Listen guys, I know you all hate Milton Bradley.  Even I have piled on from time to time.  The thing is, I believe there is enough blame to share for the whole team: Jim Hendry, the bullpen, Lou, injuries, Lee’s slow start, Soto’s sophomore slump, etc.  As a fan, you are entitled to be upset with the guy who just signed a $30 million contract and came in botching flyballs and hitting well below the Mendoza line for most of the first half of the season.

The problem, fellow Cubs fans, is two-fold.  The first is that Bradley is hitting now.  I mean hitting pretty well.  His on-base percentage has been among the elite of the National League all season, and now his power numbers are finally coming along.  In the 18 games he has played since the Cubs were in 1st place on July 31, his numbers have been some of the best on the team: G: 18 / HR: 3 / RBI: 9 / BA: .303 / OBP: .410 / SLG: .500 / OPS: .910. The second is these quotes the Tribune and Sun-Times bring us.  Let’s be honest: Paul Sullivan, Gordon Wittenmyer and Phil Rogers are not exactly the greatest sportswriters.  They are grubbing for quotes and cornering a tired, beaten down Bradley for quotes that will make him look bad night after night.  Could you deal with it?  I would lash out for sure, and in all reality Bradley hasn’t even done that.  He’s just answered honestly.

So if you want to boo Bradley when he screws up a play in the field or strikes out in an important late-inning situation, then by all means indulge.  But if you hate Bradley personally based on either his play on the field or his personality, relax.  He’s just a regular guy going to work everyday and being attacked from all sides.  Instead of hating, why not just enjoy the hilariousness of the quotes that the Cubs writers are able to cobble together from their interrogations of him.  Here’s a few recent ones:

On why he came to Chicago: “Ain’t nothing I’d rather do. If I could do anything, one, I might cure the lupus my aunt has; two, another aunt got both legs cut off because of diabetes; I might give her legs back. But No. 3 on the list would be win a championship in this city so that people can have what they deserve. The good people. The bad people can jump on the bandwagon when the time comes. But everything in my heart is to win a championship here. And I ain’t done yet.”

On racial taunts from Cubs fans: “America doesn’t believe in racism,” he said sarcastically before repeating the remark.

On being the victim of racial slurs from the bleachers: “All I’m saying is I just pray the game is nine innings, so I can be out there the least amount of time as possible and go home,” he said.

In reference to the Cubs losing 15-6 to the Nationals: “We got a Rodney King beatdown tonight.”

He does seem a little preoccupied with the racial issue, but who am I to say that he shouldn’t be?  It is the official stance of NQTC that there are most likely racist Cubs fans in the bleachers, and if I were in Bradley (or Jacque Jones) position, I’d be pissed off too.  So we can boo him when he under-performs (hell, I even made the case for booing him), but let’s not judge too harshly.  You know when you just have a terrible day all around, and then you come home and you forgot to DVR some show and that makes you fly off the handle and go crazy, but really it wasn’t the DVR thing but just everything that has happened all day?  That’s like the Cubs and Milton Bradley.  You can blame Bradley if you want, but that wasn’t really the central issue, was it?

So everyone is making a big deal out of Cubs fans booing Milton Bradley in the first 6 weeks of the season.  Some are looking to blame blogs, and some just think the booing is inappropriate.  Either way the question of whether Cubs fans are too quick to boo has arisen again.

Booing is not necessarily a bad thing, however.  Everyone’s gut reaction to it is that its insensitive and/or just plain rude.  The argument that always appeals to me is when someone says, “How would you like it if you were doing shitty at your job and 10s of 1000s of people gathered around your little cubicle and booed you?”  The problem with that is, at least at my job, I’m not being paid $30 million dollars to be accountable to the entire City.

Booing can be a reflection of an intelligent fan base.  Cubs fans get so much shit for being “too loyal” to the team, even when the team trots out miserable squads year after year.  Well just because we love baseball and are willing to watch a 65 win team all summer doesn’t mean we are idiots.  If someone deserves to be booed, then Cubs fans will boo them.

Which brings me back to Milton Bradley.  He knows what he signed up for.  He signed a gigantic multi-year deal and with those kinds of things come expectations.  As he even put it himself after last night’s home run:

”I didn’t come here to suck. I know I’ve sucked so far, but give me some love, you know what I’m saying? I am a Cub.”

I mean we love you as a Cub, but you’re going to need to start hitting and earn that contract.

So why was it not okay to boo Jacque Jones and okay to boo Milton?  Expectations.  Jacque Jones signed a 3-year $16 million dollar deal.  He had been the kind of guy that hit about .285 with 20 home runs a year before he signed that contract.  Not to say that isn’t a huge contract, but when he struggled in April by hitting around .230 Cubs fans mercilessly booed him.  It was 1 month and he wasn’t supposed to be an all-star.  Bradley’s contract is twice that and he has been even worse, hitting well below .200.

I guess my point is it’s ok to boo Bradley, but booing Jones wasn’t cool.  Unless I’m completely wrong and Cubs fans are just racist.