Today's Sports Stars Get Booed for Acting Human When Hurt
This year, as the fall football season was beginning and the summer tennis season was drawing to a close, two of these sports’ brightest stars, Andrew Luck, the Indianapolis Colts All-Pro quarterback, and Novak Djokovic, the defending U.S. Open tennis champion, found themselves booed by fans who once cheered them.
What Luck and Djokovic had done was announce that because of injuries they were withdrawing from competition. Luck’s decision was momentous. He told fans that he was retiring from professional football. Djokovic’s decision was limited to the U.S. Open. In the midst of his fourth-round match against Stan Wawrinka, Djokovic announced that the pain in his injured shoulder would not allow him to continue.
Sports fans are notoriously fickle, but the booing of Luck and Djokovic reflects more than fickleness. It is part of a cultural change in fan expectations. Fans are increasingly angry when star athletes let their personal lives (even when they involve health issues) interfere with their professional lives.