Baseball fans know it all by 10 years old

Have you ever talked sports with a 10-year-old? You say something mildly negative about their favorite team like, "I think that Trevor Hoffman guy on the Padres is washed up, plus he picks his ass in the bullpen." And invariably the 10-year-old baseball fan will get angrier than a cat in a pillow case, "Shut up, poopy head! Hoffman is the greatest thing since Pac-man and Gummy Bears. He's going to save 486 games for the Padres this year. He's rad!"

I could tell the kid they don't play 486 games in the season, but I'd have better luck teaching my dogs how to mow the yard. I could talk baseball with the kid until I'm Dodger Blue in the face, but if I laid down any hint of smack, the kid would start balling and call for his mom. She'd come over, ask what I said, and of course I'd reply with another nugget of truth: "Tony Gwynn was a glorified slap hitter with a squeaky voice and a healthy fettish for women's bloomers."

"Shut up, butt face!" She'd reply, "He could still hit .516 and club 61 homers in a season. He's groovy!"

Hey, I was like that when I was a kid. My Dodger myopia new no bounds. Steve Sax was a perennial MVP candidate, Mike Marshall was the second coming of Babe Ruth and Franklin Stubbs would lead the Dodgers to 15-straight world titles. You couldn't tell me that Enos Cabell and Ed Vande Berg wouldn't amount more than 300 pounds of dead weight, they were the key links that would net the Dodgers another World Series title. Hell, the Blue Crew could have fielded the shmucks from the Gashouse Gorillas and faced Bugs Bunny every game and I would have still fought with every hair on my ass to convince folks that the Dodgers would win the World Series.

It takes an 18-year stretch (and counting) without a world title to jade a kid (and now an old kid), though.

Talking to San Diego Padre fans is like talking to a group of rabid 10-year olds. They may know the players names and they're stats, but objectivity doesn't come with the job description I guess. And God help you if you're caught wearing a splash of Dodger Blue (or a hat, like yours truly) at their ballpark during the regular season or spring training. That's like a Charger fan seeing someone in Silver and Black, we'll foam at the chops and pack together like a litter of puppies on a slow-witted cat.

During Sunday's scouting session - I'm a Spring Training scout for the Dodger, although they never return my scouting phone calls and fail to respond to repeated e-mails (it must be a problem with their communication lines) - I learned Padre fans, while not lacking in team spirit or passion, are not much different from that 10-year-old hyperfan. I was discussing the Padres as a team with a friend of my uncle who happened to be in town to catch some spring games. We questioned San Diego's geriatric starting pitching staff, which includes Greg Maddux, 40, and David Wells, 43, the latter was "pitching" on this fine Arizona day (I'm not sure handing the ball to the hitter so he can toss it up in the air and wail it to the outfield wall is technically pitching). As we continued on our scholarly, $6 beer-aided disertations, and above described Friend of the Friar turned in her seat and slurred: "The way you're both talking I thought you might be Raider or ..."

She stopped mid-sentence because she spotted my blue LA hat. "Or Dodger fans."

It felt like she kicked me so hard in the sack that I could taste my marbles. Raider fan? Is this what the world has come to, labeling people willy-nilly as Raider fans. Why not jam a screwdriver into the back of my knee while you're at it? Raider fan, wow. Call me a raper of dogs, a feline fillander, but not a Raider fan. That's just plain rude.

So I retorted in the only fasion I know how, "Souldn't you be grazing in a pasture right now. Let us adults talk while you finish your fried twinkie and trough of kettle korn."

I'm nothing if not mature when it comes to fellow baseball fans.

And just a week before that incident, I was talking with a group of fans - again at the Peoria stadium - about teams' fans and I made the mistake of saying that San Diego fans have their share of bandwagonners. When they're sports team do well, folks from San Ysidro to San Clemente seem to become Padre or Charger fans, and they all claim to be longtime supporters. I could ask them where they were when the Bolts were 1-15, but my guess is they'd respond with, "Shut up, toe sucker! The Chargers have never had a losing season." Yeah, and my piss tastes like Rum Punch. In fact, I think I'll bottle it as sell it to Safeway.

Out here it's not much different. During a Diamondback-Dodger game last season, the D-Backs pulled comfortably ahead, which led to one overzealous 40-year-old turned 10 year old Snake fan to turn, point at me (I'm wearing my Dodger shirt and hat, so I'm not hard to miss in a crowd of purple) and yell "Kobe sucks." And the thought occurs to me, Diamondback fans still aren't sure how baseball is played. Do they wonder why there aren't free throws when a batter hits a foul? What does Kobe Bryant and the Lakers have to do with the game on the field? How does this rattle-waving nimrod know whether I'm a Laker fan, a Suns fan or a Hawks fan. Hell, one look at my five-foot-five frame, and he should have figured basketball ain't my drink of choice. If you're going to run smack, please relate it to the sport you're watching. That's all I ask.
This isn't to say Dodger fan are the MIT grads of the baseball realm. Actually, it's the complete opposite. Watch a Dodger-San Francisco Giant game from Dodger stadium and listen as the fans from the leftfield pavilion chant "Barry sucks" from the first inning to the ninth. Really, is that the best they can come up with? It makes little sense since - and this pains me to no ends to admit this - he's been a helluva a player for 20 years (steroids aside, allegedly). That's like chanting Michael Jordan sucks or Peyton Manning's a girl.

We're a funny species, sports fan. Fiercely loyal to shirts and pants, willing to come to blows for guys we've never met, will likely never meet and some not the most quality of human beings. We'll bash our own, but God save the outsider who thinks it's hunky-dory to follow suit and claim Sandy Koufax was an overrated slug who was lucky during his six years of domination.

That guy would find me peeing on his leg in the Dodger Stadium men's room.