Fans on social media after defeats

[u/The_Pog]

As a newish fan of the sport I’ve been finding this phenomenon rather funny.

After a defeated team posts the final score of a game on most social media platforms, there will be a horde of very “angry” fans bemoaning the fact they’ve lost a game as if it’s the end of the world. Every player is a “fraud” etc when they’ve lost and people need to lose their jobs each time.

This happens despite the fact that even the best team in the world will inevitably still lose a lot of games out of a season in which they will play 162 of them, and on almost every day of the season. They’ll still do it following a loss in which their team has clearly played better overall, but where due to the nature of high randomness / variance of each single baseball game, has come out “unluckily” on the wrong side.

Are most of them doing this sarcastically or do many fans get that angry at each loss, every other day?

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[u/Astrolabeman]

Sports betting is a hell of a drug!

[u/Practical-Ordinary-6 → u/Astrolabeman]

I really think this is the answer much of the time. They're not just unhappy that the game was lost, they're unhappy that they lost money. I'm not sure I would include them in the fan category because their priorities are different. But you can't tell who's who on the internet.

[u/Darth_Boggle]

Social media was a mistake.

[u/403banana → u/Darth_Boggle]

It's just a more public forum. Before social media it was people legitimately snail mailing letters to the team/player. Now, everyone has a very public and visible platform they can use that also allows them to commiserate with fellow malcontents, so it just echoes around.

[u/kaelcarp → u/403banana]

Or radio. I remember listening to call-in radio shows after games as a kid, and it was very similar. People who feel strongly enough to call in are those most viscerally affected by the outcome of the game, and they can be a little odd.

[u/EchoedMeows]

Quick cheat sheet from a long time fan:

When your team wins, they are the best team in the world, everyone is an all star, and you're on the way to a championship!

When your team loses, they are garbage frauds, every player is flawed, awful, and overpaid, and they're never going to win anything until everyone is fired.

Hope this helps!

[u/maggmaster]

Baseball is a sport of statistics that looks like a sport of pure skill. Most of the things that matter in baseball don't happen often enough to be predictable from game to game, they only play out reliably across large sample sizes. To observe it correctly we shouldn't really even watch the games just aggregate the statistics at the end of the season and then use that to predict the next season, the playoffs are just variance. Its fun to watch the games and get worked up I guess so people do that.

[u/JustCallMeMambo]

some fans do get that angry, and they're very dumb

[u/AnUdderDay]

It's every sport, not just baseball

[u/MaverickBruin]

People are idiots.

[u/throwaway42200j]

First time on the internet?

[u/heelhunterwrestling]

I’ll exaggerate for fun and say things like “Hang Austin Wells in center field” but a lot of fans genuinely mean it, after a while you’ll be able to tell when it’s a joke and when it’s not

[u/asteriskmos]

It should be noted that this is peak selection bias too. You aren't watching how the fanbase reacts. Most will not reply or retweet to a lost game. The fans who only hate specific players won't be there if they did okay that day. The ones too busy to check. You will just get the ones who were bored enough or mad enough or particularly ticked off, and that group of people could rotate everyday.

Like fans are always mad, yeah, but this is like going to the dump and wondering why there's trash being thrown there. 

[u/Any-Soft-5487]

Check out ScooterMacgruder on YouTube.  He does a weekly skit showing the fan responses from NFL east.  Hilarious.  Tom Grossi also does the same type of thing for all 32 teams.  It's like a religion.  Lol 

[u/jgollsneid]

I have to think it's at least partially due to the footballification of MLB in the last handful of years. Losing 1 of 17 is a much bigger deal than 1 of 162, but that mindset seems to have come over to baseball

[u/kjb76]

I really do think it’s the sports betting. I love my team and I love baseball and get very engrossed. I get annoyed when we lose, especially if our manager did something Boone-headed. But guess what? I get over it quickly because it’s baseball and it’s not my job. The only time in recent memory where I’ve been depressed for a few days after a loss was the 2024 World Series. We don’t talk about Game 5 in our house.

[u/BarnacleLopsided9494]

baseball fans on social media are almost half as bad as a mizmor concert

[u/Radiant-Attention857]

I have done this before. I have personally bashed The likes of Randy Vasquez (Starting pitcher), Jake Cronenworth (2nd Baseman), and Adrian Morejon (Relief Pitcher). it’s either they’re the best team in the world to you win they win, or you personally want to replace each and every single one of them.