It's perfectly acceptable to be a passionate fan of your favorite baseball team, but it's also important to remember the difference between passion and vile behavior.
The Cleveland "fans" who sent hateful, racist messages to Yu Chang following his error to end the game fall into the category of vile behavior. Chang, a Taiwanese infielder who has been with the franchise since 2019, shared some of these messages after the game and spread an important message in doing so (Warning: messages contain NSFW content).
"Exercise your freedom of speech in a right way," Chang wrote. "I accept all comments, positive or negative but DEFINITELY NOT RACIST ONES. Thank you all and love you all #StopAsianHate."
The play occurred in the bottom of the ninth with one out and runners on first and second. Instead of getting the force out at first, Chang attempted to get the force out at second base, which may have ended the game for good if it had led to a double play. Instead, his throw hit Yasmani Grandal in the helmet and allowed Nick Madrigal to score and win it for the White Sox.
After the game, Cleveland manager Terry Francona acknowledged that though a smarter play could have been made, he wasn't necessarily upset with Chang's mentality in the moment.
"I mean, that's one where you just take the out at first. It would have given us two outs and we don't really care about the force in that situation," Francona said. "But I will say, earlier in the game, he made one of the better plays when he turned that double play, so in a sense I'm glad he's not shying away from throwing the ball to second. This will give us a chance to him that that probably wasn't the right time."
What's more important, though, is that Chang and other ballplayers still receive this disgusting treatment from "fans" on a regular basis, and MLB and other sports leagues have made it clear that there should be a zero-tolerance policy for any racist ideologies.
Many prominent athletes, including Jeremy Lin, who has been at the forefront of the NBA's initiative to quell anti-Asian racism and violence, and Derek Jeter, have spoken out against this sort of behavior as the sports community attempts to do its part in healing this ugly aspect of our world.
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