Kenneth & the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Philly Fans

Yesterday was a great day for Phillies fans. Cole Hamels pitched a complete game shutout to help the Phils close out a superb home stand and the South Philly faithful treated one of the games greats with the respect he deserves.

With Cole Hamels on the mound in the 9th trying to go the distance, Griffey hit a blast to deep center that Shane Victorino snagged. The Hawaiian admitted he probably made it look a little more difficult than he should have but it was about as close to history as Philly got this week. As Junior walked back to the dugout after the catch the crowd gave him a standing ovation. Watch Shane and Junior talk about it below.

Griffey thanks everybody at the ball park and calls the ovation "awesome." Nicely done, special business persons.

Larger Yahoo! photo here.

Comments

[Phanatic74]

What is wrong with the Fans? I understand them wanting to see history by number 600, but I would rather see Philly make history by winning and taking us to the World Series !!

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[Peter_B]

Glad to see that we gave Junior the respect he deserves. Even though he isn't as dominant as he once was, his swing is still the sweetest in baseball.

[Mike L.]

Gotta love Griffey.

[GMo]

Pride. Simply pride. I'd walk over 1,000 injured Michael Irvins to applaud Griffey.

[Dan Levy]

"wooooo. . wooooo. Thanks Junior for sitting out the bulk of a four game series so one of our pitchers doesn't make the highlight reel for the rest of eternity. wooo. woooo. Now go to Florida where it's going to take 15 minutes for a fan to run from the base line out to the outfield to "catch" your 600th home run ball."

You can't not like Griffey. But it's a good thing he wasn't at the plate in a Santa Claus outfit. If so: booooooooooooooooo booooooooo.

[SonOfSchmidt]

Phanatic74:"Glad to see that we gave Junior the respect he deserves. Even though he isn't as dominant as he once was, his swing is still the sweetest in baseball."

I completely agree, but when you say the sweetest swing in baseball you mean besides Chase Utley right?

[SonOfSchmidt]

I'm sorry I attributed that quote to the wrong person, it was young Peter B who said that. My comment still stands though.

[GreggyD]

God I hate us Philly fans. We're so awful all of the time...

[johndewar]

Griffey sort of represents, in a way, the road less travelled in baseball during the steroid era. He deserved the applause he got yesterday. He seemed genuinely surprised and touched by it.

[JimMc]

Just shows Philly fans respect the game and those who play it right. Just like the ovation Flyer fans gave Mario Lemiux's before one of his retirements. Irvin didn't fall into that category.

[millertime]

agreed johndewar. i can't remember who said it the other night, but they mentioned that in spite of all the steroid business, jr. was not mentioned once. its a shame his career is so plagued by injuries, he'd probably be hitting for 700.

was anything said on sportcenter or baseball tonight about the standing o? philly fans aren't just mindless homers, it'd be nice for people to see that.

[James Beale]

I feel two ways about all the Griffey reaction. First, it's nice and he deserves the standing ovation after his final out, but second I think that it was crass to boo the Phils for walking him in the midst of close games.

If Phillies fans want to show themselves as smart and knowledgable, shouldn't they respect both Griffey and the home team?

[John Haefele]

We did respect Griffey and the home team. If I'm going to boo opposing pitchers for intentionally walking Utley I'm going to boo Tom Gordon for not pitching to Griffey. True, it was a weird situation on Tuesday night when it was a 2-1 game and Griffey came in to pinch hit, but I was confident that even if Griffey went yard on Gordon the Phils would still pull out the W.

[Gaze]

The one problem I had was Phillies fans applauding Griffey on his double early in the game. I wanted to see a homerun or a strikeout... anything else was not deserving of applause.

[Chamomiles Davis]

And somehow, the national sports media won't report this. Bastards.

[James Beale]

@ Chamomiles - the AP report ledes with this "The MVP got benched and Junior got another standing ovation from notoriously tough fans."

ESPN isn't covering it for sure, but you get much more national than the AP.

[Chamomiles Davis]

Fair enough. I should have been more specific by stating, "columnists like Michael Wilbon and Skip Bayless will conveniently forget to mention this when spewing their latest invective about Philly sports fans."

Fixed.

[James Beale]

well, I'd be a fool to argue with that point.

[Benjamin]

Like I said yesterday, the standing O was great, and glad to be there for it. Griffey seemed overwhelmed talking about it in the locker room, couldn't find words, and just said, "It was just Awesome," with a look in his eyes like he was holding back some tears.

But this isn't the 1st time Philly has shown great respect for great players. This is a very knowledgeable city, and we know our sports, and never hesitate to show our respect for opponents and home-town heroes alike.

[Benjamin]

Chamomiles - don't worry about the opinions of such "columnists". While I can't stand the unperturbed insistence to demonize philly passion, it's understandable that it comes from complete jack*sses. We know in our hearts who we are, and how we truly love our teams and players. We might get upset with them, but it's because we love them and want to see them succeed.

I enjoyed how we exhibited such class on the day Matt P, and philly, was getting ripped for being classless after the pitt eulogy was written. I think I heard heads explode from across the state.

[Loqiel]

That eulogy is awesome and worthy of much honor. Pitt fans are just taking notes from Cindy Crosby's School of Whine.

When told he would not be allowed to hoist, touch, or otherwise sniff the Stanley Cup, Cindy burst into tears and began whining. "Why not!" he cried. "Whining got me everything else this year!"

[Cottman&Castor]

I cant wait until the Flyers or Phils win a championship so I dont have to hear the "you haven't won anything since (insert year here)" argument anymore.

[woe is moe]

I think we Philly fans have a soft spot in our hearts for (as my grandfather would pronounce it) CincinNAT-ah for giving us Pete Rose. Wouldn't have won in '80 without him...

Plus, there were no snowballs available.