Justin Verlander entertained by fans’ middle finger gesture

By Alyssa Adams

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    PHILADELPHIA (KYW) — Philly sports fans always get a bad rap from opposing teams, but maybe athletes just need to have a better sense of humor? Justin Verlander shows other athletes how to be a good sport when playing in the City of Brotherly Love.

On Monday, photos surfaced of the Houston Astros pitcher giving fans the middle finger as the team bus arrived at Citizens Bank Park. Fast forward to Tuesday afternoon as Verlander was exiting the team’s bus he was again greeted by Phillies fans screaming his name.

Instead of avoiding fans and entering Citizens Bank Park, Verlander walked right into fan madness to speak with one fan in particular.

“He gets off the bus, and immediately has a huge smile on his face and just starts walking over to me,” Stephanie Di Ianni said.

Verlander recognized the Phillies fan who he exchanged middle fingers with the day before, 23-year-old Di Ianni, of South Jersey.

“I was just saying hello the Philly way and Justin Verlanders’ window was the only one not tinted, it was broken,” Di Ianni said. “As they were backing in, he just throws it up back at me and starts laughing. When he gets off the bus, I was looking at him saying hi, hello, and I flipped him off again. And he did it back and went right into the door of the stadium.”

She was hoping Verlander would remember her and maybe give her a fist bump or high five. But she got something even better.

Verlander signed a baseball for her and she says he told her they had to get a picture to “flip off the camera of course.”

“The fact that he got off the bus and immediately walked right over to me, had a huge smile on his face that was awesome,” Di Ianni said. “He could have just gave me a waved and went in with the rest of his team, but he took the time to come over and talk with me and take some pictures with me, sign my ball and just talk with me, it was really cool. He was really nice about it.”

Di Ianni gave them the middle finger in hopes someone would think it was funny, noting that the gesture was probably not nearly as bad as the things they’d heard.

“I was like what’s the harm in friendly flipping them off and everything? I’m glad he had a good sense of humor about it because it could have kind of gone really bad if he didn’t, but he just threw it right back up at me and went along with it. It was awesome,” Di Ianni said.

And that’s just what Verlander thought it was, all good fun. He posted on his Twitter account about the initial interaction, clarifying that fans did not break the window on the bus as some people claimed.

“Whole interaction was in jest as all the fans around you were just saying hello in their native tongue. So I just responded in kind. all in good fun. I enjoyed the banter. Also, nobody broke the window,” Verlander tweeted.

Verlander is scheduled to start for the Astros in Game 5 of the World Series on Thursday night at Citizens Bank Park.

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