“Why aren’t you wearing your [Aaron] Judge shirt,” was the first full sentence my husband uttered to me this morning before I had a chance to finish my morning coffee or compose any real thought other than a reminder that today is Thursday. It turns out today is not Thursday at all. Today is Opening Day and if you do not watch baseball (good for you) then that phrase means nothing. But for those who worship at the diamond, today marks the start of baseball season if you are a normal fan of baseball. Personally, I do not like the sport. However, I watch plenty of it—not because I live with a baseball fan, but because I live with something far, far worse. I live with a Yankees fan.
Living my whole life in New York, it was almost inevitable that I would end up spending the rest of my life with a Yankees fan, although I tried my best to avoid this fate. I worked my hardest to either date Mets fans or people who, like me, find baseball boring. Alas, I was fated to end up with my husband, who is your typical Yankees fan through and through.
If you’ve never interacted with a Yankees fan, consider yourself blessed and highly favored. There is no other fandom on earth as aggressive, as obnoxious, as full of assholes as the Yankees fandom. I know this not just because I live with one, but because I have been berated in public several times by strangers in Yankees attire for having incorrect Yankees opinions. Once, while sitting at a bar talking to a friend, a man sitting several stools away overheard me comment about Aaron Judge and, without letting me get my full thought out, he banged on the bar and screamed, “He’ll never be Derek Jeter!” The entire bar erupted into a discussion about Derek Jeter’s legacy and how there will never be another one of him. Meanwhile, the comment I was making in regards to Judge was just about his phenomenal ass and what workout routine I would have to do to reach such a bootylicious level.
In the weeks leading up to this year’s Opening Day, I would hear my husband muttering to himself that he missed baseball but I largely ignored those mutterings because we’ve been stuck in our apartment for a year, and ignoring each other is how we keep the mystery alive. But today, on Opening Day, he and the rest of the Yankees faction cannot be contained. As I started my workday I was assaulted by the sounds of the YES Network blaring from the television. After I had fully awoken my husband sat next to me, not to enjoy the sounds of my typing, but to mock one of my friends who is a Mets fan (the Mets’ first game of the season was postponed because players on the other team tested positive for covid). The mocking of Mets fans is an annual tradition in my household, which breaks my heart because my father was a Mets fan and the photo I have of him in my apartment darkens every time my husband talks shit about the Mets.
If you, like me, are trapped living with or related to a Yankees fan, I feel for you and I have absolutely no tips for you because the suffering is endless. The Yankees will continue to win (“27 rings,” someone screams in the distance) and because of this perpetual winning, the fandom only grows stronger and more unbearable. The only answer is patience. Like all things, baseball season has an end—although for a Yankees fan the season is extra-long because these pinstriped fuckers always have a few games in the post-season which is the worst part of the season because of the World Series heightening the emotions of fans all over the country.
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If you are a respectable human being—and by that I mean not an obnoxious Yankees fan—then I wish you a happy Opening Day, and may your team prevail against every opponent. Especially the Yankees.
This blog has been updated to reflect that the Mets game was delayed because of covid concerns and not a rain delay. You gotta believe Jezebel regrets this error.
