Baseball Fans Trend: Why Other Athletes Never Hawked Loogies

TORONTO - The internet hit pause in 2025 to ask the critical question: Why do Toronto Blue Jays and other baseball players spit so much? Leading to even more speculation on why hockey, basketball, football and other athletes don't do the same. The answer to the latter is easy, before tobacco products were historically banned in Major League Baseball, athletes from runners to swimmers had already discovered that the practice just didn't work for them.

In hockey, for example, brown saliva would freeze to the ice and be mistaken for the puck. In basketball, brown wooden floor plus brown tobacco spittle created the equivalent of black ice on a highway in winter. The accidents just kept piling up. For football, it was the helmets. In pools, the water became too stained to see through. And in the Winter Olympics of 2014, tragedy struck on the ski slopes.

Fast-forward to today, when players have traded tobacco for sunflower seeds, and the practice has taken on a life of its own. "Spitting seeds has escalated to levels we never saw back when I was trying out as a rookie in 2016," said Walter James, who didn't make the cut due to a nicotine allergy. "Today, it has become a form of art. So, some players will be remembered more for their ability execute a Phlegm Pharaoh, a Saliva SmackDown, or plain old Spit Roast than for their home runs."

Rookies top off the spit bucket for time-honored "loogie shower" of their coach.