugly examples of fans behaving abhorrently toward athletes, and are outright unjustifiable.

Some examples of these include but are certainly not limited to: a Utah Jazz fan’s encounter with Russell Westbrook last season, racist remarks directed at Golden State’s DeMarcus Cousins by a Boston Celtics fan who was subsequently banned for two years, and most recently, when a physical altercation broke out between folk hero/current 76er Mike Scott and a group of Philadelphia Eagles fans at a tailgate that was alleged to have been racially charged.

These events reside in a more separate category than those I’m interested in dissecting, for they are so plainly reprehensible. Racism and incendiary language of the like have no place in sports culture or any other culture, for that matter.

But what about booing? In 2019, when mental health and care for athletes as people is coming to the forefront more than ever before, will booing soon become a thing of the past? Should it? Do we fans now incur a responsibility we once did not?

Andrew Luck

On Saturday, August 24, as his Indianapolis Colts took on the Chicago Bears in a home preseason game, injured star quarterback Andrew Luck watched from the sideline. With the game in progress, at nearly 9:30 p.m. ET, ESPN‘s Adam Schefter broke momentous news that would immediately become a story in more ways than one:

Word of Luck’s retirement spread like wildfire, not only to every corner of the internet, but to Colts fans in attendance at Lucas Oil Stadium. They were, understandably, shocked that their 29-year-old star had made the decision to retire a mere two weeks prior to the beginning of the season. How that shock manifested itself, however, became a point of contention for the sports community. Luck was roundly booed by disquieted Colts fans as he walked off the field:

In his subsequent press conference, Luck cited the physical pain and rehabilitation he’s had to endure throughout his career as the driving force behind his retirement. He was done with being in constant pain or a state of constantly warding off pain.

The Colts fans who booed Luck on his way off the field were widely panned in the court of public opinion afterwards. It was an unseemly moment that I’m sure many of them now want back.

But to what standard are we holding sports fans in 2019? Those fans were blindsided by the news of their star quarterback retiring, live, in person, at the stadium. What they expressed was a guttural, impulsive — albeit nasty — response to the news. Of course, in a perfect world, Luck would have left the field to an appreciative cheer befitting of a player who gave as much as he gave to that city and that team. The fans would have acknowledged that this is about Andrew Luck and his life, and that he is in no way obliged to continue entertaining the fanbase at the expense of his personal wellbeing.

That kind of level-headedness is difficult to achieve, however, for a fan who is possibly three $12 Bud Lights in.

Outside the stadium, much of the reaction to Luck’s retirement was positive and supportive. That, in and of itself, signals somewhat of a paradigm shift in the psyche of fans today. Ben Strauss of The Washington Post penned a thoughtful juxtaposition of the reactions to Luck’s August retirement and that of Detroit Lions running back Barry Sanders, 20 years prior. Sanders was ridiculed and maligned, publicly and ceaselessly.

The dawn of a new era of fan reaction is upon us.

To boo or not to boo?

Last April, the third-seeded Philadelphia 76ers took on the sixth-seeded Brooklyn Nets at home for Game 1 of their first round playoff series. The Sixers looked unprepared and flat, sleepwalking their way through a listless 111-102 loss to kick off the postseason. For a team with such star power and high expectations, the home fans feared this was a harbinger of things to come. At various points throughout the dispiriting effort, they booed the effort they saw on the court.

Following the loss, Sixers point guard Ben Simmons bristled at the fans’ reaction, snapping back at them to reporters.

His response, as you might imagine, did little in the way of endearing Simmons to the Philly faithful. But they came out and won not only the next game, but the following four to beat the Nets in five games and move on to the second round. The boos subsided, and all was right on South Broad Street (for the time being).

But were the fans wrong to boo?

I’m inclined to say no. Fans pay a lot of money to go to a sporting event. Tickets, parking, churros — it adds up. They pay to see a quality effort, and when they don’t, and they’re merely reacting to what’s happening in the game, it should be within their rights to express displeasure by making this weird sound that we’ve all accepted to mean “I don’t like this!”. Booing what’s happening on the field of play should be fair game for those in attendance.

In 2019, we fans now know more about athletes than we ever have before. Players like Kevin Love and Royce White have brought mental health and the psychological issues attendant with being a professional athlete to the forefront. As a result, we have largely become more compassionate viewers and participants, often taking into account the human beings behind the jersey numbers they don. While some (hint: “But first, Pearl Jam”) long for the days of harsher fans who would criticize without abandon, I struggle to see how it’s a bad thing that thousands of fans threw support behind Andrew Luck, the person. He was dealing with something.

So was Markelle Fultz.

While the extent of it is a topic of much debate I have exactly zero interest in re-litigating, Fultz certainly has faced and continues to face some level of mental blockage that makes it difficult for him to adequately shoot a basketball the way he had throughout his first 19 years of life. That must be hell to deal with.

So, yes: Fultz was a No. 1 overall pick who never panned out and was jettisoned in his second professional season. My hope is that, armed with what they now know about The Markelle Fultz Situation™ (future 30 for 30 title), combined with the increased public emphasis on mental well-being, the Sixers fans on April 5, 2020 will exercise some empathy when Fultz takes the court, and resist the urge to boo him.

It’d sure help me sleep better.