8th grader bat flip and dance

Haven't seen it, but hope baseball doesn't go way of football celebrations.  IMO only celebrations should be team when they win, like TX A&M over FL.  What's next dancing because you got on base? 

Actually, this is a discussion my husband and I are having. Our high school team is the Indians (the town is Indianola, don't know what else you'd be) One of the kids on the team started shooting off an imaginary arrow if he hits a double or more--never any other time.Some other kids are picking it up.

My husband finds it DEEPLY offensive, not because of the Indian thing, but because he hates that kind of thing. 

I say the kids are dorks and have to find appropriate ways to celebrate, they're just not there yet.

Thoughts? What is appropriate in baseball?

Don't throw bats, someone will get hurt.  On the other stuff, baseball is changing.  It's ok to celebrate.  To each his own as long as you don't hold the game up.  Or your celebration is during the play and affects the outcome.

If harmless celebrations both you, that's your deal.

Baseball is changing. Bautista's celebration was for a big hit in a big game. For an 8th grader to celebrate like the video is ridiculous. He hasn't earned the right. I went to high high school game today. I saw three kids pose, shoot arrows and/or flex after hitting doubles. It looks ridiculous for a double. For most of the season do your job and act like you've been here before. Save the celebrations for big moments.

My son's team did the "shooting the arrow" thing on anything better than a single....nothing flashy, just a quick one when the reached base.  I didn't have a problem with it....and we weren't even the Indians lol

RJM posted:

 Save the celebrations for big moments.

Agree!  Only time my son "celebrated" a hit was when he hit an RBI double with 2 outs in the 7th that tied the district championship game and sent it into extra innings.  He pumped his fist as he got to 2nd base.  It was probably the biggest and most memorable hit of his HS and college career.

RJM posted:

Baseball is changing. Bautista's celebration was for a big hit in a big game. For an 8th grader to celebrate like the video is ridiculous. He hasn't earned the right. I went to high high school game today. I saw three kids pose, shoot arrows and/or flex after hitting doubles. It looks ridiculous for a double. For most of the season do your job and act like you've been here before. Save the celebrations for big moments.

It's ok to have an opinion on how the game should be played, but how does what other people do bother you so much?  Why should you sit in judgement of how others play the game?  It's baseball, not RJMball.

There's a thing called "showing respect for the game." It's a team game. It's not a ME game. These antics are ME moves. Look at ME. It has nothing to do with me and my opinion. It has everything to do with "the game." Respecting the game means a lot more than my opinion.

One of the many, many, many, many reasons I quit watching the NFL years ago was the constant show of players exulting themselves after making a routine tackle, a catch, a first down run, etc.  Obviously, it does not bother others the way it bothers me.  So I don't complain, but I choose not to watch.  And these kids like the one in the video are just going to mimic what they see the pros do.  In other sports it has already trickled down as far as the pee-wee levels.  Baseball is not there.... yet.  Big moment celebrations and a bat flip after a majestic bomb - okay, cool.  But the day I start seeing fielders thumping their chests and pointing at the sky after making a nice play - I'm out.

playball2011 posted:

Haven't seen it, but hope baseball doesn't go way of football celebrations.  IMO only celebrations should be team when they win, like TX A&M over FL.  What's next dancing because you got on base? 

What's next is getting on base because you were dancing...

I don't think Bautista's celebration is anymore justified. Both show a lack of humility and a desire to show up the other team. The increase in that type of behavior among the "adults" is why you see it increase in the children/young adults.

I don't have any problem with kids flashing the doubles sigh, they have been doing it for years in college. it is not new at the high school level. bat flips are very marginal and you had damn well better be right...my son bat flipped one...I was not impressed. we talked about he hasn't done it again but HR's in HS don't come along that often in the dead game era we play in now days.

Ted22 posted:

I don't think Bautista's celebration is anymore justified. Both show a lack of humility and a desire to show up the other team. The increase in that type of behavior among the "adults" is why you see it increase in the children/young adults.

This I totally disagree with. Bautista was not only appropriate but awesome and the exact right time do it. IMO

old_school posted:

I don't have any problem with kids flashing the doubles sigh, they have been doing it for years in college.

Never saw it in the time my son played college ball.  They were too busy making sure to get to 2B.

FoxDad posted:

old_school posted:

I don't have any problem with kids flashing the doubles sigh, they have been doing it for years in college.

Never saw it in the time my son played college ball.  They were too busy making sure to get to 2B.

yea pretty apparent you don't get, they flash it after the play is over.

Ted22 posted:

I don't think Bautista's celebration is anymore justified. Both show a lack of humility and a desire to show up the other team. The increase in that type of behavior among the "adults" is why you see it increase in the children/young adults.

Texas demonstrated last week they agree with you regarding showing up the other team. Seeing Bautista get drilled and punched in the face is likely to make a player less likely to be so flamboyant next time.

i don't have an issue with a MLBer admiring a no doubt about it homer. A little bat flip, ok. Bautista's bat flip may have been excessive. But I believe it was emotional spontaneity. I don't mind emotional spontaneity. I don't like the in game premeditated celebrations.

Maybe, someday after a great defensive play on the third out the fielder will run up to the guy who hit the ball and spike it at his feet.

Maybe they need to incorporate replay into these situations - the umps can watch it 4-5 times and decide if it is a premeditated celebration or emotional spontaneity.  If the umps don't want to make that call, then the opposing manager can watch it 4-5 times and decide whether his pitcher needs to pluck some guy or not.

I am all for some excessive emotional spontaneity.  Telling a guy that just hit the ball out of the ballpark to stay calm is a shame.  A pitcher can throw a "good" pitch and still get it hit out, so the idea that the batter is "showing up" the pitcher is just a little overreach.  I don't want the batter to stare down the pitcher or anything like that, but you see more emotion on doubles and triples than you do home runs - not sure why that should be the case.

RJM posted:

There's a thing called "showing respect for the game." It's a team game. It's not a ME game. These antics are ME moves. Look at ME. It has nothing to do with me and my opinion. It has everything to do with "the game." Respecting the game means a lot more than my opinion.

I dunno.  IMP Baseball is the most ME game there is.  Novels have been written about the 1 on 1 battle between pitchers and hitters which is the very essence of the game. 

In basketball or football it is near impossible to score by one player without any help from teammates.  The most important position in basketball is the point guard who has the responsibility of setting up teammates to score.  Football has the QB that has to deliver the ball to teammates perfectly to score. 

Baseball has the homerun.  No help from anyone - just the man with the stick vs. the man with the ball.  If that is not the very definition of a me game I am not sure what is. 

Perhaps the most fabled moment in the game's history is Ruth's called shot.   Not only did he hit the homer but he screamed at the Cubs dugout all the way around the bases.  That was 85 years ago which was 15 years before the NBA and the NFL was a barnstorming sideshow.  By the way  - he flipped the bat some too.  Then there is the biggest hot dog of all time, Pete Rose who spent 25 years with his look at me fake hustle.  Do we really want to talk about the Black Sox who had so much respect for the game that they threw a World Series.  The most disgusting display of selfish ME based actions ever in sports history. 

I could go in but I will not, baseball has always had it's share of showboating, mouth running knuckle heads.  Please stop with the myths of the Field of Dreams.  Baseball players never had more "respect for the game" than their basketball or football counterparts.  They have always been boozing, rable rousing wild men all the way back to the 1800's.  In fact for most of baseball's history the players were not considered respectable people in society.  They were thugs in today's parlance.  It wasn't until after WWII and the advent of TV and big money that all sports figures transformed into living breathing people coming to your house that the myths began. 

I'm willing to bet more than 80-90% of MLBers say there is a professional way to act and carry yourself on the field. It has nothing to do with the 1800s. I'll side with those 80-90% of the players.

i don't have anything more to say on the subject. I'm not going to take on every comment someone posts in defense of immaturity and lack of professionalism. My original point is it's ridiculous an 8th grader did what he did and Max Preps makes him a national figure on their site.

I took an adjective out of my last post. I thought it made the post a personal attack on those with different opinions. GIven the last post I'll put it back. This previous poster likes to make everything person. That's how high and mighty he believes himself to be.

I'm just trying to have a debate. I've debated specific points. But I don't believe I've intentionally directed insults at specific posters like this poster has directed every response to me in the form of a personal attack. 

I'm not going to take on every SILLY comment ...

You are probably right but I'll take that problem over the selfish look-at-me show that football and basketball have become.  I'm in the old school camp I guess.  I, too, think a team sport should be a team sport.  I think team or individual victories should both be celebrated with and as a team.  I do like celebration and emotion.  But I think outbursts should come about as natural emotional reaction to an event that evokes such a thing.  That's a big part of what I love about team sports, so when I see the strut, exaggerated stride and point and chest thumping for a routine first down early in the game, it turns my stomach.  Save the orchestrated team dances for rain delays.  Carlton Fisk's leaps and urging the ball to stay fair were real emotion.   The Tiger Woods fist pump when he sinks a putt to win a major is real emotion.  Terrell Owens instructing his teammates to stay away so he can pull off his magic marker stunt is not real emotion... and not team sport.

RJM - Your post that I responded to was geared specifically to selfish "ME" based actions comments you made but you do circle back to the original post.

It is impossible for a pro athlete to be successful for any length of time without professionalism, maturity and commitment to the job.  To suggest otherwise is misguided.  Any on field jumping around or antics does not detract from that. 

My other point was baseball players have always "celebrated" thereby creating the irony that baseball is the root of excessive celebrating not the exception.  They are no more or less professional than their peers.  They were doing it 75 -100 years before the NFL or NBA existed and never eliminated it, otherwise the "unwritten rules" would never have existed.  That is lost on the baseball purist in these discussions.  The taunting was so awful that players decided it was acceptable to have pitchers throw at each other when someone went too far.  You may not like the fact that baseball is the owner of the original sin on celebrations being a problem - but it is just that - a fact.   The bat toss is just the newest fad on the age old issue.

There is no arguing the monkey see...monkey do of kids mimicking their favorite actions.  It is true, always has been and always will. 

As far as how appropriate it is for an 8th grader getting this much oxygen...you get no argument from me but welcome to 2016.  Now a days people think I am odd because I don't like my picture being taken but camera's are everywhere filming everything so there is just more stuff to see and comment on.  Trending isn't going away anytime soon.  In my time children were to be seen and not heard.  Not so anymore and that genie isn't going back in the bottle either. 

So this much I suspect we'd agree on -  I am not a fan of 13 year olds getting attention this broadly for almost anything.  I might make an exception if they saved someone's life or similarly heroic deed otherwise I don't want to hear anything about them. 

Then again no one gives a damn about what I want otherwise the world would be a better place.

RJM posted:

Ted22 posted:

I don't think Bautista's celebration is anymore justified. Both show a lack of humility and a desire to show up the other team. The increase in that type of behavior among the "adults" is why you see it increase in the children/young adults.

Texas demonstrated last week they agree with you regarding showing up the other team. Seeing Bautista get drilled and punched in the face is likely to make a player less likely to be so flamboyant next time.

i don't have an issue with a MLBer admiring a no doubt about it homer. A little bat flip, ok. Bautista's bat flip may have been excessive. But I believe it was emotional spontaneity. I don't mind emotional spontaneity. I don't like the in game premeditated celebrations.

Maybe, someday after a great defensive play on the third out the fielder will run up to the guy who hit the ball and spike it at his feet.

I loved Bautista's bat flip, I had no problem with him getting hit, I had no problem with his slide at 2nd....they were all straight up old school baseball plays of men respecting the game, their teams and doing what needed to be done.

The 2nd baseman who punched got an 8 game suspension for being the creep and that is to kind, that he is. I also think the Toronto reliever will be fined in the kangaroo court for hitting Fielder in the thigh, that ball had to be in the ribs or higher. Hitting Prince in the thigh is like smacking an elephant with a flyswatter.

All in all with the exception of the Texas middle infielder it was all well done, IMO.

Ted22 posted:

I don't think Bautista's celebration is anymore justified. Both show a lack of humility and a desire to show up the other team. The increase in that type of behavior among the "adults" is why you see it increase in the children/young adults.

Is Bautista's celebration any different than a pitcher's antics after a big strikeout? Why no uproar there? He can strikeout a batter and exult in it but a batter can't? (Valverde, Familia, KRod, etc...)

The fact of the matter is this. Our opinions of the subject are largely irrelevant (other than the ability to subtract our $$ from the equation). It is up to todays players to police the game & determine what they will & will not tolerate. The way I did it, the way you did it or the way we think it should be currently done is not really a factor in how it is going to be done, other than how we may influence our own players.

I, personally, thought Bautista's bat flip was chicken #* it. Matt Bush, who drilled him, obviously agreed. Bautista took offense to this with the tackle slide into Odor who tried to decapitate him with a submarine throw which had absolutely no intent to  get to first base. Bautista took offense to that & then bowed up & promptly got his ass kicked. It is old school baseball. Nasty, mean, self policing & with passion. I can promise you Bautista will think 2X before the next flip. He may still do it, but he will definitely reconsider.

Harper (let's make baseball fun again but I never smile on the field) obviously has a different take on things as do many of the new wave. Several others of the new generation were raised to "act like you have been there & respect the game," which is my personal preference but again, is not really a factor. I personally, like the old school rivalries when the Yankees & Red Sox wanted to demolish each other & there was absolutely no possibility of high fives & group hugs with opposing players in the outfield pregame. 

"baseball is changing", I don't know about you, but I would have to add the phrase "for the worse" to that statement.  Fine, you want to show off after hitting a homerun, that is fine, but don't while when you take a fastball in the back.  Todays player acts like an a$$ for doing his job that becomes a bigger a$$ when he gets a payback.

As a player, I don't have much of a problem with it. Extra base hits, as long as they aren't shooting the arrow at the pitcher, other dugout, etc. and it's pretty small, not a big deal. It's just part of the culture in baseball, similar to "Two's" where everyone does something, other chants. In my experience, it's to their own team, pretty insignificant, doesn't mean much. I don't have a problem with it. Most of the team is cheering and shouting already, a small gesture doesn't do much. 

Bat flips are starting to get old....you hit a home run, you get the right to bat flip. But dancing and doing gestures or whatever while running the bases is a bit much. The bat flip is celebrating but I would say the dancing and stuff is disrespectful to the game and team. Don't want a bat flip? Don't give up a no doubt dinger, that's how I think about it. Most people are upset when pitchers show emotion (Such as Marcus Stroman) when they get a big strikeout or something, but I don't have a problem with that either.