Sports Reporters Ring False Alarms Over Belle's Arrival

Web-posted: Wednesday, November 27, 1996

istening to some of the local sports experts, I get the feeling that the arrival of Albert Belle in Chicago is comparable to those giant spaceships that destroyed American cities in the movie ''Independence Day'' or Godzilla stomping around Tokyo.

The ink on his outrageous contract was hardly dry before they were filled with apprehension and fearfully recited a long list of his crimes against humanity while playing baseball in Cleveland.

Among his many offenses:

When Halloween pranksters pelted his home with eggs, he jumped into his car and chased them.

He has been rude to fans, even throwing a baseball at one who angered him.

Not only does he refuse to talk to news people but on at least one occasion he threatened a reporter with bodily harm.

His co-workers--the other millionaires on his former team--judged him to be arrogant, self-centered, and at times nasty and mean.

Overall, he is a grouchy and a difficult person with whom to get chummy.

In other words, my kind of guy, and I wish he was going to play for the Cubs instead of the White Sox.

And most of the things that fill the sports experts with horror I find perfectly natural behavior.

For example, the egg pelting of his house. I wouldn't chase the scamps in my car, since that would invite a lawsuit. But I wouldn't hesitate unleashing my killer attack dog with the command: ''Fetch. Bring me back a limb.''

As for throwing a baseball at a fan or being rude to them, well, why not?

There is no group of people in our society more demanding, unforgiving and hypocritical than sports fans.

They find nothing antisocial about sitting in the stands, holding a beer in one hand and scratching their bellies with the other, while braying unspeakable insults at the athletes on the field who are performing for their entertainment.

Some go so far as to throw things at players--rolls of toilet paper, water-filled balloons, empty pint bottles and other objects.

Now and then, a fan will be so irate that he will accost a player outside a locker room or in a parking lot and heap more insults on him.

I remember when Ron Santo punched out a bozo who did that, and the judge said Santo did the right thing. Gordie Howe, the great hockey player, put a few lumps on a Blackhawk fan who waylaid him outside the old Stadium. And the late Billy Martin was always decking some barroom wit who wouldn't let him get sloshed in peace.

And one of the great moments in hockey history was when the entire Montreal Canadiens team went into the stands to whack Hawk fans on the heads with their sticks.

After each of these incidents, I was about the only journalistic voice to defend the athletes against the screeching cries that they were monsters, insensitive to the needs of fans to be goofs.

So long as an athlete doesn't kill fans, which might be considered criminal behavior, what's the harm in giving them a few lumps? It makes the fans feel that they were part of the action. Interactive, as they say in the digital world.

Belle refuses to talk to reporters. That's wonderful. Just turn on the TV news and listen to those who do talk to reporters. What do you hear? Nothing but moaning, complaining, grousing, whining. We'd have a happier society if everybody would just shut up like Belle.

Dennis Rodman, for example. He likes talking to reporters. But he usually sounds deranged and unhappy.

If that is newsworthy, then why don't they take their cameras and microphones to one of the state mental hospitals and interview the lunatics on the other side of the fence.

And if he is rude to the media, it is only fair play. Day after day, pro athletes get up in the morning, pick up the paper or turn on a radio sports show, and find themselves being ridiculed by some little butterball who gets out of breath when he goes to the men's room.

The real problem is that members of the sports media are far too sensitive. All someone has to do is say to one of them: ''You are a foolish, babbling, fat little sissy who never got picked when they used to choose up sides in the schoolyard, and if you don't get away from my locker and let me change my underwear in privacy, I'm going to twist your head around so you can see your oversized butt.'' And the sports newsperson takes it personally.

When the baseball season drifts around, what will happen is that Belle will start hitting the ball over the fence and the fans will be delighted. And if he throws a ball at one of them and hits him in the head, the fan will probably ask him to autograph the lump.

Any supposedly conservative Midwestern city that will embrace a cross-dressing whiner such as Rodman will have no problems with Belle's grouchiness.

Just so long as the pants-selling brothers Bixley and Druthers don't stick his scowling face next to the Kennedy Expressway.

© 1996 Chicago Tribune