the Bronx is burning...again

Ah, it's fall, and the Yankees are no longer part of the playoff picture. All's right with the world.

I hate the New York Yankees. I don't hate them for the money grabbing players. If someone throws cash at you, you're stupid not to catch it. I don't hate them for the obnoxious Yankee fans. I live in Florida, surrounded by some of the most obnoxious fans alive...Florida Gator fans. Even surrounded by those idiots, I manage to pull for the Gators when they play Tennessee, or LSU, or Eastern North Jacksonville Country Day School. Still, I'm a Yankee hater. I don't hate them because they win, because frankly, they don't (as evidenced by...well...now). It's George Steinbrenner that makes me hate the Yankees. It's the fat kid in a candy store with a fatter checkbook mentality that irks me. I want a gum ball, and a jawbreaker and a chocolate bar and a lollipop and a lemon drop and that taffy, and the licorice and, hell, wrap up the whole store and give it to me cuz I want it all and I can buy it. Ya just want to smack him upside his head and tell him to stop it. I hate that 'buy a team' mentality. It's one of the things I think is very wrong with baseball. Conversely, I love it when that spoiled asswipe of a man fails.

I am also the bane of Yankee Fan's existence, because their retort is always, "You're just jealous, because he doesn't own the (insert your favorite team here)." The problem with that argument is that I don't have a favorite team. I pull for different teams in different situations. Come the post season, I pick who I'd like to see go all the way based on any number of factors, and I root for them. That team is never the Yankees. I don't love a team. I love the sport. George Steinbrenner is a cancer in the sport of baseball.

Now he's probably going to fire Joe Torre, the current Yankee manager, because they didn't get far enough in the post season. I say please...do it, George. Cut off your nose to spite your face. You don't deserve Joe Torre. That man has been nothing but class in what, without him, would be a class vacuum. Take one of the few redeeming qualities of your ball club and dump it. Go ahead. Shove him out the door. Let him go somewhere he'll be appreciated. Too bad Billy Martin isn't around anymore or maybe you could bring him in to kick around one more time. What an ultra-maroon.