As I walked into Modell’s this morning I can’t say I was amazed at the amount of Yankee merchandise. Certainly the entire city needs to load up on championship gear. Hell, who wants to put on a raggedy nine-year-old t-shirt?
This year’s championship team definitely deserved to win the World Series. Say what you will about the $421 million price tag, this was baseball’s best team all season and proved it by dethroning the defending champs. For once in the wild card era, baseball’s two best teams slugged it out in the World Series.
These two teams are as polarizing as they come in the northeast. While I have nothing on the plight of true Mets fans, all of whom had to watch their two most hated rivals take center stage while they floundered, this was a painful series for myself. Growing up a diehard Orioles fan in the late 1990s, it was a birthright to hate the Yankees. The Evil Empire. Anyway you slice it, they represented what was wrong in sports. Since you all know where this is headed, I’ll just say the words and get it over with: Jeffrey Maier.
Living in the great “sports” state of Delaware, you get subjected to a lot of ridicule. “Do you have a commercial airport?” “Hey, what’s the team in Dover again?” You get the picture. I’ll digress with the worst part of living in the First State: you get the worse Philadelphia fans. More irrational, less informed and less hygienic. Needless to say I can’t stand Philadelphia fans either.
So this series was the perfect storm for most outsiders. Unless you were one of those “root for the city!” soulless bastards, or even worse a “root for the national league!” inbred, it was a waiting game until the series ended. I did my best to try and watch it as a baseball fan in general, and that failed. It left me cold and bitter inside.
The Yankees nine-year drought and woe-is-me era officially ended. I couldn’t feel happier for their fans. Let’s be honest, anytime you make the playoffs seven out of eight years, win seven division titles and two pennants. Hell, that’s like, being the Braves! Such agony can’t be reserved for New York fans. It’s obvious they deserve better.
Yankee fans can’t shake the “rich kid driving a Mercedes to high school” persona for me. I get it, you live in the greatest city in the world, so that trumps any competitive balance in baseball.
And Phillies fans suddenly became the kid whose gold-digging mother hit it big. Where were all these people in 2004? Oh that’s right, rooting for the Eagles. Up until September 2008, most of their fans couldn’t name eight players. Now I’m sure they’ll complain that the Yankees “bought” the title because that’s what Philly fans do best: blame others.
For now I’ll just sit back and wait for my Orioles 2019 Championship gear in the mail.
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