MLB on FOX reporter, baseball writer, and MLB Network insider Ken Rosenthal has used a photo of himself with the Phillie Phanatic as his Twitter avatar for more than a year, and it just rubbed some Nats fans the wrong way.
So self-styled “Nationals Overtweeter” @JackoBeam challenged Rosenthal to consider a Nationals-themed avatar instead for 2013. Rosenthall’s response: “Try me.”
JackoBeam called on fellow Nats fan Allan Petersen (Twitter @ambp77) to come up with an alternative. Petersen, who maintains a Tumbler feed devoted to Photoshopped images of the Washington Nationals, went to work, inserting both Rosenthal and new racing president William Howard Taft into a finish line photo, embellished with Rosenthal’s trademark bow ties.
Rosenthal approved.
“#Nationals fans were tired of my old Avatar showing me and the #Phillies Phanatic,” Rosenthal Tweeted. “I challenged them to come up with a new one. They did!”
All in good fun, right?
What followed was almost instant assault by Phillies fans (most of whom apparently did not watch the NL Playoffs). Here’s just a sampling of responses in the first hour, and they just keep coming…
@MannicM @Ken_Rosenthal congratulations on losing the respect of millions of phillies fans and gaining that of the 10 nats fans 😛
@MikeCorson @Ken_Rosenthal as a Phillies fan, I am now annoyed
@joejaws75 @Ken_Rosenthal perfect. When they finish behind the Phillies don’t switch back we don’t want you. #natsfansarefrontrunners
@beef5669 @Ken_Rosenthal Wait the #Nationals have fans?????
@Rodeojones000 @Ken_Rosenthal Additional proof that Nats fans are whining babies. It’s like giving in to 5-yr-old who cries for candy at the supermarket.
@Eric_Devlin @Ken_Rosenthal go back to the phanatic! Those chumps in Dc aren’t real fans
@Rodeojones000 @Ken_Rosenthal A better avatar would have been you injecting PEDs into their cheating, 21-game-winning pitcher.
@Woody2219 @Ken_Rosenthal Wash can’t sell out that stadium w/out the Phillies coming to town. Let’s not forget their over paid/rated rf. werthless!
@JFusfield @Ken_Rosenthal Phanatic > racing presidents. We all know this
@formtackling @Ken_Rosenthal nationals have fans?
@Woody2219 @Ken_Rosenthal u can change ur avatar, but everybody knows who the best mascot is. DC will always b 2nd best to philly!
@mager_ryan @Ken_Rosenthal lets make this clear the nats have one great season and think there #1 us phillies fans ran this division for the past 7 year
@RiOTMaK3Rx09 @Ken_Rosenthal typical to jump on the #Nats bandwagon now like the rest of their “fans”. You’ll be back Kenny!!! #Phillies4Life
@beef5669 @Ken_Rosenthal Ken did you see last years playoffs? All the #National fans still had tags on their hats and jerseys so the can be returned.
@seedanwrite @Ken_Rosenthal Nats fans just started watching baseball like five months ago- why care about them?
@LiamJ55 @Ken_Rosenthal all five #Nationals fans?
@BallBagSteve @Ken_Rosenthal if nats fans asked you to jump off a bridge would you? Come on ken, ur better than that. Nats are fake fans anyway
@ScotLarrimore @Ken_Rosenthal “Nationals Fans?” There’s more than one?
@neenerburns @Ken_Rosenthal Nats fans will always find something to whine about. 95% of the time, it has to do with the Phillies. #newrivalry
@kcwacko @Ken_Rosenthal I don’t know Ken we have 50,000+ every nite at the bank . We have another 8,000 at wash. They only have 10,000 fans max
@mattyjoneill @Ken_Rosenthal thats bogus! They win one year and u change it, BOGUS! #philsaresleeperthisyear
@11thFloorZack @Ken_Rosenthal couldn’t you have at least let a real fanbase choose the picture? Like fans that actually attend their playoff games?
@phillyaws @Ken_Rosenthal no way they could come up with a photo of a full stadium
@BigDaddy_NOLT @Ken_Rosenthal as the phillie phanatic zooms past them all on his quad to steal the victory! #phillies
@3Sculli @Ken_Rosenthal the “Phillie Phanatic” u mean and I guess the 18,000 Nats fans are proud now!
and one voice of reason:
@EthianD @Ken_Rosenthal I must admit, the new avatar is pretty awesome…even if u are a bandwagon jumper! #traitor #longlivethephanatic
LET TEDDY WIN 
Hahaha…all this over a twitter avatar. They sense their time in the spotlight is over.
Didn’t Rosenthal grow up in northeast philly a phillies fan? Now can we see a list of all the ridiculous comments that made this guy switch his avatar in first place?
I am a Phillies fan since 1958 … very loyal and very eager. BUT … you fans annoyed at this need to get a life.
Umm, wait a minute, it was Washington fans who got upset about Rosenthal’s avatar in the first place, they pressure him to change, he does, and now Phillies fans are the soreheads because they don’t like it? Yeah, that’s fair. Yeah, it’s okay for one group of fans to be upset but not the other.
Fact: Phillies Nation will be stronger in the midst of a 10-year non-playoff run than Natitude ever has been or will be. Enjoy your 15 minutes – we’re the real deal and you’re just trying to be. Philadelphia is 10,000 times the sports town DC is and that’s never going to change.
Yea, and nats fans are whining babies…
You must be kidding me. Veterans stadium was as empty as any stadium in the phillies lean years. Amazing how phillies fans don’t even know their own relatively recent history
To @confused:
Sure. The full story isn’t very interesting or provocative. Somebody created a fake Ken Rosenthal Twitter account. Fake Rosenthal said he would change his avatar if @JackoBeam and @ambp77 created a new one with the racing bow-tied presidents.
This is the interaction that followed:
@JackoBeam: @Ken_Rosenthal fake Rosenthal just agreed to change his avatar to Ken w/ Racing Presidents wearing bowties if we made him one. Does real KR?
@Ken_Rosenthal: @JackoBeam Try me.
@JackoBeam @ambp77 if you make it, the real KR will use it. #believe
That’s pretty much it.
To @polittr:
Who said anybody was annoyed? Amused more like it.
To @joseph:
As shown above, nobody got upset about Rosenthal’s old avatar. I don’t recall anybody attacking the Phillies or their fans (at least not as it relates to Rosenthal’s avatar). Nope. We all just find it amusing how defensive the great Philly fan base is. As a blogger, it’s awesome.
As a long time Phillies fan all I care about is if the Phils can finish above the Nats in the standings.
OK Phillies fans, I had to look this up. Let’s talk about front running. Yes, you won a World Series and sold out the new ball park for the past five seasons, but going back through your supposedly storied fan history, in the 100 YEARS before CPB opened, there were exactly 7 seasons where you averaged even 50% of capacity. Seven. Four of those were around the playoff years of ’77-’80. One was the year of the ’93 champions. Even going back to tiny Shibe Park and the even smaller Baker Bowl, the Phillies rarely drew more than 20 to 30% capacity for the season.
The Nationals have never averaged less than 54% capacity, even in cavernous RFK Stadium, even during back-to-back 100-loss seasons. Obviously a perennial contender should be drawing closer to 100% capacity, and the Nats will now.
Am I declaring DC a baseball town? Of course not. Nobody here under the age of 40 grew up with baseball; but there are a TON more loyal Nats fans than you seem to think, and the winning tradition is just beginning. Don’t like Rizzo’s arrogance? Think we overpaid for Werth? Whine all you want, but Jayson’s is looking pretty smart right now, and the richest owner in baseball isn’t complaining. Ask any major league free agent where he’d like to be playing if he got a chance. One team’s on everybody’s list, and it ain’t yours.
Hardly an argument when 30 of those years were spent playing at Veterens Stadium
Fans don’t go for the stadium, they go for the game. if the team was winning/the fans were as great as they claim, they still would show up.
Yea alright coming from citizen bank park south!!!
LOL The Vet was known as Shea South LMFAO
Here’s the way I see it – I have no idea why Rosenthal decided to appease the Nationals fans. It was kind of dumb, but really not that big of a deal. But Phillies fans are the worst, so they completely overreacted to it.
However, the Nationals fans coming in here talking about how great their fans are – no, they’re not. I go to school in DC and I see the frontrunning first-hand. My friend became a “die-hard” Nats fan this year, and was calling or texting me a bunch to ask me about the finer rules of the game of baseball. And there are plenty more of his kind. Look around their new stadium and most of the shirts and jerseys you see feature the new logo from this year, rather than the older one from their first few years in DC, suggesting that the shirts were just purchased. So that’s the way I see it.
@Ken_Rosenthal let me guess, if the cellar dwellers Astros request a change, your game? You did have style and a sense of baseball, now that is in question. Nats fans are frauds. Phils fans are loyal, passionate and have knowledge of the game. There aren’t many cities like ours. You just got taken by DC politicians!
http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-league-stew/where-youppi-mr-met-named-top-sports-mascot-195246705.html
Mr Met; Best Mascot in sports! Lol these cocky phillies fans need to calm down. Let the presidents have they’re year.
SIDENOTE
PHILLIES FANS ARE THE BIGGEST BANWAGGON FANS IN ALL OF SPORTS!
BEFORE 2005 THEY HAD DREADFUL ATTENDANCE!
Jimmy Rollins say Phillies fans are ‘front runners’ http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/26203149/