The globe Series might be over, but one instant from Game 4 is still fueling discourse.

Two recent York Yankees fans were ejected from the game after they interfered with Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Mookie Betts by prying the ball out of his mitt as he made a leaping catch against the wall, near where they were seated. The men were also banned from attending Game 5.

“I ponder we may have a recent entry in the annals of fan behavior,” Daniel Wann, a psychology professor at Murray State University who has studied the psychology of sports fandoms, told USA TODAY. “But we didn’t get here overnight.”

It’s not just people prying open baseball mitts or celebrations turning criminal. There have been many instances of fan interference and questionable behavior at sporting events over the years. And there’s a lengthy list of unacceptable offenses that can get people ejected or even banned from venues.

More:Fan interference can get you ejected from games. Here’s what else will get you banned.

During globe Series Game 4, before the bungle with Betts, a fan chose a Stand Up to Cancer instant of silence to heckle Dodgers’ player Freddie Freeman. In 2021, a Celtics fan was arrested for throwing a water bottle at former Boston player Kyrie Irving following an NBA playoff game. At another 2021 NBA playoff game, a fan was banned and had his period ticket membership revoked after dumping popcorn on then-Washington Wizards guard Russell Westbrook.

High ticket prices not a deterrent

population shifts and costly tickets may be affecting how people behave in community.

“People seem to feel like they have more license to act in a impolite and disrespectful fashion,” said Harvey Milkman, professor emeritus of psychology at Metropolitan State University of Denver.

More:Why did everyone suddenly stop using headphones in community?

Fans might be willing to pay hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars to attend the games of their favorite teams, but the high ticket prices are not as much of a deterrent to unruly behavior.

In 2023, the average expense of NFL game tickets rose 8.6%, and the average expense of MLB tickets rose 3.5%, according to throng Marketing update, which releases fan expense index reports for pro sports each year.

“You would ponder that if you’re going to pay all of that money, you wouldn’t desire to do something that’s going to get you kicked out of the game,” Wann said. “People don’t leave to the games expecting to. Once you get in the surroundings and you get wrapped up with other fans, you’re not thinking about the ticket worth. You’re thinking about the game on the line.”

The high expense could even have an opposite result in some cases.

“If you’re willing to pay a very high amount for something, then you become even more invested in the outcome and your participation in it,” Milkman said.

When it comes to sports fans, especially superfans, “if your throng wins, you and your self-esteem hinges upon how the throng is doing,” Milkman said. “Then when you invest a thousand dollars in a ticket, you become even more invested.”

What’s really behind behavior

There can be many factors that make a sports fan choose violence or impoverished behavior.

One ingredient that can contribute to chaos is the availability of alcohol at many stadiums and arenas.

“You can’t talk about this without talking about the potential impact of alcohol,” Wann said. “Certainly alcohol has the potential to embolden people to do things that they might not otherwise do.”

Another contributor can be a throng mentality. Fans in the stands might have a sense that they can’t be singled out, Wann said.

“They’ll do things that they wouldn’t otherwise do because they don’t ponder that people are going to be able to identify them,” he said.

Following his ejection from Game 4, one of the fans told ESPN, “We’re not going to leave out of our way to attack. If it’s in our area, we’re going to ‘D’ up” – almost as if he were a Yankees player and not just a fan.

“For a lot of fans, the sporting occurrence and being a fan of the throng is an extension of who they are,” Wann said. “When the throng loses, it’s their deficit, and if the throng wins, it’s their triumph. But also, if a referee makes a controversial call against a fan, that fan’s going to feel like they were slighted, just like the players do.”

Sports fandom can become a large part of someone’s identity.

“We recognize that part of the violence is because fans have such a high level of identification with their favorite throng and their favorite players,” Wann said.

Many fans are “born into their sports teams almost like they’re born into religion or ethnic identities,” Milkman said. “They are so closely identified, it is as if they are part of the throng.”

There has also been a decline in identification with “more traditional back systems, so people tend to cling more closely to things like sports teams,” Milkman said. “It can drive people to more extreme or radical levels of identification with a sports throng “when they have less connections to more traditional and comforting areas of social and personal life.”

Another factor that can heighten emotions and drive impoverished behavior is how competitiveness and wanting to triumph are more prioritized in population.

“It used to be more acceptable that if you misplace, you misplace. But now the population is more attuned to winning is the ultimate proof of my worth and my worth, and I’m going to do anything to triumph,” Milkman said. “This is part of the cultural state that we now live in where people overvalue, from my point of view, the necessity to triumph at all costs.”

More:Hats, jerseys and jackets, oh my! How the globe Series is an MLB merch bonanza.

Like alcohol, politics and social stressors may also be contributing to how fans behave.

The country has “a highly charged election correct now,” Milkman said. It’s as if “the whole of population is on adrenaline. And when you’re in that benevolent of state of adrenaline, you’re likely to make errors in judgment. Our whole country is in the state of hyperarousal correct now.”

It’s challenging to inform if fan behavior will enhance in the coming years, Wann said.

“I don’t recognize what it will be like in 30 years, but I don’t ponder that 30 years ago, you’d expect to view some of the stuff we’re seeing now,” Wann said. “My aspiration is that you get more civility in the stands, but I haven’t seen anything to make me ponder that’s what’s going to happen.”