by Dave Eisenberg

Created on: July 22, 2008   Last Updated: October 31, 2008

It was the bottom of the 11th inning of game seven in the 2003 ALCS. Knuckleballer, Tim Wakefield was on the mound for my beloved Boston Red Sox in a 5-5 ball game. Aaron Boone, a man few outside of New York had heard of before this night takes to the plate.
"WAY BACK, WAY BACK!" Gone. Into the upper deck of Left field.
Walk off homerun for that's right, Aaron Boone. Sitting in my living room with my father and brother alongside, our heads dipped into the palms of our hands as yet again the Evil Empire had stolen another one from the Red Sox. Though, I am through and through a Red Sox fan before any other team, this is not a tail of woe in the countless years of the Yankees beating out the Sox. So many can relate here, that is with the Yankees stealing wins from any baseball fans team. And if you want to know the truth of it all, Yankees fans everywhere, if I had a 207,108,489 dollar payroll, I'd win some championships to! (That is the exact payroll for the 2008 New York Yankees who currently sit in THIRD place in the AL East.)

I suppose the number one reason to hate the "expletive" Yankees would be that they're just so good, and really always have been. That is they have more championships (26 World Series wins and 39 AL pennants) than any other franchise and more numbers retired than any other franchise (16). It is hard to deny these numbers as a staggering accomplishment. Yet at the same time, from an outsider looking in, that genuinely is reason number one to hate the New York Yankees. Ruth, Mantle, Gehrig, DiMaggio, Jackson, Berra, Maris, Rizzuto, Jeter, Rodriguez, Rivera and need I continue? They have and have had some of the best Baseball players to ever pick up a glove or bat. Jealousy may be the primary drive behind any Yankee hater and I don't blame them. "YANKEES SUCK!" chants don't erupt in Fenway Park because the Yankees are a bad team, but because the hatred is so prevalent, so real, so relentless that a stadium full of people cannot help but express their hatred during a live televised event. The Yankees are almost always favored in a series, playoff or exhibition and that in itself draws hatred from fans. No fan likes to hear their team chosen against, and when every time your team is paired against the Yankees and you hear Joe Buck and the rest of the god awful broadcasters from Fox Sports choose the Yankees over your team it hurts. Plain and simply it hurts. Never has there been a more prestigious franchise in the history of sports, and of

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