Yanks-Sawxes

Since I had family in town last week, I thought it would be cool to take 'em out to The Bronx for the renewal of the most bitter rivalry in sports, Yankees-Red Sox. My aunt and cousin are big baseball fans so it was a real treat for them to see what can only be described as the most exciting baseball games one can really attend.

The games are exciting not because of the teams (I really have no rooting interest, except a slight Red Sox skew since the Yankees are the Evil Empire), but because of the spirit of the fans. It is a lot of fun to look at all the homemade "Boston Sucks" t-shirts, the leaflets being handed out with the boxscore detailing a Yankee drubbing at the hands of the Red Sox in 1995, etc. You would never expect to go into Yankee Stadium and expect 1/2 of the stadium to begin chanting "Let's Go....Red Sawwwx" in the top of the 5th inning. But that's precisely what happened on Saturday afternoon just before Edgar Renteria launched a Paul Quantrill pitch into left-center for a grand slam. Of course, as Renteria was rounding the bases, the cheers were suddenly drowned out by a chant of "Let's Go....Yankees" in retort. Later in the inning, Sox Nation was treated to a three-run jack by Trot Nixon, which effectively put the game out of reach, in what would become a 17-1 Red Sox laugher.

We stayed until the bitter end, but enjoyed watching the beer-infused back-and-forth between groups of fans. The derisive "Let's Go... Ass-hole" chant every time Manny Ramirez stepped into the batter's box was my personal favorite. There were a couple of small fights, but it was mostly just a lot of loud talk, heckling and some occassional good-natured ribbing. To be clear, the good-natured banter is very occassional. Usually, it's mean, brutal and funny. But it seems to rarely boil over into anything dangerous. The hatred is real and genuine. It's not uncommon to hear a child hurl verbal abuse at his or her enemy, only to go uncorrected by his or her accompanying parent.

Good stuff.