Spring is here again and again I must answer the same question over and over - How can you be from NYC and hate the Yankees. Well to be honest with you, it isn't all that hard, but to be fair I don't particularly hate the Yankees...I hate Yankee fans. Not real Yankee fans mind you, but the drones that wear "Got Rings" t-shirts but can't name three starting pitchers. When I was a kid we went to Yankee games, actually we now can say when I was a kid we went to the old Yankee stadium, because we had no money and the bleachers were only $1.50. All we had to do was scrounge up six quarters and jump the turnstile and there we were in a sud o prison in right center field. Unable to enter the real ballpark, we might as well be floating in a barge in the Hudson. It was a vast array of New York's weirdest, and even as a pre-teen I knew I felt at home in that element.

In those days there was hardly anybody going to games. While the Yankee faithful stayed away in droves there we stood twelve year old Met fans side by side with the cowbell guy and drunk Ernesto chanting "we didn't come in last" after the last out of the season. I even rooted for the Yanks in '96, partly because the Braves are Satan's team and Bobby Cox beats his wife and partly because of NYC pride being in Florida at the time. I'll never forget the night they clinched, it was Fantasy Fest in Key West and myself, Marky from The Point and Bill Barry from Manucci's were working Rum Runners. The theme of the parade was "Call of the Wild" and all we were wearing were grass skirts. I took things a step further as I am sometimes known to do and painted myself black. I had bones in my hair and a pitchfork which I used to poke some Atlanta fans in front of my DJ booth.

The championships kept coming and so did more fans with smug t-shirts and little knowledge. By the time the subway series came around I had full detest for all things Yankee. At one point I even took a customer's hat off his head and placed it swiftly up my buttocks. I preceded to pour drinks like that for a full inning. By the time the Marlins beat the Yankees on a future Fantasy Fest night I was in full ecstasy on the bar spraying champagne for the hometown Fish.

Now being a little older and a little less drunk baseball has lost a lot of it's luster for me. The players seem to bounce around more, the new guy on "This Week in Baseball" don't sound as good and both stadiums are gone. I haven't been to Citi Field but I heard you can't see right field from your seat, so they got that going for them....which is nice. I'll probably never go to "The House that Pavano Built" but it looks like some things never change. I saw a clip of fans in $200 seats making fun of fans in $2,500 seats, two rows away like we did to the box seat yuppies in right field from the bleachers. I also saw that Nick Swisher spent most of opening day chatting with fans. Back then we had Ricky Henderson telling us how good he was.....By the way the answer was good enough to win 80 games.

VINNY K is a stand-up comic, radio host and local DJ.
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