A friendly little rivalry | TGRFAN1's Blog

So it's June 26th of 2006, and I'm in "The Big Apple" on vacation with my family. Even though I am a huge Detroit Tiger Fan, I am also a fan of the game and it's history. I also knew on that day that Yankee Stadium was on the way out, and I had never seen a game in baseball's most historic stadium. So, the four of us attend that night's game. By the way, June 26th is my wife's birthday. My wife cares nothing about baseball, or any sport for that matter. She tolerates my interest, and I tag along with her to outlet malls. Taking my non-baseball loving wife to Yankee Stadium on HER birthday gained me immediate induction into the "Real Man Hall of Fame." As it turns out, June 26th is also Derek Jeter's birthday, but that made no difference to my wife whatsoever. Also as it turns out, that night was "Free Yankee Cap" night. (This will matter in a minute.)

Here is where I come clean: The reason that we went to the game on my wife's birthday is that it fell on a Monday, and the Broadway Theaters were all dark that night. I had promised to take her to a Broadway show, and I did the next evening. We saw "Wicked" My wife really related to that show! KIDDING!!

So after NYC, we move on to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, for a couple of days of R&R. So one afternoon I'm walking along the beach wearing my free Yankee cap. (Free, being the only reason that I would wear a Yankee cap.) As I'm on my bikini watch, a man taps me on the shoulder and says "wait a minute, he wants to tell you something." "He" was a young tot that couldn't have been any more than 3 years old. This young man says something completely unintelligible. His Dad (I assume it was his Dad, and not a hired Life Coach) tranlated for me. "He said: Red Sox Suck!!" I was rather stunned and didn't know what to say. It was rather shocking to hear this come out of the mouth of a 3 year old. I suppose that if the Tigers had a good rivalry going with another team, I wouldn't have thought a thing of what this little Yankee said, as crude comments here in The Motor City are very commonplace. Look at our Mayor, and you can see what I mean.

So this is the Red Sox - Yankee rivalry. They start indoctrinating their young as soon as sound can come out of their mouths! I would bet that that little guy got his first Yankee tattoo later that same day.