It's hard for us Pittsburghers to keep up our end of the bargain--what without our having neither a professional basketball nor baseball team. What? ... What was that? ... Who? ... Seriously ... since when? ... No shit. The Pirates! ... I thought they were a farm club.
Anyway ... apparently we Pittsburghers do have a baseball club. Aside from that, though, we've been doing a pretty good job of late, giving our beloved Keystone State the Super Bowl and Stanley Cup this year. Now, you have us the World Series last year, but you have got to repeat!
The fate of the free world depends on it! The Yankees are evil and represent all that is wrong with the world. You gotta win!
DAMN YANKEES!!!
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The Phillies are an easier team to root for since they are built from the farm system with trades and free agents filling in the holes. (I know Jeter, Posada and Rivera were brought up through the Yankee farm system, but It seems that the Yankees try to buy the best team (and as you said Bill why us non-Yankee fans loathe the Yankees).
If the Yankees win though, it's arguable that the most popular teams nationally won the NFL, NBA and MLB championships.
Mark, so was Pettitte, Joba, Hughes... in fact 11 players on the Yankee roster came up through their system (compared to the Phillies 9). The Yankees have one of the top farm systems in all of baseball.
The hate on the Yankees is just amazing to me. Us Yankee fans are all bad.. Why the bad wrap? Go Yankees!!! (BTW, my hubby is a Philly's fan. Fun in my house!)
Mark--
No! No quarter for the Yankees! Ever!!!
Sue--
Ya know I love ya, I love your new boots, I love Ersen, and I even respect your love of the G-Men. But on this issue, for the next 3-6 games, my love most definitely has to go to your husband.
As to why, I'll respond in a later post. Promise.
Even if I hadn't grown up in eastern PA, I suspect I'd find the Phillies easier to root for here. In a way, the Yankees and Phillies have been total opposites for most of their history. Both have been around since the dawn of the Major Leagues, but while the Yankees have been fabulously successful for most of that time, the Phillies have generally been somewhere between bad and godawful. It's only since the mid-1970s that they've started to be competitive. They were in the Series twice before 1980, and lost both times.
As for why I don't like the Yankees, part of it is how successful they've been. Another part of it is that their profligate use of the free agent market, plus their large farm system, demonstrates the inequality between big market teams like the Yankees (and the Phillies, ironically) and the small clubs like Kansas City.
Bill, I often use Pirate's fans as an example when defending the Yankees.... "I know, I know they spend a lot of money, and I often don't agree with their decisions (A-rod), but Steinbrenner is just their biggest fan and will do anything to help them win. Anything. His tragic flaw is that he loves them too much and the Yankee franchise makes too much money. Ask a Pirate's fan if they wouldn't rather have that problem than owners that do nothing in an off season after a 68-94 season. Their mixed bag of local company-owners don't care about the team, they just care about money."
Cujo: Agreed, there is inequality. That's the fault of baseball, not the Yankees. And, I would argue that NY is an expensive place to live. Now I'm not saying that the disparity in salaries is exactly proportionate, but lawyers who live in NY DO make more money than Lawyers who live in Philly. A lot more. Bank tellers who live in NY make a lot more than bank tellers who live in Philly. A million dollars is a lot of money in Philly, but in NY, that's not going to get you very far.
My final argument on this issue is history. My parents were immigrants, so I didn't grow up in a home with impassioned fans of any team, but this was the 80s and the Mets were winning and the Yankees were terrible. The Mets had Doc Gooden, Keith Hernandez and Gary Carter and they were the stars of the town and the Yankees had a very frustrated Don Mattingly. I chose to root for the Yankees,though, because of their history. Because of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, and Yogi Berra. Any fan of baseball has to respect that history.
Damn Sue, you pulled the Immigrant Card on me?! Well, being the son of an immigrant myself, I guess I have to respect that. I was also a Muck the Fets-er back in the '80s. You're also very right about the Pirates' ownership. They can only make a profit by continuously gutting the team, and they ONLY care about making a profit.
All that said ... well, as I said, I'll write a post about it all later.
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