How could I ever root for the New York Yankees?
As I get older and start to put down roots in New York I realize that I want to get back into baseball. And that means picking a team. Now, ‘picking’ a team sounds a bit awkward and even antithetical to concept of fandom. It’s like picking a family. Either you’re born into it. Or thrust into it by fate and circumstance. But devoting yourself to a team is too mystical and irrational to just ‘pick.’
Still, I sorta need to pick.
When I was a kid, really until I went to college, I was a huge baseball fan. A football fan too. But really a baseball fan. I was born in St. Louis, which means I started out as a Cardinals fan. Then we moved to Los Angeles where my Dad slowly evolved into a Dodgers fan. So I was a Dodgers fan too, but always as much an Angels fan, even though my Dad, I think, found the Angels somehow a bit light and airy, perhaps just unserious, certainly not an institution worthy of real devotion.
(For those who don’t follow baseball, the California Angels were an early baseball expansion team. They only go back to the early 60s.)
Perhaps because of this lack of full and unconflicted attachment to either team, for many years, as a kid I became seriously devoted to the Pittsburgh Pirates, even though I’ve never had any connection whatsoever to the city. And I’m not sure I’ve even been to Pittsburgh save for a train stop or plane layover.
Then, at 18, I left for the east coast. I lived in New Jersey for five years. Then Rhode Island for five years. Then Boston for almost three more years. Then DC five and a half more. And now New York for about a year and a half. Somehow with all the moving and distraction of trying to figure out what to do with my life and how to make something of myself, I just lost the addiction. I dabbled with the Phillies. A bit with the Red Sox. But, somehow, it was just never long enough for it to take.
Watching a movie last night about the Boston Red Sox, I was a little surprised to consider and remember that in almost a decade living in New England I never once made it to a game at Fenway Park. But that’s the past. Now I’m here. So what to do? New York is a great baseball city. No longer four three teams, sure. But two.
But the Yankees? Becoming a Yankees fan seems almost like apostasy. Dodger fans grow up hating the Yankees. Cardinal fans to a lesser degree. But still a lot of the same. And in any case, they win too much. What makes humans objects of love or devotion or care is almost always their imperfections, the weaknesses and flaws. They are what makes us human rather than mere statues. Admiration and awe for perfection, sure. But the Yanks seem all about breaking other teams’ dreams.
Having your team win all the time is great. Believe me, I love it. But picking a team that wins all the time is just too easy. Even a bit cheap.
Now, my wife, who immigrated to this country as a small child, grew up on Long Island. So to the extent she has a team, it’s the Mets. And this is her recommendation to me. But they seem rather like the Angels, too new, somehow manufactured, really neither here nor there in the grand scheme of things. (The Mets are another expansion team.)
So I throw it out to you. Yanks fans, what do you suggest? Mets fan? Maybe even those of you who’ve moved here and there and fallen permanently out of love. Give me your thoughts.
