Full disclosure: I found this thread linked off Baldwin's twitter feed, so obviously I'm a supporter. That being said, I'm perplexed about the characterization of Baldwin as young, hotheaded or rash. To me, he is one of the more measured players who still engages with social media. A lot of players don't support the kind of dialogue Baldwin does, either because they don't care, don't have the intellectual chops to keep up (although alas, this doesn't stop all of them), or--like Wilson, IMO--recognize the pernicious nature of social media, the omnipresence and anonymity of which encourage bad behavior. Baldwin is willing to tangle with the beast (which the Beast himself is not, as is his prerogative), and for that I think we need, as fans, to drop any expectation that he will behave perfectly--something that isn't hard when you carefully control your social media presence, as RW does. What Baldwin and other players like him is doing is granting us access to his humanity, for better and for worse. I was very surprised to see people attacking him for his support of BB and WT3. What else would we expect? For him to throw his teammates under the bus? That team works because it is a brotherhood. It will continue to work for that reason. Casting someone out, trashing them publicly, is counter-intuitive to the locker room culture Carroll is trying to create. So I don't blame Baldwin for reacting defensively at what he saw as a slew of nasty, personal attacks against people who are like family to him. If you wish he had different opinions, fine. He's entitled to his opinions just as you are to yours, without anyone judging the maturity of anyone else's thoughts. Just because he's one player willing to put his ideas out there doesn't mean you have to agree, or even read them. Save the name-calling for the farty-whiners
and GO HAWKS!
