Today Was Not a Good Day

Of course it had to happen, but did it have to happen so soon? As all sports fans know, you win some, you lose some; the violently elating highs come with the agonizingly soul-depleting lows. Yankees fans have it a bit worse, though, as every unintentional walk, pop-up fly, and fumbled throw home accumulates into a jumbled chorus whose main overtone sounds suspiciously like coins rolling down the drain (or, rather, giant piles of gasoline-soaked dollar bills burning in an eternal, raging hellfire). Moreover, a large percentage of non-Yankees fans are actually Yankees haters. When Yankees fans watch their team tank, they do so knowing that thousands and thousands of their fellow-baseball-viewers are cheering their misfortune with unsportsmanlike glee.

This hatred is not unwarranted. That the Yankees are frequently called a corporate baseball Death Star makes perfect sense. This is all fine and great and funny when the team is winning, but what good is a nickname like "The Evil Empire" when, despite the enormous salaries and celebrity players and palatial stadiums, you repeatedly lose games to teams that you should be CRUSHING? Man, do the Yankees get me down, sometimes. Tonight, after they failed to beat the Orioles (a good looking team, I'll admit), I cursed C.C. Sabathia's billowing pajama pants and Johnny Damon's terrible arm and left the bar and walked around the puddle-soaked streets of Williamsburg with no destination and no desire to be anywhere or do anything. Okay, that's an exaggeration. What really happened is that Maddie and I were drunk and couldn't decide what we wanted to eat. Then, when we got home, I suddenly knew what I wanted to eat and that thing was Jell-O! But the corner store didn't have any and it was way too late to go to a proper supermarket and let me tell you, friends, I felt lower and angrier than I've felt in weeks.

I know that, traditionally, this blog has been a place of love and of love-hate and of the special kind of joy that accompanies pure hatred, but let's pause momentarily to acknowledge a dark truth: SOMETIMES BASEBALL MAKES LIFE FEEL SO MUCH WORSE.