This was in the game thread and Al touched on it in the last paragraph of his game post. I figured it belonged in its own thread and not as a hijack.

To boo or not to boo?

I personally try not to boo unless I am perceiving a real lack of effort or I see a flat-out stupid play.

An outfielder making a bad throw after hustling to get to the ball is NOT boo-worthy to me. That same outfielder throwing to the wrong base IS boo-worthy.

I try not to boo failure when there is effort. But in general, I am pro-booing, or at least, pro-choice booing. 

I think the fans pays their money and deserve to see a product. At the end of the day, this is entertainment. If you went to a rock concert and saw a shoddy show, you'd be upset. 

I am anti-cursing, anti-invective and certainly anti-racist comment, but good old-fashioned booing? Bring it on.

I get most of the arguments against it. It's lame. It can be disruptive to other fans and the average fan, after 6 beers, wouldn't know a smart play from a dumb one. Fair enough.

But there is one argument that burns my ass and that is the reason for the thread.

"The player knows he failed! Why boo?"

Folks, we do not boo to provide information. We do it to vent. By that same logic, D. Lee should not have been cheered when he hit the grand slam, since he is an intelligent baseball player and knew he just hit a homer.

"Booing doesn't help!"

It is not MY job to make the player hit, field or pitch better. There are highly-paid coaches armed with state-of-the-art video equipment to do that.

I am not there to serve the player's needs. They are there to entertain me and provide me with a nice distraction to my day. I have a job, a wife, several dogs and a baby on the way. At any one time, I am stressing out over something.

The Cubs (and Bulls and Packers and Blues and Illini) provide release from that.

And if that means booing, even when it is illogical, ill-conceived and against my own rules, is part of that.