Tagged: fanhood

It’s EASY Being a Yankees Fan

No offense Jane, your Yankees are one of the top 5 greatest franchises in the history of sports. In fact, if you put the Yankees against Denmark in anything, I’d pick the Yankees.

But it’s easy being a Yankees fan.

It’s easy because it doesn’t take any work.
There’s no agony in being a Yankees fan, no frustration, no heartbreak.
And please… Not winning the world series every year doesn’t qualify as “heartbreak.”

They’re winners, and Yankees fans are passionate, I’ll give you that much.
But talk to a Cubs fan, talk to a Sox fan prior to ’04, most of all, talk to a Phillies fan.

Cubs fans have come to the point where they’re selling their loyalty on EBAY.
Red Sox nation had gotten to a place where they expected to lose, and the phrase “wait until next year” lost all meaning.
Phillies fans, though, had a different dynamic.

We can’t always be called as “supportive.” When our teams aren’t playing well, we let them know. But we’re always there, and we always believe. This year’s championship was a surprise to no one in the city of Philadelphia, we knew it would happen, we just didn’t know when.  We never gave up, never game in, never assumed the worst.

The Yanks have had problems the last few years. But who else can you blame but the Yankees themselves. For some inexplicable reason, their entire team dynamic has all but disappeared and their solution to the problem is the same every year. It’s like a doctor who keeps prescribing a medicine for a disease when it hasn’t worked the last eight times he prescribed it.

Why, I don’t know. But this year looks to be exactly the same thing. They’re probably going to sign CC Sabathia, maybe Mark Texieira and who knows, Manny as well. What the hey? Why not, right? But based on the last few seasons, I don’t think anything will change.

How does it feel Yankees fans? How does it feel to always be excited about what your new free agent will do this season?

From my perspective, being a Yankees fan is like being a rich teenager. You crash your convertible so daddy just buys you a new one.

Being a Phillies fan, or a Cubs fan or a Sox fan is like being the teenager who gets the hand-me-down Jetta. It’s nice. Not very flashy, not very fast but it’s reliable and we’ll drive it until it’s last dying sputter.

Keep your convertibles. If it doesn’t work again this year, maybe Hank will buy you a Hummer next year.

Fanhood

I take a lot of heat for being a Phillies fan. If its not the fact that we have 10,000 losses it’s the fact that we have a tiny ballpark or that we’re cholk-artists. I thought that winning the world series would change all that. I guess I was wrong.

Now I am relentlessly accused of being a “bandwagon jumper.”

I wear my 2008 post-season Phillies sweatshirt wherever I go along with the 2008 world series championship hat. I’ve been waiting for this since I was 8 years-old. Ever since Joe Carter hit the homerun off Mitch Williams. I want to show my pride and excitement for my beloved Phillies; a team my family has cheered on for 50 years, and I want to show it for more than just a week.

Aside from the Phillies, I am a fan of sports more than I am a fan of individual teams. My year runs on three seasons instead of four: Baseball, Football, Basketball. The year begins in January with NFL playoffs to the superbowl, then transitions to the second half of the NBA season followed by the playoffs (which seem to last three and a half years) mixed with opening day of baseball. I ride baseball all summer long and will hardly pay any attention to football until the Phillies are out of it. During each of these seasons, I get into “modes” where I don’t care about any other sports but the mode I am in.

Here it is November, a time when I am usually knee deep in NFL and college football, and I can’t get baseball off my mind. I still pick up a baseball bat and take practice swings in my living room and I keep bugging my friends to have a catch.

What bugs me though is how other people can call me a bandwagon jumper and ignore the entire Tampa Bay fan-base. Until this season, the Tampa Bay Rays’ fan-base consisted of Dick Vitale and the collection of team mothers (most of them, at least). Yet somehow, Tropicana Field was flooded with people sporting ray-hawks and cowbells. If that’s not a stadium full of bandwagon jumpers, I don’t know what is.

To find out, ask anyone with a ray-hawk to name the starting lineup from last year. Then you’ll know.

I watched a lot of people claim to be Red Sox fans in 2004, a lot of which were Marlins fans the year before. I really have no problem with it. If a great postseason like 2004 or 2008 converts you, admit it. Just don’t claim to be a lifelong fan and act like you were in agony for 100 years.

I haven’t quite waited a century to see my team win it all; and the curse of Billy Penn doesn’t quite measure up to the curse of the Bambino. But I finally have a reason to justify wearing a Phillies cap outside of eastern PA without getting laughed at, and I’ll do it with dignity.

I’ve earned it.
Philadelphia has earned it.

So please, don’t call me a bandwagon jumper just because my team won and your team lost. That’s not very good Fanhood.

~SL