I’m a city boy (aside from a few multi-month stints of living on farms, in the jungle, etc.) but for reasons beyond my control I live in the now infamous Coon Rapids. Coon Rapids is named after Coon Creek, which in turn was named after the Racoons feeding there on the day they decided to name the creek. We are famous for having a very important Dam on the Mississippi. And now, we are famous for the most embarrassing moment in amateur sports this year.

After a bruising 9-2 loss Wednesday in the Little League World Series, two of the team’s star players were captured on ESPN spitting into their hands before exchanging handshakes with the team from Chandler, Ariz.

[star tribune]

Ouch.

Torii Hunter of the Minnesota Twins after a brutal bad pitch during a game earlier this year. For details go here.

This is not a Minnesota thing. In fact, we are known for our good sportsmanship. This year, Torii Hunter, Minnesota Twins center fielder (and excellent hitter), was whacked in the head by a pitch on two separate occasions (the first and second head-hits of his career). I clearly remember one of these events. He was hit square on the head. There was a moment when he glared at the pitcher, shifted his feet in a manner suggesting that the next thing he was going to do was to run at the pitcher and whack him back. Just for a moment. Then he relaxed, doubled over in pain, etc. etc. Hunter seems to be the kind of guy who, if he did ever strike back in a moment like this, would regret it for the rest of his life. He seems like the kind of guy who does not have a mean bone in his body.

But while his temperament may be nice rather than nasty, I hope it is also true that years of professional sports training and activity has also contributed to a professional, appropriately detached attitude towards the game. These kids on the Coon Rapids little league team … the ones who spit in their hands … clearly lack this temperament, or perhaps have been badly trained by their parents and coaches. But now that they have been deeply humiliated, indeed, marked as bad sports, they face the challenge of turning around their attitudes and making this embarrassing event truly ancient history. Hopefully this will be the last such incident for these players and for this team.

But I have to say that this did not surprise me. I live in Coon Rapids. Coon Rapids is different than, say, South Minneapolis. If you walk around in South, and you see someone you don’t know, that person is more likely than not to greet you with a “Hello” or a “Nice day.” Coon Rapids is not a “small town” either. It is very white, working class, xenophobic, utterly lacking in charm or any other trait that one might associate with a nice place to be. Coon Rapids is where you go to listen to the sounds of the trailer trash night. Screaming crotch rockets, burning rubber, the crash and tinkle of beer bottles being tossed out of windows.

Not long ago a neighbor, Gerald Whaley, … a recluse who lived in a house everyone thought was abandoned … shot to death a young boy who had wandered into the house on a dare. Whaley claims he was awakened by a noise near the door of his bedroom, reached for the loaded firearm he kept with him as he slept, and fired. One shot and the young boy was dead. The one person interviewed on the news about it … another neighbor … said “Its a good thing this happened. This’ll teach kids to not prowl around people’s houses at night. If he had come into my house, I would have done the same thing.” This incident has been used in pro-gun literature since then.

Holy crap. When I was a kid we did that too. We used to dare each other to go inside of one of the abandoned houses in our neighborhood. We were afraid of ghosts and bogeymen living in them. I’m so glad I did not grow up in Coon Rapids.

My point is this: I agree with the people saying that when we consider the bad behavior of these two little leaguers, we need to remember that they are very young. Yes, young, stupid and obnoxious, and they can definitely grow out of this. But we also need to remember that they are part of a community. A community that has its own self-made and self-maintained culture. Likely, this would not have have happened were this the Whittier School Little League (a school in South Minneapolis) or, I suspect, a southern team (southern culture does not involve spitting in one’s hands). But ugly sportsmanship and Coon Rapids … that does not seem like a very unlikely connection.

But Coon Rapids does have at least one good thing. Wild coyotes! Have a look: