Boos for Albert Belle and some of his White Sox teammates.
Loud, ringing cheers for Ken Griffey Jr., Edgar Martinez, Alex Rodriguez and other members of the visiting Seattle Mariners.
That was the menu of fan reaction from a good share of Saturday’s crowd of 40,223 fans at Comiskey Park.
Booing a slumping home team is nothing new on the South Side. But rarely has a visiting team received more friendly support than the popular Mariners did when they routed the Sox 11-6 in the first game of a scheduled double-header. The second game was rained out.
Being treated so well as visitors is nothing unusual for Lou Piniella and his Mariners.
“We get reaction like this around the league. Why? Oh, I guess it’s the manager,” Piniella cracked.
“It’s our marquee players. Griffey, Rodriguez, Edgar Martinez, Randy Johnson. We’re a fun team to watch. People like to come out and see us play.”
Martinez received rousing cheers when he hit a two-run homer off Sox starter Doug Drabek in the first inning. Griffey got a good hand when he ripped a run-scoring double to the gap in left-center, making the score 3-0 in the third.
“We average 30,000 fans per game on the road and 38,000 at home,” Seattle starter and well-traveled ex-Cub Jamie Moyer said. `Maybe we’re America’s team.”
The Mariners put the game away in the seventh when they scored five runs. Their fans were very vocal in those moments.
Seattle had runners on second and third with one out, first base open, and Griffey due to bat in the seventh. Sox manager Terry Bevington followed the book and ordered Tony Castillo to walk Griffey intentionally.
A loud chorus of boos greeted Bevington’s decision.
Griffey, explaining the Mariners’ popularity in Comiskey, believed much of it was directed toward him.
“When I was growing up, we had favorite teams,” said Griffey. “Nowadays we have favorite players. I’m just glad I’m not the guy getting booed.”
With fans loudly booing the intentional pass to Junior, Comiskey sounded like Seattle’s Kingdome.
And the strategy didn’t work. Paul Sorrento capped the five-run Mariners seventh by hitting his team’s third homer of the game, a three-run shot that made the score 11-4. More cheering.
The boos for Belle grew louder each of his first three times at bat when he rolled out, popped up and grounded into a double play. Some Sox fans got off their hands and offered Belle a smattering of applause when he doubled and scored on Ray Durham’s hit in the eighth.
But by this time, the issue was decided. The home team, er, the Mariners, had the game in hand.
