Men with Balls: The Professional Athlete's Handbook

by Drew Magary

  Your margin for error with today’s crowd is slimmer than ever. Being a fan used to be easy. You could walk to the stadium in your bowler hat, throw down half a shilling for a box seat, and kick back with a Coca-Cola that had real cocaine in it. Not anymore. Seeing you in person now means sitting in traffic for God knows how many hours because the new stadium was stuck in some shitass suburb without proper infrastructure surrounding it. Then, fans have to negotiate the parking lot, where a fifteen-year-old parking attendant directs them to the farthest corner of the field even though there are clearly available spaces closer to the stadium. They can see them! They’re right fucking there! No wonder they resent you. You get valet service. Fucker.

  There are three kinds of fans out there today: Casual Fans, Avid Fans, and Die-hard Fans. Casual fans are the ones who take periodic interest in your team, usually depending upon your winning percentage, or if you have a catcher the girls positively swoon over. Casual fans also go by the derogatory term “bandwagon fans,” and are sneered at by avids and diehards. But this is a spurious mentality. You see, bandwagon fans are the people who make sporting events special. It takes something truly amazing to make some fair-weather asshole fan like your mom say, “Wow, that Darren Jeter is pretty darn good!” The most exciting sporting events are the ones that reach out beyond the standard fan base and manage to capture the interest of people who don’t even like your sport. Without these people, sports lose their transcendent quality. So when you see some douchebag Cowboy, Yankee, Red Sox, or Laker fan walking down the avenue, be sure to thank them for extending sports beyond its normal reach. Yes, they are fucking losers I’d like to see dragged behind a semi and then doused with tar. But they do serve a purpose. Remember that when they’re talking on their cell phones in the front row during the last two minutes of a playoff game.

  Avid fans are fans who follow your team and all local teams with the utmost devotion while maintaining a semblance of balance throughout the rest of their lives. As ticket prices grow, these fans are becoming rarer and rarer, though they are evident in places like Busch Stadium, Dodger Stadium, Qwest Field, and a handful of others. But if you aren’t playing in any of those places, you are fucked. Because that means your stadium is likely to be filled with diehards.

  Die-hard fans are fans who are unhealthily obsessed with your team and you personally. Worst of all, die-hard fans are actually proud of this obsession, and are happy to tell anyone nearby about it. Sports are just about the only obsession people are willing to tout publicly. You don’t see people wearing jerseys proclaiming their love of stamps, or young boys, or Andrew Lloyd Webber. Society would shun these people, and rightfully so. But die-hard fans are given a free pass. Why? Fear. These are the crazy, drunken motherfuckers who throw bottles and shit on the field. Do you want to be the one to tell them to stop? Me neither.

  But look on the bright side. At least you aren’t playing in Europe. Think the diehards here are out of their fucking gourds? The fans over there premeditate their stabbings. They even wear scarves, they’re so batshit insane. And these are soccer fans we’re talking about. Imagine how worked up they’d get over a real sport.

  Because they pay for tickets, buy merchandise, and squander their money in other ill-advised ways, die-hard fans are the ones who help pay your salary. And you can be quite certain that they will never, ever let you forget it. But don’t take my word for it . . .

  HEAR IT FROM A DIE-HARD FAN!

  You fucking suck!

  by John Fleischmann, longtime season-ticket holder

  Hey, (your name)!!!!!!

  You fucking suck! I pay your fucking salary, cockface!

  (gives friend high five)

  FUCK YOU!!!!

  “Let’s see you try it, prick!” Dealing with heckling.

  During the course of your career, some people will boo you for poor play. Why do they boo? you might ask. Fans boo you so that they can feel superior. After all, you’ve been blessed with God-given athletic ability, something every man yearns for. You probably breezed through high school and were voted Homecoming King. I bet you were one of those cool kids that got invited to all the house parties every weekend. I bet you even got laid when you were fifteen or younger. Christ, how I would have loved that to happen. I’d have been so much more confident if I had just been able to lay some pipe back then. Instead, I stayed home on weekends and fucked my sheets. Did you know I had to resort to making love to a peach once when I was thirteen? True story. I got a peach, hollowed it out, microwaved it, and stuck my ding-dong right in it.

  * * *

  DID YOU KNOW?

  Did you know John Fleischmann pays your salary? Well, don’t you fucking forget it, or he’ll dump a Miller Lite that’s 30 percent backwash right down your shirt.

  * * *

  Did you ever have to do that, Mr. Athlete Man? Bet you didn’t. I bet you had it made. I bet you think you look so cool out there on the field, don’t ya? With your spiffy uniform and rugged good looks. Well, I got news for you, buddy! I’m a person, too! You think I’m just gonna take your impossible perfection lying down? HELL 2 DA NAW! BOO! BOOOOOOOO!!!

  See? I’ve just taken out a lifetime of sexual frustration on you by belittling you for your performance. And I have to say, I do feel quite better. Thanks!

  It probably won’t bother you anyway. If you played for a school like Duke or Notre Dame, you’re already well accustomed to fans hating your guts. Most pro athletes excel at blocking out distractions and focusing on the task at hand. Your job is made easier by the fact that most antagonistic fans have about as much creativity with words as Avril Lavigne. “Go fuck yourself” tends to lessen in impact the 9,000,000th time you’ve heard it.

  Still, there are times when fan heckling can get to even the best of us. I’m going to play out a few hostile situations for you and show you the proper way to respond. These scenarios can happen on the road, or even at home games, where the fans can be real dicks.

  SCENARIO #1: A close relative of yours, let’s say your dad, has recently died, and a nearby fan has decided to hit too close to home. He shouts, “Hey, asshole, how’s your dead father? Oh, yeah, he’s dead! How’s it feel to be fatherless, daddy’s boy? DEAD DAD!”

  Your Response: Take out a pen during a stoppage in play and transcribe the taunt word for word. Then, in the postgame press conference, read it aloud to the media. Hometown columnists hate the fans and love to portray them as drunken sociopaths. Your dead father just bought you two solid weeks of sympathy coverage. Tell him when you visit his grave!

  SCENARIO #2: A drunken fan throws something at you.

  Your Response: Fans usually throw things because of a poor officiating call. So grab the nearest official and use him as a human shield. It’s a win-win for everyone. If you get struck by a flying object, your response can vary depending upon the object thrown. If you get mad because someone threw a marshmallow at you, you’re a pussy and deserve it. If the object in question was a battery (fans in the know use nine-volts, which are effective for breaking skin and scratching corneas), be sure to note what the fan looks like and the exact seat he’s sitting in. What’s that? You don’t have time to note all of that? Don’t worry. That fan is a season-ticket holder and the nephew of a team sponsor, so you’ll be seeing him again next week regardless of his behavior.

  SCENARIO #3: Fans en masse taunt you about a lascivious Internet rumor (see chapter 8). You know, like that thing about you peeing on girls.

  Your Response: Stop peeing on girls. That’s nasty.

  SCENARIO #4: Fans en masse taunt you about a recent arrest or drug problem.

  Your Response: Develop a strong Christ complex. Explain your actions through a wide range of subtle excuses and defensive postures. You’ll love having an excuse to become even more arrogant after you’ve made a terrible lifestyle choice.

  SCENARIO #5: A fan taunts you by calling you by your ridiculous given name and not by your sporty, cool nickname. If you’re Chipper Jones, that mea
ns hearing chants of “Lar-ry! Lar-ry!” But you don’t just hear it once. No, that one fan has to shout it during the whole fucking game, every game. He chants it so incessantly, it becomes a kind of aural waterboarding. Two hours in, you find your heart beating in lockstep with the horrible chanting. Soon, you want to give up on life entirely and succumb to the traumatizing emotional numbness. You are forever changed by man’s limitless appetite for cruelty. Life will never taste as sweet as it once did.

  Your Response: Find your parents and slap the shit out of them. No one deserves to be named Larry. That’s a silly name.

  SCENARIO #6: A drunken fan has decided to storm the field and attack you!

  Your Response: Take just a second to savor this moment, my friend. It’s such a rare occasion when you can beat the living shit out of a fan with cameras present and be completely justified in doing so. Pin that white trash down and go to town. Don’t let up until you can feel his sinuses caving in. That lets you know the damage is permanent!

  Remember: you can only attack a fan if they come onto the field and attack you. If you go into the stands, you’ll be suspended and branded as an out-of-control lunatic. It’s not worth it. Unless you get in at least one solid uppercut. The high you get from destroying another man’s jaw can’t be topped. I’ve tried.

  I know what you’re thinking. “What about racist fans, like all the ones in Boston?” I’m glad you asked.

  Racism, hate mail, and death threats: they work for you!

  Being a famous athlete means having racist white people hate you (if you’re black) and having racist black people resent the extra attention paid to you (if you’re white). If you’re Asian or Hispanic, you’ll find that most people are indifferent. Sorry, but it’s true. Blacks versus whites is far and away the best rivalry in the world of racism. For its history and sheer bitterness, it can’t be topped. If you need proof, just consult my handy Racial Rivalry Heat Index on the next page.

  Many people will bad-mouth racism and tell you that it is an “evil thing.” But these people fail to understand the practical aspects of racism. Yes, racist people are bad. Even your grandfather. But racism in and of itself is the greatest all-purpose coverall available to the professional athlete. Racism acts as a giant DETOUR sign that leads people away from things like, say, your terrible performance on the field. People will always ignore an ill-timed dropped pass if there’s a chance to run and gawk at whatever giant racial bonfire has been ignited nearby. Smart athletes use racism to their advantage, and so can you.

  How? Let’s say you scored a touchdown and decided to perform the Staggering Penis (did you take notes from chapter 2?) in the end zone, earning a fifteen-yard penalty that allows the opposing team to get close enough on the ensuing drive to convert the winning field goal at the end of the game, knocking you and your team out of the playoffs. Let’s also say that you are black, or at least burnt umber. This is just the kind of selfish, me-first type of play that really gets dormant racists fired up. The next day, you walk to your mailbox and receive a poorly worded letter from an anonymous writer with a mailing address in Tennessee (75 percent of all death threats are postmarked from Tennessee), which reads:

  U FUKING PIECE OF BLACK SHIT. U THIN YOU’RE SO FUKING GREAT. WE SHULD HAV FUKING KILLD U LIK THEM INDIANS AND I HOPE U FUKING DIE AND FUK THE JEWS 2

  Your first inclination might be to throw this letter away. Don’t. Keep it. Study it. Take note of the all caps. Racists love to write in all caps to let you know they mean business. And the spelling errors? Those are just a sign of the incredible passion with which this letter was forged. Also, notice that the racist has made sure to insult three ethnic groups even though you have nothing to do with two of them. He was going to write a manifesto one day, but since he writes so infrequently, his letter to you is pulling double duty. And racists always like to refer back to a time of racial oppression, to try to put you in your place. All in all, this is one extremely racist letter, one I myself would never, ever write, nor allow to be published in any sort of printed form. I can’t even think thoughts that awful.

  Letters like the one above are not trash. They are absolutely priceless. What better way to get people to sympathize with you, or to prove that everyone really is out to get you, than with this letter? Just one racist letter is all you need to tar all your critics with the same brush. Make the letter public and people will not only have compassion for you, they’ll also veer way off course and start talking about big-picture shit that has absolutely nothing to do with you. Is showboating part of the black culture that white people don’t understand? Are rules against dancing a way for the white man to continue to repress the black man’s spirit during modern times? Is Don Imus a total fuckhead? Who cares? The important thing is that you used that little letter to ignite a racial debate that allows anyone, no matter how idiotic, to spout an opinion in a never-ending back-and-forth debate that has no possible resolution. You’re off the hook!

  And what do you have to thank? Racism. In fact, in the long run, your little episode has ended up doing more good than harm. After all, if it weren’t for racism, would we ever seriously discuss race? Think about that. No, it takes a good ol’-fashioned racial controversy to get us Americans talking about issues of race and inequity in our society. If there were no racism, we’d never have to confront all the terrible damage racism has wrought upon the world. And that would be a tragedy.

  Racism isn’t just a diversion, it also works as a tremendous motivator. Consider this: if it weren’t for racism, would Jackie Robinson be the legend that he is today? Sound kooky? I think not. If we had been a perfectly integrated society back in 1947, then Jackie Robinson wouldn’t have had to endure all the terrible, racist catcalls he received from the stands. He wouldn’t have gotten a single death threat, or even an ominous postcard. Without racism, Robinson never would have gotten the chance to show off the fiery dignity for which he would later be so revered. Hell, he wouldn’t have even been the first black ballplayer! Jazzy Bones Harrison would have been. Think about what we would have lost. Robinson would have been just another ballplayer in a perfect social utopia free of prejudice and injustice. And that would be terrible. Jackie Robinson was a great baseball player, but racism made him even better! It made him a pioneer! An icon!

  Nothing will fire you up like a good racist taunt. I remember seeing Mississippi Burning once and wanting the American South napalmed out of existence. And I’m not even black! And I still feel the same way today! Racism is the best natural catalyst to help get your competitive juices flowing. There’s no better adrenaline rush out there. Imagine hitting a home run. Now, imagine hitting a home run in Fenway, where they throw Sambo dolls at any black player who walks into the park. How much sweeter is it to shut those annoying fucking Massholes up once and for all?

  That’s racism working for you. You should send that guy in Tennessee a box of chocolates.

  (Note: If you found this section racist, please mail any death threats to my home address: 15 Cherrydale Terrace, Merkin, CT, 06781. If you could send it prior to my book tour and include a handful of anthrax spores in the envelope, I would appreciate it.)

  “Sign this, asshole.” Autographs and fan encounters.

  The proliferation of Applebee’s restaurants in this nation has created a massive demand for sports memorabilia. Restaurant decorators are in desperate need of autographed pictures, jerseys, game balls, shoes, and anything else to distract patrons from wondering what part of the chicken was used to make the boneless buffalo wings. That means everything you touch from now on turns to gold. Or, if you suck, fine pewter.

  You may think signing autographs is a nice thing to do for fans. You’d be wrong. Remember: that fan asking you for your signature just paid $350 to see you play. He isn’t looking for a memento. He’s looking to get back in the black. Or worse, he’s a professional collector. Is he wearing a plaid shirt and pleated khakis with white socks? Does he have visible dandruff? Oh, yeah, he’s one of them.
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  The average sports memorabilia collector starts off as an aspiring serial killer, only to discover he lacks the requisite evil genius to lure teenage girls into his ’87 Dodge van (with curtains on the windows!). Now he has his eyes trained on you, the pro athlete. He’ll do anything to add you to his list, including harassing you wherever you go, regardless of what or whom you are doing. The autograph hound will use a variety of disguises and even send his children out in an effort to get you to sign. Yes, he has children. Incredible! For this reason, you should only sign autographs for children who have no visible adult guardian present. Baltimore is littered with kids like this. It’s a great town for parental neglect.

  The problem with avoiding autograph seekers altogether is that normal fans will find you mean and standoffish. In the case of Patrick Ewing, this is deadly accurate. But if, unlike Ewing, you aren’t a total prick, you might want to pick a few select places to give the people what they want: an autograph they can sell on eBay for pot money. Places like next to the stands during pregame warm-ups and charity functions are a good choice. Make sure you bring a large bottle of Purell to kill all the peasant germs.

  You need to do this periodically so that fans will have a good experience with you and tell others about it. It especially helps if your public image is suffering. Give an autograph to a fan and he may say, “You know, I know Michael Vick once slaughtered dogs for sport, but he was really cool when I met him!” It’s amazing how one nice gesture can really sucker people like that.

  On the flip side, being rude to fans can cost you. Sure, at the ballpark they’ll chant your name in fawning adoration, but if you’re rude to them in a moment of weakness, they will never forget it. In fact, they’ll tell other people about it. As many as they can. Did you know there’s a blog called garygaettiwouldntsignformesofuckhim.blogspot.com? Now you do. Word gets around.