Daily Archives: October 28, 2008

But we’re going back again in a couple of weeks…

By Will Leitch

(Writer’s Note: I wrote this piece in October 2003, right after Aaron Boone hit his epic home run to briefly stave off the impending Red Sox juggernaut. Five years later, I’m a little embarrassed by it. It betrays a New York newbie’s naivete and dopey slack-jawedness about this strange new city in which he found himself. But I still thought about this story’s Jerry every time I went to Yankee Stadium, and, all told, I still think about him a little every time I ever go to a game anywhere.)

Thanks to the glory of blind Internet luck, I scored tickets to Game 6 of the American League Championship Series, for the blood feud between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox. My seats were in the right field bleachers, notoriously the most profane, obnoxious and uproarious section in Yankee Stadium, probably in all of baseball.

Manhattan interlopers like myself, and outsiders who only know what they see on HBO, have a distorted view of what the people of New York City are like. They see glammed up urbanites in high heels and Prada sunglasses, sipping martinis and staying out until 4 a.m. They see artists, they see writers, they see stockbrokers, they see the fast living, non-stop, run run run lifestyle, the one that embodies Manhattan, the one that makes everyone want to come here, and they think that’s what life is like in New York. And for a certain, tiny-but-endlessly-self-promotional section of the population, I suppose it is.

But the real New York can be found in right field of the Yankee Stadium bleachers.

(more…)

There is an empty building on Walton Avenue in the Bronx. Four families were living there just last week, but they’re gone now and no one is sure exactly where they went.

Some may be staying with relatives in Astoria and others might be with friends in Washington Heights. It’s said that a few are already on their way back to Mali in Western Africa.

One of the men stood on the sidewalk and cursed the building when the bank was closing in. His family and his brother’s family along with two others had put nearly 10 years into a down payment. They drove cabs and worked construction and delivered pizzas and on Saturday and Sunday mornings they waited along Third Avenue for a van to take them to work at a warehouse in Red Hook or a fruit farm Upstate.

They moved into their home four years ago and thought it was forever, but time ran out just like it has for so many other families. They left in the middle of the night and piled what they couldn’t carry – several boxes of books, four chairs, two tables, a lamp and an old mattress – at the curb.

Two boys from the neighborhood found a use for the mattress.

“You try to block the plate,” one of the boys yelled from up the street.

The other boy turned his hat backwards and crouched in front of the mattress. A collision was avoided when the catcher stepped aside and swiped a tag.

“Safe!” the runner shouted as he slid across the mattress.

“I tagged you,” the catcher shot.

No one was going to win this argument. And no family feels safe on Walton Avenue or anywhere else these days.

[Photo Via It’s a Long Season]

Game 5 of the Series may have been suspended, but news about the Yankees never sleeps. Here’s today’s line-up:

• Over at ESPN’s Page 2, writer Jeff Pearlman catches up with 1998 World Series MVP Scott Brosius, who is now a very contented baseball coach at his alma mater, Linfield College.
• New York Post blogger Tim Bontemps reports on Baseball America’s ranking of the top 20 prospects at each level/league of the minors, and where any future Mets and Yanks show up. Brett Gardner was the only local to crack the Triple-A level top 20, at number 19 in the International League.
• MLB.COM reports that the late Catfish Hunter was remembered at the annual Lou Gehrig Sports Award benefit in New York last night. Graig Nettles and Tommy John were in attendance to support the cause of ALS research. Chris Chambliss received an award, but was unable to attend due to an illness in the family.
• The NY Times has an article on a one-credit research seminar on the topic of Yankee Stadium, being offered at Rutgers University. Topics of research include the hero in American culture, the plusses and minuses of urban development, and the relationship between public finance and private enterprise.

til tomorrow …

Another Fine Mess for Bud Selig’s MLB.

Before the 2-2 game can continue the $64,000 question remains: