Let’s be better next year

I’m referring to this subreddit. I used to come to this subreddit all the time. Living away from Tampa, I loved being able to talk to other Rays fans.

But last year this subreddit got a little toxic. I stopped coming to the daily game threads because it was just getting so ridiculous sometimes.

For example, some recurring comments I saw include (but were not limited to):

• DFA Diego Castillo
• Trade Brandon Lowe
• DFA Ryan Yarbrough
• DFA Michael Wacha
• Fire Chad Mottola

Those are just the ones I can remember, but there were plenty of other rather egregious and nonsensical ones as well.

Now look, it’d be one thing if this was just a small and vocal minority in the threads, but no, this was the majority of comments. These were the comments that were getting upvoted. The doomers were the ones getting encouraged here. The more frustrated and attacking you were, the more you fit in. Those of us who cautioned patience, who simply wanted to support the team through its struggles were either downvoted or ignored.

Like I said before, I stopped coming to this subreddit because it got so ridiculous. Anyone who understands baseball, and specifically how the Rays operate within baseball, knows that those comments are simply asinine. The Rays are one of, if not the best run organization in baseball, and I hope last year taught us as fans to trust the process and trust that our team will overcome its struggles, no matter how frustrating it may be in the moment.

In other words, I want us to be better. Let’s be more supportive as fans, and less gloomy. Calling for players to be DFA’d or traded over and over again does little to add to the conversation. We as fans need to be rooting for our guys, not calling for their jobs. Those are our guys. That’s our team. So let’s act like it.

Go Rays.