It has been an interesting week in the Orlando City Soccer world. There has been much conversation about the press conference that took place on Monday, where the club announced new protocols for Orlando City Stadium.
They also suspended 38 fans after they hurled garbage onto the pitch during the May 13 match against Atlanta United. The frustrated City supporters were protesting some questionable decisions by the officials in a 2-1 loss that ended a six-game winning streak for Orlando.
I wanted to take a few days and get the pulse of the public about the changes the club made, however, I do not feel any differently than I did initially. I cannot help but think that Orlando City went overboard in their desire to be viewed in a positive public light.
Certainly, it is better to do too much than too little in a situation like this, but I believe that an increasing climate of political correctness influenced their decision. There is no doubt the Club had to do something, but do one and two-year suspensions really fit the crime?
While every individual case is different, this group of outcast fans as a whole are likely some of the most passionate that attend games. One has to feel a significant amount of emotion to react in such a visceral way.
Alcohol and other factors may have played a part as well in Trashgate, but there were ways for Orlando City to still make their statement. They could have suspended individuals for a portion of the remaining 2018 games or even the whole season and still made their point.
Another reason that these suspensions seem overly harsh is because of the new safety measures the club announced. The changes included a pregame fan code of conduct video, the pouring of all drinks sold in the stadium into cups and an official announcement from the public address announcer in light of another incident.
These protocols are things that are already implemented in almost every stadium or venue in professional sports. I have to think that not having these things in place is a tremendous oversight for the Orlando City gameday operations staff and that they bear a large portion of the blame for unruly fan behavior.
To his credit, team CEO Alex Leitao took personal responsibility for the incident. The team should be in a much better position going forward, but that does not change what happened.
If expectations are not set in advance for people, then you leave individuals up to their own devices to create the rules. Under those guidelines, Orlando City is at least half-culpable and when you think about it that way, it looks disingenuous for them to be so hard on fans.
Ultimately, a sports franchise has to find a balance between creating an intense home environment and maintaining order. It took Orlando City one chaotic incident for them to find a better equilibrium between those two objectives and they should have given fans a similar margin for error.
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