Dumping Them Out: Phillies vs Diamondbacks Fans
Welcome back to another episode of Dumping Them Out. Intro paragraph over.
I've officially been the world's biggest Arizona Diamondbacks fan for 19 days now. I spent $50 on a flat bill hat that doesn't fit my head to make it official. It's been a hell of a ride. I've learned a lot of cool things about the team. Like if you turn their logo sideways it makes the head of a snake. They do fun different brightly colored arm sleeves every game. They have a pool in the stands. Their mascot is a bobcat. I've even learned some of the players names.
The dynamic between Phillies fans and Diamondbacks fans on the internet is my favorite thing right now. The general vibes I get from Diamondbacks' fans are, "Oh wow! We made this NLCS! How neat! This should be a fun week of watching baseball!" It's a very non-serious, happy to be here, hopeful they can win but not getting their hopes too high type of attitude. Just a bunch of nice, wholesome Diamondbacks fans who probably didn't watch a single regular season game all season, but are just now getting into it because the playoffs seem like a fun time.
Conversely, Phillies fans have more of a, "FUCK YOU ARIZONA YOUR PATHETIC PIECE OF SHIT BALL CLUB DOESN'T EVEN DESERVE TO BE HERE WHY DID YOU EVEN SHOW UP JUST GO FUCKING HOME FUCKIN FIGHTINS FUCKIN SAID!!!" type of attitude. It's maybe the funniest mismatch of fan bases I've ever seen.
Mostly, I just love the hypothetical scenario of a father and his 8-year old son going to watch their first Diamondbacks game together and running into Max on their way home.
Next topic: This tweet is a few weeks old, but I was thinking about it while watching USC vs Utah last night. If you haven't seen, all of Utah's scholarship players were given a big fancy Utah truck by their NIL collective.
It's a very cool truck. Obviously, anybody would rather have a truck than not have a truck. But it's kind of hilarious that the whole Utah football team has to drive around in the loudest, least conspicuous vehicles of all time. It's literally a giant sign that says, "Hey look I'm a football player." Everybody who sees one of those trucks will immediately try to look through the front window to see which player it is. Don't even think about smoking a joint in that thing. Or going out past curfew. It almost seems like the whole thing is a way for Utah's coaches to track their players. I'm sure the kids are happy for the trucks, but I know there are times when they must think, "Damn, I wish I wasn't in this billboard right now."
Speaking of NIL, I just learned something the other day that I couldn't believe was true. Did you know that college athletes who come from out of the country aren't allowed to make any NIL money while in the United States? Something about their student visas don't allow for it. They can get regular jobs, like if they want to work in the school book store or something. But there's some stupid rule that says they can't make any NIL money. That seems really shitty.
I was so sad when Iowa got their game-winning punt return called back yesterday for a bull shit fair catch signal.
Of all the stupid storylines I was cheering for in college football this year, the #1 stupid thing I wanted to happen was Iowa making it to the Big 10 Championship with 1 loss, despite having one of the worst offenses in the history of offenses. Iowa is hilarious. They've been the same team for as long as I can remember. Incredible defense. Incredible special teams. Incredible coaching. High school level offense. But every couple of years they'll go deep into the season with 0 or 1 losses, with 7 wins by 3 or less points. They'll end up ranked in the Top 15, maybe Top 10. All of college football gets "Mad About Iowa", because they play in the Big 10 West (which to be fair is the biggest joke of a conference in all college football) and if you go off the eye test Iowa never deserves to be ranked that high. But records don't lie. Offense is only 1/3rd of the game, and Iowa does the other 2/3rds as well as anyone. It's a hilarious thing to watch play out every season.
But yesterday the Big 10 refs robbed us of the most perfect Iowa moment ever. The game was just like any Iowa game. Offense does nothing to help out the team. Zero ball movement all game long. They even did a horribly pathetic punt from midfield with 2 minutes left in the game. But of course, their defense got Minnesota to go 3-and-out and punt the ball back. Honestly, Iowa's ONLY chance of winning that game was if they returned the punt. Their offense was never going to move the ball more than 0 yards on that drive. And the returner fucking did it. He returned the kick. Touchdown Iowa. The hilarious Iowa season was alive. But the fucking ref just HAD to call whatever that stupid fair catch rule was. I guess the returner did kind of wave his left arm? To me it looked like he was directing his teammates away from the ball, and not calling a fair catch. But whether the refs were right or not, I hated that call. Iowa got hosed. America got hosed. We deserved an Iowa vs Ohio State (or Michigan) Big 10 championship game. I wanted Iowa to be 1 fluke game away from being the worst team in the history of college football to make the 4 team playoff. I know they would have ended up losing by 50, but I wanted to hold onto the dream of Iowa in the college football playoffs a little bit longer. Shame on your refs.
