The Key to a Rivalry: Timing
Larry Lucchino is jazzed.
No, not about the Liverpool Football Club. Well, not just about them. Larry is tickled pink because–and I hope you’re not at work as you read this because you may just start yelping loudly–the Red Sox are playing the Yankees.
I KNOW RIGHT.
Do you schedule to sit down and watch a Red Sox-Yankees contest if you’re alone in your house? Do you skip other stuff to see it? And not just other stuff on your TV, other, like, life stuff. Do you bother to stay on the game if you come upon it while flipping channels?
Seriously, do you? Because I don’t. Unless A.J. Burnett is pitching, Yankes-Sawx games are not interesting/comically inept enough to witness for all five-six hours they go on.
I live near Philly, where our rivals are supposed to be the Mets, but due to certain events, it’s actually the Giants at this point, with the Braves thrown in there as well. Now, I’ll be the first to tell you that some of the joy of baseball comes from not only your own success, but the abysmal failures of your enemies. The Mets have more than supplied these in the recent past. It’s been great. Nothing beats that image that’s still clear as day in my head, of emotionally warped New Yorkers quietly shuffling out of Shea after Tom Glavine gave up seven runs–seven–in the first inning of their final 2007 collapse.
Starting at that point, the cliche comment has become that the Mets are no longer our rivals, and that we feel bad for them moreso than we hate them. Which, to me, is utter nonsense. The rivalry doesn’t just go away. It’s still there, even if the Mets aren’t good. This is just one of those very fortunate periods when we get to point and laugh. They would do the same thing. And why shouldn’t they? It’s a rivalry. We’re not in it because we’re trying to get out of it. We’re in it because we’re both trying to do the same thing while standing right next to each other.
So I feel like I understand the nature of an eternal nemesis, and I try to use that understanding when focusing on Yankees-Red Sox. Because granted, I hate the Red Sox. And certainly, I hate the Yankees. I loathe the Yankees. I might hate the Yankees more than I hate the man who killed my dog when I was seven. In fact, I think that guy was wearing a Yankees hat.
“Ha, ha, ha,” he laughed, getting back into his very expensive car. “Why don’t you just buy a new dog; or hell, just offer all the best dogs in your neighborhood treats to lure them away from the owners who already love them.”
No, that absolutely didn’t happen. But I hate the Yankees anyway. And the Red Sox. So can I get into a series like this by being a fan of rivalries in general?
Nope. Despite it being “The Best Rivalry in Sports,” we fans of neither team truly don’t give a shit. We’re simply told to give all of our shits by the ESPN marketing team, who flash that montage of historic video clips before each series–Aaron Boone, Fours Days in October, Don Zimmer and Pedro Martinez. And the best I can muster is, “Hrrmm.” Then I change the channel and–hey, Wilfred is on! That show is excellent.
In fact, this “Best” claim merely breeds resentment. It isn’t the Best rivalry right now. Why should this regular season series be so captivating to me, when even the players aren’t really into it more than any other regular season series?
Now, the post season, maybe that’s when I can get into a series, regardless of the teams involved. But the truth is, I don’t see how there can be any magic left for the Yankees. No one, in the grand scheme of things, will ever be as good as them. Nobody. Barring a franchise-wide collapse over the course of several decades and some sort of explosive grandeur from some of their organization, the greatest franchise in history is already decided. If the Yankees want to keep winning, go for it. But don’t try to tell me they’re doing it because they’ve got something to prove. It’s because it’s their job and they’re expected to do it because they’re the Yankees.
In the same vein, the Sox don’t have the “scrappy underdog” thing going either. Two World Series wins in the last decade can do a lot to change you from a perpetual disappointment to a constant competitor. When their Story left, so did their Bill Simmonses and their Denis Learys and their long-suffering columnists, who got to write that majestic, romantic column the day before the Parade, and then, I don’t know, stood around and shrugged at each other. Why else would anyone want to be a baseball writer in Boston other than to write the column for the day after the Red Sox reversed the Curse? You are automatic history at that point. Yours is the column that is framed in living rooms across New England.
At this point, from a general baseball fan’s perspective, the Yankees and Red Sox aren’t proving anything other than they are the Yankees and Red Sox–they’ve got most of the money, a lot of the talent, and they’re going to be on top for as long as humanly possible. And the rest of us have to live with that, while being totally sick of it.
Truly, rivalries are at their best for brief windows at a time. They stretch and fade and they visit other cities, but a true rivalry bonds two bitter things together forever. But for everybody to care–like in 2004, when even I watched Yankees-Red Sox with raised eyebrows and clenched fists–it’s got to be a special time, not the middle of an August prior to which the Yankees and Red Sox have taken turns pounding the christ out of the American League all summer. Engrossing fans from all over comes from having a hole to climb out of, and both these teams are out of their holes (if the Yankees have ever been in one).
Then again, I don’t own the Red Sox. So Larry Lucchino can get as jazzed as he wants.