Commentary: Fans need to control themselves

You start with the harmless kinds of fans -- the ones who are with their team through thick and thin, waving pennants and wearing fur coats while chanting phrases such as, " ... advance the ball, advance the ball and subsequently score!"

Then there are the bad kind, the ones who probably never played a sport in their lives but who spend the entire game cussing and spitting and whining because their team is losing -- or not winning by a large enough margin. When there are three or more in one room, you can bet at least one will wind up on an episode of Cops or Jerry Springer.

Then you have the absolutely insane fans, who really aren't fans at all but psychotic, unbalanced individuals who are a danger to themselves and others. They should be kept away from children, pets and sharp instruments.

The most recent example can be found in the actions of a few West Virginia supporters who decided the best way to celebrate the Mountaineers' upset of Virginia Tech was to set bonfires throughout Morgantown.

Certainly when I want to celebrate something, whether it be a wedding anniversary, my team winning a big game or Halle Berry returning my phone calls, the first thing I want to do is break out the trusty lighter and burn something up.

Still, so-called American football "fans" have a ways to go before catching up with soccer extremists. Take this particular wing nut -- submitted for your approval -- who took a World Cup match to the ultimate extreme last year.

Korea hosted the event along with Japan, and the Korean National Team was getting ready to play powerful Portugal. A fan of the host team decided his squad might need a little extra help, so he decided to provide it.

What did he do? Well, this Darwin Award nominee doused himself in gasoline and lit himself on fire. The intended purpose was to kill himself, which he thought would result in his becoming a ghost. By becoming a ghost, he would be able to help the Koreans by serving as their invisible twelfth player -- despite the fact that the governing body of soccer, FIFA, strictly prohibits the participation of ghosts, goblins or apparitions of any kind in international events.

Unless I'm mistaken, they aren't even allowed to dress out.

The poor sucker spent many painful days in critical condition in a hospital, neither dead nor ghostly -- just burned really, really badly.

While an incident such as this could be considered a case of "thinning of the herd" instead of a tragedy, it really makes you wonder how people can take a sport and transform it into a life or death situation.

Don't get me wrong -- when I'm off the clock, I'm as big a sports "fan" as they come. My wife often laughs at me because she'll hear me screaming in the living room during Sundays in the fall, only to discover that I've simply taken issue with an official while watching the NFL.

But I don't think I'm a bad fan at all. In fact, I think I'm pretty much run-of-the-mill. I root my team on, I'm disappointed when they get beat, but when the game is over I'm fully aware that life goes on and am comfortable in the knowledge that win or lose, the supermarket near my house will still sell beer.

Unfortunately, there's a lunatic fringe out there who give all the decent sports fans a bad name. And the incident in West Virginia is hardly an isolated one. Following many championship games, pro and college, fans have started fires, flipped over police cars and rioted. Fans of the winners are often as destructive as fans of the losers.

International soccer fans, of course, have the reputation for being the worst (or is it best?) hooligans of all, although we Yanks are quickly gaining ground. When the Russian team was eliminated from the last World Cup, many of their fans rioted in the streets. Soccer hooligans are even charted by INTERPOL and often denied passports because of their violent history.

And now -- in the good old U.S. of A. -- we've seen tragic violence at youth sporting events because parents don't have sense enough to let their kids be kids. When my daughter played youth softball, I got a first hand look at too many card-carrying morons who actually yelled at their children until they cried -- just because they dropped a ball in a game that's supposed to be fun.

I don't have any tolerance for that nonsense. And I'll spend the rest of my life wondering why people want to be destructive over a sport -- an activity designed to not only build character, but reveal it.

So please, people. Just enjoy the games. When you see a good play, cheer it on. When you see a bad play, ask yourself if you could do better. If the answer is yes, try out for the team and then you'll get a chance to prove it.

Otherwise, let the coaches coach and the players play and when the game is over, get on with your life.

Oh in case you missed it Korea beat Portugal 1-0 in the 2002 World Cup. Two Portuguese players were ejected in the second half, giving the winners an 11-man to nine advantage.

Had our suicidal Twelfth Man known this in advance, he could've kept his lighter in his pocket.

I mean, they didn't need him anyway.