The Yankees' 10-year World Series drought is angering Yankee fans
June 8, 2019 6:28 PM   Subscribe

The mighty New York Yankees have won one World Series since 2001, in 2009. The 21st century belongs to the Boston Red Sox The mighty New York Yankees have won 27 World Series championships. They have failed to add No. 28 since 2010, and those were the last years of the Jeter-Rivera-Pettitte-Posada-A-Rod days. Since then, the Yankees have rebuilt, and rebuilt under a Yankee farm system that produced Judge, Severino, etc., but they still have not reached No. 28. Yankee fans are waiting and are restless. Yankees expect to win the World Series every year. It's fact. Call To the Pen link
posted by YankeeKing6700 (58 comments total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
My default comment on this is that rooting for the Yankees is like rooting for small pox.

If I am being honest though, the things that made me resent the Yankees have either stopped being their MO (largest possible bid for every top tier free agent) or become more commonplace (huge payroll, expensive ballpark full of luxury boxes). And to be real, I like many of the current Yankees. Judge? Love him. Sir Didi? A wonder to behold. Torres, Severino, Betances? Top shelf all around.

Hating the Yankees isn't as much fun as it used to be.

Don't get me wrong: I still manage. But these days, it's mostly habit.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:38 PM on June 8, 2019 [27 favorites]


I'm a Cubs fan. If the Yankees ever win the World Series again it will be too soon.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 6:46 PM on June 8, 2019 [7 favorites]


The one thing I hope we can all agree is terrific about the Yankees is that they are not the Cardinals.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:50 PM on June 8, 2019 [18 favorites]


As a Royals fan back in the day...

Freddie Patek says Fuck The Yankees...
posted by Windopaene at 6:51 PM on June 8, 2019 [2 favorites]


Eh, Yankees suck.
posted by praemunire at 6:53 PM on June 8, 2019 [6 favorites]


The Yankees and the Cardinals should have faced off in the 2009, 2012 World Series.

LaRussa would have schooled Girardi.

The Yankees have 27 world titles, the Cardinals have 11 world titles.

The Yankees and Cardinals are class personified.
posted by YankeeKing6700 at 6:55 PM on June 8, 2019


I'm a Cubs fan. If the Yankees ever win the World Series again it will be too soon.

The Yankees have to win the World Series every year. That's a fact. It is on the players contract when they sign. Anything less than a championship is failure, it is the Steinbrenner/Jeter edict.
posted by YankeeKing6700 at 6:57 PM on June 8, 2019


Cardinals fandom is a cesspool of racist awfulness.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:59 PM on June 8, 2019 [12 favorites]


The Yankees and Cardinals are class personified.

o lol
posted by halation at 7:00 PM on June 8, 2019 [10 favorites]


Boston's championships in the NFL, MLB, and NHL over the last 20 years - which I picked as a nice round number for research and for no other reason - should irritate NY sports fans. Boston has 6 Super Bowls, 4 World Series, and 2 Stanley Cups (possibly a 3rd coming next week), versus NY with 1 Stanley Cup, 3 World Series, 2 Super Bowls, (neither city has had an NBA or MLS championship in that time). The Yankees did win the World Series in 1998, but that really doesn't change the anything. For whatever it's worth, the previously long-suffering fans in Boston have had a good long run of gloating to follow their long, long periods of horrible teams. If the Celtics can get good again (the Revolution are not saveable at this point), Boston fans, who are already insufferable, will be the absolute worst.
posted by jwest at 7:18 PM on June 8, 2019 [5 favorites]


Ah yes the classy Yankee fan
posted by Carillon at 7:35 PM on June 8, 2019 [1 favorite]


The late, great blogger Steve Gilliard used to write a lot of posts that ended with "Fuck the fucking Yankees" and I see no reason to doubt his wisdom.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 7:38 PM on June 8, 2019 [9 favorites]


The 23 other teams that haven't won a World Series in the past nine years are somehow able to contain their grief.
posted by theory at 7:38 PM on June 8, 2019 [27 favorites]


My family moved to Los Angeles in 1961, the year the Angels franchise was founded, so I was a natural life-long Angels fan. They won their only World Series in 2002, the same year I was dignosed with Congestive Heart Failure and laid off from a long-time job, so I was somewhat distracted from my team at the time. I exist in constant fear that I will drop dead if the Angels ever win it all again, but with their current standing 13 games behind the Houston Astros, it's not a deep-seated fear.
posted by oneswellfoop at 7:48 PM on June 8, 2019 [6 favorites]


Meanwhile, Mariners and Nationals fans just want their teams to stop sucking in the postseason.
posted by dw at 8:06 PM on June 8, 2019 [6 favorites]


This Mariners fan has less than zero sympathy for any drought the Yankees are currently suffering, ever have suffered, or ever will suffer.
posted by calamari kid at 8:07 PM on June 8, 2019 [8 favorites]


Meanwhile, Mariners and Nationals fans just want their teams to stop sucking in the postseason.

hi i'm an orioles fan and what is a "postseason" ???
posted by halation at 8:08 PM on June 8, 2019 [18 favorites]


Um hi. Pirates fan checking in here.
posted by octothorpe at 8:23 PM on June 8, 2019 [3 favorites]


As a Red Sox fan allow me to point and laugh.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:25 PM on June 8, 2019 [6 favorites]


hi i'm an orioles fan and what is a "postseason" ???

It's what the Orioles watch on TV in November.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:26 PM on June 8, 2019 [10 favorites]




I was a huge St. Louis Cardinals fan in the late 60's when they were winning World Series games and I was 16...but now I'm in Denver, a place without the money the Yankees have to hire the best players, so what's the point in spending hours following baseball? Going to a game is fun, sure, but, otherwise, sorry, I can't be bothered by following sports anymore.

And since Bob Gibson is not at the bat anymore, I don't like whatever they call that new rule about replacing the pitcher in the 9th position.

I am more interested in the latest article about Peter Schjeldahl and his new book.
posted by kozad at 8:34 PM on June 8, 2019 [2 favorites]


All this Twins fan has to say is Oh Waaaaaah poor Yankees waaaaaaaaah. We are so sick of getting beat by the Yankees every time we get to the postseason. I'd love to see them stay home and pout.
posted by Gray Duck at 8:43 PM on June 8, 2019 [4 favorites]


neither city has had an NBA or MLS championship in that time

Ahem (and it came against the Lakers, the one non-New York team Boston fans historically hate).
posted by adamg at 8:49 PM on June 8, 2019 [3 favorites]


jwest: Boston did in fact win an NBA championship in that timeframe. It was in 2008. And this, of course, strengthens your point.

[jwest] If the Celtics can get good again (the Revolution are not saveable at this point), Boston fans, who are already insufferable, will be the absolute worst.

I resent the implication that we are not already the worst. Seriously, what more do we have to do? Murder and pillage when we visit your cities to watch our teams beat yours? Who's worse than we are?
posted by tom_r at 8:55 PM on June 8, 2019 [10 favorites]


And on (non)preview, adamg beat me to it.
posted by tom_r at 8:57 PM on June 8, 2019


I resent the implication that we are not already the worst. Seriously, what more do we have to do?

you'd have to be philly fans
posted by halation at 8:58 PM on June 8, 2019 [9 favorites]


hi i'm an orioles fan and what is a "postseason" ???

it's those extra games after the season we kept playing during the middle part of this decade while the Yankees were sitting on the golf course or maybe crapping out in the wild card game.
posted by escabeche at 8:59 PM on June 8, 2019 [1 favorite]


No Red Sox fan can be laughing this year, lucky to get the wildcard at this point. I’m still waiting to find out what bizarre preseason regimen they had the pitchers on that caused all their arms to not work for a month.
posted by vogon_poet at 9:04 PM on June 8, 2019 [1 favorite]




adamg and tom_r - my bad. Boston is even worse than my research led me to believe. Thank you for pointing that out!
posted by jwest at 9:35 PM on June 8, 2019


Mod note: Attached the second link to text so it wouldn't bork up the mobile view
posted by Eyebrows McGee (staff) at 10:07 PM on June 8, 2019 [1 favorite]


I recently had a Boston fan telling me how great it was that they just win all the championships now. I said the meanest thing I could think of, “How’d it feel when you became the Yankees?” He just gasped.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:12 PM on June 8, 2019 [25 favorites]


As a life long Sox fan - all I can say is there will never ever be enough Red Sox victories to get over little brother syndrome. Also, damn I love Spaceman. And bench clearings today aren't anywhere near as vicious. (rightfully so... everyone realizes whats on the line - both everything and nothing).

Now, outside of that - I really do love long term sports rivalries for that very reason - they mean so much - bone deep - and yet ultimately, they matter for nothing and shed nothing. (Unlike say tribal warfare)

*on preview* Abehammerb Lincoln - that's easily the meanest thing you could say and hotly debated amongst old timey Boston fans as we look at the younger knuckleheads who don't know the "pain"
posted by drewbage1847 at 10:23 PM on June 8, 2019 [2 favorites]


Cardinals fandom is a cesspool of racist awfulness.

Yep, STL has serious racism problems. My dad and I fought long and hard against that in the local school system. I’ve spent years mentoring kids born on the wrong side of the opportunity gap into solid jobs and educational chances. Friends and family were helping out in Ferguson, and continue to try to improve the area one day at a time.

So, um, I don’t know, maybe don’t lump us all in like that? Bet you can turn over some horrible shit with any sports franchise in this fair nation.

Sincerely, Cards fan.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:39 PM on June 8, 2019 [3 favorites]


i love mefi sports threads. it's like a happy medium between the comments on espn and deadspin.
posted by wibari at 10:52 PM on June 8, 2019 [2 favorites]


The Cardinals' online fanbase has well-documented and recurring upwellings of truly noxious racism, to the point where it's notable, even above other fanbases. This awfulness is compounded by the oft-repeated truism that St. Louis has "the best fans in baseball!"

I was just referring to that. Certainly, they have some perfectly fine fans as well.

I went with a terse reference to that, sort of assuming this was old news to everyone here and didn't need additional qualification.

Maybe it was too inside baseball? (Pun intended.)
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:56 PM on June 8, 2019 [3 favorites]


No worries. I actually wasn’t aware of the online stuff. Sigh, one step forward, one step back. That damn town.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 11:06 PM on June 8, 2019 [2 favorites]


Yeah, Deadspin can catch you up, but essentially, racists calling themselves Cardinals fans have gone nuclear at Jason Heyward, Dexter Fowler (several times), and others. It's bad.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:26 PM on June 8, 2019


To be fair... while the Yankees are expected to win it every year - and in the 80s, 90s, and 00s before the curse was reversed - when they did... Red Sox fans pretty much knew that if our team was doing well in the first half of the year, that they'd blow it somehow in the back half. July, as a lifelong Sox fan - was pretty much the month when we would collectively facepalm and wonder how the Sox would blow a 12 game lead and finish the month 5 or 6 behind - playing catch up for the rest of the year.

And yeah, it was not lost on us how expensive our bench and bullpen were... It was not lost on us how our team could just dominate the early season, and just self destruct after that... If there is a team that even when they got to the playoffs they take almost every game to a full 7 series and manages to blow it at the absolute end - it is/was the Sox of my childhood. There are so many people that died of old age who never got the experience of not watching their team self destruct and lose it. every. damn. year.

And, for folks who right now are frustrated because the Sox are underperforming - when we are just at the beginning of June... who don't remember that the alternative was pretty much they'd perform through June and then crash through July ... it can get worse... The curse was quite real. All I can say is, that as a kid... there was a point where you had to learn to turn off the TV and instead listen to the radio - where the announcers would pepper in facts of prior games and stats that gave you hope.

Because failure is always an option for the Sox... Failure was the dominant story for nearly a century. It wasn't just poor playing that was the Red Sox brand of failure - it was the talented WTF moment just repeated until all turpitude was just eroded. And at some point, the Sox will go back to their failure mode and some other team will win again.

Beyond all other professional sports leauges in the Boston Area - the Sox drove this point home...
posted by Nanukthedog at 11:49 PM on June 8, 2019 [5 favorites]


Montreal Canadians fan here.

All empires crumble.
posted by srboisvert at 3:04 AM on June 9, 2019 [8 favorites]


Red Sox nation by birth.

All the feels, Yankee fans. All the feels.

Now bite me.
posted by spitbull at 3:42 AM on June 9, 2019 [2 favorites]


To be fair... while the Yankees are expected to win it every year - and in the 80s, 90s, and 00s before the curse was reversed - when they did... Red Sox fans pretty much knew that if our team was doing well in the first half of the year, that they'd blow it somehow in the back half. July, as a lifelong Sox fan - was pretty much the month when we would collectively facepalm and wonder how the Sox would blow a 12 game lead and finish the month 5 or 6 behind - playing catch up for the rest of the year.

And we were still their fans and kept the faith nonetheless.

That was my point ultimately - that we were not the fair-weather fans who get "restless" when we didn't win. We were their fans anyway.

Yankee fans complaining that it's been a whole ten years since their team won the World Series should try waiting another eighty-six years for a win, during which the whole time their Red Sox-loving friends repeatedly taunt them with chants of "Two-thousand-niiii-innne" (clap clap clapclapclap) much like my own Yankee-loving friends did with chants of "Nine-teen eight-teen" (clap clap clapclapclap) at the drop of a hat. Or going to a game at Fenway and listening to the ice cream vendors spontaneously switch to announcing that they're selling special "Yankees Suck!" ice cream sandwiches.

Red Sox fans stayed Red Sox fans in the face of that.

This isn't about the team. From the first link it sounds like the Yankees are now facing exactly the same kind of luck the Sox did for a century; they're a good team, they're playing solid, something just goes pear-shaped in the third act and they lose their chance. It's not about the talent of the players, it's simply about fate, it's totally beyond anyone's control, it's just baseball.

This is about the fans. There are Yankee fans who expect them to win every year and are threatened when they don't. Most Boston fans stayed fans even when they didn't win and their faith is now being rewarded.

Which is why, as a Red Sox fan, I am pointing and laughing.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:34 AM on June 9, 2019 [5 favorites]


Your favorite sportball team sucks. And so does mine.
posted by terrapin at 5:24 AM on June 9, 2019 [2 favorites]


Yankees Schmankees. Not only does Yankee fan expect it, he thinks it is HIS RIGHT to win a championship every season. Quashed expectations are one thing, but denying one his God-given rights, now that is another thing entirely.
posted by MorgansAmoebas at 6:31 AM on June 9, 2019


I think one of the reasons that I became a Premier League an a few years ago is that the Red Sox and Patriots have become just two more big money teams that can expect to win it all every year. My great grandfather immigrated to Boston from Ireland, and my grandfather and grandmother on my dad's side are both Boston natives. I came into my Boston fandom honestly, I was born into it. I never really had a choice. But it has got kind of boring the last 10 years.

That said, I'm in Boston at the end of the month for work and I have tickets for a game at Fenway.
posted by COD at 6:36 AM on June 9, 2019


neither city has had an NBA or MLS championship in that time

When Philadelphia soccer fans were agitating for MLS to expand to their city, they used to travel to Red Bulls games in New York and sing “We’ve won as many cups as you and we don’t have a team”
posted by nickmark at 6:38 AM on June 9, 2019 [1 favorite]


I had a poster of Yaz over my fucking crib in the South End.

Then my family moved to eastern Long Island.. where Yaz was from but Yankees fans ruled the roost.

Bite me so hard.
posted by spitbull at 6:51 AM on June 9, 2019


The Yankees have high expectations that other teams don't have: World Series parades. That's it. That's the goal.

The biggest factor in formulating the offer, Hal said, is that the Yankees, their fans, and their business partners expect to win the World Series, and Torre had not done so since 2000. Hank Steinbrenner explained that mandate, using the same kind of football analogies his father has used.
“The point is, the objective of the Yankees since the ’20s has been to win a championship every year, just like the objective of Lombardi with the Packers or Belichick with the Patriots,” Hank Steinbrenner said.
“Our goal is to win it every single year, even though we know, obviously, you can’t win it every single year. But nothing less than a championship is considered really acceptable.”

posted by YankeeKing6700 at 7:49 AM on June 9, 2019


Yeah, Deadspin can catch you up, but essentially, racists calling themselves Cardinals fans have gone nuclear at Jason Heyward, Dexter Fowler (several times), and others. It's bad.

Cardinals fans are very aggressive--like Yankee fans---the goal is to win. Yes, their racism is pretty bad, but just because those players are black does not mean they should get a pass for poor play like a white player would. They signed up for it, the people who watch want to be entertained, so criticism is well warranted.

They should just keep their racism out the door.
posted by YankeeKing6700 at 7:53 AM on June 9, 2019


lol did you open an account just to post these spicy takes
posted by mintcake! at 7:54 AM on June 9, 2019 [10 favorites]


Kozad said: but now I'm in Denver, a place without the money the Yankees have to hire the best players, so what's the point in spending hours following baseball? Going to a game is fun, sure, but, otherwise, sorry, I can't be bothered by following sports anymore.

I spent my happy childhood rooting for the Tigers (Kozad I guess we were rooting for opposite sides in 1968), but I am now geographically an Orioles fan, and I LOVE Camden Yards. My problem is that I raved to the janitor about last Saturday at the Park, when we got smashed by the Giants but the weather was so beautiful and my seat was so good and the food was so delicious..... And now every morning he talks to me about the draft pick or asks me who won last night, and I'm beginning to realize I'm going to have to study up on how bad we're losing....

I spent 10 long years on Long Island hating the Yankees and I'm not going to stop now.
posted by acrasis at 8:04 AM on June 9, 2019 [1 favorite]


The racist Cardinals fan thing is a lot more than criticizing play. When Dexter Fowler said--as neutrally and respectfully as he could--that the travel band would be hard on his family, the response was pretty disgusting.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:44 AM on June 9, 2019 [2 favorites]


Life long Yankees fan here. Special shoutout to my favorite player, of any and all sports, of all time, Thurman Munson. Fuck Reggie. Thurman was the real straw.

Anyway, the Yankees have had some lean years during my lifetime. But, what I always appreciated from George was that he was always going to try to win it all. He would laugh at the tanking. Trust the process? Yeah, the process allowed for free agency so we spend. The Yankees have done more for player salaries and player rights than any other franchise. He was a guy who before interleague play would demand the Yankees win the in-season charity exhibition game against the Metropolitans, the Mayor's Trophy Game. Now that putz deBlaz is a friggin Red Sox fan.

I still root for the Yankees. Hard. I actually tape every game and watch 162+ games a year. It is the culture of winning. Show me a good loser and I will show you a loser.

What other team has an old timers game every year and trots out Hall of Famers? Look at the YES announcers. Paul O'Neil, David Cone, Ken Singleton, now Boomer Wells. Two of them threw a perfect game.

Now I am not just a fan of winners. Heck I root for the New York Football Giants and the NY Knickerbockers. But the Yankees are special. What fan does not appreciate their owner wanting and trying to win every game every year?

And, like written up thread, these Baby Bombers are special. Good players and good guys. Step back, take a deep breath, namaste, and recognize that while your favorite team may suck, the Yankees don't.

Let's go Yankees!
posted by AugustWest at 12:09 PM on June 9, 2019 [1 favorite]


In response to a comment upthread about Boston's good century, they only have 1 Stanley Cup in the last 20 years, not 2.

That is all, and thank god for that(Go St Louis!).
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 7:04 PM on June 9, 2019 [1 favorite]


Have they started playing real baseball in the AL?

(checks...)

No?

Go Giants!
posted by chavenet at 3:01 AM on June 10, 2019


First: see you in 66 years.

Second, being from Boston, I'll often make comment about how the pats are the Yankees of football. It pisses of every fan from Boston and many New Yorkers and let's be honest, what's the point of rooting for a Boston team if you're not going to let your inner masshole fly?

Anyway, as was said before, I'll still find a way to hate the Yankees. I don't care if they end up in the bottom of the AL east for twenty years running, they still will not have finished their penance. I do feel a little for Yankees fans, in that it's hard to know what to do when your team stops behaving the way it's supposed to. Without the sox tanking midseason, without bad years to make up for the good, I feel conflicted. Can I still be a fan if we're hour the faux scrappy underdogs anymore? If we have to acknowledge that Boston actual spends to get a good team, just not as much as the Yankees, where does that leave us?
posted by Hactar at 6:25 AM on June 10, 2019


I enjoy the Yankees in their new role as speed bumps on the road to an Astros World Series ring.
posted by lefty lucky cat at 7:03 AM on June 10, 2019 [2 favorites]


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