Fans disappoint with boos

The life of a heckler isn't too shabby. From your seat, you can yell, boo, harass and try all other avenues of expression in attempts to embarrass the poor soul who has incurred your wrath. \nOf course, you must be careful who you heckle, just ask seven AIDS activists who created a scene during one of President Bush's many campaign stops prior to November's election. The Secret Service, doing their job to protect the President, removed the hecklers from the crowd, grabbing some women by their hair and another by her bra straps. Just be thankful that around Assembly Hall, the only people who might stop heckling are elderly men and women wearing crimson vests helping you locate your seats. \nI'm going to throw something at y'all I don't normally do: sarcasm.\nBravo for booing Sean Kline when he took off his warm-ups at the scorers' table. Bravo for booing Sean Kline when he hurt himself scraping and battling for an important rebound. Bravo, I bet you're proud. \nI have failed to find a quote from any player where he/she attributed booing home fans to an increase in motivation or production. \nWhen you boo "your" team, you are simply rooting against them -- it's as simple as that. \nAll too often in sports, heckling has become a sport in itself. The interaction between fans and athletes has taken a turn for the worst. One can look no further than to this season's crowd melee in Detroit, where heckling transformed into battery. \nThough good old-natured booing is tradition and shouldn't be outlawed, to heckle a college athlete on his home court is indefensible. The fact that Kline is a 22-year-old Hoosier native, playing basketball for the team he grew up idolizing, seems to have been ignored. They forget Kline was a warrior for the Hoosier frontcourt last year before he tore his ACL, constantly battling against larger and more talented foes. It takes a brave man to stand in front of a crowd he expects to be supportive and watch them turn hostile. \nKline isn't even safe on thefacebook.com, as three groups founded on the Web site delegate their efforts to bash Kline. There's the "I Hate Sean Kline" group, the "I Hate Sean Kline Club" group and the "SKS (Sean Kline Sucks)" group. In all, a total of 64 students belong to one of these three groups cursing the 6-foot-8 junior.\nMike Davis, himself subject to the boo birds this season, assessed the situation appropriately.\n"When you talk about a kid who has had major surgery on his knee, and the way the fans reacted to him is really embarrassing," Davis said. "He's trying the best he can ... Everybody we put on the floor that has an Indiana jersey on, you should support him."\nCoach Davis and Kline will be glad to hear however that there is the "Official Sean Kline Fan Club" which boasts 12 members, including Kline himself and teammates Adam Ahfeld and Lucas Steijn. After Wednesday night's disgraceful display by IU "fans," I'm glad to announce the club's membership has increased to 13.